INNER PARLOR
A second permanent innovation adopted by the Benedictine
monasteries was the inclusion of an inner parlor in
the east range, directly adjacent to the chapter house. Although
this inner parlor is referred to by name in several
Benedictine and Cluniac customs, its function is not stated.[104]
An auditorium is first mentioned in the Farfa description
of 1043.[105]
Later in the eleventh century it is mentioned in
the tours of the claustral prior at Cluny and Hirsau.
Bernard's account of the claustral prior's tour at Cluny in
his Ordo Cluniacensis refers to a parlatorium in the same
context that the otherwise similar tour in the Consuetudines
of Hirsau refers to the auditorium.[106]
This designates the
inner parlor in the east range as a place for talking and
listening.
Twelfth-century customs outside the Benedictine order
further explain the exact use of the auditorium. Cistercian
customs describe the auditorium as the place where monastic
officials could converse privately with one or two monks,
where the prior made work assignments, and handed out
tools for the day's work after the chapter meeting, and
where the master of the novices could instruct new novices.[107]
The Liber Ordinis S. Victoris Parisiensis further specifies
that in this order of canons the auditorium or locutorium,
as it is called in this text, was particularly used for briefly
talking about any business that could neither be signified
(probably referring to sign language) nor put off until the
time of the locutio, but the Liber emphasizes that no one
could talk there without permission from a high member of
the order.[108]
It explicitly states that no stranger may be led
into this "regular locutorium" and also mentions rules for
the "other locutorium," thus distinguishing between the
locutorium or auditorium in the east range and the auditorium
in the west range, which, as on the Plan of St. Gall, served
as reception room for visitors. The auditorium in the east
range of the twelfth-century cloister is thus defined as a
place where claustral silence could be broken to discuss
necessary business. This had probably been its role since
its beginning.
Although silence was at all times considered a basic
monastic virtue it had not always been as severely enforced
as it was by the Cluniacs, the later autonomous Benedictines,
and the Cistercians. St. Benedict, in dealing with this
problem, referred to it as taciturnitas rather than silentium.[109]
He designated three regular periods of absolute silence; but
for the rest of the time only excessive loquacity was forbidden.
The same relative freedom of speech, except at
certain regulated periods, is evident in the monastic customs
of the eighth and ninth centuries. The rule of ordinary
silence is in fact so relaxed that a consuetudinary from
Corbie of around 826 permits conversation during the midday
rest in the summer, provided that it does not bother
those who sit and read in bed; should there be any need for
sustained talk the monks must simply go outside and conduct
their business there. In the same text they are instructed
not to yell from a distance because of the noise.[110]
Under
relaxed conditions like these there was no need for a special
room in which the ordinary claustral silence could be
broken. No such area, consequently, is set aside on the Plan
of St. Gall.
Joseph Semmler has pointed out that it was not until the
tenth century that the monks began to practice strict silence
during the days of the great religious festivals. This trend
toward increased enforcement of silence is true of the reformed
German monasteries, the English monasteries that
adopted the reform of Dunstan, and it is also true in particular
for Cluny.[111]
In the eleventh century men like Peter Damian (9881072),
inspired by the same ideals of reform as Cluny,
wrote impassioned letters against unnecessary talking and
forcefully recommended greater silence.[112]
At Cluny, as the
number and length of the breaks in silence were progressively
reduced, as absolute silence was required even in the
workshops, a sign language was developed to maintain the
necessary communication.[113]
The auditorium in the east
range, first mentioned in the Farfa description, provided an
area for talking aloud and may well owe its existence to the
pressure of increasing claustral silence. Like the sign language
it might also have originated at Cluny. Just as the
sign language was adopted by nearly all the later medieval
monasteries, the auditorium in the east range became an
integral part of all later Benedictine and Cistercian planning.[114]
