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Priest As Criminal: Community Regulation of Priests in the Archdeaconry of Paris, 1483-1505

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Priest As Criminal: Community Regulation of Priests in the Archdeaconry of Paris, 1483-1505 Priest as Criminal: Community Regulation of Priests in the Archdeaconry of Paris, 1483-1505 A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA BY Tiffany D. Vann Sprecher IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Ruth Mazo Karras, Adviser November 2013 © 2013 Tiffany D. Vann Sprecher Acknowledgements I am happy to have this opportunity to express my gratitude for the support I have received during my graduate career and while writing my dissertation. First, I would like to convey my appreciation for the funding I have received in the form of the Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship, the Hella Mears Graduate Fellowship, the Russell J. and Dorothy S. Bilinski Fellowship, the Henrietta Holm Warwick Fellowship, and fellowships from the Center for Early Modern History at the University of Minnesota. I would also like to thank the helpful staff at the Archives nationales and the Bibliothèque nationale de France for their assistance and accommodation. Through the vicissitudes of graduate school, my friends and colleagues have provided an invaluable network of support. I am fortunate to have benefitted from the friendship and advice of many including Chantel Rodriguez, Rachel Gibson and Jecca Namakkal. Brian Toye assisted me with many of my Latin translations and Danika Myers-Hurwitz has provided me with years of validation and impeccably-timed cocktails. For source recommendations and feedback on drafts I am greatly indebted to Howard Patchin, Joseph B. Pham, Brian Hill, Basit Hammad Qureshi, Nathaniel Holdren, Cameron Bradley, Ann Zimo and Thomas Heebøll-Holm. Many faculty have also been generous with their time and guidance. In particular, I would like to thank Martha Bayless who inducted me into medieval history and Kevin Madigan who encouraged me as I set out on my own ventures. I also owe a large debt of i gratitude to Beverly Kienzle for instilling in me a love for the archives and for giving me the paleographic skills essential to complete this project. The faculty at the University of Minnesota have also taught me much and I would like to extend my thanks to Carla Rahn Philips for her help. I am particularly appreciative of my committee members: John Watkins, Sarah Chambers, Michael Lower, Kay Reyerson and, most of all, I would like to thank my adviser Ruth Mazo Karras for her professionalism, conscientiousness and insight. Finally, I could have never completed this project without my family. I would like to extend my thanks to my brother for challenging me and making me laugh. I can never thank my parents enough for their unending and unconditional support and for always encouraging me to make my own path. Most importantly, I dedicate this work to my husband, Jonathan, who has always helped me and whose love, support, and excitement is the foundation of this work. ii Table of Contents Acknowledgements i List of Tables iv Introduction 1 Chapter 1: The Case of the Vying Vicars: 33 Black Market Ministry Chapter 2: The Case of the Playing Priests: 73 Gambling, Drinking, Partying and Late Medieval Religious Order Chapter 3: The Case of the Malevolent Men: 110 Violence in Defense of the Priesthood Chapter 4: The Case of the Wayward Women: 149 Laypeople as Parapolice Conclusion 181 Bibliography 200 iii Tables Table 1: Categories of Accusations against Priests 57 Table 2: Games Priests Were Cited for Playing 85 Table 3: Insults and their Meanings 136 Table 4: Insults Implying Social Deviance 139 Table 5: Fines Issued for Violence and Insults 144 iv Introduction On 10 May 1499, the priest Laurent Colas appeared before the court of the archdeacon of Paris, for many crimes. Firstly, Colas was accused of having had carnal knowledge of the local curate’s servant, Marion, and of having celebrated mass in the archdeaconry without permission or a license. He was also alleged to have fought with a man named Jean Hornet and, during this disagreement, having disparaged Hornet’s marriage. Colas’ insults seem to have prompted a disagreement between the two men. Hornet testified that, to retaliate for injurious things he had said to Colas during this dispute, Colas deliberately unmoored boats belonging to Hornet and a man named Bertrand Rogaret, letting them drift from the shores and float freely in the foamy waters of the Seine. Hornet further testified that Colas damaged his fishing basket as well, prompting the court to fine Colas for a third of the basket’s value. 