The Abbey Church of Notre Dame de Beaugency

Notre Dame de Beaugency was located in the center of medieval Beaugency, just yards from the castle. As you can see from the map, but also this aerial image.

Image 1: Map

Image 2: Aerial view

Around the year 1104, Lord Ralph I of Beaugency, with the support of Bishop Ivo of Chartres and Countess Adela of Blois-Chartres, removed the monks living at the abbey of Notre Dame de Beaugency and replaced them with reformed Augustinian Canons.

The present church replaced an older structure and was rebuilt in a Paleo-Christian style to reflect the newly reformed community who sought to reconnect with the apostolic roots of Christianity. Lord Ralph I likely started the plans for construction, if not construction itself. The church was started around 1140 and would have been completed by the time of his grandson, Lord John I (d.1218).  Over the centuries, wars have taken their toll on the church. Most recently, parts of the church were damaged by bombing in World War II.

Notre Dame de Beaugency is dedicated to the Virgin, but also three saints from Picardy: St. Firmin (an early bishop of Amiens) and his companions, St. Victor and St. Fulcian and St. Gentian. In addition to the abbey, there was also a school in the abbey. Today a much larger modern school also occupies part of the abbey grounds. The dormitory of the abbey that still stands was built in the eighteenth century and is today a hotel.

West Façade of Notre Dame de Beaugency:

Note the plainess of the entry. While most would enter through this west entrance, the Beaugencys had a private entrance on the northside of the church. The canons also had a private entrance from their residence on the southside. In 1104 a church council was held at Notre Dame to try to resolve the marriage of King Philip I to Bertrade of Montfort, which was deemed adulterous. Forty-eight years later, another council was held, also to resolve a royal marriage conflict. The marriage of King Louis VII and Queen Eleanor was annulled.

Image 3: Notre Dame exterior

Let us now enter through the west door and visit the church.  The red dot on the plan shows where in the church the image is located. But first, familiarize yourself with the layout of the church and some of the terms used for the places in the church

Image 4: Plan of Notre Dame

Moving into the interior, here is a view of the nave.

Image 5: Nave

The Nave of Notre Dame facing east.
All churches are oriented so that the altar, considered holiest part of the church, is at the eastern end. The church has a main nave abutted by two side aisles. This would allow movement through the church. Unlike most churches, Notre Dame is not in the shape of a cross. There is no transept or crossing that separates the east end where the canons would sing and perform mass from the west where the laity would have been. The choice of leaving out the transept may have been influenced by the fact that this was an abbatial church rather than a parish church, where there would have been parishioners worshiping in the space daily.  While the lords of Beaugency attended mass here, they could be easily accommodated.

Nave wall, north side.
Like the façade, the interior of the church is plain. This was done purposefully to reflect the canons adherence to a simple, uncorrupted way of life. Although much of the church was constructed in what was technically the Gothic Era, Notre Dame de Beaugency eschews many of the characteristics of that style. The arches are slightly pointed and the ceiling uses quadrapartite (four part) vaults (which are clear on the slide of the nave in the previous image), the windows are small and rounded. Nor are the walls or capitals (the carvings between the pillar and the wall) heavily decorated. With the exception of the David and Goliath capital, all the other capitals are not historiated (meaning they do not tell a story)and have vegetative motifs.

Image 6: Nave Wall north

Details of the capitals on the pillars running down the nave. They are carved with decorative vegetative motifs that were influenced by early Christian and Roman sculpture. Note the face in one of the capitals.

Image 7: Pillar details

Capital, northside of nave, next to entrance to the church from the castle precincts:
Here the young David uses his slingshot to bring down the giant, Goliath. King David was an
important role model for medieval kings and lords. Bishop Ivo referred to King David as an exemplar for
Lord Ralph I when he wrote to the Beaugency lord. It is not coincidental that this capital was placed on the northside where the Beaugency family entered the church. It was there to remind them of their duty to be good lords.

Image 8: David and Goliath capital

Sanctuary of the church:
The altar is situated just after the larger space that bisects the church between the Nave and the apse. Only the clergy were permitted into the eastern end of the church, as it was deemed the most sacred space. The laity was granted entrance on holy days and other special occasions. Note the four-part vaulting in the
ceiling of the apse, the rounded portion of the east end. Although not executed in a strictly Gothic form,
the tall arches of the apse do allow a lot of light into the sanctuary, an important feature of Gothic. Sadly,
most of the stained glass in the sanctuary is not original to the medieval church as a result of damage
sustained over the centuries.

Image 9: Sanctuary

The apse:
The east end of the church is rounded with a walk way or ambulatory to allow
access to the chapels in each of the niches around the apse. These chapels were dedicated to
the saints of the church and housed their relics. Worshipers and the canons could easily
visit these shrines to pray or ask for intercession.

Image 10: Apse
Here is a view of the apse with baptismal font and the relics of the saints in the gold reliquary housed in a niche of the pillar. The eastern end of the sanctuary was deemed the most holy as the relics of the saints populated the altars and spaces. As the rope barrier in the foreground indicates, even today this space is reserved for the priest.

Image 11: Apse with relics

Reliquary, housing the relics likely of the patron saints of the church: Mary, St. Firmin,St. Victor, St. Fulcian and St. Gentain. St. Firmin was an early bishop of Amiens which lay far to the north of Beaugency in Picardy (about 185 miles). Sts. Fulcian, Victor and Gentian were his companions and were martyred by the fourth-century Roman governor for refusing to recant their faith. Why a church in the region of the Loire would chose saints from Picardy is intriguing. As the head of the newly reformed community of canons came from Picardy, he may have brought veneration of these saints with him. Or Lady Mathilda, also from Picardy, may have also have influenced the dedicatory saints.  For discussion of the various accounts of the founding of the church, see chapter 1.

Image 12: Reliquary

Looking up at the ceiling above the apse: Note the four-part (quadrapartite) vaulting.

