Transitional Holiness in the Twelfth Century: the Social and Spiritual Identity of Domina Christina of Markyate
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Transitional Holiness in the Twelfth Century: The Social and Spiritual Identity of Domina Christina of Markyate Joanna Marie Royle Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of History, Medieval Area, University of Glasgow June 2008 ii Abstract This thesis reassesses the evidence for the English woman of spirit, Christina of Markyate, as a case-study for transitions in sanctity and spirituality during the twelfth century. It highlights the lack of appropriate vocabulary and models available in the 1130s and 1140s to make sense of the new manifestations of holiness that Christina embodies. By using three distinct but overlapping discourses to structure the study – social networks in religious life, sanctity and spirituality – it reflects on how the stakeholders in Christina’s texts negotiated their positions in relation to these discourses and throws light on a context of rapid discourse shift. The first section, ‘The Lady Christina: Texts and Contexts’, locates Christina, her texts, and her religious foundation at Markyate in their immediate and extended social networks. It shows that she had regional fame during her lifetime but that this was not sustained after her death. Her story is intimately tied up with the Abbey of St Albans, whose interest in their own domestic saints caused its revival in the later middle ages. Although charismatic in her own right, Christina was principally a successful institution builder and prioress, whose main concerns were domestic, rather than carving out a new kind of role for religious women in England. The second section, ‘Saint Christina: Sanctity and Learning’ addresses whether it is possible to consider Christina a saint, and what sanctity might involve when the traditional trappings of cult are missing. Christina fell between older and newer ideas about holiness, which resulted in the disrupted use of models to shape her story. Her saintly credentials were her virginity and visions, and in seeking to have these recorded Christina strategically performed and recast her external behaviour within recognisable modes of holiness. It is also possible to identify ways that Christina moved beyond existing constructions of identity and found a feminine voice in the performances of her ‘sartorial body’. The third section, ‘Ancilla Christi: Visions and Community’ looks in detail at Christina’s spirituality, using her visions to critique the separation of elite and popular modes of numinous encounter by taking her out of her primary social networks and identifying a comparative framework in contemporary trends in Western visionary culture. Visions flourish within particular domestic contexts and disciplines, and Christina enables us to glimpse a sub-culture of visionary experience in twelfth-century England, which rarely shows up in sources and is given little authority in the dominant narratives. The question of what ‘success’ might mean in these three discourses, forms a background theme to the investigation. It is used as a route into what was valued, what was normative, and what was recognisable, in the contemporary fields where Christina enjoyed networks and status, rather than as an objective measurement tool. A variety of sources and theoretical approaches are used to contextualise the fourteenth-century redactions of her vita in order to yield twelfth-century meanings. The main redaction, found in John of Tynemouth’s legendary of British saints, is a disrupted text full of hagiographic elements that can be opened up to multiple readings because of its historical situation and competing agendas. Overall this thesis concludes that Christina and many of the people with whom she came into contact recognised her visions as a mark of divine favour, and that in a climate where the primary category for receiving such distinction was sainthood, Christina was cast, not especially successfully, as a saint. iii Acknowledgements Writing a PhD is a process which incurs many debts of gratitude. I would first like to extend my appreciative thanks to the AHRC whose financial support has made it possible. I am also grateful to the Royal Historical Society who awarded me a grant before the start of my research to attend the 2003 Christina of Markyate conference in St Albans. The Department of History at the University of Glasgow have provided me with lovely office space as well as grants towards research trips and professional training. Researching and teaching here has been enriching, and spending many years within the wider University has given me a greater wealth of opportunities than I could have hoped for. In particular the Glasgow Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, where I took my MPhil, and the recently established Gendering History reading group, have proved intellectual homes