Lindsay Rudge PhD Thesis - University of St Andrews

of the ruling of two years before, women appeared to have a choice in the way their
dedication was played out: a subsequent canon of the same council rules that a man could
remarry if his wife left him, either to enter a monastery or to live as a veiled woman
outside the monastery, and this latter option is mentioned explicitly. 17
At the end of the eighth century, the situation appears similar in Charlemagne’s
Italian kingdom. A canon of the council of Friuli, convened by Paulinus of Aquileia,
reveals the existence of virgins or widows who had taken a vow [propositum] of
continence, the sign of which was to be dressed in black, for such had been the old
custom. 18 In Italy the definitions and terminology of dedicated women appear to have
been quite clear. At the council of Rome in 743, the bishops distinguished five different
categories of religious who were forbidden to fornicate: priests, deacons, nonnae,
monachae and spiritalae commatrae. Using the distinction which seems to have been
made by councils in Francia, women were divided into those who lived outside of
monasteries, those who lived in monastic communities (monachae), and ‘spiritual
companions’. 19
From the shadowy women who lay behind these articles of legislation, then, we
turn now to consider examples of dedicated women for whom documentary evidence still
exists.
Eighth-century dedicated life in practice: north and south
i) The South
While the northern half of Gaul was the centre of government, inextricably linked
to centres of reform, the south of Gaul, the regions of Aquitaine, Provence and Burgundy,
17 Ibid., can. XVI: Si quis vir mulierem suam dimiserit, et dederit commeatum pro religionis causa infra
monasterium Deo servire, aut foras monasterium dederit licentiam velare, sicut diximus, propter Deum, vir
illius accipiat mulierum legitimam. Similiter et mulier faciat.
18 Conc. Foroiul., MGH Conc. II:I can. XI: Item placuit de faeminis cuiuscumque conditionis, puellis
scilicet vel viduis, quae, virginitatis sive continentiae propositum spontanee pollicentes, Deo emancipate
fuerint, et ob continentiae signum nigram vestem quasi religiosam, sicut antiquus mos fuerit in his
regionibus, indutae fuerint: licet non sint a sacerdote sacratae, in hoc tamen proposito eas perpetim
perseverare mandamus.
19 Conc. Romae, MGH Conc. II:I can. V: Capitulo, ut presbyteram, diaconam, nonnam aut monacham vel
etiam spiritalem commatrem nullus praesumat nefario coniugio copulari.
177