History of the Cathedral Church of Wells: As Illustrating the History of the Cathedral Churches of the Old Foundation — John Shaqi
History of the Cathedral Church of Wells: As Illustrating the History of the Cathedral Churches of the Old FoundationFreeman, Edward A. (Edward Augustus)
History
History of the Cathedral Church of Wells: As Illustrating the History of the Cathedral Churches of the Old Foundation
Freeman, Edward A. (Edward Augustus)
Wells Cathedral
churches therefore we sometimes find a cloister and sometimes not, and,
when there was one, it might be built of any shape and in any position
that might be thought good. But in Gisa's country of Lorraine the
secular canons were used to live in a much stricter way than they did
in England. They were not monks, because they did not take vows; but
they lived much more after the manner of monks, dwelling together with
a common refectory and a common dormitory or sleeping-room, and being
governed by very strict rules which had been drawn up by Chrodegang,
Bishop of Metz in Upper Lorraine.[29] You will see that the main
object of all this was to hinder them from marrying, which the English
secular priests, living each man in his own house, often did. Gisa's
great object was to bring this discipline, the discipline, as he says,
of his own country, into his church of Wells. This was what several
Bishops about the same time were doing elsewhere. About a hundred years
before Adalbero, Archbishop of Rheims, had done the same in his church,
the metropolitan church of France.[30] But Rheims, you may remark,
though in France and the head church of France, is quite near enough
to the borders of Lorraine to come within the reach of Lotharingian
influences. So in our own country, at this very time Leofric Bishop
of Exeter was introducing the same discipline into his church.[31] But
we find that Leofric, though by birth an Englishman, or perhaps rather
a Welshman of Cornwall, had been brought up in Lorraine. It is always
from Lorraine, in one shape or another, that this kind of change seems
to come. And we have quite enough to show that Englishmen did not like
it, as the changes which were brought in by Gisa and Leofric did not
last very long either at Wells or at Exeter. Gisa, however, carried
his point for the time. He built a cloister, a refectory, and whatever
other buildings were needed for his purpose, and made the Canons live
after the Lotharingian fashion. As their chief officer he appointed
one Isaac, one of their own body, and whom they themselves chose. He
was called the Provost, and his chief business was to look after the
temporal concerns of the church.
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