Image 13: Vaults in apse

Keystone with Beaugency coat of arms inthe vaults above the apse:
Note the date of 1239, which would have been during the time of Lord Simon II. Given the rebuilding of the church in the centuries following the Middle Ages, the keystone is likely not original to 1239.
The Beaugency coat of arms was used as early as the twelfth century and was heavily influenced by their alliance with the Vermandois family. According to scholars, the Vermandois coat of arms consisted of a blue and yellow checkerboard. As a result of the marriage of Ralph I to Mathilda of Vermandois, the
red bar or fress was placed across the checkerboard pattern. Here three circles have been added
to the red bar. The colors of blue and yellow were also those of the Beaugencys’ lords, the counts of Chartres.

Image 14: Keystone with coat of arms

View down the nave looking west from the apse:
Notice the complicated vaulting in the ceiling where the nave meets the crossing, which was added later. Although the church does not have a wide crossing to give it a cruxiform shape, the center of the church is wider to accommodate the two entry ways on either side. Later drawings show a tower or elaborate steeple over this space and the heavy piers at the four corners suggest some sort of tower or exterior feature was above the central space of the church.

The organs and the pulpit are modern additions to the church

Image 15: Nave_west

Entrance on southside to the precincts of the monastery:
As canons, like monks, sang the offices throughout the day and night, they would need easy access to the church from their living quarters. Today this door leads to the eighteenth-century dormitory, which has been converted into a hotel.

Image 16: Canons entrance southside

Eighteenth-century dormitory. Hallway with rooms off to the left.

Image 17: dormitory

Eighteenth-century Dormitory:
Individual room for a canon. In the medieval dormitory, canons may have had their own cells or rooms. The abbot of the community almost certainly had his own housing. The young novices studying to
join the order were housed in a common room in the dormitory under the supervision of the novice master.

Image 18: dormitory room

Moving outside of the abbey church onto the abbey grounds.

View of the Abbey gate: This would have provided entry into the abbey grounds. Note the
proximity of the Loire River in the top of the photo

Image 19: abbey gate

Exterior of the Abbey church, east end:
Notice the the chapels radiating around the apse. Note also the wall running behind the church. This wall continues up to the castle precincts and was shared between the abbey and castle. In the thirteenth century, the canons asked the lord of Beaugency for permission to cut an entry in the shared wall to provide easier access to the abbey grounds.

Image 20: Exterior abbey walls

View of the eighteenth-century abbey buildings and east end of Notre Dame de Beaugency:
Note the wall which continues up toward the castle and how residents of Beaugency have built right up to the wall. In some places, incorporating it into modern structures.

Image 21: Modern abbey buildings

View of the abbey from the banks of the Loire:
Flooding has been a serious issue for Beaugency since ancient times – and as recently as 2016. The village has been flooded many times. The flood of 1907 was very severe as is recorded in postcards from the time. Follow this link to see images of this flood: http://www.beaugen.net/beaugency/pgs/crw.htm

Image 22: Abbey and Loire

View of the bridge of Beaugency across from the abbey of Notre Dame

Image 23: Abbey and Bridge

Walking west along the perimeter of the abbey’s walls: The round tower is known as “the
Devil’s Tower” and was built in the thirteenth century. Note the tower of St. Firmin in the
distance, which is all that remains of the medieval parish church directly across from the castle.

Image 24: Walls and tower

Following the walls on the perimeter of the abbey and turning north up toward the
castle donjon (in background to the left. Visit the Castle under the Places Tab to take a tour). This gate leads into a modern vocational school.

The medieval abbey also had a school where the Beaugency sons were likely educated.

Image 25: View to castle

Looking through the gate at the grounds of the modern vocational school, “Lycee  professional privé de l’abbaye.” Note the south side of the abbey church to the left.

Image 26: Modern school

St. Avit of Châteaudun:

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Background:

The monastery of St. Avit was founded in the early Middle Ages. Tradition holds that it was established by St. Avit himself as a hermitage or retreat. St. Avit trained as a monk in the abbey of Micy, located between Beaugency and Orléans. He and a companion, St. Calais, decided to leave the monastery and seek isolation so they could focus on cultivating their spiritual life. There has been dispute over where St. Avit lived and worshipped.  Some asserted that St. Avit’s retreat had been in Le Perche, the area to the north west of Châteaudun, known for its dense forests and rugged terrain. A nineteenth-century scholar, however, made the convincing argument that St. Avit’s hermitage was actually on the banks of the Le Loir River.

This ancient community of Benedictine monks was dissolved, however, in the mid eleventh century. It seems that the monks had fallen on hard times and their numbers had declined to the point where the monastery was nearly vacant.

In its place, a community of Benedictine sisters was founded. The meager archeological and textual evidence suggests that the buildings and church of the male monastery were simply repurposed to serve the nuns. No new church was erected. The documents referring to the establishment of the nuns at St. Avit calls it a restoration rather than a foundation. When coupled with the scant archeological evidence, it seems that the nuns simply moved into the physical spaces and buildings that had had been the monastery. They likely found an outdated Carolingian church, but there would be other spaces for the nuns: a dormitory, a refectory, cloisters, a scriptorium, a chapter house, and a sacristy – as well as outbuildings for animals and workshops.

Although no plan of the nunnery exists, here is an imagined rendering of how the space of the convent might have been organized. This plan is based on the convent of Le Ronceray in Angers, which was roughly contemporary with that of the nuns of St. Avit.

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Like any other monastery or nunnery, the convent of St. Avit would have held spaces for prayer (the church, chapels, cloister), eating and sleeping (dormitory, dining hall and kitchens), a chapter house where the nuns would meet; a space for learning and writing (library and scriptorium); and a place to store their treasures and relics (sacristy).

The chapter house was where the nuns gathered to conduct business, including receiving gifts as well as hearing or resolving disputes. This reconstructed chapter house at The Cloisters provides some idea of what the nuns' chapter house might have looked like. Follow the link below and click on number 6 to see an example of a chapter house.

https://maps.metmuseum.org/galleries/cloisters/1/004

Cloisters were places where nuns could go for contemplation. At the center of the cloister might have been a fountain or garden. The Cloisters museum in New York has reconstructed medieval cloisters. Return to the link above and click on numbers 3 and 7 to see examples of medieval cloisters. 

