Chapter II: The Head of the House (3)

Less famous is the name of another mighty builder, who ruled, some two centuries later, the little Augustinian nunnery of Crabhouse in Norfolk[260]. Joan Wiggenhall was (as has already been pointed out) a lady of good family and had influential friends; she was installed as Prioress in 1420, and began to build at once. In her first year she demolished a tumble-down old barn and caused it to be remade; this cost L45. 9_s._ 6_d._, irrespective of the timber cut upon the estate and of the tiles from the old barn, but the friends of the house helped and Sir John Ingoldesthorpe gave L20 "to his dyinge," and the Archdeacon of Lincoln 10 marks. Cheered by this, the Prioress continued her operations; in her second year she persuaded the Prior of Shouldham to co-operate with her in roofing the chancel of Wiggenhall St Peter's, towards which she paid 20 marks, and she also made the north end of her own chamber for 10 marks, and in her third year she walled the chancel of St Peter's and completed the south end of her chamber. Then she began the great work of her life, the church of the nunnery itself, and for three years this was the chief topic of conversation in all the villages round, and the favourite charity of all her neighbours:

"Also in the iiij yere of the same Jone Prioresse," runs the account
in Crabhouse Register, "Ffor myschefe that was on the chyrche whiche
myght not be reparid but if it were newe maid, with the counseyle of
here frendys dide it take downe, trostynge to the helpe of oure Lorde
and to the grete charite of goode cristen men and so with helpe of the
persone before seyde (her cousin, Edmund Perys, the parson of
Watlington) and other goode frendes as schal be shewyd aftyrward, be
the steringe of oure Lorde and procuringe of the person forseyde sche
wrowght there upon iij yere and more contynuali and made it, blessyd
be God, whiche chirche cost cccc mark, whereof William Harald that
lithe in the chapel of Our Lady payde for the ledynge of the chirch
vij skore mark. And xl li. payede we for the roofe, the whiche xl li.
we hadde of Richard Steynour, Cytesen of Norwiche, and more hadde we
nought of the good whiche he bequeathe us on his ded-bedde in the same
Cyte, a worthly place clepyd Tomlonde whiche was with holde fro us be
untrewe man his seketoures. God for his mekyl mercy of the wronge make
the ryghte."

The indignant complaint of the nuns, balked of their "worthly place clepyd Tomlonde," is very typical; there was always an executor in hell as the middle ages pictured it, and a popular proverb affirmed that "too secuturs and an overseere make thre theves"[261]. In this case, however, other friends were ready to make up for the deficiencies of those untrue men:

And the stallis with the reredose, the person beforeseyde payde fore
xx pounde of his owne goode. And xxvi mark for ij antiphoneres whiche
liggen in the queer. And xx li. Jon Lawson gaf to the chirche. And xx
mark we hadde for the soule of Jon Watson. And xx mark for the soule
of Stevyn York to the werkys of the chirche and to other werkys doon
before. And xxi mark of the gylde of the Trinite which Neybores helde
in this same chirche. The glasynge of the chirche, the scripture
maketh mencyon; onli God be worshipped and rewarde to all cristen
soules.

After the death of the good parson of Watlington, another cousin of the Prioress, Dr John Wiggenhall, came to her aid, and in her ninth year, she set to work once more upon the church, and she

arayed up the chirche and the quere, that is for to seye, set up the
ymagis and pathed the chirche and the quere, and stolid it and made
doris, which cost x pownde, the veyl of the chirche with the
auterclothis in sute cost xl_s._[262]

During the building of the church the Prioress had not neglected other smaller works and a long chamber on the east side of the hall was built; but it was not until her tenth year, when the building and "arraying" of the church was finished, that she had time and money to do much; then she made some necessary repairs to the barn at St Peter's and built a new malt-house, which cost ten marks. In her twelfth year "for mischeef that was on the halle she toke it downe and made it agen"; but alas, on the Tuesday next after Hallowmas 1432, a fire broke out and burned down the new malt-house, and another malt-house with a solar above, full of malt. This misfortune (so common in the middle ages) only put new heart into Joan Wiggenhall:

thanne the same prioresse in here xiij yere with the grace of owre
Lord God and with the helpe of mayster Johnne Wygenale beforseyd, and
with helpe of good cristen men which us relevid made a malthouse with
a Doffcote, that now ovyr the Kylne, whiche house is more than eyther
of thoo that brent. And was in the werkynge fulli ij yere tyl her
xiiij yere were passyd out, which cost l pounde. Also the same
prioresse in her xv yere, sche repared the bakhous an inheyned
[heightened] it and new lyngthde it, which cost x marc. And in the
same yere she heyned the stepul and new rofyd it and leyde therupon a
fodyr of led whiche led, freston, tymbur and werkmanshipe cost x
pounde. Also in the same yere sche made the cloystir on the Northe
syde and slattyd it, and the wal be the stepul, which cost viij li.

