1 00:00:02,260 --> 00:00:11,560 Well, thanks so much for this opportunity to contribute to this very interesting symposium, which I've actually been looking forward to for months. 2 00:00:11,560 --> 00:00:19,630 And I'm so sorry that family circumstances mean that I can't be joining you in real time. 3 00:00:19,630 --> 00:00:23,980 I hope this pre-record will do, which is very much in the past. 4 00:00:23,980 --> 00:00:36,280 Make two amends. Spirits of 20/20 elders speaking today about two of my great loves, Cistercian monasteries and ghost stories. 5 00:00:36,280 --> 00:00:41,440 I aim to show how 12 ghost stories written by a monk by Island Abbey, 6 00:00:41,440 --> 00:00:52,450 Yorkshire and around fourteen hundred have enormous and hitherto neglected potential for interpreting this internationally important monastery. 7 00:00:52,450 --> 00:01:02,230 It's recently been turned into two free to enter site, and I think the visiting public read can get something from these stories. 8 00:01:02,230 --> 00:01:12,700 I want to show how the stories opened up wider questions concerning mediaeval beliefs about death, commemoration and the afterlife, 9 00:01:12,700 --> 00:01:25,220 and how an exploration of these questions and the roles of the monasteries and wider society can really bring them a life for modern day audiences. 10 00:01:25,220 --> 00:01:40,340 The next slide, please. Well, 11 00:01:40,340 --> 00:01:51,410 we all have reasons why we've chosen our scholarly specialism and this man is at least partly responsible for me becoming a mediaeval art historian. 12 00:01:51,410 --> 00:01:59,720 I'm sure you do recognise him without the caption as Montague Rhodes, James the Great Cambridge mediaevalist. 13 00:01:59,720 --> 00:02:03,650 Now, I'd like to claim that I was as precocious as James, 14 00:02:03,650 --> 00:02:15,130 and it was my reading as a teenager of these apocryphal New Testament additions or his catalogues of eliminations that set me on my path. 15 00:02:15,130 --> 00:02:22,220 But no, it was his ghost stories for which she's most popular to this day and best known to this day, 16 00:02:22,220 --> 00:02:29,190 which I first encountered as an impressionable teenager in the early 1980s. 17 00:02:29,190 --> 00:02:39,920 But as anyone who's read them will know, these stories were often inspired by mediaeval themes such as cathedrals and monasteries, 18 00:02:39,920 --> 00:02:46,020 choir stores and tombs, illuminated manuscripts and stained glass windows. 19 00:02:46,020 --> 00:02:52,510 They are all very much the stock trade of my day to day work today. 20 00:02:52,510 --> 00:03:02,460 And I have the next slide, please. Well, I have to be honest. 21 00:03:02,460 --> 00:03:09,180 No, it was actually due to his ghost stories, but which he is most famous to this day, 22 00:03:09,180 --> 00:03:18,510 which I first encountered as an impressionable 13 or 14 year old one Halloween tied in the early 1980s. 23 00:03:18,510 --> 00:03:22,200 But as anyone who has read them will know, James, 24 00:03:22,200 --> 00:03:31,590 it was inspired to write his stories by a number of historical and specifically mediaeval themes being cathedrals and monasteries, 25 00:03:31,590 --> 00:03:41,280 choir stalls and tombs, illuminated manuscripts, stained glass windows and ruined Templar preceptors. 26 00:03:41,280 --> 00:03:52,400 Next slide, please. It was James who first brought to Scally attention the subject of my talk today. 27 00:03:52,400 --> 00:04:04,160 The island happy ghost stories. His transcription of them and a brief discussion was published in the English Historical Review in 1922. 28 00:04:04,160 --> 00:04:11,380 The stories are written in Latin. On Page is in a 12th century manuscript from Highland's Library. 29 00:04:11,380 --> 00:04:18,490 They dates to the turn of the 15th century and James described the language of refreshing. 30 00:04:18,490 --> 00:04:27,740 And I think that means that Latin was bad. And even a polygrapher as talented as James found the handwriting difficult. 31 00:04:27,740 --> 00:04:32,150 And looking at the leaf I'm showing here, I think you can understand why. 32 00:04:32,150 --> 00:04:45,340 And I'm rather glad it was James who found them and not me that I was spared the task of transcribing the next slide, please. 33 00:04:45,340 --> 00:04:52,030 Almost all the ghost stories are in the village is fields and lanes surrounding by island. 34 00:04:52,030 --> 00:05:01,180 It's very much North Yorkshire collection. And the store is a lend authenticity by the writer making comments such as the old people say 35 00:05:01,180 --> 00:05:08,030 and and surnames occur in the stories which were common in the region until modern times. 