In addition to the abbey of St. Avit itself, the community of St. Avit expanded to include several priories stretching from the banks of the Loire River at Meung-sur-Loire to Montfort-le-Gesnois to the west in the region of the Sarthe.

Unfortunately, the abbey of St. Avit was destroyed during the French Revolution. The nuns fled their home. After the revolution, they joined the community of St. Nicolas of Verneuil in Normandy.

Location:

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This detail from the Cassini map of 1777 shows the location of convent of St. Avit. This map is known as Cassini III. The Cassinis were a family of cartographers who worked on developing a modern map of France. For more information about the Cassini maps, follow this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cartography#Cassini_maps

The abbey of St. Avit was located across the Le Loir river from St. Denis-des-Ponts. Nothing remains of the church and Charles Cuissard, author of "Sommaire des chartres de l'abbaye de Saint-Avit," asserted the location of the nunnery was unknown. Note that one of Beaugencys earliest possessions, the church of St. John, is located just a few miles up the Le Loir.

Cuissard’s assertion that the location of the monastery was unknown and that its relics were lost is baffling given that there were archeological assessments of the site and artifacts found in the early 1890s – when Cuissard’s article on St. Avit was published. Indeed, a Merovingian tomb, containing a body was discovered, as were several other tombs. Moreover, the relics of St. Avit were preserved at the Abbey of St. Nicolas of Verneuil. Modern researchers have determined that the abbey site lays under the parking lot of a local supermarket. 

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Follow this link to a story in a local French Newspaper about recent interest in St. Avit, complete with a photograph of one of the relics the nuns of St. Avit took with them to their new home in Normandy when they were forced to leave their nunnery.

https://www.lechorepublicain.fr/saint-denis-les-ponts/loisirs/fetes-sorties/2017/10/22/une-exposition-en-leglise-de-saint-denis-les-ponts-fait-revivre-lancienne-abbaye-de-saint-avit_12600625.html

Foundation of the Convent of St. Avit:

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In the year 1045, Lord Ganelon of Montigny – a vassal of the Beaugency family – made a sizeable gift to establish a community of Benedictine sisters at the male monastery of St. Avit of Châteaudun. Ganelon provided the nuns with a chapel, rents, tithes, vineyards, the right to pannage their pigs in the forest, as well as personnel to support the nuns – including providing for a priest and donating a family of serfs.

Ganelon’s niece, Adelaide, became the first abbess of St. Avit.

The Priories of St. Avit: Montfort-le-Gesnois and Vibraye

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In 1092 the nuns of St. Avit received a very generous gift from Domina Agnes of Montfort-le-Gesnois. In addition to providing resources for just about every need that the nuns might have – land, revenue and natural resources – she also gave churches and chapels that would become priories of St. Avit. A priory consisted of a smaller community of sisters attached to the mother house under the supervision of a prioress. Domina Agnes gave two chapels (those of St. André and St. Croix) located in the castle precincts of Montfort-le-Gesnois, as well as the church of St. Victor in Montfort-le-Gesnois (one of those those pictured above?). Also included in her benefaction were the church of St. John and the chapel of St. Mary both located in Vibraye, a settlement situated  midway between Montfort and Châteaudun). Agnes also granted two other precious gifts to St. Avit: her daughters, who were to become nuns.

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As the Cassini map from 1777 indicates, Vibraye was a heavily wooded area – as late as the eighteenth century. In her donation, Agnes of Montfort-le-Gesnois provided the nuns with portions of the woods of Vibraye, the right to pannage their pigs in the woods, and the profits from charcoal burning. Charcoal burning involved carbonizing wood in a charcoal burner or kiln.

To see how medieval charcoal was produced, follow this link. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0HW4qk8dv4

Charcoal was an important resource for medieval people and used in heating forges and other industries.

In addition to the priory of Notre Dame and churches within her castle precincts, Agnes also gave “chapels” to the nuns.  While these medieval chapels are no longer extant, they may have close resembled the Chapel of St. Anne of the forest of Vibraye, founded in the early 1600s. To see images of this tiny forest chapel, please follow these links.

http://www.petit-patrimoine.com/fiche-petit-patrimoine.php?id_pp=72373_1

If you scroll down to the bottom of this link, you can see pictures of the chapel, including an interior shot taken sometime in the last century.

https://www.sauvegardeartfrancais.fr/projets/vibraye-chapelle-sainte-anne/

Image 8

As this nineteenth-century postcard records, pilgrimage to this forest chapel – and its medieval precursors – were still popular in the modern era. For more images of postcards of the chapel please visit this link:

http://www.perche-gouet.net/histoire/photos.php?immeuble=1278

Although a modern church built in the sixteenth century and devastated by a fire in 1814, the church of St. John the Baptist of Vibraye was likely constructed over the site of the medieval church of the same name. It may have been in this church that Rotrou of Montfort-le-Gesnois, a descendant of Lady Agnes, endowed a chapel and gave it to the nuns of St. Avit.  Because the medieval documents do not specify if the priory of Vibraye was connected to the church of St. John or the Chapel of St. Mary, it is difficult to locate the priory with confidence. Arguments could be made for either site.

Image 9

With Lady Agnes’ donation of 1092, St. Avit had its first priory. By the end of the thirteenth century, the nuns could count at least six priories.

The Priories of St. Avit: St. Agil

The next priory to be established was at St. Agil, located mid-way between Vibraye and the nuns’ convent on the banks of Le Loir river. The chapel that would become the priory was given to the nuns between 1112 and 1137 and was counted as one of their priories in an inventory of their property conducted for the pope in the 1170s. In 1190, however, Viscount Hugh VI of Châteaudun “at the supplications of his kinswoman Ada of Touraille [who would eventually become abbess] founded the priory of St. Agil, which he magnificently endowed.” How do we reconcile these seemingly conflicting pieces of evidence? St. Agil had been part of St. Avit’s patrimony since the 1170s, but perhaps not as well supported as it could have been. Viscount Hugh’s “foundation” may have been the granting of resources necessary to refurbish and/or support the small community of nuns living at this priory.

