University of Virginia Library

1. § I

THE Conquest wrought both good and evil to literature —evil because the Normans thought books written in the vernacular unworthy of preservation;[3.1] good because the change brought to the country settled government, and to the church an opportunity for reformation. Lanfranc was the moving spirit of reform, both in church administration and in the learning of its members. While still in Normandy he had built up a reputation for the monastic school at Bec, and probably had a share in collecting the excellent library that we know the monastery possessed in the twelfth century. [3.2] When he was appointed to the see of Canterbury he continued to work for the same

ends, although his primacy can have left him little leisure. A fresh beginning had to be made in Canterbury. In 1067 a fire destroyed the city, including the cathedral and almost the whole of the monastic buildings; and in this disaster many "sacred and profane books" were burned. It was Lanfranc's task to repair this loss. He brought books with him,[3.3] and introduced some changes and more method in the making and use of them. In the customary of the Benedictine order which he drew up to correspond with the best monastic practice, he included minute instructions about lending and reading books. He was also responsible in the main for the substitution of the continental Roman handwriting for the beautiful Hiberno-Saxon hand. In another respect his influence was more beneficial. Both at Bec and in England he aimed to turn out accurate texts of patristic books, and the better to achieve this end he himself corrected manuscripts. In the abbey of St. Martin de Sécz at one time there was a copy of the first ten Conferences of Cassian with his corrections; and in the library of Mans is a St. Ambrose which was overlooked by him. [3.4] Happily he was in a position to lend texts to monks for transcribing, and his help in this direction was sought by Abbot Paul of St. Albans. Recent research by Dr. Montagu James suggests that Lanfranc's work for the Canterbury library was a good deal more practical and influential than has been usually believed. Among the survivors of the Canterbury collections at Trinity College, Cambridge, and elsewhere, "are some scores of volumes undoubtedly from Christ Church, all of one epoch," the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and all written in hands modelled on an Italian style. "Another distinguishing mark," writes Dr. James, "in these volumes is the employment of a peculiar purple in the decorative initials and headings.... The nearest approaches I find to it in England are in certain manuscripts which were once at St. Augustine's Abbey, and in others which belonged to Rochester. It can be shown that books did occasionally pass from Christ Church to St. Augustine's, and it can also be shown that certain of the Rochester books were written at Christ Church." All these books, therefore, Dr. James believes, were given by Lanfranc or produced under his direction.[3.5]

Lanfranc also encouraged original composition, for Osbern, monk of Canterbury, compiled his lives of St. Dunstan, St. Alphege, and St. Odo under his eye.

In this work of bookmaking and collecting Lanfranc was supported or his example was followed by other monks from Normandy: by Abbot Walter of Evesham, who made many books;[3.6] by Ernulf of Rochester, who compiled the Textus Roffensis; and by many others. At this time grew up the practice of using English houses to supply books for Norman abbeys; this partly explains the number of manuscripts of English workmanship now abroad. A manuscript preserved in Paris contains a note by a canon of Ste-Barbe-en-Auge referring to Beckford in Gloucestershire, an English cell of his house, whence books were sent to Normandy.[3.7]

From Lanfranc to the close of the thirteenth century, was the summer-time of the English religious houses. The

Cluniac or reformed Benedictines settled here about 1077. In 1105 the Austin Canons first planted a house in this country. The White Monks, another reformed Benedictine order, entered England in 1128, and in the course of four and twenty years founded fifty houses. Soon after, in 1139, the English Gilbertines were established, then came the White Canons, and in 1180 the Carthusian monks. The land was peppered with houses. In less than a century and a half, from the Conquest to about 1200, it is estimated that no fewer than 430 houses were founded, making, with 130 founded before the Conquest, 560 in all. [3.8] Many were wealthy: some were powerful, because they owned much property, and popular because, like Malmesbury, they were "distinguished for their `delightful hospitality' to guests who, arriving every hour, consume more than the inmates themselves."[3.9] The Cluniacs could almost be called a fashionable order.

