journal of medieval history

Journal of Medieval History 33 (2007) 60e86www.elsevier.com/locate/jmedhist

What’s in a name? Clerical representations ofParisian beguines (1200-1328)

Tanya Stabler Miller

Department of History, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA

Abstract

This article examines how Parisian university clerics responded to the city’s communities of beguines(uncloistered religious women), highlighting in particular the ways in which clerics employed the term‘beguine’ in sermons and preaching material from thirteenth-century Paris. Because the beguines werenot hidden behind convent walls but were instead a visible presence in the city, they were often the focusof Parisian clerics’ ideas about religious women. Sermons preached, composed, and copied in Paris revealthe process by which Parisian medieval thinkers constructed, although not always consciously, a negativemeaning for the term ‘beguine.’ Always poorly defined, ‘beguine’ evoked a wide variety of meanings andassociations for clerical observers in medieval Paris. The varied ideas about and images of the beguineallowed the Parisian intellectual elite to include these women in discussions of their own position insociety as clerics in charge of the religious instruction of the laity. Clerics used the beguine as an exampleof the contemplative life, often comparing their own intellectual approaches to religious knowledge withthe beguines’ mystical knowledge. These positive comparisons, however, were joined by negative accu-sations when clerics expressed concern that the beguine thought too highly of her spiritual gifts.� 2007 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Keywords: Beguines; University of Paris; Sermons; Gender; Heresy

About 1200, groups of lay women in the southern Low Countries attracted the attention ofinfluential religious leaders and preachers such as James of Vitry (d. 1240) and Thomas ofCantimpre (d. 1270). Admiring their piety, obedience to church authority, and especially theirvisions and mystical experiences, these clerics wrote hagiographies and exempla praising

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61T.S. Miller / Journal of Medieval History 33 (2007) 60e86

women whom they identified as mulieres religiosae, and later as ‘beguines’. In a period whenecclesiastical leaders considered religious dissidence among the laity to be the Church’s great-est challenge, these clerics promoted beguines as ideal models of sanctity and obedience fora laity over which they were eager to gain control.1

A little over a century later in 1310, city officials in Paris sentenced a woman namedMarguerite Porete to burn at the stake at the Place de Greve for writing and circulatinga book that, according to the judgment of 21 theologians from the University of Paris, containeddoctrinal errors. The documents recording Marguerite Porete’s trial and execution describe heras a beguine who had relapsed into heresy for claiming that the soul can achieve a state ofannihilation that frees it from the need for virtues, as well as from the need for God’s conso-lations and gifts.2 Local chroniclers’ accounts of the trial and execution offered more generaldescriptions of Marguerite and her transgressions. The vernacular Grandes chroniques deFrance described Marguerite as a ‘beguine clergesse’ who had circulated errors regardingthe articles of the faith and sacrament of the altar.3 A later chronicler, John of Outremeuse(d. 1400), also claimed that Marguerite had spoken erroneously about the sacraments, addingthat she had translated the Scriptures.4

In 1311, at least six of the 21 Parisian theologians called upon to judge Marguerite’s bookparticipated in a church council in Vienne where ecclesiastical officials made several specificconnections between Marguerite’s ideas and deeds and the beguine status.5 These connectionswere expressed in two decrees, the second of which, Ad nostrum, accused beguines and

1 Andre Vauchez, ‘Proselytisme et action antiheretique en milieu feminin au XIIIe siecle: la Vie de Marie d’Oignies

(d. 1213) par Jacques de Vitry, in: Propagande et contre-propagande religieuses, ed. Jacques Marx (Brussels, 1987),

95-110; Jo Ann McNamara, ‘Rhetoric of orthodoxy. Clerical authority and female innovation in the struggle with her-

esy’, in: Maps of flesh and light. The experiences of medieval women mystics, ed. Ulrike Weithaus (New York, 1993),

9-27. A more recent work on the early beguines’ role in validating the church’s increasing emphasis on the sacraments is

Dyan Elliott, Proving woman. Female spirituality and inquisitorial culture in the later middle ages (Princeton, 2004),

especially chapter two.2 Paul Verdeyen edited the documents recording Marguerite Porete’s trial and condemnation, which are housed at the

Archives Nationales [AN] (J 428). See ‘Le proces d’inquisition contre Marguerite Porete et Guiard de Cressonart

(1309-1310)’, Revue d’histoire ecclesiastique, 81 (1986). At least four years before Marguerite’s trial, the bishop of

Cambrai, Guy of Colmieu, condemned Marguerite’s book as heretical. Because Marguerite continued to circulate a con-

demned book, the Parisian inquisitor judged that she had relapsed into heresy (Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’, 78). The ‘errors’

university clerics condemned were excerpts from her book, The mirror of simple souls. The documents recording Mar-

guerite’s trial name only two of these errors. The first was the statement: Quod anima adnichilata dat licentiam virtu-

tibus nec est amplus in earum servitude, quia non habet eas quoad usum sed virtutes obediunt ad nutum. (‘The

annihilated soul gives freedom to the virtues, is no longer in their bondage, because it has no need of them but the vir-

tues obey according to the will’). The second asserted: Quod talis anima non curat de consolationibus Dei nec de donis

eius, nec debet curare nec potest, quia tota intenta est circa Deum, et sic impediretur eius intentio circa Deum. (‘Such

a soul does not care for the consolations of God nor for his gifts, nor ought to care, nor can it care, because it is com-

pletely intent on God, and thus its intent upon God might be impeded’). AN J 428, 15a, quoted in Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’,

51. All translations are my own unless otherwise noted.3 [U]ne beguine clergesse qui estoit appellee Marguerite Poree qui avait trespassee et transcendee l’escripture devine et

les articles de la foy avoit erre, et du sacrement de l’autel avoit dit paroles contraires et prejudiciables. Et pour ce des maitres

expers en theologie avoit este condampnee. Les grandes chroniques de France, ed. Jules Viard (Paris, 1934), 8, 273.4 Margarite Porte, qui translatat la divine Escripture, en queile translation mult elle errat es artycles de la foid; et del

sacrament del alteit dest-elle pluseurs parolles prejudiciaus contre la Sainte Escripture, pat quen pluseurs maistres de

theologie mult expers le condempnont, et fut arses. Jean d’Outremeuse, Chronique, in Paul Fredericq, Corpus documen-

torum inquisitionis haereticae pravitatis neerlandicae (Ghent: The Hague, 1889-1906), 2, 64 n. 39. Jean d’Outremeuse,

was reliant on Les grandes chroniques de France.5 Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’, 54.

62 T.S. Miller / Journal of Medieval History 33 (2007) 60e86

beghards (the beguines’ male counterparts) in German lands of espousing antinomian beliefs.6

The first decree, Cum de quibusdam, targeted the beguine status specifically by prohibitingwomen from adopting the beguine life. As several scholars have noted, Ad nostrum focusedon doctrine, whereas Cum de quibusdam was more concerned with the beguines’ behaviour.7

Both decrees, however, are specifically connected to Marguerite Porete and her book. Severalof the eight doctrinal errors ascribed to beguines and beghards in Ad nostrum were clearly basedon statements extracted from The mirror of simple souls.8 Cum de quibusdam echoed chronicledescriptions of Marguerite Porete, claiming that beguines ‘as if insane, argue and preach on theTrinity and the divine essence and introduce beliefs that are contrary to the Catholic faith con-cerning the articles of faith and the sacraments of the Church’.9 Clearly, medieval clerics nolonger saw the beguines as pious promoters of orthodoxy and priestly authority; rather, theyviewed the beguine as a threat to clerical powers and a promulgator of erroneous belief.

Much has been written about why the beguines, who had served as useful examples of piety andobedience in late twelfth- and early thirteenth-century sermons and religious literature, had be-come examples of heresy and dissidence themselves less than a century later. Historians of medi-eval religious movements have argued that local authorities distrusted the beguines’ pursuit of anapostolic life, as well as their relationship with the mendicant orders.10 Several studies havepointed to official suspicion and even hostility directed towards ‘unenclosed’ beguines, that is, be-guines who did not live in an officially recognised beguine house (or beguinage), as a major factorin attacks on beguines.11 While it is certainly true that beguines were often targeted by anti-mendicant polemicists in treatises and sermons denouncing mendicant privileges, and it is well

6 Ad nostrum refers to beguines and beghards in German lands as ‘an abominable sect’ and ascribes to them eight

specific doctrinal errors. Ad nostrum . non sine discicentia grandi pervenit auditum, quod secta quaedam abominabilis

quorundam hominum malignorum, qui Beghardi, et quarundam infidelium mulierum, quae Beguinae vulgariter appe-

lantur, . tenens et asserens doctrina sua sacrilega et perversa. For the full Latin text and translation of these ‘errors’,

see Decrees of the ecumenical councils: vol. 1 Nicaea I e Lateran V, ed. Norman Tanner (Georgetown, 1990), 383-4.7 Robert Lerner, The heresy of the free spirit in the later middle ages (Berkeley, 1972), 81. On medieval canonists’

recognition of the distinctions between the two decrees, see Elizabeth Makowski, ‘A pernicious sort of woman’.

Quasi-religious women and canon lawyers in the later middle ages (Washington D.C., 2005), 25.8 Several scholars have discussed the relationship between Marguerite’s Mirror of simple souls and the Ad nostrum

decrees. See in particular Lerner, The heresy of the free spirit, 82-3.9 [Q]uasi perductae in mentis insaniam, de summa Trinitate ac divina essentia disputent et praedicent ac circa fidei

articulos et ecclesiastica sacramenta opiniones catholica fidei contrarias introducant’, Decrees of the ecumenical coun-cils, 374.

10 Herbert Grundmann, Religious movements in the middle ages, trans. S. Rowan (Notre Dame, IN., 1995); Lerner, The

heresy of the free spirit; and Jean-Claude Schmitt, Mort d’une heresie. L’eglise et les clercs face aux beguines et aux

beghards du Rhin superieur du XIVe au XVe siecle (Paris, 1978).11 Ernest McDonnell, whose study of beguines and beghards in the southern Low Countries continues to influence

scholarship on these women, suggested that Marguerite and other ‘wandering’ beguines were ‘receptive to heretical

ideas’ and that their actions brought ‘discredit upon the [beguine] movement’. McDonnell asserts that Marguerite

was probably ‘one of the free beguines . who had no permanent residence, lived by begging, were guilty of moral

laxity, hesitated to submit to ordained spiritual officials, and were receptive to heretical ideas’. McDonnell, then,

like several other scholars of the beguine movement, suggests that ‘unenclosed’ beguines were more likely to espouse

ideas deemed heretical and thus bring ‘good beguines’ (that is enclosed beguines) into disrepute. Ernest McDonnell,

Beguines and beghards in medieval culture (New Brunswick, NJ, 1954, repub. 1969), p. 367 and 490-92. Although

scholars do not know anything about Marguerite Porete apart from the scant information supplied by the records

from her trial (at which Marguerite maintained her silence) and her book (which reveals almost nothing about its au-

thor), it is assumed that Marguerite did not live in a beguinage. Yet, life in a beguinage would not necessarily prohibit

the writing of theological treatises.


known that secular and ecclesiastical authorities disapproved of female mendicancy and itinerancy,it is less clear from these studies why Marguerite Porete’s beliefs and actions were considered char-acteristic of beguines. Moreover, by presenting beguines as itinerant, indigent victims of anti-men-dicant sentiment, these studies assume that beguines generally did not engage in theological debate.

Scholarship on medieval women’s spirituality, on the other hand, generally regardsMarguerite’s death and the Vienne decrees as examples of women’s troubled relationshipwith the institutional Church. Yet in most studies on religious women, beguines feature d albeitprominently d in only the first part of a scholarly narrative that treats the fourteenth century asa time of relative openness to female religious authority. Such scholars analyse writings by andfor individual religious women and their confessors in an effort to determine how and why maleclerics, who encouraged and publicly promoted certain features of female spirituality, such asasceticism, frequent confession, devotion to the Eucharist, ecstatic states, and visions in orderto win back dissidents, attacked these features by the end of the fourteenth century.12 Whileacknowledging that some medieval clerics were not supporters of the beguines, scholarshipon medieval religious women views the beguines’ relationship with the clergy in thethirteenth and fourteenth centuries as mainly congenial: with only Marguerite Porete, who,significantly, lacked a male clerical protector, as a tragic exception to the rule.13

Although useful for our understanding of the complex relationship between religious women,their confessors, and clerical authority, such studies do not help to explain why medieval clericscondemned the beguines in 1311, nor do they sufficiently address the significance of the variousaccusations levelled against beguines in Cum de quibusdam. By identifying the fourteenth cen-tury as a propitious time for religious women, moreover, these studies gloss over the very seriousaccusations levelled against beguines before the Council of Vienne and overestimate the degreeto which clerical observers supported and sanctioned certain features of female religiosity.14

Since Parisian clerics condemned Marguerite Porete and subsequently participated in a church

12 There is a range of arguments about how and why female spirituality eventually came under attack. John Coakley

argues that the relationship between clerics and female penitents remained congenial until the fifteenth century, when

clerics began to feel threatened by the authority women could claim on the basis of their visions and mystical experience.