To see pictures of this church, with some portions dating to the twelfth century, please follow this link: http://www.saint-agil.com/tourisme-loisirs/l-eglise

The Priories of St. Avit: St Martin at Meung-sur-Loire

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According to the extant charters from St. Avit, St. Martin at Meung-sur-Loire was the next priory created by the nuns. In the same list of properties confirmed by Pope Alexander III in the 1170s, St. Martin was described as a priory being possessed by the nuns of St. Avit, indicating that this priory was acquired or established by the nuns sometime before 1170.

Unfortunately, the church of St. Martin was destroyed in the fifteenth century. For the Beaugency family, this priory was located just a few short miles from their home base. It is likely that women from the Beaugency family were educated at St. Martin and may have lived here as a nun.

The Priories of St. Avit: Fontenay-sur-Eure

In the year 1186, St. Avit of Châteaudun added another priory to its patrimony.  Fontenay-sur-Eure was created when Domina Martha of Lanneray founded the priory. She established the priory in the presence of the bishop of Chartres and Abbess Ermengarde. Martha established the priory, but also built a house for the nuns “on an island.” While this “island” is not self-evident today, the priory was located close to the Eure River. Images from Google Earth today show how the landscape has been modified. The nuns’ house could have been on land bisected by the Eure, perhaps to the northwest of the church of St. Severin in Fonteny-sur-Eure.

Martha also specified that on the day of her burial that the nuns and the brothers of St. Avit have one measure of wine. The “brothers” of St. Avit were likely the male clergy who ministered to the nuns.  The gift was approved by the Viscount of Chartres.

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The medieval church of St. Severin was likely connected to the nuns’ priory in Fontenay-sur-Eure. This may have been where the nuns worshipped. The tower dates from the twelfth century, as does part of the church structure.

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View from church of St. Severin in Fontenay-sur-Eure. Could this be the island where Martha of Lanneray built a house for the nuns?

The Priories of St. Avit: St. Denis in Vitray-en-Beauce

By 1207 another priory had been added to the patrimony of the nuns of St. Avit: St. Denis in Vitray-en-Beauce. In this year, a charter recorded that “Claire, abbess of St. Avit, who had been the prioress of Vitray, conducted an inquest concerning the rent that she requested from Geoffrey of Poncey, canon of Chartres, tutor of her nephews.” How the priory came to be part of the convent of St. Avit is not clear and a donor is not identified in the extant sources. The church of St. Denis consists of two contrasting parts: a Romanesque nave built in the twelfth century and a Gothic choir rebuilt in the year 1550 – according to an inscription on the first buttress of the choir.  The priory continued to be part of St. Avit’s patrimony and in 1621 the abbess, Catherine of Illiers helped to support the reconstruction of the bell-tower by the members of the parish, both “poor and rich.”  The bronze bell in the tower weighs nearly half of a ton and was installed in the year 1887.

The twelfth-century nave suggests that St. Denis was a community of significant size and could support a community of nuns. 

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West Entrance. Romanesque door with Dog-tooth detail. This likely was the main entrance into the church, which may have been oriented toward other monastic structures, like the nuns’ residence, to give them easy access.

Image 18

Remnant of a Romanesque wall painting. The Figure on the right is a young girl, kneeling, in a hooded habit. The figure on the left is a older man in ecclesiastical vestments. Perhaps this image records a young novice of St. Avit taking Her vows before the bishop.  Or the abbess of St. Avit making her oath to the bishop of Chartres?

Image 19

Nave looking west toward the Romanesque entry. Altar and bell tower are just behind. Note the wooden roof, columns and Supports. Large trees would have been necessary for these timbers. In recalling his reconstruction of the abbey of St. Denis near Paris, Abbot Suger had to scour the forests around Paris.

The builders of St. Denis in Vitray may have looked northwest to the forests of Le Perche or perhaps to Vibraye. Recall that Lady Agnes had given St. Avit rights to wood in the forests.

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The Priories of St. Avit: St. Pierre of Vouvray

In the year 1238, Simon of Lucé and his wife Jeanne began donating property to St. Avit in the area of Vouvray. Vouvray was located just over a mile from the convent of St. Avit – by land or by travel on the Le Loir. Early in that year they gave sixty measures of Land “among Vouvray.” In the following year, the couple donated the chapel of St. Pierre for the soul of Jeanne’s son, Odo of Bullou. In the same benefaction, they also founded a chapel within the church of St. Avit for Jeanne’s deceased first husband, Pierre of Bullou.

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Today the chapel itself is hard to find. I was only able to locate it due to a series of amazing coincidences. When I was touring the region with friends, hunting down the priories of St. Avit, we happened to have dinner at restaurant in Montlivault. When the chef came out to talk with us and asked why we were visiting this part of France in the early spring (i.e. not tourist season), we explained that we were looking for the chapel of St.Pierre of Vouvray but were uncertain where it was located. Remarkably, the chef turned out to be from Vouvray and knew right where the chapel was! We found it the next morning.

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The surrounding buildings of the chapel were destroyed in the wars of religion. It is likely that there is a cemetery near the chapel. It was in a state of severe disrepair early in the twentieth century and has since been restored.

St. Avit and Neighboring Ecclesiastical Communities: St. John of Chamars

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Property in Chamars, including a portion of the church of St. John (referred to on the Map above as St. Jean of the Oaks) was one of the first possessions of the Beaugency family in the county of Chartres.  Lancelin II held property there in the 1030s and 1040s. Eventually the Beaugencys gave their portion of this church to the abbey of Marmoutier and St. John became one of that abbey's priories.