Then she began her greatest work, after the building of the church:

Also in the xvj yere of the occupacion of the same prioresse (1435)
the dortoure that than was, as fer forthe as we knowe, the furste that
was set up on the place, was at so grete mischeef and at the
gate-downe [falling down], the Prioresse dredyinge perisschyng of her
sistres whiche lay thereinne took it downe for drede of more harmys
and no more was doon thereto that yere, but a mason he wande[263] with
hise prentise, and in that same yere the same prioresse made the litil
soler on the sowthe ende of here chaumber stondyng in to the paradise,
and the wal stondinge on the weste syde of the halle, with the lityl
chaumber stondynge on the southe syde, and the Myllehouse with alle
the small houses dependynge there upon, the Carthouse, and the
Torfehouse, and ij of stabulys and a Beerne stondynge at a tenauntry
of oure on the Southe syde of Nycolas Martyn. Alle these werkys of
this yere with the repare drewe iiij skore mark. In the xvij yere of
the same Prioresse, be the help of God and of goode cristen men sche
began the grounde of the same dortoure that now stondith, and wrought
thereupon fulli vij yere betymes as God wolde sende hir good.

In the twenty-fourth year of her reign Joan Wiggenhall saw the last stone laid in its place and the last plank nailed. The future was hid from her happy eyes; she could not foresee the day, scarcely a century later, when the walls she had reared so carefully should stand empty and forlorn, and the molten lead of the roof should be sold by impious men. She must have said with Solomon, as she looked upon her great church, "I have surely built thee an house to dwell in, a settled place for thee to abide in for ever"; and no flash of tragic prescience showed her the sheep feeding peacefully over the spot where its "heyned stepul" pointed to the sky. In 1451 she departed to the heaven she knew best, a house of many mansions; and her nuns, who for four and twenty years had lived a proud but uncomfortable life in clouds of sawdust and unending noise, buried her (one hopes) under a seemly brass in her church.

The mind preserves a pleasant picture of Euphemia of Wherwell and of Joan Wiggenhall, when Margaret Wavere, Eleanor of Arden, Isabel Hermyte and the rest are only dark memories, not willingly recalled. Which is as it should be. The typical prioress of the middle ages, however, was neither Euphemia nor Margaret. As one sees her, after wading through some hundred and fifty visitation reports or injunctions, she was a well-meaning lady, doing her best to make two ends of an inadequate income meet, but not always provident; ready for a round sum in hand to make leases, sell corrodies, cut down woods and to burden her successor as her predecessor had burdened her. She found it difficult to carry out the democratic ideal of convent life in consulting her sisters upon matters of business; she knew, like all rulers, the temptation to be an autocrat; it was so much quicker and easier to do things herself: "What, shulde the yong nunnes gyfe voices? Tushe, they shulde not gyfe voices!" So she kept the common seal and hardly ever rendered an account. She found that her position gave her the opportunity to escape sometimes from that common life, which is so trying to the temper; and she did not always keep the dorter and the frater as she should. She was rarely vicious, but nearly always worldly; she could not resist silks and furs, little dogs such as the ladies who came to stay in her guest-room cherished, and frequent visits to her friends. When she was a strong character the condition of her house bore witness, for good or evil, to her strength; when she was weak disorder was sure to follow. Very often she won a contented "omnia bene" from her nuns, when the Bishop came; at other times, she said that they were disobedient and they said that she was harsh, or impotent, or addicted to favourites. In the end it is to Chaucer that we turn for her picture; as the Bishops found her, so he saw her, aristocratic, tender-hearted, worldly, taking pains to "countrefete chere of court," smiling "ful simple and coy" above her well-pinched wimple; a lady of importance, attended by a nun and three priests, spoken to with respect and reverence by the not too mealy-mouthed host (no "by Corpus Dominus," or "cokkes bones," or "tel on a devel wey!" for her, but "cometh neer my lady prioresse," and "my lady prioresse, by your leve"); clearly enjoying a night at the Tabard and some unseemly stories on the road (though her own tale was exquisite and fitting to her state). Religious? perhaps; but save for her singing the divine service "entuned in her nose ful semely" and for her lovely address to the Virgin, Chaucer can find but little to say on the point:

But for to speken of hir conscience
She was so charitable and so pitous--

that she would weep over a mouse in a trap or a beaten puppy! For charity and pity we must go to the poor Parson, not to friar or monk or nun. A good ruler of her house? doubtless; but when Chaucer met her the house was ruling itself somewhere at the "shires ende." The world was full of fish out of water in the fourteenth century, and, by seynt Loy, Madame Eglentyne (like Dan Piers) held a certain famous text "nat worth an oistre." So we take our leave of her--characteristically, on the road to Canterbury.