The Clergy in the Medieval World
Secular Clerics, their Families and Careers in North-Western Europe, c.800–c.1200

The first broad-ranging social history in English of the medieval secular clergy.

Julia Barrow (Author)

9781107086388, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 15 January 2015

470 pages, 3 maps
22.9 x 15.5 x 3.3 cm, 0.8 kg

'Professor Barrow's ambitious study of the clergy between c.800 and c.1200 provides an excellent framework for understanding the development of an important but surprisingly neglected group. Historians of medieval society and particularly of the medieval church will welcome this book, which provides a deeply researched and comprehensive overview of the subject but will also serve as the starting point for much future work.' Hugh M. Thomas, University of Miami

Unlike monks and nuns, clergy have hitherto been sidelined in accounts of the Middle Ages, but they played an important role in medieval society. This first broad-ranging study in English of the secular clergy examines how ordination provided a framework for clerical life cycles and outlines the influence exerted on secular clergy by monastic ideals before tracing typical career paths for clerics. Concentrating on northern France, England and Germany in the period c.800–c.1200, Julia Barrow explores how entry into the clergy usually occurred in childhood, with parents making decisions for their sons, although other relatives, chiefly clerical uncles, were also influential. By comparing two main types of family structure, Barrow supplies an explanation of why Gregorian reformers faced little serious opposition in demanding an end to clerical marriage in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Changes in educational provision c.1100 also help to explain growing social and geographical mobility among clerics.

1. Introduction
2. The clerical office, grades of ordination and clerical careers
3. Rules for life: monastic influence on the secular clergy
4. Clergy as family men: uncles and nephews, fathers and sons among the clergy
5. The fostering of child clerics: commendation and nutritio
6. The education of the cleric, I: schools
7. The education of the cleric, II: schoolmasters, curricula and the role of education in clerical careers
8. Household service and patronage
9. Clergy of cathedral and collegiate churches
10. Clergy serving local churches, 800–1200: the emergence of parish clergy
Conclusion.

Subject Areas: Church history [HRCC2], Medieval history [HBLC1], European history [HBJD]