The Abbot and the Rule: Religious Life at St Albans, 1290-1349 (review)

From the historian's viewpoint the sources for the history of St Albans abbey lie more in its chronicles than in its archives. St Albans outshone all other English Benedictine houses in the production of a great series of chronicles. The work of Roger of Wendover, Matthew Paris, and Thomas Walsingham is not matched elsewhere. The extensive archival series of registers, rolls, and charters, covering all aspects of the life of the community and of the abbot, do not survive for St Albans as they do, for example, at Durham and Westminster. St Albans boasts some very fine registers and cartularies but very few charters, papal letters, and virtually no court and account rolls. The chroniclers, however, were acutely aware of the importance of texts and frequently included privileges and statutes in their documentation.

Michelle Still's work is a study of religious life at St Albans based on what now constitutes the second volume of the Gesta Abbatum, attributed in its final composition to Thomas Walsingham. The manuscript of the Gesta was edited by H. T. Riley in three volumes in the Rolls Series in 1867-69. Volume 2, the heart of Still's book, covers the period from the accession of Abbot John of Berkhamsted in 1290 to that of Abbot Thomas de la Mare in 1349. None of the abbots during these years was a nonentity. Hugh of Eversden, John de Maryns, Richard of Wallingford, and Michael of Mentmore were educators, reformers, and legislators. Outstanding amongst them in intellectual contribution was the polymath Richard of Wallingford, the inventor of the great clock, which he considered more important than the repair of the crumbling building.

Some corrections of detail must be made. Firstly, Abbot John de Maryns died on the 7th of the kalends of March (or the vigil of St. Matthias' day), 1308 (see Gesta ii 108 and 113) but this of course is February 23, 1309 New Style. Hugh of Eversden's succession is also therefore in 1309, not 1308. Secondly, the list of the Priors of St Albans' cells is not accurate. There are notable omissions, e.g., for Tynemouth and Wallingford, and at least two 'ghosts'; Stephen de Wittenham was never prior of Belvoir, nor John Langley prior of Hertford. This reviewer would also query the purpose of some of the maps—particularly those showing the location of St Albans and the dependencies. The OS maps of Monastic Britain are far superior. Also the map on p. 263 duplicates that on p. 128, with the one small difference that Ridge is marked on p. 128, and the key on the same page should show the liberty shaded. There are, too, some areas of the bibliography and the index (e.g., St Albans under A) that should have been tidied up in the transition between thesis and book. Chapters 1 and 2 are indulgent in providing background, but the two chapters on education and the provision of charity do add to our knowledge of the community and its activities in the half-century before the Black Death.