During this prosperous age some of the great houses did their best work in writing and study. Thus to pick out one or two facts from a string of them. In 1104 Abbot Peter of Gloucester gave many books to the abbey library. In 1180 the refounded abbey of Whitby owned a fair library of theological, historical, and classical books. [3.10] About the same time Abbot Benedict ordered the transcription of sixty volumes, containing one hundred titles, for his library at Peterborough.[3.11] By 1244, in spite of losses in the fire of 1184, Glastonbury had a library of some four hundred volumes, historical books consorting with romances, Bibles and patristical works almost crowding out some forlorn classics.[3.12] Nearly half a century later

Abbot John of Taunton added to Glastonbury forty volumes, a notable gift in those days of costly books, while Adam of Domerham tells us he also made a fine, handsome, and spacious library. [3.13] In 1277 a general chapter of the Benedictines ordered the monks, according to their capabilities, to study, write, correct, illuminate, and bind books, rather than to labour in the field. [3.14]

To such facts as these should be added the record of the Canterbury, Dover, and Bury libraries, the histories of which have been so admirably written by Dr. M. R. James. [3.15] Of the library of St. Albans Abbey we have not such a fine series of catalogues. Yet no abbey could have a nobler record. From Paul (1077) to Whethamstede (d. 1465) nearly all its abbots were book-lovers.[3.16] Paul built a writing-room, and put in the aumbries twenty-eight fine books (volumina notabilia), and eight Psalters, a Collectarium, books of the Epistles and Gospels for the year, two copies of the Gospels adorned with gold and silver and precious stones, without speaking of ordinals, customaries, missals, troparies, collectaria, and other books. Here, as everywhere, the library began with church books: later, easier circumstances made the stream of knowledge broader, if shallower. The next abbot also added some books. Geoffrey, the sixteenth abbot, was the author of a miracle play, an industrious scribe, and the donor of some books finely illuminated and bound. His successor, at one time the conventual archivist, loved books equally well, and got together a fair collection. Great Abbot Robert had many books written—"too many

to be mentioned."[3.17] Simon, the next abbot (1167), a learned and good-living man who encouraged others to learn, was especially fond of books, and had many fine manuscripts written for the painted aumbry in the church. He repaired and improved the scriptorium. He also made a provision whereby each succeeding abbot should have at work one special scribe, called the historiographer, an innovation to which we owe the matchless series of chronicles of Roger of Wendover, Matthew Paris, William Rishanger, and John of Trokelowe. In a Cottonian manuscript is a portrait of Abbot Simon at his book-trunk, a picture interesting because it illustrates his predominant taste for books, as well as one method—then the usual method —of storing them.

John, worthy follower of Simon, was a man of learning, who added many noble and useful books to St. Albans' store. William of Trompington (1214) distinguished himself by giving to the abbey books he had taken from his prior. Abbot Roger was a better man, and gave many books and pieces; but John III and IV and Hugh are barren rocks in our fertile valley, for apparently they did nothing for the library. Richard of Wallingford did worse than nothing. He bribed Richard de Bury with four volumes, and sold to him thirty-two books for fifty pounds of silver, retaining one-half of this sum for himself, and devoting the other moiety to Epicurus—"a deed," cries the chronicler, "infamous to all who agreed to it, so to make the only nourishment of the soul serve the belly, and upon any account to apply spiritual dainties to the demands of the flesh."[3.18] Abbot Michael de Mentmore, who had been educated at Oxford, and became schoolmaster at St. Albans, encouraged the educational work of the abbey by making

studies for the scholars. As he also ordered the morning mass to be celebrated directly after prime, or six o'clock, instead of at fierce, or about nine, to allow the students more time, it is safe to assume he was more zealous than popular. He also gave books which cost him more than £100. His successor, Thomas, enlarged his own study, and bought many books for it; and, with the assistance of Thomas of Walsingham, then preceptor and master of the scriptorium, he built a writing-room at his own expense.

But Whethamstede was St. Albans' greatest book-loving abbot. An ardent book-lover, especially fond of finely-illuminated volumes, he indulged his passion for manuscripts, and for conventual buildings, vestments, and property, until he got the abbey into debt, and was led to resign. After the death of his successor, Whethamstede was re-elected. In his time no fewer than eighty-seven volumes were transcribed.[3.19] In 1452-53 he built a new library at a cost of more than £150. Another library was erected for the College of the Black Monks at Oxford, for £60. [3.20] It was described as a "new erection of a library joyning on the south-side of the chapel, containing on each side five or more divisions, as it may be partly seen to this day by the windows thereof, to which he gave good quantity of his own study, and especially those of his own composition, which were not a few, and to deter plagiaries and others from abusing of them, prefixt these verses in the front of every one of the same books, as he did also to those that he gave to the publick library of the University:

"In other books which he gave to the said library these:

This, in brief, is the story of St. Albans' tribute to learning. In most monasteries the same kind of work went on, in a more circumscribed fashion, and without the same distinction of finish, which could probably only be attained at the big places where expert scribes and illuminators could be well trained.[3.22]