John Coakley, ‘Gender and the authority of the friars. The significance of holy women for thirteenth-century Franciscans

and Dominicans’, Church History, 60 (1991), 445-60 and ‘Friars as confidants of holy women’, in: Images of sainthood in

medieval Europe, ed. Renate Blumenfield-Kosinsky and Timea Szell (Cornell, 1991), 222-46. Jo Ann McNamara specif-

ically targets the Parisian theologian Jean Gerson (d. 1429) whose ‘top-down’ approach to controlling female spirituality,

she argues, irreparably damaged women’s claims to spiritual authority and even paved the way for the witch persecutions

in the early modern period. Jo Ann McNamara, ‘The rhetoric of orthodoxy’; Dyan Elliott makes similar suggestions

about Gerson in, ‘Seeing double. John Gerson, the discernment of spirits, and Joan of Arc’, American Historical Review,

107 (2002), 26-54. Elliott’s recent book, Proving woman, also implicates Gerson, arguing that Gerson’s treatises on spir-

itual discernment were informed by inquisitorial procedure, which was increasingly used to ‘prove’ whether a person was

a saint or a heretic, but eventually worked to collapse the two categories, working to ‘criminalise’ female spirituality.13 For example, Dyan Elliott explains Marguerite’s fate as caused by her ‘indifference to presenting herself in the con-

text of some recognizable confessional relationship’, Proving woman, 212. Caroline Bynum asserted Marguerite’s ex-

ceptionality with regard to her rejection of ‘the whole tradition of affective spirituality’, Holy feast and holy fast. The

religious significance of food to medieval women (Berkeley, 1987), 185-6. See also Amy Hollywood, The soul as virgin

wife. Mechtild of Magdeburg, Marguerite Porete, and Meister Eckhart (Notre Dame, IN, 1995), 50.14 Nancy Caciola, however, argues that religious laywomen were never universally revered by their communities or by

ecclesiastical observers. Caciola makes the important point that historians must look beyond hagiographical represen-

tations of medieval women, which were intended to prove their subject’s sanctity, to assess the extent to which com-

munities believed such women were divinely inspired. Nancy Caciola, Discerning spirits. Divine and demonicpossession in the middle ages (Ithaca, 2003).


council where they attributed Marguerite’s ideas and activities to all beguines, their thoughts aboutthe beguine status, as well as the local beguine community with which they had contact, merit scru-tiny.15 Indeed, an examination of sermons and preaching material produced by preachers andscholars based in Paris demonstrates that the beguine status aroused suspicion and criticismlong before Marguerite Porete was brought before the inquisition. Thus, this essay focuses onhow clerics living, teaching, or studying in Paris represented the beguines with whom they hadsignificant contact, and how they employed the term ‘beguine’ in sermons and preaching mate-rial.16 Such evidence reveals the process by which Parisian medieval theorists constructed, al-though not always consciously, a variety of interpretations of the term ‘beguine’. First appliedto exceptionally holy women in the thirteenth century, ‘beguine’ was a poorly defined and versatileterm. Over the course of the thirteenth century, the label ‘beguine’ called to the clerical minda wide range of ideas and qualities, both positive and negative, that preachers shaped and re-shapedin their sermons to Parisian beguines, fellow scholars, and other urban audiences.

Preachers made use of several different images of the beguine d mystic, ascetic, social critic,and outcast d in the sermons and exempla reflecting upon their experiences as universityscholars. Drawing upon, and thus reinforcing, negative imagery of the beguines, some clerics ex-pressed a desire to become like the beguine who remained steadfast in the face of criticism.Others expressed admiration for the beguines’ intense, solitary spiritual experiences, as wellas their active involvement in their communities, claiming that the beguines were closer toGod than the Parisian theologians who spent their time in study and disputation. Still othersexpressed concern that the beguines had interiorised these positive images of themselves, causingseveral to speculate that these women arrogantly thought of themselves as worthy alternativesclerical authority. The ‘beguine clergesse’ Marguerite Porete stepped into this context in 1310.17

15 Nicole Beriou has examined several of the sermons preached at the beguinage in Paris in her important article ‘La

predication au beguinage de Paris pendant l’annee liturgique 1272-1273’, Recherches augustiennes, 13 (1978), 105-229.

Beriou’s article, however, primarily concerns the sermons as a source and how closely they record a ‘preaching event’.

While Beriou draws attention to several general themes in the sermons, such as penance, she does not address the ways

in which these sermons express clerical understandings of beguines. This study, nevertheless, is indebted to her work on

Parisian sermon collections.16 Although I identify the clerics and sermons in this paper as ‘Parisian’, most of the clerics in this study were not

natives of Paris but rather spent a significant part of their careers as scholars and Masters in Paris. I describe the clerics

delivering these sermons as ‘preachers’ or ‘university clerics.’ All of the preachers mentioned in this article studied and

matriculated at the University of Paris. Most of the sermon evidence employed in this paper is drawn from sermon col-

lections bequeathed to the Sorbonne by the cleric Peter of Limoges (d. 1306), especially Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale

de France (BNF), Lat. 16481 and 16482. These collections contain sermons preached to a variety of Parisian audiences

during the 1272-1273 liturgical years. Another cleric, Raoul of Chateauroux, copied down the sermons as they were

preached. Nicole Beriou analyses these collection, and others, in detail in L’avenement des maıtres de la Parole. La

predication a Paris au XIIIe siecle (Paris, 1998).17 Because Marguerite Porete’s arrest, trial, and execution coincided with inquisitorial proceedings against the Templars,

and because William of Paris, the Dominican inquisitor who presided over both the Templars’ and Marguerite’s trials,

served as King Philip IV’s confessor, several scholars have suggested that political interests played a significant role in

determining Marguerite’s fate. Both Robert Lerner and Paul Verdeyen have argued that Marguerite’s trial was directly

related to the Templars’ trial. This connection is evident in the fact that the documents recording both trials were found

together in the papers of two royal ministers. While these factors may explain in part how the trial itself was conducted, as

well as William of Paris’ efforts to demonstrate the legality of the proceedings, they do not explain why Marguerite’s ideas

were thought to be characteristic of all beguines. See Robert Lerner, ‘An ‘‘Angel of Philadelphia’’ in the reign of Philip the

Fair: the case of Guiard de Cressonessart’, in: Order and innovation in the middle ages. Essays in honor of Joseph R.Strayer (Princeton, 1976), 343-64; Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’; and Edmund Colledge, et al., ‘Introductory interpretive essay’.


The mulieres religiosae and their hagiographers

The earliest references to the mulieres religiosae, who came to be known as beguines, are foundin the writings of James of Vitry, Thomas of Cantimpre, and other clerics involved in promotingthe new religious movements of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries.18 From these writ-ings, it is evident that the term ‘beguine’ initially denoted a laywoman committed to living a reli-gious life in the world.19 In the early thirteenth century, however, clerics, and many members of thelaity, did not agree about what constituted a ‘religious life’. James of Vitry and his circle of fellowpreachers and theologians were deeply involved in the Church’s efforts to win back laymen andwomen whom they felt had strayed into heterodoxy and religious dissidence.20 Their missionwas especially focused on the cities, where the revival of trade and an expanding economy, com-bined with a growing interest in the religious ideals promoted by the Gregorian Reform, resulted inoverwhelming lay involvement in various religious movements.21 These laymen and women,moved by a desire to reject what they viewed as the ill-gotten gains of the urban markets, soughtto adopt a life based on the vita apostolica. Many laymen, and some women, viewed preaching asthe primary ideal of the vita apostolica, an activity over which ecclesiastics claimed to possessa monopoly. Moreover, some of these lay preachers preached sermons highly critical of the insti-tutional church. In order to quell this lay criticism, several clerics sought to tap into the vita apos-tolica ideal by promoting urban religious women who were obedient to church authority, as well asengaged in other activities considered ‘apostolic’, such as manual labour, caring for the poor, andpraying for the dead.22 These urban women, like the mendicant orders, sought to live an active lifeof works combined with a contemplative life of prayer. This combination, which elicited bothpositive and negative responses from clerical observers, came to define the beguine movement.

18 On James of Vitry’s role in promoting the beguines, see Brenda Bolton, ‘Vitae matrum: A further aspect of the

Frauenfrage’, in: Medieval women, ed. Derek Baker (Oxford, 1978), 253-73 and ‘Mulieres Sanctae’, in: Women in me-

dieval society, ed. Susan Mosher Stuard (Philadelphia, 1976). See also Michel Lauwers ‘Entre beguinisme et mysti-

cisme. La vie de Marie d’Oignies (1213) de Jacques of Vitry ou la definition d’une saintete feminine’, Ons

geestelijk erf, 66 (1992), 46-70 and ‘Experience beguinal et recit hagiographique. A propos de la vita Marie Oigniacen-

sis de Jacques de Vitry (vers 1215)’, Journal des savants, 11 (1989), 61-103. On lay religious movements, see Herbert

Grundmann, Religious movements.19 For an excellent narrative on these first informal groups of beguines, and the gradual development of more formal

communities, called beguinages, see Walter Simons, Cities of ladies. Beguine communites in the medieval Low Coun-

tries, 1200-1565 (Philadelphia, 2001), especially chapter two. What we know about the early beguines comes from

eleven hagiographies composed between 1190 and 1250 and focused primarily on women living in cities in the southern

Low Countries: Marie d’Oignies (d. 1213), Odilia of Liege (d. 1220), Juetta of Huy (d. 1228), Christina Mirabilis

(d. 1228), Ida of Nivelles (d. 1231), Ida of Louvain (d. c. 1231), Margaret of Ypres (d. 1234), Lutgard of Tongeren

(d. 1246), Juliana of Mont-Cornillon (d. 1259), Beatrice of Nazareth (d. 1268) and Ida of Gorsleeuw (d. c.1262).20 On the relationship between religious dissidence and the project of developing new techniques and tools for

university-trained preachers, as well clerical efforts to define preaching as the exclusive prerogative of trained clerics,

see Philippe Buc, ‘Vox clamantis in deserto? Pierre le Chantre et la predication la€ıque’ Revue Mabillon, 65 (1993),

5-47; Michel Lauwers, ‘Praedicatio e Exhortatio. L’eglise, la reforme, et les la€ıcs (XIe et XIIe siecles)’ in: La Paroledu predicateur, V-XVe siecles (Nice, 1997), 187-232; and Nicole Beriou, L’avenement, especially chapter one. On James

of Vitry’s understanding of the properly-trained preacher’s importance to society, see Jessalynn Bird, ‘The religious’s role

in a post-Fourth Lateran world: James of Vitry’s Sermones ad Status and Historia Occidentalis’, in: Medieval monasticpreaching, ed. Carolyn Muessig (Brill, 1998), 209-30. On Peter the Chanter and his contemporaries in Paris, see John

W. Baldwin, Masters, princes, and merchants. The social views of Peter the Chanter and his circle (Princeton, 1970).21 Grundmann, Religious movements and Lester K. Little, Religious poverty and the profit economy in medieval Europe

(Ithaca, 1978).22 Andre Vauchez, ‘Proselytisme et action antiheretique’; Michel Lauwers, ‘Entre beguinisme et mysticisme’.


In his Vita Mariae Oigniacensis, James of Vitry told the story of Mary of Oignies, a womanfrom the diocese of Liege who, stricken with guilt over her merchant parents’ wealth, opted tolive a life of manual labour and extreme poverty.23 As a woman who voluntarily chose to livea life of prayer, charitable works, and asceticism, but who did not enter a monastic institution,Mary, though never called a beguine in her vita, is regarded as the first, or prototypical,beguine.24 Over time, the circle of women who gathered around Mary in Oignies came to bereferred to as beguines, as were the growing communities of mulieres religiosae in the LowCountries, northern France, and Germany.25

Presented as a model of sanctity and obedience to the church, James’ vita of Mary of Oigniesmet with extraordinary success; several of James’ contemporaries composed vitae of themulieres religiosae in their own communities.26 As Michel Lauwers has suggested, however,James’ vita conveys a certain ambiguity regarding the roles of action and contemplation inMary’s life. According to the first part of the vita, Mary expressed her religiosity by caringfor lepers, spinning wool, and giving alms, activities that subsequent hagiographers depictedas typical of the praiseworthy beguines in their own locales.27 Later in the vita, however,Mary no longer engages in manual labour, rather, she focuses her attentions on Christ alone,devoting herself solely to a life of contemplation.28 As a contemplative, Mary was blessedwith visions and revelations. In the vita, though James of Vitry praised the virtues of manuallabour and charitable works, he considered religious contemplation, manifested in ecstaticstates and visionary experiences, superior to manual labour.29 While many clerics consideredwork, when performed voluntarily by women, as a particularly meritorious form of penance,

23 James of Vitry, Vita B. Mariae Oigniacensis, AA SS, June 5, 547-72. Trans. M. King, The Life of Marie d’Oignies

(Ontario, 1993).24 See Lauwers, ‘Entre beguinisme et mysticisme’ and ‘Experience beguinal et recit hagiographique’; Joanna Ziegler,

‘Reality as imitation. The dynamics of imagery among the beguines’, in: Maps of flesh and light. New perspectives on

the religious experience of late medieval women, ed. Ulrike Wiethaus (Syracuse, 1993), 118-19; Simons, Cities of ladies,

36-47. James never called Mary a ‘beguine’, though he alludes to the ‘new names’ wicked men used to slander the

mulieres religiosae. See The Life of Marie d’Oignies, trans. M. King, 38. James does not explicitely mention any of

these ‘new names’ in his vita of Mary. In his ‘Sermon to virgins’, however, James lists ‘beguine’ as one of the dispar-

aging terms applied to the groups of religious laywomen in Liege and elsewhere. James of Vitry, Sermo II ad virgins, ed.

