Rescued From Oblivion Re-inventing the cults of St. R ombout and Our Dear Lady of Hanswijk, Mechelen 1580-1802. Renée Schilling Rescued From Oblivion Re-inventing the cults of St. Rombout and Our Dear Lady of Hanswijk, Mechelen 1580-1802. Renée Schilling Thesis RMA History: Europe 1000-1800 Student number: s1753371 Supervisor: Judith Pollmann For Josepha Meier † Contents Introduction ....................................................................................................................................................... 1 Historiography ............................................................................................................................................... 3 Mechelen as a case-study .............................................................................................................................. 6 Chapter 1: Re-imagining the past .................................................................................................................... 11 A turbulent end of the sixteenth century ..................................................................................................... 13 Memories of the sixteenth century .............................................................................................................. 14 Coping with the past .................................................................................................................................... 18 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................... 21 Chapter 2: Miracles ......................................................................................................................................... 23 A Miraculous Statue .................................................................................................................................... 24 An Inefficacious Saint? ............................................................................................................................... 30 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................... 35 Chapter 3: Materiality ...................................................................................................................................... 36 St. Rombout and the matter of authenticity ................................................................................................. 37 The act of giving .......................................................................................................................................... 43 Materiality in devotional books ................................................................................................................... 47 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................... 50 Chapter four: Stakeholders .............................................................................................................................. 53 Authors ........................................................................................................................................................ 55 Confraternities ............................................................................................................................................. 60 Imposed from above .................................................................................................................................... 63 The magistrate, the guilds and the crafts ..................................................................................................... 65 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................... 67 Chapter 5: New Threats ................................................................................................................................... 68 Jansenism ..................................................................................................................................................... 70 Jesuits .......................................................................................................................................................... 72 Joseph II ...................................................................................................................................................... 76 French Period............................................................................................................................................... 81 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................... 85 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................................................... 87 Sources and Bibliography ................................................................................................................................ 92 List of Illustrations ...................................................................................................................................... 92 Archival Sources ......................................................................................................................................... 92 Primary Printed Sources .............................................................................................................................. 93 Secondary Literature ................................................................................................................................... 94 Websites ...................................................................................................................................................... 99 Introduction On 26 May 1793 the local newspaper of Mechelen, 't Wekelycks Bericht, included a police report that was filed two months earlier. In this report Bernardus Smets, canon of the St. Romboutskathedraal, Joannes Franciscus de Haes, chaplain of the same church and Petrus Josephus Gooris, gravedigger, confessed that earlier that year they had stolen the relics of St. Rombout. It was canon Smets who had come up with the idea. Because the French soldiers, who had occupied the city in November 1792, had started to confiscate church property he feared that the relics of St. Rombout would be next. Smets went to archbishop Joannes Henricus de Franckenberg to ask for permission to steal the relics of St. Rombout to keep them safe from the greed of the French. On February 12 Smets confided his plans to Franciscus de Haes and Petrus Gooris. The next day the three men met in the St. Romboutskathedraal. Chaplain de Haes opened the doors of the altar and Smets and Gooris climbed inside. For half an hour they attempted to open the reliquary, but they were not able to lift the heavy silver lid. The following day they returned, this time equipped with more tools. While they combined their strength to lift the lid of the reliquary Smets and Gooris saw through a small opening between the doors of the altar French soldiers passing by. Eventually they were able to lift the lid of the reliquary and when they saw the relics of the saint, lying in a simple box, they were 'moved in their hearts'. They left one relic of the saint in the reliquary so as to ensure that the altar could still be used for services. When Chaplain de Haes had freed them from the altar, canon Smets inspected the relics to make sure they were in a good condition and complete. Gooris hid the box with the relics in his room in the cathedral. It was, however, soon decided that the relics could not stay there, for the French soldiers often searched the cathedral in the hope of finding more valuable objects they could confiscate. Getting the box out of the cathedral proved a new challenge. The cathedral was always protected by soldiers and it was forbidden to carry packages in the city during the evening and the night. Moreover, only one entrance of the cathedral was open during the night, which was guarded by a soldier. It was Gooris' job to distribute coals and candles to the soldiers in the cathedral. He confided in his colleague Meyer and told him about the plan to smuggle the relics outside the cathedral and asked him if he could distract the soldiers while he was distributing the coals to them. In the meantime Gooris, overcome by fear, prayed in his room for strength. Then he took the box with the relics and hurried out of the cathedral. Outside he met with De Haes and together they went to the house of Smets where the box stayed for the night. The following day the relics were moved to the house of the nephew of Gooris, called Josephus Smets. The relics were moved once more on 1 23 March and buried in a leaden box in the garden of Gooris.1 This was not the first time the relics of the saint were rescued. Citizens had also saved the bones of St. Rombout when Calvinist troops attacked the city in 1580. When Smets, De Haes and Gooris gave their statement about their rescue in 1793, they even referred to the heroic actions of their ancestors: This reliquary contains among other things precious parts of the holy remains of St. Rombout […] whose holy remains our ancestors were able to protect for so many centuries with