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Religious Drama in Kendal; The Corpus Christi Play in the Reign of James I.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 September 2015

Anne C. Parkinson
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Extract

A study of the persistence of Catholic practices and traditions in the old counties of Cumberland and Westmorland highlights the great concern felt by Bishop Robinson of Carlisle (1598–1616) in regard to popish practices in his diocese at the end of Elizabeth’s reign and the beginning of that of James I. The incidence of such persistence in the Carlisle diocese, however, was slight in comparison with that of the Chester diocese in which lay the market town of Kendal in Westmorland. Here the continuance of Catholic practices was typified, not only by the persistent use of sites of old wayside crosses in funeral processions, but echoed in the townspeople’s equal determination to keep the long-established custom of the performance in their town of the Corpus Christi Play.

Type
Research Article
Information
British Catholic History , Volume 25 , Issue 4 , October 2001 , pp. 604 - 612
Copyright
Copyright © Catholic Record Society 2001

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References

Notes

1 Mullett, Michael, ‘Late Medieval Piety’, in North West Regional Studies Bulletin, 1999, p. 63 Google Scholar.

2 The Register of the Guild of Corpus Christi in the City of York, Surtees Society, vol. 57 (1872), pp. v–vii Google Scholar.

3 Ibidem. The list of the Guild’s members included Sir William Parr of Kendal, grandfather of Queen Catherine Parr, p. 89; Jackson, Charles (ed.), ‘The Life of Master John Shaw’, in Yorkshire Diaries and Autobiographies in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, Surtees Society vol. 65 (1877), pp. 138—9Google Scholar; Haigh, Christopher, Reformation and Resistance in Tudor Lancashire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 1975 Google Scholar; Parkinson, Anne C., A History of Catholicism in the Furness Peninsula: 1127–1997 (Lancaster: CNWRS, Lancaster University, 1998), p. 4 Google Scholar.

4 For ‘borrowing’ of texts see Goldberg, P. J., ‘Performing the Word of God: Corpus Christi Drama in the Northern Province’, in Studies in Church History, Subsida 12, (ed.), Wood, Diana Life and Thought in the Northern Church c. 1100-c. 1700, pp. 159–60Google Scholar, n.p. 60.

5 Beverley Town Documents, pp. 266–7; cited in Goldberg, ‘Performing the Word of God’, p. 154.

6 Horrox, R. ‘Medieval Beverley: the guilds and their plays’, VCH, Yorkshire: East Riding, vol. 6. pp. 42–3Google Scholar.

7 P. J. Goldberg, ‘Performing the Word of God: Corpus Christi Drama in the Northern Province’, p. 149 & n., p. 160.

8 Cumbria Record Office (Kendal) Boke of Recorde, MSS. of Corporation of Kendal Proceedings, f. 244.

9 Mullett, ‘Late Medieval Piety’ p. 63.

10 The feast of Corpus Christi is kept on the Thursday following Trinity Sunday, which is the Sunday following Pentecost. The play, at York in the pre-Reformation period, was performed on the eve—the Wednesday.

11 Hunter, Michael, ‘the Problem of “Atheism” in Early Modern England’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 5th ser. 35 (1985), pp. 135–57Google Scholar; Collinson, Patrick, ‘Hooker and the Elizabethan Establishment’, in McGrade, A. S. (ed.), Richard Hooker and the Christian Community (Temple, Arizona), 1997, pp. 163–5Google Scholar.

12 Cressy, David, ‘The Atheist’s Sermon: Belief, Unbelief, and Traditionalism in the Elizabethan North’, Travesties and Transgressions in Tudor and Stuart England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000) pp. 162–70 Google Scholar.

13 Clopper, Lawrence M. (ed.), Records of Early English Drama: Chester (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1979), pp.111–15Google Scholar, Corporation Lease Book 1575 CCA: CHB/3 f. 28 (10 Nov. 1575); Assembly Books CCA: AB/1 ff. 162v-3 (21 Nov. 1575); Corporation Lease Book CCA: CHB/3 f. 28v (21 Nov. 1575).

14 Douglas, Audrey and Greenfield, Peter (eds.), Records of Early English Drama: Cumberland, Westmorland, Gloucester, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1986), p. 18 Google Scholar; CRO(K) Boke of Recorde, f. 219.

15 Ibidem, p. 178; Chamberlain’s Accounts, CRO (K) WMB/K f. 22. ‘pd Gowen Caslaye for paven of street whear playe was . . .’

16 Hutton, The Rise and Fall of Merry England, p. 155.

17 Douglas, and Greenfield, (eds.), Records of Early English Drama: Cumberland, Westmorland, Gloucester p. 18; pp. 218–9Google Scholar.

18 Jackson, Charles (ed.), ‘The Life of Master John Shaw’, in Yorkshire Diaries and Autobiographies in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, Surtees Society vol. 65 (1877), pp. 138–9Google Scholar.

19 Editors of Kendal Newspapers, Local Chronology: Notes of the Principal Events Published in the Kendal Newspapers (London: Hamilton, Adams & Co., Kendal: Thomas Atkinson, 1865), p. vii Google Scholar; Greenfield, (ed.), Records of Early English Drama: Cumberland, Westmorland, Gloucester, p. 51, n. 32Google Scholar.

20 Douglas and Greenfield (eds.). Records of Early English Drama: Cumberland, Westmorland, Gloucester, pp. 17–18; Chamberlains’ Accounts 19, CRO (K) WMB/K, ff. 15, 15v.

21 Goldberg, , ‘Performing the Word of God’, Studies in Church History, Subsida 12, pp. 168–9Google Scholar.

22 Douglas and Greenfield, Records of Early English Drama: Cumberland, Westmorland, Gloucester, pp. 18–19.

23 Johnston, Alexandra F. and Rogerson, Margaret, Records of Early English Drama: York (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1979), p. 390 Google Scholar; North Yorkshire County Library, House Books B27, f. 151 (8 April).

24 Ibidem, pp. 392–3; f. 219 (3 February).

25 Clopper (ed.), Records of Early English Drama: Chester, p. liv.

26 Johnston and Rogerson, Records of Early English Drama: York, p. 291; North Yorkshire County Library, House Books, B19, f. 16v (25 May).

27 Ibidem, p. 348; B23, f. 49v (13 March).

28 Clopper (ed.), Records of Early English Drama: Chester, p. liv.

29 For background to the history of this feast see Rubin, Miri, Corpus Christi: The Eucharist in Late Medieval Culture (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994)Google Scholar.

30 Shaw’s 1644 interlocutor indicated that a ‘passion play’ was at least a feature in the Kendal cycle.

31 Agreement was reached with the Lutherans on Justification at Regensburg in 1541, but foundered over agreement on the Eucharist. See Mullett, Michael A., The Catholic Reformation (London and New York: Routledge, 1999), pp. 36–7Google Scholar.

32 During the reign of Edward VI, perhaps in 1548, the Last Supper was one of many scenes suppressed from the Chester play; Clopper (ed.), Records of Early English Drama: Chester, p. liv.

33 R. Beadle, The York Plays. ‘The Saddlers Play’. Line 317.

34 Aquinas, St. Thomas Summa Theologiae vol. 54 The Passion of Christ (ed.), Murphy, R. T. A. (London: Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1964), p. 179 Google Scholar.