J. Greven, ‘Der Ursprung des Beginenwesens’, Historisches Jahrbuch, 35 (1914), 43-9, cited in Simons, Cities of La-

dies. On the negative connotations of the term ‘beguine’, see below.25 In his supplement to James of Vitry’s Life of Marie d’Oignies, Thomas of Cantimpre reports that James wished to

buried among the ‘flocks of beguines’ (inter oues beghinarum) in Oignies, Thomas of Cantimpre, Vita Mariae Oignia-censis. Supplementum, ed. Arnold Raysse in: AA.SS, June, vol. 5, 580. We know that these women lived a beguine life in

common until the early fourteenth century when their community was dissolved. See Edouard Poncelet, Chartes du

prieure d’Oignies de l’Ordre de Saint-Augustin (Namur, 1913), lxii-lxiii.26 For a discussion of the manuscript tradition, and the various other contemporary works in which Mary is mentioned,

including the exempla collections of Caesarius of Heisterbach, Stephen of Bourbon, Thomas of Cantimpre and Arnold

of Liege, as well as Vincent of Beauvais’ Speculum historiale, see Lauwers, ‘Entre beguinisme et mysticisme’, 46-47

and Experience beguinale et recit hagiographique’, 83. On the ‘beguine’ hagiographies, their authors, and the often very

different purposes for which these vitae were written, see Brenda Bolton, ‘Vitae matrum’ and ‘Mulieres sanctae’ and

Simons, Cities of ladies, 36-39.27 Lauwers, ‘Entre beguinisme et mysticisme’, 50. For James of Vitry and Thomas of Cantimpre, manual labour was

an important element of beguine life. Hugh of Floreffe’s, vita of Juette of Huy (AA. SS. January, 2, 145-69), Gossuin of

Bossuet’s Ida of Nivelles (published in Quinque predentes virgins, ed. C. Henriquez (Antwerp, 1630)) and an anony-

mous canon’s vita of Juliana of Cornillon (AA. SS April 1, 442-75) portray the women’s manual labour as penitential.28 James of Vitry, The Life of Marie d’Oignies, trans. M. King. 70.29 Lauwers, ‘Entre beguinisme et mysticisme’, 50.


they viewed the contemplative life as more praiseworthy and suitable for religious women.30

Indeed, the tensions between the active and contemplative aspects of beguine spirituality revealclerical discomfort with the beguines’ unenclosed lifestyle. Some hagiographers portrayed theirfemale subjects as abandoning the active life of manual labour for contemplation, which usuallyentailed giving up the unenclosed beguine life for a more acceptable, and less visible, monasticlife of enclosure.31 In the vitae of women like Mary of Oignies and other beguines who did notenter monasteries, however, these tensions remained unresolved.32

Many of the 10 other beguine vitae have much in common with that composed by James: thewomen take on vows of poverty and chastity, devote themselves to caring for the sick and thepoor, and practice extreme forms of asceticism.33 Significantly, most of the women experiencevisions and periods of ecstasy, and some even possess the gift of distinguishing consecratedfrom un-consecrated hosts. The vitae further complicate the beguines’ image by depictingthem as humble, pious outcasts, frequently ridiculed by wicked sceptics.34 Yet, at the sametime, the vitae portray the beguine as a powerful and influential figure. Because of her spiritualgifts, the beguine possessed the authority to act as a wise counsellor to good priests and otherclerics, and a severe critic of sinful ecclesiastics.35

The similarities among the beguine vitae attest to the influence of James’ account of Mary’slife, as does the frequency with which northern French and Flemish clerics employed Mary’svita in sermons and preaching material.36 In the first half of the thirteenth century, clericsmade use of Mary’s vita in sermon literature intended for the edification of the laity. Thus,by the middle of the thirteenth century, sermons and preaching material exposed medievalclerics and the laity to the various, and in some ways inconsistent, characteristics James hadportrayed as typical of Mary and therefore other beguines. Over time, the expectations and con-tradictions expressed in James’ vita of Mary of Oignies came to be associated with a distinctive

30 On clerical tendencies to regard women’s voluntary manual labor as penitential, see Sharon Farmer, Surviving pov-

erty in medieval Paris. Gender, ideology, and the daily lives of the poor (Ithaca, 2002), 117-30.31 Hollywood, The soul as virgin wife, 40.32 Michel Lauwers discusses these tensions in depth, arguing that James of Vitry and the other authors of the beguine

vitae stressed chastity and devotion to the sacraments in order to demonstrate the women’s orthodoxy and obedience to

clerical authority, despite their lack of enclosure. See Lauwers, ‘Entre beguinisme et mysticisme’and ‘Experience

beguinale et recit hagiographique’.33 For a good summary of the themes common to the beguine vitae, see Walter Simons, Cities of ladies, chapter 3.

Caroline Bynum discusses the ascetic practices and paramystical experiences of the beguines along with other religious

laywomen in Holy feast and holy fast. The 10 other beguine vitae are: the canon Hugh of Floreffe’s vita of Juette of Huy,

Vita Ivetta Reclusa Huyi, AA.SS January, 1 vol. 1, 863-867; Gossuin of Bossuet’s vita Ida of Nivelles, in: Quinque pre-

dentes virgins, 199-257; the anonymous canon of St. Martin’s of Liege’s vita of Juliana of Cornillon, AA.SS, April, 1,

442-75. Thomas of Cantimpre, a Dominican greatly impressed and influenced by the work of James of Vitry wrote sev-

eral vitae. In 1231, Thomas wrote a supplement to James’ vita of Mary of Oignies: Supplementum vitae Mariae Oignia-

censis in AA.SS, June 5:572. Thomas also wrote vitae for Christina Mirabilis, Margaret of Ypres, and Lutgard of

Aywieres: Vita Christinae Mirabilis in AA.SS. 5:637-60; Vita Margarethe de Ypris ed. G.G. Meersseman in: ‘Les freres

precheurs et le mouvement devot au Flandre au XIIIe siecle’, Archivum fratrum praedicatorum, 18 (1948), 69-130; VitaLutgardis in AA.SS June 5, 187-210. The authors of the vitae of Alice of Schaerbeck and Ida of Leeuw are anonymous:

Vita Alicae in AA.SS June 2, 471-77, Ida of Leeuw in AA.SS October 13, 100-35.34 James of Vitry and Thomas of Cantimpre frequently mention the derision with which the beguines were regarded,

James’ sermon to virgins, in which he uses the term ‘beguine’, reveals that the term was used as an insult, see note 24

above.35 Much has been written about the authority beguines were able to claim on the basis of their spiritual gifts. See

especially Bynum, Holy feast and holy fast and Bolton, ‘Vitae matrum’.36 See note 26 above.


term. In Mary’s vita as well as in the hagiographies, exempla collections, and sermons inspiredby this text, the beguine was not a nun, although she lived like one, voluntarily living a life ofpoverty and chastity. The beguine served her community by caring for the poor and engaging ina variety of charitable activities, yet she also longed to live as a religious contemplative, con-sumed by her love for Christ. The beguine endured harsh criticism and ridicule from the wickedand the ignorant, yet her intimacy with Christ empowered her to criticise bad clerics and to in-struct her fellow Christians. Clearly, these early thirteenth-century representations of beguinesresulted in a very complex picture.

Beguine communities in Paris

Contemporary understandings of the beguine status were further affected by the establish-ment of official, locally or, in the case of Paris, royally sponsored houses for beguines d calledbeguinages. Although the papacy never recognised the beguines as an official religious order,by the middle of the thirteenth century ecclesiastical and secular officials sought to institution-alise a way of life that was at its beginning informal and spontaneous. Although a number ofwomen continued to adopt the beguine life privately in their own homes, other urban womenmet their spiritual ambitions by joining a beguinage. In 1264, the saintly French king LouisIX established a beguinage for ‘honest women who are called beguines’.37 Records of an in-vestigation into the conduct of beguines in the beguinage in Ghent report that King Louis’ greatadmiration for the beguine life inspired him to establish a similar beguinage in Paris.38

By the mid-thirteenth century, then, Parisian preachers were confronted with a significantand highly visible population of real beguines to whom they were obliged to preach and admin-ister the sacraments. Clerics studying and teaching in thirteenth-century Paris had ample oppor-tunities to interact with beguines. Fiscal records from the period reveal that beguines settlednear the mendicant houses in Paris’ university quarter.39 Parisian preachers discussed thesegroups of independent beguines and frequently preached to the women residing within thecity’s beguinage. Several sermon collections from the late thirteenth century demonstrate theregularity with which Parisian clerics preached at the royal beguinage, indicating that universitymasters took a keen interest in the city’s beguine communities.40

The establishment of beguinages in northern European cities like Paris complicated clericalunderstandings of what it meant to be a beguine. A woman who wished to live as a beguinecould now join a beguinage and submit herself to its rules, thus appearing to be part of an of-ficial order. To clerical observers, religious laywomen who did not enter the city’s beguinage,whether by choice or because of prohibitive circumstances, seemed less committed to their

37 Domum insuper Paris, honestarum mulierum, quae vocantur Beguinae, de suo adquisivit, et eisdem assignavit, in

qua religiose et honeste conversantur circiter quadringentae. Geoffrey de Beaulieu, Vita Ludovici Noni, in: Recueil

des historiens des Gaules et de la France, 20 (1840), 11-12.38 Jean Bethune, Cartulaire du beguinage de Sainte-Elisabeth a Gand (Bruges, 1883), 73-6, no. 106.39 Sharon Farmer, ‘Down and out and female in thirteenth-century Paris’, American historical review, 103 (1998),

366-67.40 Nicole Beriou’s extensive research on two related thirteenth-century sermon collections (BNF Lat. 16481 and

16482) shows that of the 243 sermons preached to an identified audience, far more were preached at the beguinage

(54) than at any other place of worship. The Cistercian convent of Saint-Antoine came in second with 33, and 30

were preached at the parish church of Saint Gervais. Beriou, ‘La predication au beguinage’. On the relationship between

these two collections, see Beriou, L’Avenement, especially chapter four.


vows than their ‘enclosed’ counterparts. Ecclesiastical officials frequently expressed concernabout women who lived as beguines outside of the beguinage. The bishop of Liege, for exam-ple, stated that only beguines residing in the beguinage would benefit from ecclesiastical pro-tection and privileges. Women residing outside of the beguinage, ‘although they call themselvesbeguines and dwell among women in the manner of beguines, attired like them in a modesthabit’ they would not receive the same recognition.41

Parisian clerics often preached to the beguines about the importance of remaining within thebeguinage, warning that leaving the institution constituted an abandonment of their vows, andthat, in order to be considered ‘religious,’ one had to remain enclosed.42 Moreover, thebeguine’s vow of chastity, which signified her adoption of the beguine life, was voluntary.Whether the beguine undertook her vow upon entry into the beguinage or while living in herown home, she could abandon this vow at any time. Preachers commented on the informal na-ture of the Parisian beguines’ vows, expressing scepticism that women could remain committedto the beguine life for more than one or two years.43 Finally, unlike nuns, beguines who lived inthe Paris beguinage were permitted to leave regularly in order to work or visit family orfriends.44 Thus, by the mid-thirteenth century, clerics concerned about defining and categoris-ing medieval society could not determine when and if a woman identifying herself as a beguineadopted or abandoned her vows.45 As a result, although secular and ecclesiastical officialshoped that beguinages would separate the beguines from the laity, the separation was never sat-isfactorily clear to clerical observers.46 The beguines looked and dressed in a common habit,like regular nuns, but they lived and worked in the city like the laity.47 As late as 1274, clericalobservers still complained that they were unable to categorise the beguine status. In his letter toPope Gregory IX, the theologian Gilbert of Tournai famously stated: ‘There are among uswomen whom we do not know what to call, religious or lay, because they live neither in theworld nor removed from it’.48

41 L.J.M. Philippen, De begijnhoven, oorsprong, geschiedenis, inrichting (Antwerp, 1918), 304 quoted in McDonnell,

Beguines and beghards in medieval culture, 127.42 Nicole Beriou, ‘La predication au beguinage’, 181.43 BNF Lat. 16482, fol. 245 ra, ed. Beriou, ‘La predication au beguinage’. In a sermon preached at the beguinage in

1273, an anonymous Franciscan preacher noted: Non sis per unum annum vel duos in tuo bono proposito, et postea facis

pactum cum alio a Christo, vel per malas cogitationes et locutiones cum viris suspectis.44 Royal accounts and property records demonstrate close relations and frequent interaction between residents of the

beguinage and outsiders. The statutes drawn up in 1327 in response to the series of investigations into the beguines’

orthodoxy still allowed beguines to leave the beguinage to conduct business and visit friends. The Paris beguinage’s

statutes are housed in the Archives Nationales (AN JJ 73, fol. 52v, no. 71) and were edited by Leon Le Grand, ‘Les

beguines de Paris’, Memoires de la societe de l’istoire de Paris et de l’le-de-France, 20 (1893), 354-7. Other northern

European beguinages permitted similar traffic in and out of the beguinage. See Walter Simons, Cities of ladies, chapter

three.45 The Paris beguinage did not impose penalties on women who left the community. If a beguine was in good standing

at the time of her departure, she did not incur any loss of property. If she had purchased a house in the beguinage and

wished to sell this house to another beguine, she was required to hand over one-third of the selling price to the com-

munity. See Le Grand, ‘Le beguinage de Paris’, article 19.46 On the impetus behind the creation of a beguinage, see Walter Simons, ‘The beguine movement in the southern Low

Countries, a reassessment’, Bulletin van het Belgisch historisch instituut te Rome/Bulletin de l’Institut Historique Belgede Rome, 59 (1989), 84-92.