36 00:05:08,030 --> 00:05:16,220 As I said in my introduction, the stories provide a valuable source with which to explain not only the belief systems of the mediaeval world, 37 00:05:16,220 --> 00:05:21,610 but they also provide a prism through which to interpret the life of the violent monks, 38 00:05:21,610 --> 00:05:28,670 their relationship with the outside world, and the art and architecture of the monastery before doing any of this. 39 00:05:28,670 --> 00:05:34,900 I think we need a little bit more context. Appropriately enough, given the subject of my talk. 40 00:05:34,900 --> 00:05:43,420 The monks arrived at the island and the vigil of the Feast of All Saints in eleven seventy seven. 41 00:05:43,420 --> 00:05:52,870 The monastery soon prospered and at the end of the 12th century was regarded as one of the three shining lights of religion in the north. 42 00:05:52,870 --> 00:05:58,900 Now, the importance of bylined and the development of sister Persian architecture. 43 00:05:58,900 --> 00:06:04,630 Indeed, early Gothic architecture more widely has long been recognised. 44 00:06:04,630 --> 00:06:11,790 Our current English heritage interpretation of the site is provided via a guidebook only. 45 00:06:11,790 --> 00:06:14,310 There are no site panels, though this will soon. 46 00:06:14,310 --> 00:06:22,440 Change is, by and large, focussed on the importance of buying land in the development Cistercian architecture, 47 00:06:22,440 --> 00:06:33,000 especially in the 12th and early 13th century. It's argued that Highland's buildings show the vigour of this reforming order. 48 00:06:33,000 --> 00:06:44,330 The period after 13 hundred is given, scant attention is more or less treated as one of decline culminated in the Abbeys suppression in 15 30A. 49 00:06:44,330 --> 00:06:51,200 It's not a view I subscribe to. To be honest, the ghost stories currently all mentioned are all. 50 00:06:51,200 --> 00:07:01,840 And I think that's an important oversight. Can have the next slide, please. 51 00:07:01,840 --> 00:07:12,010 Well, that's partly because the violence stories are far from being a one off, mediaeval monks were great recorders of ghost stories. 52 00:07:12,010 --> 00:07:23,540 Indeed, by the time the anonymous monk scribe bylined penned his tales, there was already a centuries old tradition of monastic ghost story writing. 53 00:07:23,540 --> 00:07:26,260 And this is stations excels at this. 54 00:07:26,260 --> 00:07:34,930 Some particularly fine examples were set down in the early 13th century by a German Cistercians as areas of heister back. 55 00:07:34,930 --> 00:07:44,800 Now, this ghost story recording wasn't simply because the monks enjoyed a Keesing terror, a spine chilling tale of the supernatural. 56 00:07:44,800 --> 00:07:48,250 I think they may. What? Oh, I don't know. 57 00:07:48,250 --> 00:07:59,050 Rather, the stories get to the heart of mediaeval belief about death and the afterlife, the fate of the soul after death and how to secure its safety. 58 00:07:59,050 --> 00:08:06,000 Salvation in heaven. The avoidance of how and the shortening of time in purgatory. 59 00:08:06,000 --> 00:08:10,460 When when souls were cleansed of sin. 60 00:08:10,460 --> 00:08:22,430 Now, in many respects, the monastic vocation was a selfish calling, a way of securing personal salvation as a great Cistercians, 61 00:08:22,430 --> 00:08:32,320 Bernard of Clairvaux explained, life in a Cistercian monastery was an opportunity to live the unchallenged to life on earth. 62 00:08:32,320 --> 00:08:38,260 And the great buildings of bylined need to be interpreted in this context, 63 00:08:38,260 --> 00:08:46,150 in the words of the 12th century monastic chronicler William Wansbrough, the Cistercians provided for them monks. 64 00:08:46,150 --> 00:08:58,640 The surest road to heaven. But monks and nuns, I should add, weren't guaranteed a place in paradise. 65 00:08:58,640 --> 00:09:08,150 They could be tempted by sin and many monastic tale of the supernatural tales of the tormented souls of error in religious 66 00:09:08,150 --> 00:09:18,020 returning after death to make good for an uncompressed sin or request highest per services such as prayer and masses. 67 00:09:18,020 --> 00:09:24,460 Indeed, one of the bylined stories features the spirit of a labour of the Revo, 68 00:09:24,460 --> 00:09:32,690 another the tormented soul of a canon of the nearby Augustinian monastery, Newberg Priory. 69 00:09:32,690 --> 00:09:48,450 Next slide, please. Stories can also be used to explain the place of the monasteries in wider society. 