Late Medieval Monasteries and Their Patrons: England and Wales, c. 1300–1540 (review)

It seems perverse that the interest we have paid to monasteries in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, when they are least well documented, has always been far greater than the effort applied to them in the later Middle Ages, where the sources and building remains are considerably greater. I suppose origins have been seen as more important than natural development. This is certainly the case with their architectural study, though I am heartened that this is not what drives modern historical or archaeological research. Karen Stöber’s PhD research, which lies behind this important study of later medieval patronage, is remarkably the first substantial study of lay patronage in later medieval English and Welsh monastic houses.

The book is organized in five extensive chapters sandwiched between a brief introduction and briefer conclusions, and finishes with an appendix listing all the known patrons of English and Welsh houses by order. The first chapter, “Community and Change,” deals with the rights and duties of patrons, multiple patronage, the descent of patronage, and its application to individual orders. The second chapter deals with the various manifestations of monastic patronage in the later Middle Ages, the relationship between house and patron and the benefits that accrued to both parties, elections, and conflict. Next, burial preference of patrons is examined both against the changing pattern of late-medieval lay burial and shifting loyalties to individual houses. Then, five noble patronal families, the Montagues, the Berkeleys, the de Clares, the Howards, and the Scropes of Bolton, are examined in detail—all were patrons of several monasteries, one of which was favored by successive generations of the family. Finally, the role of the patron at the end of monastic life is assessed, the likelihood of patrons to argue for the continuance of their houses, or their unsubtle requests to be granted the same should they be suppressed.

Stöber was faced with a huge task in identifying later medieval monastic patrons because the range of documentary sources is vast. References, too, are often oblique, and survival since the suppression is very uneven. All the same, she has identified the vast majority of patrons and the descent of patronage. Showing that the number of houses with lay patrons was declining between c. 1300 and the 1530s (some fifty advowsons passed to the crown and a similar number had ceased to exist before the early-sixteenth century), and passing to a lessening group of families, she also demonstrates that what has previously been considered increasingly outmoded expressions of piety were actively sustained and encouraged by that small group of late-medieval patrons who gave lands and property, maintained contact with often small religious communities, and who chose burial in their church or chapter house. While patronage signified status, either old or recently acquired, it also implied responsibilities, and these responsibilities were taken very seriously, even against the growing trend away from the monastic life.

This is an excellent study, providing the basis for understanding the functioning of the great majority of monastic houses that were neither rich nor filled with religious long after their original foundation but before their eventual suppression. Patrons exercised a remarkable influence on their houses: their extended families often provided the monks and nuns or at least the managers. Stöber has provided an extensive and very readable survey of the later medieval lay patrons that extends our understanding of their monastic houses and their piety. It is a very real contribution to monastic studies in England and Wales.