Constructing Monastic Space in the Early and Central Medieval West (Fifth to Twelfth Century)

doi:10.1017/9781107323742.016

16 - Constructing Monastic Space in the Early and Central Medieval West (Fifth to Twelfth Century)

from Part I - The Origins of Christian Monasticism to the Eighth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 January 2020

Michel Lauwers and

Matthew Mattingly

Edited by

Alison I. Beach and

Isabelle Cochelin

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Alison I. Beach: Affiliation:
Ohio State University
Isabelle Cochelin: Affiliation:
University of Toronto

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Summary

The practice of asceticism may represent a rupture with the world, but in the early medieval West it notably encouraged the establishment of “small worlds,” to use the expression of Wendy Davies to describe the numerous, largely cloistered groups that came to replace the social and political institutions of the ancient world. The structure of these small monastic worlds was defined, in the first place, by a way of life regulated according to written norms and by the establishment of well-defined, hierarchically organized complexes of space. Several contributions to this volume demonstrate that this twofold process, characteristic of the history of Western monasticism, emerged only gradually. It took centuries for religious experience to become equated with a disciplined way of life, let alone a single monastic rule, and for the conception and establishment of a topography specific to the requirements of monastic living to develop.

Type: Chapter
Information: The Cambridge History of Medieval Monasticism in the Latin West , pp. 317 - 339

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781107323742.016 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2020

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16 - Constructing Monastic Space in the Early and Central Medieval West (Fifth to Twelfth Century)

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