The nuns of St. Avit had a dispute with the monks of Chamars in the thirteenth century over a causeway and fishing weir they had constructed that had caused inadvertent damage to the residents living on the banks of the Le Loir river and the monks’ property. The dispute went all the way to the Papal court and Abbess Ada was forced to destroy both the causeway and weir. (see document 25 in the document section of the book)

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The remains of the gate leading into the Church of St. John's precincts. Most churches had walls and gates to delineate their sacred space and provide protection.

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Church of St. John of Chamars. The tower and church built in the eleventh and twelfth centuries.

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Interior of St. John of Chamars. The painted apse is a modern reconstruction. The church itself was in bad repair – as evident in the image below which shows holes in the roof before restoration.

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This image shows the close relationship between castle and church. The monks of St. John of Chamars were under the watchful eye of the viscount of Châteaudun, whose castle was just across the Le Loir river. While tensions often occurred between monastery and castle over land and prerogatives, having the viscount so close did provide the monks with an element of protection.

The Nuns of St. Avit and their Environment

The nuns of St. Avit altered the landscape around them and had an impact on the surrounding environment. They built buildings for their use but also mills for their support and for economic advantage. Most of the mills mentioned in the extant sources were water mills. Given the proximity of St. Avit – and most of its priories – proximity to rivers, they were well placed to exploit these natural resources. To provide the energy for the water mills which milled grain or fulled cloth, the nuns arranged to have river water diverted into causeways. They also built fishing weirs and cleared forests.

Looking west down the Le Loir River from St. Denis-les-Ponts. Note water diverted into mill race off of the River. This mill race could be regulated to control the flow of water.

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Further down the mill stream. Note the apparatus above that could be used to regulate the flow of water by raising and lowering a barrier. Mill ponds stored water that could be released to power a water wheel, which turned a mill stone that would grind the raw grain into flour.

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To see a medieval water mill in action, watch these videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rauJq_LTMYI

The technology of mills did not change too much from the middle ages until early modern times. The Grist Mill on George Washington's estate shows how grain is processed from start to finish.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tp7nvAvuwk&t=144s

But also watch this video of a medieval water mill in Bayeux, France

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Site of convent of St.Avit looking east up the Le Loir River from St. Denis-les-Ponts. Notice how the river has been diverted and traces and ponds created.

This image from the Luttrell Psalter shows the close relationship between mills, mill races and fish weirs. Fish weirs are the basket-like objects inserted in the water to catch fish. As the nuns altered the course of the water through construction of causeways and mill races, fish weirs would also have an impact on the environment and the way the water flowed.

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Although the house of St. Avit of Châteaudun is no longer extant and lays beneath a modern supermarket, the abbey’s priories and their imprint on the environment by building sluices and mills remains to this day. 

The Castle at Beaugency

Image 1: Map of Beaugency

Image 2: Aerial view of Beaugency

The Medieval Castle:   

Because of its placement on the Loire River, Beaugency had always been a strategic site and was fortified in the Carolingian era. Sometime in the eleventh century, perhaps under the supervision of Lord Lancelin I, a wooden castle was likely erected. Given the remains of ditches around the castle complex, the initial castle at Beaugency was built in the motte and bailey formation. This means that a wooden fortress (the keep) was built up on a motte and the bailey was the community next to the motte that was protected by a wall. For a contemporary rendering of a motte and bailey castle, see the image from the Bayeux tapestry, figure 1.5 in Medieval Lives, c. 1000-1292: The World of the Beaugency Family.

William the Conqueror made particular use of motte and bailey castles in his conquest of England in 1066. Visit these sites to see images of these castles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwF8ScdOgQ0

https://www.castlesworld.com/tools/motte-and-bailey-castles.php

During the eleventh century, castles also came to proliferate in France. In addition to providing defense, castles were also a tangible symbol of a lord’s power. The Capetian kings strove to control the construction of castles in their lands. In theory, a lord needed the permission of his overlord or king to build a castle. “Adulterine” castles were those built without the permission of a lord. King Louis VI of France spent much of his time besieging the castles of lords who challenged his power or were otherwise disruptive. See the Abbot Suger’s, Deeds of Louis the Fat, especially chapters 6, 7, 11,12, 18, 19, 24 and 25 on the Internet Medieval Sourcebook: https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/basis/suger-louisthefat.asp

To follow the construction of modern motte and bailey castle, a historical archeology project, visit this site about the château motte: https://chateauamotte.fr/en/history-of-the-motte-and-bailey-castle/

The Castle at Beaugency:

Sometime between 1030 and 1060, the stone donjon was built at Beaugency. Today the castle is literally a shell of its former glory due to destruction caused by a fire in 1568 and was further demolished in nineteenth century when the entire interior collapsed. Before its destruction, however, the castle had fallen out of use as later lords built a more modern elite residence next to the tower – which is open to visitors today.

Here is a French morning show featuring the Château du Dunois. You might not understand the French, but the images provide a glimpse into noble life of the late middle ages.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgnGNHpuBVk
 

The Beaugencys’ Castle:

Image 3

This is the east face of the castle and probably gives the most accurate view of what the fortress looked like originally. Two additional levels were added to the castle through the ages.

Given the architectural similarities to other castles constructed under the supervision of the count of Anjou, the one at Beaugency may have been inspired – or even mandated – by this count. At the very least, there was a common architectural vocabulary of castles in the Loire Valley of which Beaugency was a part.

See for example, the castles at Langeais and Loches to note the similarities with the castle at Beaugency:

Loches: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ch%C3%A2teau_de_Loches
Langeais (scroll down the page to the section on the original castle or château)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ch%C3%A2teau_de_Langeais

The castle at Beaugency was built for defense. The tower was originally three levels consisting of a cellar where goods could be stored and two floors above. The first floor contained a great hall. The next level might have been additional space for family or retainers. Access to the ramparts would also have been from this level and important for defense. Both levels had fireplaces for heating.

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The changes that were made to the castle, inside and out, are evident in the walls. This exterior view shows the various types of windows that were carved into the castle wall over the centuries. As defense became less of an issue, the wall was cut away and windows were added. The architectural elements embedded in the walls, like this pillar and capital, helps architectural historians date the various phases of building.