1 To historians of the medieval church, this list of accusations likely comes as no surprise. Late medieval priests have long had a reputation as a troublesome bunch. The types of crimes cited against Colas –contumacy and sexual and professional misconduct – were perhaps the most common complaints against priests and are certainly the most 1Paris, Archives Nationales, Z10 21, Registre de Causes, 1497-1505, Archidiaconat de Paris, fol. 86v. Fishing baskets were typically funnel-shaped wicker or webbed containers that would be baited and placed in a weir, sluice or some other eddy. Fish that entered the basket would be prevented from escaping by its small opening. Richard C. Hoffmann, “Fishing,” in Medieval Science, Technology, and Medicine: An Encyclopedia, ed. Thomas F. Glick et al. (New York: Routledge, 2005), 175. 1 studied among modern scholars. For instance, legal historians include priests who committed violence and theft into studies of institutional and social responses to crime while gender historians study priests’ sexual transgressions and violent conflicts to tease out medieval models of masculinity. The most established historiographical tradition related to priests’ crimes, however, was initiated by church historians who have traditionally identified priests’ personal and professional failings as a significant contributing factor to the success of the Reformation throughout Europe. Disillusioned with their priests, historians have argued, parishioners turned away from the Catholic church and to the new religious leadership offered by nascent Protestant churches. Initially this historiography relied heavily on medieval narrative sources critiquing contemporary clergy. In these sources, preachers and theologians railed against contemporary priests whom they accused of enjoying luxurious clothing, fine foods, and the company of women, all while letting their parishioners languish without strong religious leadership. Later Protestant historians appropriated these documents and added their own critiques of the Catholic Church to vindicate and galvanize their movements. These early documents established a foundation for a subsequent historiography which portrayed the late medieval church as headed by a corrupt and complacent clergy who inspired their most vehement critics to launch a theological and institutional revolution, resulting in the formation of Protestantism. From the 1980s, however, scholars have begun to look more critically at depictions of late medieval priests. The current study seeks to contribute to this growing body of scholarship by contextualizing priests’ criminal behavior within its legal and 2 social context. Examining court registers from the archdeaconry of Paris from 1484- 1505, I emphasize that late medieval indictments of priests were not accurate descriptions of priests’ general behavior. Rather, they were polemical exaggerations intended to initiate and justify ecclesiastical reform measures. This reform was propagated through episcopal statutes and legal proceedings that regulated priests’ professional and personal comportment. The ecclesiastical administration developed and enforced standardized laws intended to be applicable throughout France. However, priests and parishioners often acted independently of ecclesiastical law to regulate parish life. The confluence of official statutes and local enforcement produced a diversity of models for correct sacerdotal behavior. Before the Reformation, these models coexisted under the aegis of a single church and enabled parish communities to shape their priests’ personal and professional behavior to suit local needs. This dissertation therefore demonstrates an agency among community members that has hitherto been unexplored and advances explorations of the diversity and flexibility of the late medieval church. I. The Court Community regulation of priests was enabled by a court system that operated largely at the community’s behest. The court operated without a centralized police force; court actions were initiated primarily through accusations and denunciations. The court registers record some instances in which priests were taken into custody by members of the royal sergeancy and court officials could initiate legal actions ex officio, meaning upon their own authority. Even so, sergeants and officials acted primarily against crimes that were “notorious,” meaning that they had been committed in public view, were 3 widely rumored among the populace to have been committed, or had been confessed to by their perpetrator.2 The ecclesiastical court also employed an inquisitorial procedure called the visitation. This was a regular itinerary that the archdeacon, or more likely his vicar, made to ascertain the state of each parish.3 The visitor would ensure that the parish church and its sacramental instruments were well maintained and confirm that each parish was supplied with at least one correctly appointed priest and midwife, as well as two or more churchwardens, depending on the population of the parish.4 The visitor would
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