The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought: Studies of the Activities and Influences of the Child Among Primitive Peoples, Their Analogues and Survivals in the Civilization of To-DayChamberlain, Alexander Francis
Science
The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought: Studies of the Activities and Influences of the Child Among Primitive Peoples, Their Analogues and Survivals in the Civilization of To-Day
Chamberlain, Alexander Francis
Child rearing; Children -- Folklore; Folklore and children
It would appear from the mention of "children strangely decked and
apparelled to counterfeit priests, bishops, and women," that on these
occasions "divine service was not only performed by boys, but by little
girls," and "there is an injunction given to the Benedictine Nunnery of
Godstowe in Oxfordshire, by Archbishop Peckham, in the year 1278, that
on Innocents' Day the public prayers should not any more be said in the
church of that monastery _per parvulas, i.e._ little girls" (408.
I. 428).
Though with the Protestantism of Elizabeth the Boy-Bishop and his revels
were put down by the authorities, they continued to survive, in some
places at least, the end of her reign. Puttenham, in his _Art of
Poesie_ (1589), observes: "On St. Nicholas's night, commonly, the
scholars of the country make them a bishop, who, like a foolish boy,
goeth about blessing and preaching with such childish terms as make the
people laugh at his foolish counterfeit speeches" (408. 427). Brand
recognizes in the _iter ad montem_ of the scholars at Eton the
remnants of the ceremonies of the Boy-Bishop and his associates (408.
432); and indeed a passage which he cites from the _Status Scholæ
Etonensis_ (1560) shows that "in the Papal times the Eton scholars
(to avoid interfering, as it should seem, with the boy-bishop of the
college there on St. Nicholas's Day) elected _their_ boy-bishop on
St. Hugh's Day, in the month of November." In the statutes (1518) of St.
Paul's School, we meet with the following: "All these children shall
every Childermas Day come to Pauli's Church, and hear the Child-bishop
sermon; and after he be at the high mass, and each of them offer a
1_d_. to the Child-bishop, and with them the masters and surveyors
of the school." Brand quotes Strype, the author of the _Ecclesiastical
Memorials_, as observing: "I shall only remark, that there might be
this at least said in favour of this old custom, that it gave a spirit
to the children; and the hopes that they might one time or other attain
to the real mitre made them mind their books."
In his poem, _The Boy and the Angel_, Robert Browning tells how
Theocrite, the boy-craftsman, sweetly praised God amid his weary toil.
On Easter Day he wished he might praise God as Pope, and the angel
Gabriel took the boy's place in the workshop, while the latter became
Pope in Rome. But the new. Pope sickened of the change, and God himself
missed the welcome praise of the happy boy. So back went the Pope to the
workshop and boyhood, and praise rose up to God as of old. Somewhat
different from the poet's story is the tale of the lama of Tibet, a real
boy-pope. The Grand Lama, or Pope, is looked upon as an incarnation of
Buddha and as immortal, never suffering death, but merely transmigration
(100. 499).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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