47 Sermons preached at the beguinage, as well as the community statutes, refer to the beguines’ habit.48 Et apud nos mulieres aliae, de quibus nescimus, utrum debeamus eas vel saeculares vel moniales appelare, partim

enim utuntur ritu saeculari, partim etiam regulari. Gilbert of Tournai, Collectio de Scandalis Ecclesiae, ed. Autbertus

Stroick in: ‘Collectio de Scandalis Ecclesiae. Nova editio.’ Archivium Franciscanum Historicum, 24 (1931), 58.


Despite this apparent confusion as to where the beguines stood in relation to the regular and sec-ular sectors of society, preachers were aware that the commitment to the beguine life signifieda claim to lead a religious, even saintly, life. This claim, however, was often regarded with mistrust.Sermons preached to and about beguines in thirteenth-century Paris reveal that some clerics be-lieved that an opportunistic woman could conceal her impious ways beneath her beguine habitand behind the beguinage’s walls. The beguine identity, therefore, invited close scrutiny and highexpectations about outward behaviour. These expectations, however, were almost impossible to sat-isfy, since the beguine status, at least to clerical observers, was unclear, unofficial, and ill-defined.

In a sermon he preached at the Paris beguinage in 1272, the secular canon Ranulph ofHoublonniere expressed his suspicion that the beguine life could serve as a cover for irreligiousbehaviour. After declaring that the beguinage ought to be a garden of God, Ranulph claimed thatamong the beautiful roses and violets, there were thistles, thorny roses, and ill-smelling violets.49

These undesirables in God’s garden represented the bad beguines who he warned would even-tually discredit the entire group: the beguine who seems humble but lashes out when chastised,the beguine who seems chaste and pure, but who secretly burns with lust, and the seemingly wisebeguine who refuses to be instructed.50 Although Ranulph preached this sermon to the womenresiding in the Paris beguinage, he employed ideas about beguines that not only reflected, butalso, as part of a sermon collection, contributed to a discourse that presented these women asoutwardly praiseworthy but inwardly arrogant and immoral. Significantly, Ranulph’s sermonpresented three ‘types’ of bad beguines posing as their good counterparts. The roles these badbeguines assumed corresponded to the models of holiness presented in the beguine hagiogra-phies and exempla. In these texts, James of Vitry and his fellow hagiographers depicted their be-guine subjects as humble, chaste, and wise. The bad beguines were expert imitators of thesecharacteristics; underneath the pious exterior they were proud, lustful, and foolish. By claimingthat the beguinage offered the thistles a cover for their evil ways, Ranulph’s sermon suggestedthat the beguine life offered bad women opportunities to conceal their wickedness.

Ranulph’s contemporary, the Dominican preacher Giles of Orleans, also expressed thesuspicion that there were bad women in the beguinage, warning that the beguines d becausealready suspect d should hold themselves to a higher standard than other religious women,namely nuns. Giles’ sermon at the beguinage in 1272 warned ‘corrupt beguines’ against leadingpeople into error and especially against bringing scandal to the entire beguinage.51 Giles opens

49 BNF Lat. 16481, fol. 157ra-159rb, ed. Nicole Beriou, La predication de Ranulphe de la Houblonniere (Paris, 1987)

vol. 2, 106-7. De aliis conqueritur Dominus quia in eorum iardino non est flos nec fructus, sed loco dictorum florum

bonorum, sunt ibi urtice mordentes, ‘cuisenz’ d urtica enim cuisit d, viole fetentes, et rose pungentes.50 BNF Lat. 16481, fol. 157ra-159rb, ed. Beriou, La predication, 107. Urtice pungentes: videbitis unam personam ut

unam beginam, que videtur exterius ita humilis per habitum, et si dicatur sibi unam verbum modicum, quod sibi dis-

pliceat, statim accipiet urticam, id est unam verbum ‘cuisant’, et proicit in faciem dicentis. Viole fetentes: videbitis

unam beginam que extra per habitum ostendet quod sit ita sancta, pura et bona puella vel casta, attamen intra erit viola

fetens, quia intra tota ardet luxuria et mala voluntate peccandi, d pro malis loquor. Tertio rose pungentes: videbitis

unam beginam que apparet ita sapiens quod videtur quod qui eam bene verberaret, umquam plus quam ovis se revin-

dicaret. Sed faciatis ei aliquid quod sibi displiceat, statim mordebit et punget fortiter. Sicut faciatis ei aliquid quod sibi

displiceat, statim mordebit et punget fortiter. Sicut ovis quando mordet d sic morsura de begina est morsura ‘de

berbiz’.51 BNF Lat. 16482, fol. 167 va-167 vb, ed. Beriou, ‘La predication au beguinage’, 182. Contra pravas beginas et alias

quecumque sint, sive in religione sive extra, que habent habitus provocantes homines ad peccatum, et contra illas que

excultant homines, unde scandalizant alias probas mulieres et totum beginagium, quia statim dicunt qui talia semel

vident ‘O, tales sunt begine’. Ue illi per quem scandalum venit! (Mat. 18:7).


his sermon with a story about a certain noblewoman who had expressed astonishment whenshe heard him praise the beguine life, citing the beguines’ terrible reputation. The Dominicantells his audience that he defended the beguine life by explaining to the noblewoman that sheshould not wish to cut down a tree on account of a few bad pieces of fruit. He further pointedout that among Christ’s apostles there was Judas, and even monasteries were not free fromvice.52 Responding to Giles’ defence of the beguinage, the noblewoman claimed that noone was surprised when a monk or nun behaved badly. She further explained to Giles thatshe had several daughters but was unable to marry them according to their station. Ratherthan marry them off to cobblers, the noblewoman opted to place them in a convent.53

This decision, she admitted, was not made out of piety, nor according to her daughters’ re-ligious aspirations, but out of a desire to protect their status. Thus, the woman explained,when a nun behaved badly, no one is surprised since nuns were not motivated by religiouszeal.54 On the other hand, she continued, a woman enters a beguinage out of her ownfree will. Therefore, the noblewoman argued, if a beguine behaved badly, she should bestoned.55

The decision to live as a beguine, then, was a voluntary assumption of a religious identityloaded with expectations, both positive and negative. Although James of Vitry warned thatone should ‘admire rather than imitate’ Mary, the vita portrays this saintly woman proneto visions and ecstatic states as the ‘model’ beguine.56 Thus, the claim to live as a beguineprobably seemed d to some d a desire for sainthood and many expected the aspirant to fail.Dyan Elliott has recently pointed out that, beginning in the thirteenth century, the develop-ment of new methods for establishing the veracity of individual (especially women’s) claimsto sanctity introduced an impossibly high standard of proof that subjected religious women toincreasingly intense scrutiny.57 Doubts about whether beguines’ lived up to the model are

52 BNF Lat. 16482, fol. 167 va-167 vb, De hoc dixit michi unum mirabile verbum quedam domina nobilis, quando ei

predicabam quod esset begina. ‘Hoc non facerem, nec sic nec sic, quia faciunt sic et sic’. Et ego ei ‘Domina, vidistis

vos umquam tam bonum pirum in vita vestra quin aliqua pira haberet verminosa? Non. Modo, dicatis michi, si illud

pirum habeat duo vel tria pira verminosa, scinditurne propter hoc pirum? Constat quod non. Plus, non est nec fuit um-

quam in terra tam bona societas multorum in qua non esset aliquis malus. Etiam in societate Christi fuit unus vermi-

nosus, scilicet Iudas. Non tamen propter hoc bona religio est reprobanda. Non enim tam bonus monachus vel monacha,

nec ita bene clausus quin bene cadat aliqua vice. Part of this sermon has been edited by Beriou, ‘La predication au

beguinage’, 182.53 BNF Lat. 16482, fol. 167 vb, Et ipsa respondit michi mirabiliter. ‘Non est mirum si una monacha vel nona cadat in

peccatum et vadat ad malum pudorem’. Sancta Maria, dixi ego, quid dicitis vos? Et illa, ‘Domine, ostendo vobis quid

dicere volo. Ego habeo quatuor vel quinque filias. Non potero maritare eas secundum quod status meus et earum re-

quirit, sed oportebit me eas maritarem ad sutores (chavetiers), si volo eas maritare.54 BNF Lat. 16482, fol. 167 vb, Et cogitans quod hoc esset michi pudor secundum mundum, licet non secundum

Deum, pono eas in religione ita quod nec Deus, nec mater sua, nec sancti eius invocabuntur ad introitum. Sed

dabo abbatie centum libras vel ducentas, ita quod nec puer habet Deum pre oculis, nec ego, nec abbatissa, nec

priorissa. Nec Deus est ibi invocatus, nec est ad introitum. Quid igitur mirum si malus sit eventus ex quo malus

est introitus?55 BNF Lat. 16482, fol. 167 va-167 vb, Sed quando una begina vadit ad beginnagium, vadit ibi de propria voluntate, et

ideo, ex quo de sua propria voluntate vadit inter alias sanctas et probas mulieres, deberet lapidari et ‘flatir’ quando facit

rem inhonestam et facit magnum scandalam.56 James states in the prologue that his readers should admire Mary, not expect to imitate her. The Life of Marie

d’Oignies, trans. M. King.57 Elliott, Proving woman.


evident in Ranulph’s complaints about arrogant, lustful, and foolish beguines. A woman’schoice to live as a beguine could be perceived as meritorious, since it reflected a genuinedesire on the part of the beguine to live a pious life. On the other hand, it could representan effort to hide misbehaviour behind the guise of holiness. After all, since the beguine’svows were impermanent, how could anyone determine if and when she abandoned hervocation?

This uncertainty was expressed by Ranulph of Houblonniere in a sermon preached toa congregation gathered in the chapel of the Hotel-Dieu in Paris on the perils of living a piouslife in the midst of the world’s temptations. Referring to the religio of the beguines, Ranulphobserved that people deviate from the path of righteousness because they have become con-fused or misled by the multiple and mutable paths available in his day.58 Significantly,Ranulph considered the beguine status a useful analogy when discussing the difficulty he be-lieved people experienced determining the right path from the wrong, warning that what peo-ple perceive as the signs of paradise are sometimes the signs of hell.59 Since no one wasreally certain how to characterise the beguines, Ranulph perceived them as symbolic ofthe difficulties Christians faced in distinguishing the road to heaven from the road to eternaldamnation.

Parisian sermons reveal a general conception of the beguine as one who easily slips fromgood into bad without detection. Although this idea may be explained as typical clerical mi-sogyny, Parisian sermon collections do not record clerics preaching to, or discussing, othergroups of women in the same way. After the Paris beguinage, most of the sermons in late thir-teenth-century collections were recorded at the Cistercian abbey of Saint-Antoine.60 In herstudy on Parisian sermon collections, Nicole Beriou has observed that the sermons preachedto the nuns at Saint-Antoine focused on enclosure, obedience, detachment from families andworldly cares, and peaceful relations among the nuns.61 Sermons directed to audiences of lay-women warn against vanity, idle, or malicious gossip, and especially against lust andseduction.62

The Dominican Humbert of Romans’ Liber de eruditione praedicatorum, which includedoutlines of sermons for over 100 different potential audiences, reflects clerical understandingsof the beguine as saint or sinner.63 While Humbert’s sermons to Cistercian, Benedictine,Franciscan, and Dominican nuns focus on enclosure and obedience, his sermon to beguinesdiffers both in style and content. In the section Ad Beguinas, Humbert juxtaposes a list ofvillainesses from the Bible with a list of heroines, setting up a dichotomy of good and

58 BNF lat. 16481, 18rb-19ra ed. Beriou, La Predication, 31. Hoc uidetis hodie: quilibet facit uiam suam, unus per

religionem beginarum etc., ita quod tot sunt hodie habitus quod nescit homo in quo statu sit etc.59 BNF lat. 16481, 18rb-19ra, ed. Beriou, La Predication, 31. Signa mutata. Sicut latrones mutant in nemoribus, sic

hodie quia insignia paradisi quandoque sunt insignia inferni in hoc mundo et e contra.60 See note 39 above.61 Beriou, L’Avenement, 324. In his examination of conciliar legislation and sermon material, Jean Longere

comes to similar conclusions, see ‘La femme dans la theologie pastorale’, Cahiers de Fanjeaux, 23 (1988),

127-52.62 Beriou, L’Avenement, 300-4. On differences between sermons directed to wealthy women from those directed to

poor women, see also Sharon Farmer, Surviving poverty, 107-113.63 Humbert’s Book on the art of preaching was a handbook intended to guide Dominicans in the composition of ef-

fective sermons. It was probably inspired by James of Vitry’s ad status collection. See Edward T. Brett, Humbert ofRomans. His life and views of thirteenth-century society (Toronto, 1984), 151-66.


bad women.64 Although Humbert’s sermon material directed to nuns contains negative com-mentary, his sermon to beguines suggests that the beguine was either irredeemably wicked orperfectly virtuous.65

Beguines and clerics: allies or rivals?

