Writing the Wilton Women
Goscelin's Legend of Edith and Liber confortatorius
Edited by Stephanie Hollis
This collection of essays and translations brings together two closely related works by an important but little studied late eleventh-century author, Goscelin of Saint-Bertin. His Liber confortatorius (the earliest work of spiritual instruction for a female recluse known to have been written in England) is addressed to Eve. Goscelin, who may have been a chaplain at Wilton, had been Eve’s spiritual mentor since her childhood. Eve, however, left Wilton in her early twenties to become a recluse in Angers without even informing him of her plans, and in the Liber confortatorius, written in the form of an extended letter (c. 1082), Goscelin attempts to reassert and reconfigure their former close relationship. His account of the life and translation of St Edith, who was a member of the Wilton community until her death (in c. 986) at the age of twenty-three, was commissioned by the Wilton nuns and based on their oral report. Completed in c. 1080, the Legend gives a portrait of Edith and her mother Abbess Wulfthryth, and an account of the community’s posthumous relationship with its saint up until the time that Goscelin began work on it. It is (with the exception of Goscelin’s Life of Wulfhild of Barking) our only near contemporary narrative account of a late Anglo-Saxon women’s community. The essays in this collection present a closely integrated account of some of the most central and striking aspects of the two texts. The essays and accompanying translations are the result of a collaborative research project undertaken at The University of Auckland. Contributors: W.R. Barnes, Rebecca Hayward, Kathleen Loncar, and Michael Wright
- Edited by Stephanie Hollis
Other Titles in this Series
Saints Edith and Aethelthryth: Princesses, Miracle Workers, and their Late Medieval Audience
The Wilton Chronicle and the Wilton Life of St Aethelthryth
Volume 25
The Manere of Good Lyvyng
A Middle English Translation of Pseudo-Bernard's 'Liber de modo bene vivendi ad sororem'
Volume 30
Medieval Women and their Spiritual Texts: Helfta Writings, Margery Kempe, and Beyond
Essays in Honour of Naoë Kukita Yoshikawa
Volume 34
Saints’ Lives for Medieval English Nuns, II
An Edition of the 'Lyves and Dethes' in Cambridge University Library, MS Additional 2604
Volume 32
Sacred Communities, Shared Devotions
Gender, Material Culture, and Monasticism in Late Medieval Germany
Volume 29
Saints’ Lives for Medieval English Nuns, I
A Study of the 'Lyves and Dethes' in Cambridge University Library, MS Additional 2604
Volume 18
Living Saints of the Thirteenth Century
The Lives of Yvette, Anchoress of Huy; Juliana of Cornillon, Author of the Corpus Christi Feast; and Margaret the Lame, Anchoress of Magdeburg
Volume 20
The Sisterbook of Master Geert’s House, Deventer
The Lives and Spirituality of the Sisters, c. 1390-c. 1460
Volume 33
Medieval Women – Texts and Contexts in Late Medieval Britain
Essays in Honour of Felicity Riddy
Volume 3
Mystics, Goddesses, Lovers, and Teachers
Medieval Visions and Their Legacies / Studies in Honour of Barbara Newman
Volume 31
Thomas of Cantimpre
The Collected Saints' Lives: Abbot John of Cantimpre, Christina the Astonishing, Margaret of Ypres, and Lutgard of Aywieres
Volume 19
The Knowing of Woman’s Kind in Childing
A Middle English Version of Material Derived from the Trotula and other Sources
Volume 4
Virgins and Scholars
A Fifteenth-Century Compilation of the Lives of John the Baptist, John the Evangelist, Jerome, and Katherine of Alexandria
Volume 10
Three Women of Liege
A Critical Edition of and Commentary on the Middle English Lives of Elizabeth of Spalbeek, Christina Mirabilis, and Marie d'Oignies
Volume 23
Send me God
The Lives of Ida the Compassionate of Nivelles, Nun of La Ramee, Arnulf, Lay Brother of Villers, and Abundus, Monk of Villers
Volume 6
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