Medieval Church Officers

 We tend to think of the medieval church as monolithic, as a single, unified entity.  In fact, there were numerous different entities within it, as I have earlier discussed, popes, cardinals, archbishops and bishops, monasteries, shrines, houses of canons, nunneries, and they certainly did not always see eye to eye.

Even within a single entity there was a lot of difference and disagreement.  Cathedrals, for example, had a bishop but also a cathedral chapter.  This chapter had been separate from the bishop since the ninth century in most places, and the priests in it, who supposedly helped the bishop in administering the diocese, were quite jealous of their own prerogatives.  The property from which the chapter drew its revenue was different from the property that supported the bishop, and the chapter had its own elected officials who led them, often in opposition to the bishop.

 

The dean was the head of the cathedral chapter, but there were many other church officers, most connected with the chapter, some connected with the bishop.  Among the most important were the chancellor, who oversaw the chancery, where records were kept and documents written, and the provost, responsible for the land and other property belonging to the church.

(You will notice that dean, provost, and chancellor are still names for some of the major officers of a university, due to universities' origins in medieval cathedral schools.)

Also important were the sacristan, responsible for the bread and wine of the mass and for maintaining the sacred vessels and altars, and the cantor, who led the singing of the psalms.  By the twelfth century many dioceses were divided into what were called archdeaconries, with an archdeacon over each (you knew that was coming), someone who took responsibility for overseeing the various churches within that archdeaconry.

A monastery had many of the same officers, chancellor, provost, cantor, sacristan, but there was no dean.  This is because the monks did not constitute a separate institutional body from the abbot, even though the monks collectively were called a chapter, and they would have regular meetings in what was called the chapter house, to discuss issues and give erring brothers a chance to confess and mend their ways.  Unlike in the cathedral, where most of the officers were elected by the cathedral chapter, in a monastery most officers were appointed by the abbot.

Monasteries had always had schools, where boys who joined the house would be educated.  It was assumed that they would most likely grow up to be monks there.  From the eighth or ninth century on, cathedrals also had schools, to train the boys and young men of the diocese who hoped someday to become priests, although most would never join the cathedral chapter.  There was thus always a school master (school mistress in a nunnery), sometimes the same person as the chancellor.  A large monastery might have a separate Master of the Boys, someone who supervised them in areas other than their education, such as keeping them in line if they got too ramunctious, making sure they were properly clothed and fed, and arranging for them to have some exercise and time to play.

© C. Dale Brittain 2020

For more on the medieval church, see my ebook, Positively Medieval:  Life and Society in the Middle Ages.  Also available in paperback.

Augustinian canons

In my previous post I discussed cathedral chapters.  Here I discuss another group of priests, "canons regular" or Augustinian canons, who also served churches in a body--just not cathedral churches.

Canons were groups of priests who brought the liturgy and pastoral care to the broader world, as opposed to monks, where the group of religious men spent their days in isolated prayer and contemplation.  One could always of course have individual priests attached to a parish church, but canons by definition were priests who functioned in groups of other priests.

Cathedral priests/cathedral canons were of course attached to a cathedral and were called "secular canons" because they reached out to the secular world.  Many other churches acquired bodies of canons.  In some cases, an old monastery was too small and too poor to support the monastic life, so the monks were replaced by canons, who were able to live from payments for baptisms, burials, and the like, which monks (isolated from the world) did not receive.  (Officially of course one did not have to pay for the sacraments, but it would be extremely tacky not to.  Imagine getting married today and not bothering to pay the minister.  But if you don't pay him, he won't sue you.)

In the eleventh century, many bodies of secular canons (ones not attached to cathedrals) decided that the life they were living was not pure enough and thus decided to follow a semi-monastic rule.  The rule most often settled on was based on a letter Saint Augustine had written back in the fifth century, when he really hadn't had Augustinian canons in mind, but that was not a problem.  His holiness and antiquity worked just fine as a justification for them adopting his "rule."

These canons regular lived in common, sharing a dormitory, sharing their refectory (cafeteria), sharing all their possessions.  They followed a simple life of a vegetarian diet and a lack of comforts.  In this way they look a lot like monks.  However, they spent their days in parish activities.  Their elected head was called a dean, rather than an abbot.

By the early twelfth century in France, almost all urban churches were served by a body of Augustinian canons.  Wealthy urban families who might feel no connection to rural monasteries, generally supported by the aristocracy, made gifts to support these canons.  The people who lived nearby would consider a church of canons their church.  In one case, in what is now Belgium, the canons had been reading the history of early monasticism in Egypt and decided to head off to become desert fathers themselves.  They sneaked off during the night, but the distraught townspeople pursued them and brought them back and got the bishop to order them not to try that again.

Cathedral canons on the Continent never adopted any version of the Augustinian rule.  In some cathedrals in England, however, such as Canterbury, the cathedral canons did indeed seek to follow such a semi-monastic form of life.

The example of the different kinds of canons indicates the complexity of the medieval church, rarely reflected in historical fiction (including mine).

© C. Dale Brittain 2015

Cathedral chapters

What's a cathedral chapter, you ask?  It's the body of priests attached to a cathedral, who helped the bishop run the diocese.  As I noted in my post on bishops, they began as the head Christian of their region (diocese).  Administrative responsibilities meant that, essentially from the beginning, they needed priests to assist them.

By the ninth century, the cathedral chapter had gained a formal existence, with its own elected officers and its own property.  The property attached to the cathedral church, which could be fairly substantial, was divided in two, with the bishop administering half and the cathedral chapter administering half.

The cathedral canons, the members of the cathedral chapter, each received an individual stipend, called a prebend.  The number of canons was limited by the amount of prebends their share of the cathedral patrimony could generate.  Although the prebend was not personal property, so the individual canon could not sell it or bequeath it, he still had it for his lifetime.  Cathedral canons had individual houses grouped around the cathedral (in the "cathedral close") where they lived, supported by their prebends.

The cathedral chapter was made up of "secular" canons as they were called, in distinction to "regular" canons, those who (like cathedral canons) served a church in a body, reaching out to the broader community, but who followed a strict rule that required them to live in common, sharing their possessions, their dormitory, and their food.  (Click here for more on canons regular.)  Cathedral canons lived essentially pure lives, at least by the end of the eleventh century (earlier they had often been married, or at least had a live-in partner), but they did not believe in sharing.

One of the important functions of the cathedral chapter was running the cathedral school, where priests for the whole diocese would be trained.  Medieval universities grew out of a few of these cathedral schools.  Members of the chapter had almost always started as pupils at the cathedral school.  Once ordained as priests, they might be invited to join the chapter if there was a prebend vacant, and if they came well recommended.  Many cathedral chapters had virtual dynasties of uncles and nephews.

The most important officer of the cathedral chapter was the dean, elected by the canons.  He stood up to the bishop if he felt that the chapter's rights and privileges were being violated.  Other officers included the chancellor, responsible for the school and the archives, the provost, who oversaw the chapter's property, and the cantor, who led the singing in the cathedral--something cathedral canons did every Sunday, if not more often.

The example of the cathedral chapter suing the bishop--as indeed happened!--should dispel any lingering thought that the medieval church functioned as a monolithic unit.  (Click here for more on the medieval church.)

© C. Dale Brittain 2015

For more on the medieval church, see my ebook, Positively Medieval:  Life and Society in the Middle Ages.