James of Vitry and his circle, as well as a later generation of Parisian beguine supporters,however, acknowledged and even valued such scepticism of the beguine life. Keenly aware oftheir responsibilities towards and authority over Christian society, some Parisian preachersembraced the image of the beguine as social outcast in order to demonstrate their own desireto humble themselves. In such sermons and exempla, these clerics expressed their approval ofthe beguine status by way of comparison with their own way of life as university scholars. Ina sermon he preached to the beguinage in 1270, the secular cleric Robert of Sorbon com-pared the Paris beguinage to a field in which the treasure of the kingdom of heaven was care-fully hidden. This treasure, Robert claimed, was so well-hidden within the beguinage that theuniversity masters full of reason were unaware of its existence.66 The masters’ desire forpraise and social recognition, Robert explained, prevented them from recognising the valuein the beguinage. Indeed, the masters preferred to be regarded as honourable men orprud’hommes, rather than associate themselves with the lowly, socially reviled beguine.67 Un-til the masters lowered themselves and desired to be despised as the beguines, Robert warned,

64 Ad beguinas: Notandum quod sicut legitur in Biblia, multae fuerunt olim mulieres quae non reliquerunt materiam

laudis post seo sed potius viru perij ex diversis vitiiso ut Eva inobediens, et ideo maledicta a Domino; Gen. 3. Item

uxor Loth curiosa, et ideo mutata fuit in statuam salis, Gen. 19. Item Dina filia Iacob discurrens corrupta fuit, Gen. 34.

Item uxor Purifatis vaga oculis, et ideo capta est amore Ioseph, qui erat pulcher facie, et decorus aspectu, coniectis in

eum oculis. Gen. 38. Item Maria soror Moysi rixosa: et ideo percussa est lepra. Num 12. Pythonissa quae se faciebat

divinam 1. reg. 28 quam consulit Saul et ideo mortuus est in bello et tegnum eius est dissipatum 1. Paralip d. Item

Iezebal malitiosa, quae Prophetas Domini persecute est: et Naboth ut vir suus haberet vineam eius fecit interfici, et

ideo sanguinem eius canes biberunt, qui essusus, effuses est in eodem loco 3. Rer. 18 et 21 et 4. Reg. 9 sicut prae-

dixerat Helias. Similiter Herodias cum filia sua saltatrice, quae propter correctionem quam faciebat Ioannes, fecerunt

ei caput amputari. Marci. 6. Aliae vero laudis materiam fuerunt laudis materiam post se relinquentes, ut Sara, Re-

becca, Lia Rachel, Ruth, Anna uxor Elchaniae, et mulier quae fecit coenaculum Helisaeum in quo ministraret ei: Iu-

dith, Hester, Maria Virgo, Anna prophestissa: Maria Magdalena, et aliae mulieres quae sequebantur Dominum, et

Dorcas quae erat operibus bonis plena, et eleemesynas faciens: et aliae multae. Et nota in quibus omnes ist fuerunt

laudabiles porro in diebus nostris, sicut sun aliquae per Dei gratiam bonae imitatrices bonarum, quae a timore Domini

conceperunt spiritum salutarem. Humbert of Romans, De eruditione religiosorum praedicatorum, in: Maxima biblio-

theca veterum partrum et antiquorum scriptorum ecclesiasticorum, ed. Marguerin de la Bigne (Lyon, 1677), Book II,

chapter 54.65 Although Humbert closes the sermon by noting that the beguines imitate the ‘good’ women he has named, the ser-

mon clearly fits with stereotypical portrayals of beguines as either ‘bad’ or ‘good’: [B]onae imitratrices bonarum.fe-

lices beguinae, et omni laude dignissimae, quae timore divino repletae hoc faciuns’ Humbert of Romans, De eruditionereligiosorum praedicatorum, Book II, chapter 54.

66 BNF Lat. 16507, ed. Nicole Beriou, ‘Robert de Sorbon. Le prud’homme et le beguin’, Academie des inscriptions et

belles-lettres (1994), Appendix 1, 490. De primo, quis est iste campus, dico quod beginnagium. . Et iste thesaurus in

predicto argo in tantum est absconditus quod pauci aut nulli possunt ibi illud inuenire, etiam magni magistri, immo

dicunt: ‘Fi, de beguinagio’.67 BNF Lat. 16507, ed. Nicole Beriou, ‘Robert de Sorbon, Le Prud’homme et le beguin’, Academie des inscrip-

tions et belles-lettres (1994), Appendix 1, 490, Dicunt enim: ‘Bene uolo esse probus homo, sed nequaquam

beguinus’.


they would never be able to find, nor to acquire, the treasure of heaven.68 Significantly,Ranulph of Houblonniere’s assertion that the beguinage served to obscure the true natureof its inhabitants was a theme in sermons by preachers more positively disposed towardsthe beguines.

Robert’s sermon expresses the notion that the contempt with which some observers regardedthe beguines was a positive, indeed essential, aspect of the beguine life. Moreover, it was anaspect he advocated for university clerics, who Robert believed were too concerned withstudying, debating, and advancing their careers.69 Caroline Bynum has argued that clerics, trou-bled by their authoritative positions in medieval society, often used female imagery to expresstheir own desire to withdraw from the world and its pressures, or as a way to criticise them-selves and other clerics.70 Robert of Sorbon’s suggestion that the lowly beguine should serveas a model for Parisian clerics seems to fit this pattern of ‘symbolic reversal’ described byBynum.71 The beguine life, which Robert characterised as lowly and generally despised, servedas a useful contrast to the clerics’ life, which was supposed to be exalted and universallyrespected.

In his sermon, Robert compares the beguines’ knowledge of and intimacy with God with theParisian clerics’ ignorance and distance. In his work on the relationship between Dominicanconfessors and religious laywomen, John Coakley has shown that some clerics perceived majordifferences between women’s religious experiences and their own. Because of their ‘otherness’,these confessors thought such women were favoured with a more intimate relationship withGod than they themselves could experience.72 These confessors, Coakley argues, were both fas-cinated by and envious of their female penitents, since these women brought to mind theclerics’ own perceived limitations. Coakley suggests that this relationship between female mys-tics and male clerics was initially based on the notion that the women’s mystical experiencesand the clerics’ religious authority served complementary goals, namely to fight heresy andstrengthen the resolve of wavering Christians. Over time, however, the belief that women’smystical knowledge differed and even surpassed the learning of the clergy eventually resultedin suspicion and, in some cases, suppression.73

While we have no record of spiritual friendships among individual Parisian beguines andscholars, sermons preached at the beguinage, as well as other writings composed for beguines,reveal a clear set of expectations regarding the beguines’ spiritual experiences. Some Parisianpreachers encouraged, indeed expected, the beguines to prepare themselves for the reception ofdivine visions. Emphasising penance, some preachers urged the Parisian beguines to

68 BNF Lat. 16507, ed. Nicole Beriou, ‘Robert de Sorbon’, Appendix 1, 490. Et que est causa quare isti magni magistri

et sapientes mundani hoc non possunt cognoscere nec istum thesaurum in beguinagio invenire? . inter omnes ordines

seu religions plus despicitur beguinagium vel uilipenditur; nunc autem sic est quod homo sanctae uite siue probus homo

est honorandus non despiciendus, etiam eius religio est honoranda, et quia illi et ille qui sunt in beguinagio. . Et tamen,

ut iam prius dictum est, plus ceteris uilipenduntur, et ideo sunt ibi quasi contraria simul, scilicet esse probum hominem

et esse despectum.69 Asrik L. Gabriel, The Paris Studium: Robert of Sorbonne and his legacy, selected studies (Notre Dame, IN, 1992).70 See in particular Caroline Bynum, ‘Women’s stories, women’s symbols. A critique of Victor Turner’s theory of limi-

nality’ and ‘‘‘.And Woman His Humanity’’. Female imagery in the religious writing of the later middle ages’, in:

Fragmentation and redemption. Essays on gender and the human body in medieval religion (New York, 1992).71 Bynum, ‘Women’s stories, women’s symbols’, 35-37.72 Coakley, ‘Friars as confidants of holy women’, 225.73 Coakley dates the souring of this confessor/penitent relationship in the later middle ages, ‘Friars as confidants of

holy women’.


contemplate the sufferings of Christ in an effort to achieve unification with God.74 One sermon,preached in 1272 by an unidentified Franciscan, directed the beguines to pray in solitude beforea crucifix or an image of the Blessed Virgin Mary, promising that this exercise would result in amystical encounter with God.75 La regle des fins amans, a devotional text likely written bya cleric connected with the Paris beguinage, described the process by which the beguinesachieved mystical union with God. The beguine’s spiritual progress began with praying atthe appropriate times and occasions. Secondly, the beguine was instructed to pray for theChurch, for sinners, and the dead. In the third stage, the beguine was to contemplate her sinfulstate and Christ’s glorified humanity. In the fourth stage of prayer, the Regle promised that thebeguine would reach the point of rapture and her bodily senses would disappear.76 In addition todescribing the beguines’ spiritual exercises, the Regle includes a list by which one may recog-nise the ‘order of perfect lovers’.77 This list, which draws on the themes and language of courtlyliterature, describes the beguine as one who, among other qualities, ‘keep(s) the command-ments of her lover’, ‘go(es) often and willingly to her lover’, and ‘receive(s) devotedly thejewels her lover sends, which are poverty, suffering, maladies, and tribulations’.78 Similarly,the final page of a sermon collection compiled during the 1270s and, by 1306, stored in thelibrary of the college of the Sorbonne, contains a list, in French, of characteristics attributedto beguines. This list of qualities, entitled ‘Les XXXII proprietes de beguinage’, portrays thebeguines expressing their love for Christ with ‘praying mouths, weeping eyes and desiring

74 Beriou, ‘La predication’, sermons 15, 35, and 50. On the role of meditative practices in facilitating visionary expe-

riences, see J. Hamburger, The visual and the visionary. Art and female spirituality in late medieval Germany (New York,

1998) and Barbara Newman, ‘What did it mean to say ‘‘I saw’’? The clash between theory and practice in medieval

visionary culture’, Speculum, 80 (2005) 1-43.75 BNF Lat 16482, fol. 54-55, ed. Beriou, ‘La predication’. [G]ratia Dei te visitat et in te descendit dum sic devote te

applicas in oratione et contemplatione in loco solitario cum Deo. In tali enim loco solent amici invicem sibi revelare

secreta sua.. [Q]uando vadis iuxta unum altare, vel ante ymaginem crucifixi vel beate Virginis, vel, si ad ecclesiam

ire non potes, iuxta lectum tuum, flectis genibus et ad terram totus prostatus vel prostrata.76 En orison a iiij choses: Premiere on doit prier chou que on doit, c’est a dire ses matines, ses eures et ce qu’on a de

penance en commandement. Apres on doit prier pour toute sainte eglise et pour les pecheours que diex les convertisse,

et pour les mors qui merci atendent que diex leur aliege leur tormens et haste leur gloire. Apres on doit prier pour ses

especiaus. Apres on doit penser a son estat, comment on devroit vivre pour morir, et c’est meditacions. Quant ame

a ensi regarde son estat, lors doit ele requerre le en orisons pour avoir paradis par les couvens. . En pensant et mirant

icele humanite vestue de gloire, cele divinite joint a nature humainne, j. deu vrai homme en iij persones, le pere, le fil,

le saint esperit, j seul dieu en trinite: quant ame est fichie ensi en tele meditacion, nus des sens corpereus n’i ouvre

de son office, et ce apele on ravisement, ‘La regle des fins amans’, ed. Karl Christ in: Philologische Studien aus

dem romanische-germanischen Kulturkreise: Festgabe Karl Voretzsch, ed. B. Schadel and W. Mulertt (Halle,

1927), 201.77 Li ordres des fins amans est beginaiges. Par xii signes connoist on les fin amans. ‘Le regle des fins amans’,

193.78 Li premiers est de hair ce que ses amis het: c’est pechies. Li secons est garder les commandemens son ami. Li tiers

est regehir et descouvrir souvent son cuer a son ami. Li quars est amer loiaument.Li quins est penser souvent et enten-

tivement a son ami. Li vj. Est oir volentiers la parole de son ami. Li vij. Est demander soingnesement noveles de son

ami. Li viij. Est aler souvent et volentiers ou liu ou ses amis est. Li ix. Est envoier souvent joiaux et biaux dons a son

ami. Li x. est recevoir devotement les joiaux que ses amis envoie, qui sont povretes, mesaises, maladies et tribulations.