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Looking up from the ground floor at the remaining walls of the structure from the ground level, the changes that were made to the interior space are apparent. Chimneys were added but also enlarged and elaborated through the years. Passage ways and windows were also bricked up as space was added or changed as the castle was refurbished.

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The ground floor of the castle was a vaulted area used for storing foodstuffs for the castle community. An engraving from the nineteenth century shows what the ground floor looked like prior to the explosion.

Image 7

Although mostly destroyed, evidence of the vaults remains as well as the rather grand sense of space.

Image 8

During the time of the lords of Beaugency, the castle consisted of two stories above the ground floor. Crenellations topped the castle. The third floor was added sometime in the twelfth century; and the fourth floor was added after the castle passed into the hands of the French king. The additions to the twelfth-century castle may have been started under Lord Ralph I and may have overlapped with the construction of the new abbey church of Notre Dame de Beaugency. This would have made practical sense as a mason and builders would have been resident on the site.

Evidence of the crenellations can be seen in the walls of the castle, in spite of the addition of two more floors

Image 9

Looking up from the cellar, it is possible to see all four floors of the castle. However, the Beaugency family would only have known the castle when it had two or three floors above the cellar.

Image 10

It can be difficult to imagine what the castle looked like in its original state. Here is an image that takes away the top two floors to try to show what the castle would have looked like with only two floors above the cellar. This would have been the castle that Beaugency family members living up to about 1150 would have known.

Image 11

Sometime in the twelfth century, a third floor was added to the castle. This slide provides an idea of what this might have looked like. This was the castle that the Beaugencys would have inhabited until they sold the lordship in 1292 to King Philip IV of France.

Image 12

This nineteenth century engraving gives an idea of what the interior of the castle would have looked like with three floors.

Image 13

Archeologists and historians have been able to reconstruct a likely floor plan for the first floor of the castle. The space was divided roughly between public and private. The family would have gathered for meals in the public space or great hall. The lord may have also held court or council meetings here as well. Those visiting or providing castle guard would have likely slept here as well. The great hall was also a place for entertainment, such as musicians, a traveling bard, or even acrobats. A spiral staircase connected this level of the castle to the other floors above and below.

Image 14

The private sectors of the castle were where the lord and his family would have resided. Contrary to the famous statement that the “middle ages were a millennium without a bath,” spaces for personal hygiene also existed. There was also a chapel where the Beaugency family could worship in private. The chapel was decorated and contained a Romanesque fresco of Christ in Majesty. Sadly the fresco no longer is extant and all that remains of it is a very blurry image made in the nineteenth century (on the left side of the image below). This image of Christ in Majesty was similar to those executed in religious spaces throughout the region. The region of the Vendômois is particularly known for its fresco Romanesque churches. As far as the nineteenth-century engraving allows us to tell, the Christ figure that decorated the chapel at Beaugency closely resembled the one in the apse of the church of Lavardin (on the right side of the image below). Recall that Hervé of Beaugency married Eva-Avelina of Lavardin. Perhaps the lords of Beaugency saw and liked the fresco in Lavardin and replicated it in their chapel?

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The region around Vendôme is rich in frescoed Romanesque churches.

To tour the frescoed churches of the region, follow this link:

http://www.vendome-tourisme.fr/vendome/principal/preparez-votre-sejour/voir-faire/decouvrir-le-vendomois/eglises-fresques

You can click on specific churches and then get pictures of them.

The private chapel in the castle may have resembled this twelfth-century castle chapel.
https://maps.metmuseum.org/galleries/cloisters/1/004

Recall that the Beaugencys also constructed a chapel above the eastern gate of the castle in the thirteenth century (see image 19 below). Lord John I likely intended this as a family sepulcher as his wife, Agnes was the first occupant. It is possible that there were effigy tombs like the ones here from The Cloisters Museum

Here are a couple of examples of thirteenth-century aristocratic effigy tombs:

A Lady:

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/471462

The Knight, Jean d’Alluyes, whose ancestors were vassals of the Beaugencys:

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/470599 

So what might the interior of the Beaugency castle have looked like? Unfortunately, no contemporary descriptions exist, but the rooms likely were similar in décor and size to these:

http://www.castlesandmanorhouses.com/life_01_rooms.htm#hall

The castle keep at Richmond Castle in England, from around c. 1070, also gives an idea of this space.
You can take of a tour of the castle at this link:

https://www.britainexpress.com/counties/yorkshire/castles/richmond.htm

Image 16

Just a few miles down the Loire from Beaugency is the castle of Blois. In the 1990s excavations were conducted on this site. To see what sorts of material culture were associated with castle life, follow this link:

https://www.chateaudeblois.fr/3026-publications.htm

Click on the number six, the fortress of the counts of Blois and this will take you to a PDF file with a presentation of these artifacts. This website has information about dress, jewelry and armor in the middle ages – all of which would be found in a medieval castle.

http://web.ceu.hu/medstud/manual/SRM/index.htm

As this seventeenth-century engraving illustrates, walls surrounded all of Beaugency, as well as the castle, well into the modern period.

Image 17

Remnants of these walls are evident today. These are walls just outside of the eastside of the castle. These are remains of the wall that surrounded the castle precincts.

This slide shows one of the passages into the castle grounds. The thirteenth-century chapel is above the passage way.

Image 18

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There would have been a wall between the castle and Notre Dame de Beaugency, as evident in the early modern engraving above (image 18). Recall that Lord Ralph II allowed the canons of Notre Dame to cut a hole in the wall to facilitate entrance into their abbey complex. 

Looking toward Notre Dame de Beaugency from the castle. Note the remains of the wall. This may have been the edge of the wall delineating the castle precincts.

Image 20

Like many medieval castles, that at Beaugency has a long and storied history. It embodies in stone the social, political, economic and aesthetic transformations that characterized the centuries between 1000 and 1300 AD.