70 00:09:48,450 --> 00:09:56,700 Why did nobles like Ireland's founder, Roger Timmo Brick, invest so heavily in religious houses? 71 00:09:56,700 --> 00:10:02,250 Well, the answer is that they often done horrible, horrible violent deeds. 72 00:10:02,250 --> 00:10:08,850 And as a consequence of this sin, they feared for the everlasting safety of their souls. 73 00:10:08,850 --> 00:10:20,050 Now, the cook stories also show the efficacy of prayer and specifically monkish prayer for the release of souls from the pains of purgatory. 74 00:10:20,050 --> 00:10:31,070 In many monastic ghost story, the restless spirits want nothing more than the saying of prayers or commemorative masses for their souls and pylons, 75 00:10:31,070 --> 00:10:38,090 cut tularaemia summary of its charter's detail and its landed in Darwin include multiple grants 76 00:10:38,090 --> 00:10:45,100 of land stating that these were made for the health of the soul of the hapless benefactor. 77 00:10:45,100 --> 00:10:56,470 A well into the 16th century. The monastery was receiving requests for spiritual services, especially the saying a private requiem masses. 78 00:10:56,470 --> 00:11:03,340 Now, all of this helps explain the cathedral like size of the church of Vineland, what it was first constructed. 79 00:11:03,340 --> 00:11:07,720 It was the largest Cistercian church in England and its multiple altars, 80 00:11:07,720 --> 00:11:18,040 which you can see along the East End and there in the transects and also in the nave were used by the monks with the saying of these private requiems, 81 00:11:18,040 --> 00:11:28,180 masses for the soul of the Abbe's benefactor's. And a like is often for the monks occupied. 82 00:11:28,180 --> 00:11:35,870 Very, very important role in the religious life of northern society until the very moment of its suppression. 83 00:11:35,870 --> 00:11:45,990 Membership of the Abbe's confraternity or Labour overheard, was valued by middling sorts and aristocrat since the 16th century. 84 00:11:45,990 --> 00:11:53,240 That happening to me seems numerous bequests in the 16th century also for the saving of masses. 85 00:11:53,240 --> 00:11:58,630 Next slide, please. 86 00:11:58,630 --> 00:12:08,950 Well, as I've said, the majority of the ghosts in the Bible and tales, one, nothing more than pious services so their souls can rest in peace. 87 00:12:08,950 --> 00:12:14,200 Well, one of the Bible inspectors is a supernatural being of another sort. 88 00:12:14,200 --> 00:12:21,220 He's a revenant, one of the restless dead. He takes solid bodily form. 89 00:12:21,220 --> 00:12:31,330 He neither seeks nor is appeased by pious services. The monks have no option but to annihilate is evil remains. 90 00:12:31,330 --> 00:12:41,500 Indeed, it's been argued that this corporeal ghost is the inspiration for several of the ghosts and James's supernatural tales. 91 00:12:41,500 --> 00:12:49,810 And the story concerns one. James Tanksley is a local clergyman who was buried before the entrance to the 92 00:12:49,810 --> 00:12:55,120 Chapter House Island as a very prominent and prestigious place to be buried. 93 00:12:55,120 --> 00:13:02,020 Indeed. And it is normally reserved to location, normally reserved for important people. 94 00:13:02,020 --> 00:13:12,440 Tanksley didn't deserve this privilege. Rising at night and one during the day, Ole's ultimately gouging out the eye of his former conky pine. 95 00:13:12,440 --> 00:13:20,570 Well, it's a chilling tale, but it also enables me to discuss how burial within the precincts of a Cistercian monastery, 96 00:13:20,570 --> 00:13:24,950 indeed any monastery was a much sought after privilege. 97 00:13:24,950 --> 00:13:31,850 And the graves of benefactors and monks were strategically located so as to maximise 98 00:13:31,850 --> 00:13:38,180 on the intercessory opportunities afforded by the daily liturgical life of the monks, 99 00:13:38,180 --> 00:13:44,940 such as a seeing of masses, the singing of the offices, office and processions. 100 00:13:44,940 --> 00:13:59,910 Thank you. Next slide, please. Night stairs from the dormitory to sing the night office of Matins, 101 00:13:59,910 --> 00:14:10,370 and I also imagine that many of the visitors will be surprised to learn that the island had its own same second T.S.A. a B arts. 102 00:14:10,370 --> 00:14:16,630 It's the blessed Roger who had led his community to buy land and who was associated with 103 00:14:16,630 --> 00:14:23,710 the miracle on the deathbed of the Great Northern Cistercians say already have reaver. 104 00:14:23,710 --> 00:14:28,590 Rochus Feast was celebrated by the Cistercians on the 30th of March. 