Li xj. Est avoir dolour del damaige son ami. Li xij. Est estre apareillies de faire de cuer et de cors et d’avoir quanque ses

amis veut et commande. Cist xij. Signe sont tous jours en vraie amor et en fins amans, ‘Le regle des fins amans’, 194. On

the use of courtly language in mystical texts, see Barbara Newman, ‘La mystique courtoise. Thirteenth-century beguines

and the art of love’ in: From virile woman to womanchrist. Studies in medieval religion and literature (Philadelphia,

1995), 137-167.


hearts’. With ‘cherubic understanding and seraphic insight’ the beguines ‘die by living, live bydying, fast by feasting, feast by fasting’.79

Learned clerics thought that beguines were especially capable of divine union and oftencompared their own acquired knowledge with the beguines’ mystical knowledge. The samesermon collection that includes ‘The 32 properties of the beguinage’ also contains extendednotes, in Latin, praising the beguine life. These notes seem to have been intended for preachersin the composition of their own sermons and include exempla admonishing preachers whocriticise beguines, as well as several illuminating anecdotes on the beguine life. One particu-larly detailed exemplum describes an encounter between a Parisian master and a weepingbeguine. The master asks the beguine to explain to him the cause of her weeping. Thebeguine tells the master that the cause of her tears, which outweighs the sorrow she feelsfor her own and others’ sins and the plight of the poor, is the absence of her spouse, that is,Christ.80

Persisting in his questioning, the Parisian master asks the beguine to explain to him whatshe knows about the one for whom she weeps. In response, the beguine admits that she knowsonly that Jesus suffered, died, and was resurrected for all of humankind. At this, the masterwonders how it is that, though he knows more about God than the beguine, he is not affectedin the same manner as the beguine, namely with this gift of tears.81 Comparing love (affectus)with knowledge (intellectus), the Parisian master, citing the Book of Job, laments that he has‘fed the barren’, that is knowledge, but has ‘done no good to the widow’, meaning love.82

The master proceeds to ask the beguine to teach him how to experience the affective love bywhich the beguine is so consumed. Employing the tools of the medieval preacher, the beguineinstructs the master by relaying to him an exemplum. This exemplum compares the master’spursuit of knowledge and deeper meaning in sacred Scripture to a tigress gazing at her reflec-tion in a mirror. In the beguine’s exemplum, hunters plot to steal the tigress’ young, butnaturally fear their ferocious mother. To avoid encountering the tigress, the hunters place a mir-ror in her path in order to distract her. Believing her own reflection to be her offspring, thetigress gazes upon the mirror, thus delaying in the path and allowing the hunters to escape with

79 BNF lat. 15972, f. 177v. Vechii les XXXII proprietes de beguinage. Bouche orant, eul plorant, ceur desirant, petit

aler, bas regarder, en haut penser, droite entencion, douche pacience, ceur croissant, entendement cherubinal, sentement

ceraphinal, aler en seant, parler en taisant, plourer en riant, estre fort en enfleivant, riche en apovriant, sage en taisant,

pensees coulees, paroles enmelees, euvres ordenees, foi enlumineem esperance eslevee, amour embrasee, angelique en-

tendement, courtoisie espirituel, devins sentemens, dormir en vellant, vellier en dormant, morir en vivant, vivre en mor-

ant, juner en maignant, maignier en junant. The use of paradoxes in this text led Leon le Grand to believe that ‘The 32

properties of the beguinage’ was intended as a satire of the beguine life. Leon le Grand, ‘Les beguines de Paris’, 309-10.

Paradoxes were a feature of mystical writing, however. See Michael Sells, Mystical languages of unsaying (Chicago,

1994).80 BNF lat. 15972, fol. 175v. Notam exemplum de quaedam benigna fleute . quaesivit quidam magnum magistrem

qui dui fuerat parisius causam fletuum . respondens et dicens in trias causas fletus in hac valle miseriae, scilicet, pec-

cata propria, peccata aliena, oppressio pauperum . illo quaerente causam specialem sui fletus cum admiratione. Re-

spondit quod flebat pro dilatione patrie et absenciam sui sponsi.81 BNF lat. 15972, fol. 175v. [Q]uaesivit ‘et quid cognoscis tu et scis de illo pro quo tam ploras’? Respondit ipsa

parum scio de illo nisi quod passus pro nobis mortus et resurrexit . et cogitavit ille in corde suo quod multa plura

sciebat de deo quam ipsa, nec tam afficiebatur ad ipsum ut diligebat . dixit ‘ego dui studui ut multa scirem de

deo, scilicet, ypostases unitatem essencio et trinitem partiter, et ydeas etc, parum autem ad senciendum de ipsum

laboravi’.82 BNF lat. 15972, fol. 175v. Job: pavi sterilem et quae non parit, scilicet, intellectum qui non meretur et viduae non

bene feci, scilicet, affectui.


her young.83 The beguine explains the meaning of her exemplum, saying: ‘because you seemany mirrors in sacred Scripture, upon which you gaze, your love (affectum) is impeded’.84

It is the beguine’s lack of text-based knowledge, then, that allows her to surpass the cleric inexperiential knowledge of God. This experiential knowledge is perceived as more direct, andtherefore less fallible, than the knowledge the cleric obtains from books.85

This exemplum expresses a consciousness of the different types of knowledge in which thebeguine and the cleric excel. The beguines’ knowledge, she admits and the master knows, issimpler in terms of its content, but more direct and experiential than the master’s scholarly,text-based knowledge. The encounter clearly demonstrates the master’s admiration and envyof the beguine’s experiential knowledge, while maintaining the master’s superiority in the realmof text-based knowledge. The master knows that he knows more about theology, but he does notfeel rewarded, nor does he feel that he has been looking in the right places. Thus, he seeks tolearn from the beguine.86

Presenting the beguine mystic as the theologian’s superior might have served as an effectiveway to encourage male clerics to focus more on prayer and contemplation than on study anddisputations. Yet, this exemplum suggests a rivalry between the learned master and the beguine.As women, beguines were supposed to remain under the control of their confessors; however,as holy women, through their spiritual gifts, they were able to connect with God on a level thatthe learned cleric did not conceive as possible for himself. Significantly, the association ofbeguines with mystical experiences, a common theme in the beguine vitae, became part of a dis-course comparing beguines to learned theologians.

Comparisons between the beguine and the Parisian master appeared in several thirteenth-century sermons and exempla. In a sermon he preached to the nuns at Saint Antoine in1272, Giles of Orleans related a story about a well-spoken beguine. Giles declared that thisbeguine’s explanation of the value of listening to the word of God could not have been betterif it had been articulated by ‘the best cleric in Paris’.87 Several exempla depicted beguines andParisian clerics in conversation. In one such exemplum, a Parisian theologian asks a beguine toexplain her way of life. The beguine answers saying: ‘We know to love God, to confess, toknow God, the seven sacraments, to love our neighbours and to distinguish between the vicesand virtues, to have humility without pride, love without hate, patience in tribulation, clear

83 BNF lat. 15972, fol. 175v. Cui illa respondit narrans exemplum de quodam animali, quod vocatur thygris . fetus

venatores raperee volentes quaerunt eius absenciam et quia animal est velox et ferox, timentes eius ferotitatem .recedunt ponunt specula in via sua que thigris respitiens moratur et retardatur quia credit fetus suos reperisse propter

sui apeciem et ymagiem quam videt in speculo.84 BNF lat. 15972, fol. 175v. sed quia vos multa specula in sacra scriptura vidistis et ibi respexistis et affectum vostrum

retardastis.85 On similar comparisons between these two ways of acquiring nkowledge, see Anneke Mulder-Bakker, ‘Introduc-

tion’, in: Seeing and knowing: women and learning in medieval Europe, 1200-1550, ed. A. Mulder-Bakker (Turnhout,

Belgium, 2004), 1-19.86 Anneke Mulder-Bakker notes that medieval observers recognised that formal training, contrary to modern under-

standing, was not the only means of obtaining knowledge. This book learning could easily be a ‘detour’ in comparison

to the more direct route to knowledge followed by inspired women. As a direct participant, the visionary saw and knew,

rather than settling for ‘hearsay’, as the book-educated scholastic. This direct knowledge made the visionary free of

error, giving her unquestionable authority, Anneke Mulder-Bakker, ‘Introduction’, 2-3.87 BNF, 16482, fol. 97 rb. Unde de hoc dixit bonum verbum quedam begineta. in: Seeing and knowing, Per quem lo-

cum intravit Deus in vobis quem vos ita diligitis? ‘Certe, domine per aurem quia vita amoris est per auditum et intrat per

aurem’. Optime dixit. Si esset melior clericus de Parisius, non posset melius respondere.


knowledge of God and the Holy Church, and are ready to suffer everything for God: all this isthe beguinage’.88 After the theologian heard the beguine’s description of her way of life, heremarked, ‘Thus you know more about divinity than all the masters of Paris’.89

Medieval hagiography and devotional literature depict women as particularly susceptibleto visions and paramystical experiences, indicating that women were thought to have moredirect access to divine knowledge.90 Such a gendered understanding of intellectual abilities,however, was not universally accepted and was constantly negotiated. Indeed, clerics debatedthis division of spiritual and intellectual labour among themselves since it touched on anissue about which there was some disagreement: the question of the proper relationshipbetween, and the relative merits of, the active religious life and the contemplative life. Inthe thirteenth century, clerics, especially mendicants, championed the vita mixta, or themixed life of action and contemplation, as the best form of religious life. Medieval clericsconceived their role as one of active preaching in the world, an activity requiring expertise,which clerics acquired through study. They also believed, however, that this active life wasbest combined with d or at least alternated with d contemplation, which had as its goalmystical union with God.91 Yet, for many scholars, the vita mixta was a difficult ideal toreach. Scholars engaged in disputations, served in royal and papal courts, and competedwith one another for lucrative benefices, all while trying to reconcile careerism with religiousvocation.

As James of Viry’s Life of Mary of Oignies demonstrates, clerics observed that beguinesalso pursued a vita mixta. The spiritual work clerics encouraged among beguines, however,was not the same type of labour they reserved for themselves. The active life for the cleric con-sisted of preaching and administering the sacraments, whereas the beguine’s active life, at leastas idealised by hagiographers, did not entail public, visible activity. Even the beguine’s engage-ment in penitential labour seemed to demand justification on the part of hagiographers.92

As Amy Hollywood has argued, the active life, ideally, was limited to penitential prayer andbodily suffering.93 Parisian beguines, however, like beguines in other cities, were a visible

88 Il fu uns maistres a Paris, si apiella un sein compaignon et le dist que il li amenast une beghine, et cils l’en amena

une. Et li maistres li dist: ‘Quels gens iestes vous et que faites vous?’ ‘Maistres’, fait elle, ‘nous faisons che que li fols ne

scet ne ne poet faire; car li fols poet vivre en pain et en yauwe et aler descaus et en laignes et viestir haire. Et se ne le

sces, si l’apreng a faire.’ ‘Et que faites vous dont?’ che li a dit li maistres. ‘Nous scavons Dieu amer, confesser, nous

warder, Dieu cognoistre, les VII sacremens, nos proimes amer et desevrer les vices et des virtus, avoir humilite sans

orgoel, amour sans hayne, pascienche en tribulation, clere cognissanche de Dieu et de saint eglise, et apparillies de

tout souffrir pour Diu: tout chou est beghinages.’ Berlin, Staatstbibliothek, MS Gall. oct. 28. ‘Altfranzosische Mystik

und Beginentum’, ed. Alfons Hilka, Zeitschrift fur romanische Philologie, 47 (1927), 123.89 Quant li maistres l’oy, si dist: ‘Dont saves vous plus de divinite que tout li maistres de Paris’, ‘Altfranzosische Mys-

tik und Beginentum’, 123.90 Bynum, Holy feast, holy fast. On the notion that women had more privileged access to divine knowledge, see John

Coakley, ‘Gender and the authority of the friars’ and ‘Friars as confidants’. Such access cannot be said to be limited to

women, however. See Anneke B. Mulder-Bakker, ‘The metamorphosis of woman. Transmission of knowledge and the

problems of gender’, Gender and History, 12, 3 (2000) and ‘Introduction’ in: Seeing and knowing.91 On the mendicant ideal of the vita mixta, see Katherine L. Jansen, The making of the Magdalen. Preaching and pop-

ular devotion in the later middle Ages (New Jersey, 2000), 49-54. For a discussion of changing ideas about the relation-

ship between action and contemplation (or Mary and Martha), see Giles Constable, ‘The interpretation of Mary and

Martha’, in: Three studies in medieval religious and social thought (Cambridge, 1995), 1-141.92 On the ways in which male hagiographers adjust certain aspects of the beguines’ active spirituality in conformity

with ‘existing female monastic practices’, see Hollywood, The soul as virgin wife, 39-50.93 Hollywood, The soul as virgin wife, 44-50.


presence in the city: many instructed children, cared for the sick, and engaged in commercialactivities.94

The beguines’ active spiritual labour, however, was not completely unlike that reserved forthe clergy. In 1216, Pope Honorius III, at the request of James of Vitry, permitted beguines tolive in communities in order to mutually exhort one another to live pious lives.95 ThoughParisian scholars such as Thomas of Chobham recognised a difference between exhortationand preaching, the latter being the privilege of the educated male elite, some clerics became con-cerned that in their contacts outside of their communities, the beguines might cross the line ofexhortation into evangelism d a line that historians argue became increasingly blurry in the thir-teenth century.96 During the latter half of the thirteenth century, religious dissidents, the popu-larity of the mendicant orders, and hagiographical precedents prompted Parisian theologians toconsider the basis of preaching authority as well as the very nature of preaching itself. Disagree-ment about the mendicants’ role in teaching the laity, as well as enduring concerns about the un-authorised preaching of Cathars and Waldensians, compelled theologians, particularly at theUniversity of Paris, to debate the question of what sectors of medieval society had the rightto preach.97 Further, saintly examples of female preachers, known to the laity through the Bibleand collections of saints’ lives, especially James of Voragine’s popular Aurea Legenda (compiled1255-1266), posed difficulties.98 Over time, theologians felt increasingly compelled to reconciletheir position on women preachers with their own justification for preaching: in other words, wasthe preacher authorised by grace or by training? Theologians argued that only properly trainedclerics could claim the right to preach; a female apostolate carried out by saints such as MaryMagdalen and Catherine of Alexandria was permissible only during the early days of theChurch, when there were few to carry out the task.99 Nevertheless, the example of the divinelyinspired woman, whom men such as James of Vitry credited with persuasive speech, may haveled to concern that beguines would use their influence independently of their spiritual directors.

