Pilgrims and Pilgrimage in the Medieval West by Diana Webb (review)

BOOK REVIEWS107 the vast and magnificent Knole near Sevenoaks in Kent which was bought and expanded by Archbishop Bourchier in 1456 and further extended by the Sackville family over four centuries.1 The 108 illustrations provide sketches of ground plans, photographs of architectural rums, and aerial views. Appendix 1 surveys the palace at Canterbury shortly after Archbishop Laud's death;Appendix 2 gives a list of the palaces whose bishops were licensed to crenellate between 1200 and 1523; and Appendix 3 lists bishops' manor houses. After the Norman conquest, designs for bishops' palaces predictably derived from the comment, especially France. "Without exception they are two-storied blocks vaulted at the ground level and subdivided for a smaller room at each level" (p. 31). As the number of a bishop's officials and household servants increased in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, a main hall was superseded by a larger one. The site of the palace vis-à-vis the cathedral varied from place to place. Some palaces, Durham being the best example, were castles, and most palaces in design and layout were indistinguishable from those of the laity of the same social level. In the later fourteenth century, as bishops pressed seigneurial rights on the peasantry, they responded with violence, rioting, and in four cases the murder of the bishops. Thus, for reasons of security, bishops secured royal licenses to crenellate, or fortify, their palaces against the rustics. This lucidly written but somewhat old-fashioned study rests on a sure knowledge of recent archaeological evidence and careful reading of primary and secondary sources, though the author seems innocent of some valuable American research, such as C. M. Radding and W W. Clark, Medieval Architecture, Medieval Learning (1992). Students seeking an explanation of the palace and manor as aspects of medieval material culture might consult N. J. G. Pound, Hearth and Home.A History ofMaterial Culture (1989). Bennett Hill, OSB Georgetown University Pilgrims and Pilgrimage in the Medieval West. By Diana Webb. [The International Library of Historical Studies, 12.] (London: I. B. Tauris, Publishers. Distributed by St. Martin's Press, NewYork. 1999. Pp. viii, 290. $59.50.) This is a compendium of about 400 excerpts from western European medieval records illuminating various aspects of pilgrimage from c. 1000 to c. 1500. Twelve chapters, arranged in four parts, deal inter alia with penitential pilgrimage, indulgences and jubilees, problems encountered en route, pilgrim badges and souvenirs, wills, and criticisms of pilgrimage; there is one chapter on Pistoia. The excerpts, taken from a broad range of medieval documentation (private letters, charters, chronicles, royal passports, saints' Lives, episcopal and papal letters, statutes, etc.) are arranged chronologically within each chapter. Part three, devoted to English pilgrimage, includes information on Englishmen 'See V Sackville-West, Knole and the Sackvilles (London, 1969). 108BOOK REVIEWS abroad,foreigners in England, and pilgrimage within England and Scotland,with some excellent, lively material. Webb introduces each chapter with a helpful summary, setting the scene and referring to some of the excerpts to follow. Chapter 4, "Help and Hazard: The Pilgrims' Experience," is particularly interesting , touching upon some often-ignored aspects of this commonplace of medieval life, including one case that resembles a modern lawsuit for false advertising (pilgrims who had unwisely relied upon Rome's "proclamation of safe-conduct" [p. 106]). The next brief chapter, too, is one of the more engaging : "Remembering Pilgrimage: Souvenirs," contains apposite authorial comments , and sources, for the trinket business in its technical as well as tawdry aspects. The professional medievalist will probably enjoy this collection, which is a convenient teaching tool, as a stimulus to reflection rather than research. (Though most of the excerpts are in print, Webb includes some unpublished material from Italian archives.) Since the iutended audience seems to be the student interested in this facet of medieval life, one hopes that a paperback edition will be forthcoming, given the price of the hardback. One might add, to Webb's extensive bibliography of sources, source collections, and secondary works, Brian Spencer's Pilgrim Souvenirs & Secular Badges: Salisbury & South Wiltshire Museum Medieval Catalogue, Part 2 (Salisbury, 1990), and Linda Davidson and Maryjane Dunn-Wood's Pilgrimage in the Middle Ages: A Research Guide (NewYork, 1993). Diana Webb...