in which to develop many ideas and academic fellowship. The enthusiasm of my supervisor Marilyn Dunn for the relationship between ideas and our understanding of the past first convinced me to come to the University of Glasgow as an undergraduate. She has allowed me to ask numerous abstract questions of my material, invested long supervisions in exploring them, and encouraged me to reach into different disciplines to seek for answers. That this project has come to fruition at all can be greatly attributed to her patience and scholarly generosity. Additionally Steve Marritt deserves special mention for stepping in the role of second supervisor and for his help on technical points relating to Anglo-Norman materials. Vanessa Traill is not only responsible for my being able to make anything at all of Anglo-Norman charters but has also made our shared office a place of intellectual endeavour and uproarious merriment. In the final stages of the thesis Daniel Gerrard offered monumental help in proof-reading and double-checking and saved me from many infelicities: for the rest I am of course to blame. I have enjoyed many illuminating conversations on Christina of Markyate with Andrew Roach, who also read parts of the manuscript and offered valued comment. To all of them I am particularly grateful. Additionally, for help on specific questions, large and small, relating to Christina I would like to thank Katie Barclay, David Bates, Lynnea Brumbaugh-Walker, Mark Chambers, Barbara Chapman, James Clark, Kimm Curran, Jeff Denton, Simon Ditchfield, Julia Bolton Holloway, Alaric Hall, Jeremy Haselock, Joanna Huntingdon, Simon Knott, Rachel Koopmans, Anne Marshall, Tom Muckley, Gale Owen-Crocker, Frederick Paxton, Jim Simpson, Julia Smith, Tessa Webber and M. Anna Maria O.Ss.S. iv During various archival trips the families of friends have generously given me accommodation and sustenance, and I am indebted to Jill and John Seaman, Sue and John Watling, and Rachel Craven for the use of their spare rooms. For the ongoing enthusiasm, hostelry-frequenting, chocolate-providing and interest in my project that any scholar needs in their good friends my best thanks go out to Laura Bamford, Rachel Battilana, Chloe Clemmons, Jean and Michael Evans, Beth Fox, Lucy Keutenius, and Alix and Freya Sperr. Also to my cats Eleanor and Marianne who helpfully sat on many pieces of important paper. My parents, Mary and David Royle, have been paragons of kindness and support, offering a range of pride, encouragement and finance as the need arose. Likewise Nick Lobnitz has been my rock, my firmest believer, my greatest advocate, and sometimes the rescuer of a cycling damsel in distress. He has made me laugh and made me tea in near equal measures when the road to the end of the project seemed long. The final and greatest thanks are usually reserved for parents or partners, but in fact the most is probably owed to my Wise Friend Beth Seaman, who has shown interest far beyond the call of duty, lengthily discussed identity and performance while walking round the park, loaned me her new computer when mine suffered an untimely demise, and read and commented on a whole manuscript far outside her own nursing field. Christina and I are very much in her debt. This thesis is dedicated to two people who inspire me: my grandmother, Antoinette Collings, a woman of great resilience and gentleness, and my friend, Betty Simpson, a woman of great knowledge and urbanity. (Anglican) Feast of St Alban, 2008. v CONTENTS ABSTRACT . ii Acknowledgements . .iii Contents . v Abbreviations . .viii Introduction. .1 I. Introducing Christina. 2 II. Historiography. .5 III. Problematising Christina. .12 IV. ‘Truth Content’: Christina the Person v. Christina the Text. 16 V. Approaches. .21 PART 1: THE LADY CHRISTINA: TEXTS AND CONTEXTS. .26 1. Social Networks in the Narrative Sources. 30 I. Writing the Life I – The Original Vita. .31 I.I Dating the Vita – Political Dynamics in the Reign of King Stephen . ..33 I.II Textual Fissures and Omissions. 37 II. The Manuscript Evidence. 39 II.I John of Tynemouth, Sanctilogium. 39 II.II Nicholas Roscarrock, Lives of the Saints. 41 II.III Thomas Walsingham, De Fundatione et Meritis Monasterii. .42 II.IV Gesta Abbatum Monasterii Sancti Albani . .44 II.V William of Malmesbury, De Gestis Pontificum Anglorum . 46 II.VI The Hildesheim Psalter. .48 III. A Twelfth-Century Story in Fourteenth-Century Texts? . 49 IV. Christina’s Social Networks. 52 V. Two Familiae. 60 2. Monastic Networks and the Priory at Markyate. .65 I. Christina in the Discourse of (New) Monasticism. 66 I.I Charisma. .67 I.II Eremite or Coenobite? . 71 I.III Prioress. .73 II. St Trinitas Markyate. .77 II.I From Hermitage to Priory. .78 II.II Relationships with the Wider Monastic Community. .85 III. Abbey of St Albans. .89 III.I The Social Identity of Abbot Geoffrey. 93 IV. The Political Context. 97 Conclusions. 100 vi PART 2: SAINT CHRISTINA: SANCTITY AND HOLINESS. ..