In Paris, clerical anxieties over women, particularly beguines, preaching must have beenespecially acute. Indeed, there is evidence that the mistress of the Parisian beguinage preachedto her fellow beguines. Peter of Limoge’s sermon collection includes several sermons preachedat the beguinage by its mistress, Agnes of Oinches.100 These sermons were part of a collectionPeter bequeathed to the Sorbonne for the purpose of instructing preachers.101 Although Agnes’

94 The Paris beguinage, like those in the Low Countries, had a school for children. Parisian beguines, both inside and

outside of the beguinage, were engaged in a wide range of occupations and had extensive business ties with wealthy

Parisian merchants and even the royal family.95 James of Vitry, Lettres de Jacques de Vitry (1160/1170-1240) eveque de Saint-Jean d’Acre ed. R.B.C. Huygens

(Leiden, 1960), 74.96 On clerical efforts to define preaching and the right to preach, see Michel Lauwers, ‘Praedicatio d Exhortatio.

L’eglise, la reforme, et les la€ıcs (XIe et XIIe siecles)’ in: La Parole de predicateur, V-XVe siecles (1997), 187-232. Al-

cuin Blamires, ‘Woman and preaching in medieval orthodoxy, heresy and saints’ lives’, Viator, 26 (1995), 135-52.

Thomas of Chobham wrote on the distinction between exhortation and praedication. Although laymen and women

could repeat what they had heard from a trained preacher, they were not to explain scripture. This hierarchy is described

in Thomas of Chobham’s Summa de arte praedicandi. See F. Morenzoni, Des ecoles aux paroisses. Thomas de Chob-

ham et la promotion de la predication au debut du XIIIe siecle (Paris, 1995).97 Blamires, ‘Woman and preaching’, 138-9.98 Blamires, ‘Woman and preaching’, 142-5.99 Blamires, ‘Woman and preaching’, 147.

100 BNF Lat. 16482, fol. 15 ra and fol. 16 vb contain extracts of sermons attributed to Agnes of Oinches.101 Beriou, L’Avenement, 86.


preaching was probably limited to her fellow beguines, the inclusion of her sermons in this col-lection suggests a respect for Agnes’ abilities as a preacher. In the context of scholarly debate overthe right of women to preach or teach, the existence of sermons preached by a beguine is signif-icant, indicating that the debate over whether or not women could or should preach may not havebeen sparked only by heretical, biblical, and hagiographical examples. Rather, when theologiansdebated the possibility of female preaching, they may have had specific women in mind.

Sometimes she is Martha, sometimes she is Mary

Several Parisian preachers commented on the beguines’ non-contemplative activities. Ina sermon preached to a university audience in 1272, Robert of Sorbon again compared thebeguines to male religious authorities, saying:

Sometimes good women accomplish more in the parish than even priests, or regentmasters in theology in Paris, by their good works and examples and good words. Anexemplum about the beguine who came to Paris to acquire the Summa of vices and virtues:When she was staying in a certain city where priests under its authority often came, shewould lend them this Summa in quires, first asking if they had time before celebratingmass. In this way, she multiplied (the Summa) throughout that region.102

According to Robert, by buying and circulating preaching material, the beguine did more good inher parish than male religious authorities. Robert of Sorbon’s exemplum, therefore, reveals thatsome beguines took seriously their obligation to exhort their fellow Christians. Rather than devoteherself solely to the attainment of mystical intimacy with God, the beguine in Robert’s exemplumactively encouraged local priests with word, example, and significantly, sermon literature.

While it may have been acceptable for a theologian to praise beguines as superior incontemplation, humility, or active work in the world, it was an entirely different matter whenbeguines made these claims to superiority themselves. The notion that beguines could claimthe right to correct and instruct, so prominent in the beguine vitae of the early thirteenth century,was problematic for some Parisian preachers. Indeed, several Parisian preachers accused the be-guines of pride and arrogance. In 1272, the secular cleric Gerard of Reims targeted beguines ina sermon focused on the theme of judgement. In his first elaboration of the term, ‘the judgementof rashness’, Gerard employed Matthew 7:1 (‘Do not judge, so that you may not be judged’),warning beguines that in judging others, they themselves will be judged by God.103 Paraphrasinga letter from Jerome to a mother and daughter living in Gaul, Gerard referred to beguines saying‘it is unsuitable to isolate oneself while the tongue wanders through the world’.104 Here, Gerardalludes to the beguines’ ostensibly isolated life while criticising beguines who judge the wholeworld but wish to be condemned by no one.105

102 BNF, Lat. 15955, f. 307 va-307 vb. Et nota quod quandoque plus proficient in parochia bonae mulieres quam etiam

presbiteri, vel magistri in theologia regendo Parisius, per earum bona opera et exempla et bona verba. Exemplum de

begina quae venit Parisius emptum Summam de viciis et virtutibus; quae cum monraretur in quadam civitate ad

quam saepe veniebant presbiteri subditi illi civitati, accommodabat eis per quaternos huiusmodi Summam, praequirendo

si erant ociosi, ante (quam) missam celebraverant, ita quod per totam regionem illam eam multiplicavit.103 BNF 16482, fol. 58ra, Iudicium multiplex reperitur in sacra scriptura. Primo, iudicium temeritatis. Mat. 7:1: ‘Nolite

iudicare et non iudicabimini’, scilicet a Deo, sicut alique moniales vel alie quedam persone religiose vel begine.104 BNF 16482, fol. 58ra. Ieronimus in epistola ad matrem et filiam in Gallis commorantes, ‘Inconguum est latere cor-

pore et lingua per totum orbem vagari’.105 BNF 16482, fol. 58ra.


The Franciscan minister general Bonaventure warned the beguines against having too muchpride in their knowledge. Bonaventure’s concern that the beguines thought too highly of theirintellectual and spiritual gifts is clearly expressed in a comparison of two sermons preached onthe same day in 1273. Bonaventure preached first to the Cistercian nuns at Saint-Antoine andsecond to the beguines in the Paris beguinage, choosing wisdom as his theme in both sermons.As Nicole Beriou has observed, Bonaventure’s discussion of wisdom varied significantly in thetwo sermons. In the sermon to the Cistercian nuns, Bonaventure encouraged his audience toretreat from the world, quoting Ecclesiastes 27:12 (‘In wisdom remain’). In this sermon, Bona-venture claimed that wisdom was best attained from the contemplative, isolated existence. Inthe sermon at the beguinage, however, Bonaventure based his message on Wisdom 7:13(‘I have learned without guile and imparted without grudging’). Bonaventure did not emphasisecontemplation in the sermon to the beguines. Instead, he warned the beguines against arroganceand teaching things about which they lack sufficient knowledge, saying ‘Just as he sins whoknows and does not wish to learn first, so also does he who does not know and wishes to bemaster’.106 Like Ranulph of Houblonniere, who complained about seemingly wise beguineswho refuse to be instructed, Bonaventure represented beguines as too proud of their knowledge.The difference in Bonaventure’s approaches to the two groups of women further reflects thecleric’s belief that beguines were active, not only in charitable works, but in discussing mattersof faith.

This type of portrayal of the arrogant beguine is particularly apparent in the Compilatiosingularis exemplorum. This late thirteenth-century text presents a dialogue between abeguine and a Parisian master of theology. The exchange begins with the master chiding thebeguine for her arrogance and disrespect. The beguine answers the theologian with a series ofcomparisons between the knowledge and experiences of the beguines with those of the theolo-gians, including the claims ‘You talk, and we do. You learn, and we seize. . You assume, andwe know’.107 Although this text was the work of a male cleric, it casts the beguine as the the-ologian’s arrogant rival, reflecting a relationship that was less complementary and moreantagonistic.

The clearest and most famous expression of clerical concern about the Parisian beguines’non-contemplative activities was Gilbert of Tournai’s report to Pope Gregory IX in preparationfor the Second Council of Lyons (1274). In this report Gilbert voices his extreme disapproval ofcertain activities in which he believed beguines were involved, claiming:

There are among us women called beguines, and some of them are esteemed for theirsubtleties and delight in novelties. They have interpreted the mysteries of Scriptureinto French, although they are hardly understood by experts in Holy Scripture. Theyread them in common, irreverently, audaciously, in their little rooms, workshops, andin the public squares. I have seen, and read and held a bible in French, whose exemplar

106 Sicut peccat qui scit et non vult primum docere, sic qui nescit et vult magister esse. Beriou, L’avenement, 315. Both

sermons have been edited and published in Sermones de diversis, ed. Jacques Bougerol (Paris, 1993), nos. 44 and 45.107 Vous dites, et nous faisons. / Vous aprenes, et nous aprenons. / Vous lises et nous eslisons / vous machies, et nous

engloucissons. / Vous marcheandes, et nous acatons. / Vous enlumines, et nous embrasons. / Vous quides, et nous sa-

vons. / Vous demandes, et nous prenons. / Vous queres, et nous trouvons. / Vous ames, et nous languissons. / Vous lan-

guissies, et nous nous mourons. / Vous semes, et nous messonnons. / Vous laboures, et nous reposons. / Vous

agraillissies, nous nous engroissons. / Vous sonnes, et nous cantons. / Vous cantes, et nous espringons. / Vous florissies,

nous fructefions. / Vous goustes, et nous assavorons. (Bern, Burgerbibliothek, MS 679, fol. 14v-15r. c. 1300), ed.

W. Simons, Cities of ladies, 217.


is displayed publicly by the booksellers of Paris so that heresies and errors, dubious andabsurd interpretations might be copied.108

Gilbert of Tournai’s commentary conveys clerical anxieties about beguine encroachment uponthe intellectual territory of the educated male elite. Whether or not Gilbert’s accusations weretrue, they demonstrate that some clerics believed that beguines audaciously engaged in activ-ities unsuitable for the laity, and especially women. Moreover, it shows that the authors ofCum de quibusdam, the Vienne decree condemning the beguines, were not the first to associatebeguines with translating and disputing scripture.

The beguine clergesse and ‘Holy Church the lesser’

Parisian sermons not only reflect clerical confusion about how to classify and categorisebeguines, they also demonstrate that Parisian scholars found in the beguine status a useful focusthrough which to debate the more pressing issues and concerns of their day. Parisian sermonsconvey clerical anxieties over the relative merits of public action and solitary contemplation,both of which they understood as aspects of the beguine life. Beguine proficiency in mysticalencounters seemed superior to clerics questioning the legitimacy of their intellectualapproaches to divine knowledge. Finally, beguine involvement in actively promulgating theWord, whether as praiseworthy disseminators of collections of vices and virtues or as sinisterpropagators of erroneous copies of scripture, represented a threat to clerical authority andcontrol over instruction of the laity.

By the early fourteenth century, many of these issues remained unresolved. Moreover, theywere evident in the person and work of the ‘beguine clergesse’ Marguerite Porete. In herbook, The mirror of simple souls, Marguerite depicted learning as an obstacle to the soul’sgoal, which was annihilation in God. For Marguerite, Reason was what ruled ‘Holy Churchthe lesser’ since Reason was incapable of understanding Love’s teachings. Throughout thefirst eighty-seven chapters of The mirror of simple souls, Love attempts to explain to Reasonhow the Soul can become annihilated in God’s love. Reason, however, is constantly perplexed,often complaining that Love’s teachings are full of confusing paradoxes. The Soul responds toReason’s complaint, declaring ‘what strange conclusions you reach! You take the straw andleave the grain, because your understanding is too base’.109 Marguerite’s book furtherasserts that the Annihilated Soul seeks guidance in God, ‘whose teaching is not writtendown either in books or examples or in the teachings of men’.110 Marguerite even criticisesthe learned elite saying that by living by the counsel of Reason, these clerics are ‘stupid andasinine’, and because of their stupidity, she must ‘be silent and.circumspect in (her)words’.111

108 Sunt apud nos mulieres, quae Beghinae vocantur, et quaedam earum subtilitatibus vigent et novitatibus gaudent.

Habent interpretata scripturarum mysteria et in communi idiomate gallicata, quae tamen in sacra Scriptura exercitatis

vix sunt pervia. Legunt ea communiter, irreverenter, audacter, in conventiculis, in ergastulis, in plateis. Vidi ego, legi et

habui biblium gallicatum, cuius exemplar Parisiis publice ponitur a stationariis ad scribendum haereses et errores, du-

bietates et inconcinnas interpretationes. Gilbert of Tournai, Collectio de scandalis ecclesiae, in: Archivum franciscanum

historicum, 24 (1931), 61-2.109 Margaret Porette. The mirror of simple souls, trans. Edmund Colledge, J.C. Marler, and Judith Grant (Notre Dame,

IN, 1999), 28.110 The mirror of simple souls.111 The mirror of simple souls, 89.