Peasants and the Rural Landscape

The Medieval Village

The Beaugency family depended upon the labor of peasants – free and unfree – to work the lands of their patrimony. The lives of the elite and the common often intermingled. What did the world of those living and working in the countryside look like?

Medieval villages varied in their lay out, but the most common pattern was something that scholars call the open field system. As you can see from the various aerial photos of deserted medieval villages from the United Kingdom on the link below, peasants clustered together in villages and the would go out to the open fields surrounding their community. This allowed peasants to pool their labor and resources to farm the lands around them. The furrows, or trenches that medieval agrarian workers carved into the soil, are still evident today.

https://heritagecalling.com/2014/08/29/7-abandoned-villages-that-can-teach-us-about-medieval-life/

The villages that populated the lands of the Beaugencys, such as the one at Ouzouer-le-Marché, conform to this organization.  Note the villages that spot the landscape, surrounded by fields for cultivation.

Image 1

Peasant houses varied and changed over the centuries. Most were of one or two rooms. Houses could be made from a variety of materials, such as wattle and daub or stone. To learn more about peasant houses, but also medieval villages, access this article and video from Medievalists.net

http://www.medievalists.net/2008/10/the-medieval-peasant-house/

But what did the inside of peasant homes look like? What sort of belongings did peasants own? Follow this link to learn more and to glimpse inside a peasant home.

http://www.historynotes.info/in-the-medieval-peasant-house-3054/

In 1992, a medieval fishing village located on the Belgian coast was discovered by archeologists. Based on the excavations, many of the houses and material goods have been reconstructed. Although the village reached its highpoint in the fifteenth century – and was located far from the Beaugency heartlands – the houses and material culture can provide some idea of what medieval village life might have been like for the Beaugency peasants. Like their neighbors to the south, the peasants of Walraversijde farmed, but they also depended upon the sea. Noted medieval scholar, Maryanne Kowaleski, explores what made a peasant a peasant and the peasantry's relationship to the see. Follow this link to read this article:

http://www.medievalists.net/2015/01/peasant-peasant-peasant-medieval-maritime-peasant-lives/

Using the archeological record, a reconstruction of what the village might have looked like was developed. Like the villages in the region around Beaugency, houses were clustered together with other buildings. Note the windmill in the middle of the village. This could have been used to mill grain or pump water to keep the village from getting marshy.

Image 2: Model of excavation

Image 3: Reconstructed village

Several houses have also been reconstructed and allow for a sense of what a street might have looked like in a medieval village. Notice the different sorts of buildings – some were residences, others were used for crafts or other services such as a bakery.

Image 4: Street view 1

Image 5: Street view 2

An important member of the village would have been the blacksmith. He (or she) would have been responsible for making household items and tools, but also shoeing horses and maintaining plows. To learn more about medieval blacksmiths, read this article and watch the video from Medievalists.net:

http://www.medievalists.net/2018/11/role-blacksmith-medieval-society/

Residences themselves also differed based on the wealth and status of a peasant family. This house, for example, was the residence of a family of considerable wealth and position. Note that it is built of brick and has fancy windows.

Image 6: Large House

The interior space and furnishing also reflect an occupant of considerable status. There are two tables set in the main room – perhaps one for servants or guests, with the nice table cloth, table ware and glasses. A spacious fireplace with a chimney also provided warmth and a place to cook.

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The sleeping quarters in this house were also comfortable and bordering on luxurious. Note the nice wall hangings and curtains around the bed. There was also space to put clogs or pattens which were slipped on over shoes to navigate the muddy streets. In the left corner of the image, there is also a writing desk and quill, an indication that literacy varied among the residents of a medieval village.  There was a partial loft built above the main room that could be used for storage. Perhaps the resident of this house engaged in trade?

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Down the street from this prosperous household was a more humble dwelling – likely the home of a fisherman or farmer. Although made of brick like the other house, there are far fewer windows. Moving to the interior, note the difference in the size of the room as compared to the larger home, as well as the height of the ceiling.

Image 13

The interior furnishings of this house are also more modest. The furniture is simple and not as refined or elegant as that in the neighboring house. The bedding and tableware are also of a lesser quality – perhaps made locally rather than imported. Note also that this house has an open hearth and not a fireplace with a chimney. While the open hearth served the same function for cooking and heat, the smoke had no way to disperse making the interior smoky. It would also have been a serious hazard for young children.

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In addition to the large open room, the stairs led to two bedrooms on the second floor. Although in a space designated for sleeping, these rooms were sparsely furnished and because they were so far from the hearth, bitterly cold in the winter months.

Image 17

In addition to the living spaces inside of the home, each peasant dwelling would have had a garden where they grow produce. Privies or outhouses were also an necessity and could be found behind the dwelling

Image 18: Garden and Outhouse

Material Culture

The excavations at Walraversijde also yielded considerable material culture and physical remains. Based on a forensic reconstruction of a skull found at the site, this is what a medieval resident of this village may have looked like.

Image 19: Peasant

Artifacts that would have graced the kitchens and tables of this village were discovered:

Image 20: Pots

Shoes were also found. A set of medieval eye glasses were also uncovered at the site. Perhaps these were used by the wealthy peasant as she or he recorded the goods that had been traded or sold? These would have been a very unusual item and likely possessed by a resident of considerable means.

Image 21: Shoes and Glasses

What did a medieval peasant wear? Follow this link to see a video about a ploughman – a peasant who made his living ploughing fields – dressed at the end of the Middle Ages.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNAMbRt5eI8

To learn about what a peasant woman might have worn, watch this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ibj7GsfsCpI

Artifacts reflecting peasant piety were also discovered at this site. Much like modern day travelers, medieval pilgrims purchased mementos of their journey. Most popular were pilgrimage badges made out of lead that represented the pilgrimage site visited. Small flasks containing holy water or oil could also be purchased. Most simple of all is the scallop shell, a symbol of a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostella, that has holes drilled it in so that the pilgrimage could display the proof that they had made the pilgrimage.