105 00:14:28,590 --> 00:14:35,230 Perhaps his in-tray. It remains and relics were enshrined in the Monasteries chapter house, 106 00:14:35,230 --> 00:14:42,790 likely also the place for a cenotaph for the monasteries found Rochard a Mowbray. 107 00:14:42,790 --> 00:14:50,570 I can have the next slide, please. 108 00:14:50,570 --> 00:15:01,860 The stories also show how well integrated the Playland monks were into the religious mainstream of the late Middle Ages of their religious vitality. 109 00:15:01,860 --> 00:15:11,780 In several of the stories, the holy name of Jesus, the IHS or YHA monogram on the left of the site is its most common mediæval 110 00:15:11,780 --> 00:15:17,960 iconographic depiction is evoke all the wounds of Christ shown there on the right. 111 00:15:17,960 --> 00:15:22,240 Now, both were emerging cults at this time, 112 00:15:22,240 --> 00:15:33,700 and their popularity in northern England was partly attributable to the role the Cistercians played in the early development and dissemination. 113 00:15:33,700 --> 00:15:42,760 Another of the stories concerns a northerner who made the pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James at Compostella in northern Spain. 114 00:15:42,760 --> 00:15:46,990 And that was one of the greatest of all pilgrimage destinations of the late Middle Ages. 115 00:15:46,990 --> 00:15:56,410 And it gives an idea that people were going on pilgrimage to not just it was a kind of holiday, but to secure their spiritual salvation. 116 00:15:56,410 --> 00:16:02,890 In summary, I think they show that the late mediaeval church was truly international. 117 00:16:02,890 --> 00:16:09,050 It was dynamic and it was vibrant. And that applies to pilot Abbey to. 118 00:16:09,050 --> 00:16:23,530 And next slide, please. Well, I'll conclude by talking about the suppression. 119 00:16:23,530 --> 00:16:28,400 Wellington, the 50s, 30s. Local people were still interested in the Bible. 120 00:16:28,400 --> 00:16:31,720 The monks with the salvation of their souls. 121 00:16:31,720 --> 00:16:42,450 But the Abbey, like monasteries across the land, fell victim to Henry, the eighth disillusion of the monasteries by-lines and coming in 50 38. 122 00:16:42,450 --> 00:16:47,970 Ghost stories are more specifically the manuscript containing them provide a hook to 123 00:16:47,970 --> 00:16:55,650 discuss these dramatic events and show that the monks were not part passive participants. 124 00:16:55,650 --> 00:17:03,920 This is shown by the extraordinary efforts of the last prior Rabbi Lynch preserving tact, his monasteries, libris, 125 00:17:03,920 --> 00:17:09,590 and this has parallels other northern religious houses such as Monk Breton, 126 00:17:09,590 --> 00:17:16,040 Barnsley and Kirk Stolte and other evidence shows that this wasn't because the monks were doing this. 127 00:17:16,040 --> 00:17:24,080 First of all, Prophet, they hope their monasteries would come back one day and this became a reality. 128 00:17:24,080 --> 00:17:30,720 Six monasteries in and around London during the reign of the Catholic Queen Mary, 129 00:17:30,720 --> 00:17:34,970 while the monks who wrote Chumby, for instance, coalesced as a community. 130 00:17:34,970 --> 00:17:44,300 So did those who suffered during a is rain and a monk or simply a fact that a cop hit out at the back of a missile, he'd say, from his monastery. 131 00:17:44,300 --> 00:17:52,760 Prayers for Mary's successful pregnancy. What was it to be Mary died childless and 15, 58. 132 00:17:52,760 --> 00:18:02,570 And was succeeded by her Protestant half sister and the belief systems of Elizabeth Church were very different from those of the Middle Ages. 133 00:18:02,570 --> 00:18:08,930 There's no purgatory. There's no press with dad. And good works have no role in salvation. 134 00:18:08,930 --> 00:18:12,250 Secured by faith. No. 135 00:18:12,250 --> 00:18:23,920 But from foundation to disillusion the Bilin ghost stories of the dead, wholly and otherwise rarely do bring to life is internationally important. 136 00:18:23,920 --> 00:18:34,620 Monastery. And I'll be exploring all the themes I've talked about in much more detail in a podcast I recorded for the English Heritage website, 137 00:18:34,620 --> 00:18:42,310 which maintain in my James Ghost Stories Christmas tradition will be released at any time around. 138 00:18:42,310 --> 00:18:51,240 Now, I think. But please do contact me if you have any thoughts or questions, what I've been talking about today. 139 00:18:51,240 --> 00:18:57,240 Thanks again for listening to me. And I'm so sorry I can't be with you in person. 140 00:18:57,240 --> 00:19:01,710 And best of luck for what promises to be a remarkably interesting event. 141 00:19:01,710 --> 00:19:03,876 Thank you so much.