Marguerite, however, was neither silent, nor cautious. The proceedings against Margueriteindicate that, sometime before 1306, Marguerite sent her book to the Bishop of Cambrai,Guy of Colmieu, for approval. Instead of endorsing the book, the Bishop declared it hereticaland ordered it to be publicly burned in Valenciennes, the town where Marguerite reportedlylived at that time. According to the records of Marguerite’s trial, the Bishop of Cambraiinformed her that she would be handed over to secular authorities should she attempt to dissem-inate her erroneous beliefs, whether in verbal or written form.112 Apparently undeterred by thebishop’s warning, Marguerite added to the original version statements of approval from threetheologians as well as several chapters and continued to circulate her book, eventually sendinga copy to yet another bishop, John of Chalons-sur-Marne.113 Finding that the Bishop ofCambrai had previously condemned the book, John brought Marguerite to the attention ofthe inquisitor of Haute-Lorraine, who soon handed her over to the inquisition in Paris.114

William of Paris, the inquisitor presiding over Marguerite’s trial, informed 21 theologiansand four canon lawyers from the University of Paris that the accused not only defied ecclesi-astical orders, she preached her ideas by sharing her work with ‘many other simple people,to beghards and others, as if good’.115 Because of her disobedience and contumacy, on 31May, 1310, the canon lawyers pronounced Marguerite ‘not only as one fallen into heresy,but as a relapsed heretic’, recommending that she be handed over to the secular authoritiesfor justice.116 The very next day Marguerite was publicly burned in the Place de Greve bythe order of the provost of Paris.117

Although Marguerite’s book discounted the active life of works, this ‘clergesse’ wasemblematic of the learned, active beguine. Marguerite persistently circulated her work and,as recent scholarship suggests, The mirror of simple souls had a pedagogical aim.118 Thus,Marguerite was the locus of clerical anxieties about beguines. The notion that Marguerite’sactions were a threat to the clergy is apparent from the observations of her contemporaries.John Baconthorpe, an English theologian who lived in Paris at the time of Marguerite’s execu-tion, characterised her as a ‘certain beguine who published a little book against the clergy’.119

112 AN J 428, n. 15, ed. Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’, 82. A quo episcopo tibi fuit sub pena excommunicationis expresse in-

hibitum ne de cetero talem librum componeres vel haberes aut eo vel consimili utereris, addens et expresse ponens dic-

tus episcopus in quadam littera suo sigillata sigillo, quod, si de cetero libro utereris predicto vel si ea que continebantur

in eo, verbo vel scripto de cetero attemptares, te condempnabat tamquam hereticam et relinquebat iustitiandam iustitie

seculari.113 After the book was burned in Valenciennes, Marguerite added seventeen chapters as well as a prologue containing

three clerical testimonies to the book’s orthodoxy. One of these clerics was the renowned Parisian Master Godfrey of

Fontaines. Marguerite may have hoped that the editions would convince the bishop of Chalons to reverse the bishop of

Cambrai’s condemnation. Colledge et al., ‘Introductory essay’, xl-xlii.114 Colledge et al., ‘Introductory essay’, xlii.115 AN J 428, n. 19 bis, ed. Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’, 78. Margarita dictum librum in suo consimili eosdem continentem

errores post ipsius libri condempnationem reverendo patri domino Johanni, Dei gratia Cathalaunensi episcopo, commu-

nicavit ac necdum dicto sed et pluribus aliis personis simplicibus, begardis et aliis, tamquam bonum.116 AN J 428, n. 15, ed. Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’, 82. Margaretam, non solum sicut lapsam in heresim, sed sicum relapsam

finaliter condempnamus et te relinquimus iusticie seculari.117 Verdeyen, ‘Le proces’, 89.118 While preparing this article for publication, I came across Robin O’Sullivan’s recent study of The Mirror of simple

souls. She argues that, despite the quietist strain in the Mirror, the book expresses ‘an outwardly directed, pedagogical

concern’. See ‘The school of love. Marguerite Porete’s Mirror of simple souls’, Journal of Medieval History, 32 (2006)

143-62.119 Beguuina quaedem, quae libellum quondam adversus clerum ediderat, cited in Lerner, Heresy of the free spirit, 206.


What’s in a name? From ‘beguine’ to ‘bonne femme’

The Vienne decrees, which were circulated in Paris in October of 1317, several years after theCouncil of Vienne, impacted beguines all over northern Europe.120 Although historians havepointed out that beguines living by a rule in a large ‘court’ beguinage were ultimately permittedto continue their way of life, the various reactions to the decrees reflect the power of the term ‘be-guine’.121 Through an examination of property deeds in thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Stras-burg, Dayton Philips found that after the publication of the Vienne decrees, none of the womendescribed as ‘beguine’ before 1318 identified as such afterwards.122 Beguines living in the begui-nages of the southern Low Countries came under the scrutiny of local bishops, some of whomsought to forbid women to identify as beguines.123 Aware of the negative connotations the termnow held, residents of many beguinages were careful not to call themselves beguines, preferringinstead to identify as ‘bonnes fames’ (good women); some beguines discarded their grey-brownhabits and dressed in ordinary secular clothing.124 In Paris, King Charles IV responded to inves-tigations into the local beguines’ orthodoxy by commissioning members of the Dominican order towrite a series of statutes for the residents of the royal beguinage.125 Emphasising that the begui-nage’s founder was none other than the saintly king Louis IX, Charles went to great lengths to dis-associate the beguinage’s residents from the beguines targeted by Cum de quibusdam, calling theParisian beguines ‘bonne et preude fames’.126 Parisian property records reveal no trace of be-guines living outside of the city’s beguinage after the first two decades of the fourteenth century.127

120 Shortly after the Council of Vienne (1311-12), Pope Clement V decided to revise the decrees resulting from the

Council, instructing that all extant copies of the decrees be destroyed. Clement published the revised version of the de-

crees initially on March 21, 1314. On April 20, 1314, however, Clement died. Clement’s death prevented copies of the

decrees from officially circulating in the universities. It was not until the new pope, John XXII, was elected to the papacy

in September of 1316 after a protracted election, that the decrees, now referred to as the Clementine decrees, were pub-

lished. For a good narrative of these events, see Jacqueline Tarrant, ‘The Clementine decrees on the beguines: conciliar

and papal versions’, Archivum historiae pontificae, 12 (1974), 300-8. While Tarrant’s comparison of the manuscripts pro-

duced by the Council and its final version demonstrates that significant changes were made to this decree, I am not con-

vinced that the final versions of Ad nostrum and Cum de quibusdam do not reflect the views of the Council’s participants.121 On the ways in which the beguinage helped protect beguines in the Low Countries, see Joanna Ziegler, ‘The curtisbeguinages in the southern Low Countries. Interpretation and historiography’, Bulletin van het Belgisch Historisch

Instituut te Rome/Bulletin de l’Institut Historique Belge de Rome, 57 (1987), 31-70 and W. Simons, ‘The beguine move-

ment in the southern Low Countries’.122 Dayton Phillips, Beguines in medieval Strasburg. A study of the social aspect of beguine life (Stanford, 1941), 128.123 For a detailed narrative on the inquiries in Germany, France, and the Low Countries following the publication of the

Vienne decrees, see McDonnell, Beguines and beghards, 521-556. A more succinct discussion, focused solely on the

beguinages in the southern Low Countries, is found in Simons, Cities of ladies, 132-37.124 McDonnell, Beguines and beghards, 528-9; Simons, Cities of ladies, 134.125 Leon Le Grand, ‘Les beguines de Paris’, 318.126 AN JJ 64, no. 475, fol. 256v. Charles (etc), faisons a touz presens et a venir que comme Monseigneur saint Loys,

entre les autres oeuvres de misericorde que il fist en son vivant, eust acquis une enceinte de maisons a Paris assis delez la

porte Barbeel, et illec eust mis bonne et preude fames beguines pour servir Nostre-Seigneur chastement et eussent et

tenissent lesdites maisons comme les leurs, sauf et retenu a lui la propriete du lieu, et depuis nos tres chers seigneurs

pere et freres, les roys Philippe, Loys, et Philippe derrain trespasse, que Dieu absoille, pour le bon gouvernement et estat

dudit hostel de beguinage, eussent commis la garde et l’administracion d’ycelui au prieur de l’ordre des Freres

prescheurs de Paris, lequel par vertu et autorite de ses commissions fist certains status et ordenances selon lesquelles

lesdites beguines se doivent vivre et maintenir, cited in Le Grand, 317-18.127 Although I have found evidence that beguines owned houses outside of the beguinage, the women are always iden-

tified as residents of the beguinage. The statutes permitted the beguines to maintain full control over their property.


Everywhere after 1317, religious and secular authorities compelled the beguines to residewithin beguinages and in many regions the beguinage was the only acceptable residence forthese women. Nevertheless, while residence in a beguinage was the key factor to providingwomen a place in which they might pursue a religious life, the term ‘beguine’ did not loseits negative connotations. In his gloss on the Vienne decree Cum de quibusdam, the canon law-yer Johannes Andreae (d. 1348) described the nature of the beguine life as a bad imitation ofa truly religious life.128 Another canon lawyer glossed Cum de quibusdam by utilising the anal-ogy of the beguine as a wolf in sheep’s clothing; her deceptive grey habit concealed herirreligious life.129 Canon lawyers were not alone in understanding the negative implicationsof the term. As late as 1397, when the Sisters of the Common Life came under inquisitorialinvestigation, the women responded by vehemently denying that they had anything in commonwith beguines.130

Conclusion

This examination of late thirteenth- and early fourteenth-century sermon literature illumi-nates an overlooked part of the context into which Marguerite was brought when she was im-prisoned in Paris in 1309. By analysing how Parisian clerics employed and contributed torepresentations of beguines in sermons and exempla literature, this article sheds light on whyMarguerite’s ideas, and especially the means by which she disseminated them, were thoughtto be typical of beguines. It is impossible to say whether Parisian beguines really discussedtheology and translated scripture, but it is significant that clerics claimed they did. Moreover,historians cannot know whether or not Marguerite Porete identified herself as a beguine,although it is important that Parisian authorities thought she was. When Parisian preachersapproached an audience of beguines, they brought certain assumptions about these women tothe pulpit.

Moreover, these sermons demonstrate the ways in which clerics looked to beguines indiscussions of contemporary issues. Beguines, for many clerics, were good to think with.131

To clerical observers, the beguine could be the wolf in sheep’s clothing, concealing her impiouslifestyle beneath her religious garb. The beguine could also be the religious contemplative,whose intimacy with God the male clergy considered beyond their own capacities. Finally,the beguine could be the active religious, preaching and teaching the Word to a receptive urbanlaity, and thus a possible interloper onto the preachers’ terrain. Even as clerics praised beguinesfor their piety, humility and good works, they were working from and contributing to certainunderstandings about beguines, themselves and their place in medieval society. Still, this think-ing had serious consequences for real beguines in Paris and elsewhere.

Clearly, Parisian preachers expressed suspicions about religious women, especiallybeguines, long before the end of the fourteenth century. While it is important to recognisethe contexts in which women were able to claim religious authority, it is equally important

128 Elizabeth Makowski, ‘Mulieres religiousae, strictly speaking. Some fourteenth-century canonical opinions’,

Catholic Historical Review, 85 (1999), 8.129 Makowski, ‘Mulieres religiousae, strictly speaking’, 9.130 Makowski, ‘Mulieres religiousae, strictly speaking’, 12.131 Although Ruth Karras has argued persuasively that university clerics largely ignored women in quolibital discus-

sions, Parisian clerics often looked to beguines in discussions of pastoral and academic concerns. See Ruth Mazo

Karras, ‘Using women to think with in the medieval university’, in: Seeing and knowing, 21-34.


to bear in mind that women could rarely claim such authority with impunity. There werelimitations to women’s activities, even if some women were occasionally able to traverse theselimitations.

Acknowledgements

An earlier version of this essay was presented at the California Medieval History Seminar. Iwish to thank all of the participants for their helpful comments and suggestions. I am alsoindebted to Sharon Farmer, Nancy Mcloughlin, Andrew Miller, Keiko Nowacka, and KatrinSjursen for reading and commenting on earlier versions of this essay.

Tanya Stabler Miller is a doctoral candidate in medieval history at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her

dissertation examines beguine communities and their relationship to religious and political authority in thirteenth-

and fourteenth-century Paris.

journal of medieval history

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