To learn more about peasant piety and how they may have worshiped, read this article
http://www.medievalists.net/2010/12/how-medieval-peasants-prayed-research-from-sweden/

Image 22: Pilgrimage Badges

The youngest residents of the village were also represented in the archeological record. Cradles and toys were found among the remains of Walraversijde. Image 23 shows a reconstructed cradle with a rattle attached. There were also sticks for a medieval version of hockey, a walker for a toddler and behind it stilts for an older child.

Image 23: Toys

The Rural Landscape

Medieval Villages existed in a wider, rural landscape. This landscape was populated with bridges, water mills, forges, ovens, granges, tithes barns and windmills. All of these structures play an important role in the agricultural world of the middle ages.

The bridge was an important, and unique, feature of Beaugency. It provided a vital artery across the Loire and was one of a handful of bridges along the river. As the engraving shows, part of the bridge near to the town was a draw bridge that could be used to defend Beaugency. The charter evidence also indicates that there was a mill and chapel situated on the bridge as well – both of which were fairly common for larger medieval bridges.

Image 24: engraving of bridge

This early modern engraving of the bridge further upstream at Orléans provides an idea of the multi-purpose function of a bridge. Note the mill on the bridge, with the mill wheel to the right. On the left of the mill, down by the water, you can see the controls for the sluice, as well as a fish weir. Constructing mills on bridges was an efficient use of resources and space.

Image 25: Orleans Bridge Engraving

Mills were also very important resources. Water mills required altering the medieval landscape to construct mill races and sluices to control the flow of water so that the water could be diverted to mobilize the water wheel. The wheel was hooked up to various gears that would turn a mill stone so that grain could be milled. To learn how the nuns of St. Avit utilized mills, visit St. Avit under the Places tab on the website

To see how a water mill works, watch these videos. The medieval water mill would have had the wheel, gears and other mechanisms fashioned from wood rather than metal, however.  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rauJq_LTMYI

The technology of mills did not change too much from the middle ages until early modern times. The Grist Mill on George Washington's estate shows how grain is processed from start to finish.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tp7nvAvuwk&t=144s

But also watch this video of a medieval water mill in Bayeux, France

Slide 26 with video of water mill

Recall that the nuns of St. Avit had a protracted dispute with the neighboring monks at Chamars over their construction of a cause way and weir that altered the flow of the water and caused damage to the monks’ property. The illustration below from the Luttrell Psalter shows a mill, but also a fish weir (the conical shaped device that was used to catch fish as the swam up the mill race.

Image 26: Mill_Luttrell_Psalter

Windmills served a similar function. Instead of using the power of running water, however, the wind would power the sails of the mill, which would turn the gears attached to the millstone to grind grain. The Beaucerain plane just north of Beaugency is especially windy and the site of many medieval – and modern – windmills. (see figure 1.12a and b in chapter 1) In areas where there was not sufficient running water to power a water mill – like the Beaucerain plain – windmills could be employed to serve the same function as a water mill.

Image 27: Medieval Windmill

Windmills were built on turnstiles so that they could be turned into the wind to optimize power. This old film shows how a medieval windmill would have worked. Windmills were an important feature – and necessary to the milling of grain – far into the modern period.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9Jg1xuw8Uk&t=8s

The Netherlands is famous for its windmills, which were used to pump water to create arable land. Many of those build in the pre modern era stand today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9O6QvXIGHFk

Some are also used to mill grain, as evident in this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_xdmzvCSw8

Like grain, grapes also had to be processed into wine. Human labor was used to break down the grapes, as evident in many manuscript illustrations. Visit this link on Medivalists.net that has images of peasant labor through the year. The image for October shows a peasant stomping on grapes in a large vat.

http://www.medievalists.net/2014/06/year-medieval-farm/

But there were also mechanical wine presses that were employed. These too were valuable objects and often controlled by lords.  When Bernard of Dangeau and the monks of St. Trinité of Vendôme got into a dispute over a winepress, Bernard seized it and took it to his castle. Shortly afterward, Bernard’s brother drowned, which he – and the monks – ascribed to his bad behavior over the winepress and Bernard made restitution. This incident demonstrates what a valuable asset a winepress could be.

For the history of the wine press, please follow this link:
http://www.wikiwand.com/en/History_of_the_wine_press

A medieval winepress was recently discovered in Armenia:
https://allinnet.info/history/medieval-wine-press-facility-discovered-in-yeghegnadzor/

When peasants harvested their crops, they needed a place to store their goods. Barns were erected all over Western Europe for this purpose. Many tithe barns have survived. These were places where lords – frequently the church – could store gran and crops. This image is of a tithe barn at the Templar Commanderie at Arville, west of Châteaudun. The Templars, like other clergy, would have collected tithes for their support.

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The size of this barn suggests that the members of this ecclesiastical community collected and used a significant amount of resources. The building itself is remarkable and a significant undertaking. More modest tithe barns were also used, like this one just north of Tours near Meslay.

Image 31

Granges were another feature of the rural landscape. A grange was an enclosed agricultural community that usually started out as a priory of an abbey and hence was home to a community of monks. Located about fifteen miles north of Ouzouer-le-Marché was the grange at Nottonville. Monks from the abbey of Marmoutier built, inhabited and controlled this grange. Granges were established as an outpost in an undeveloped or underdeveloped area. The monks and their peasants would then work the land and develop its agricultural potential.

Image 32

The monks of Marmoutier also controlled the grange at Meslay. Much of the grange’s medieval past remains today, although the grange is now used as an event site. However, you can take a tour and see some of the medieval buildings.

Follow this link to take a tour of the grange:

http://www.meslay.com/Apage6.htm

Click on this link to read about its history:

http://www.meslay.com/Apage2.htm

As they traveled about the region of the Loire, the Beaugencys would have encountered these structures and have been familiar with the rural landscape. They and their peers depended upon the labor of peasants to work the rich lands to provide the foodstuffs and products that they would need to survive. The region that the Beaugency family called home was agriculturally rich and diverse. The aristocracy oversaw the exploitation of these resources and were protective of their control of such assets as water mills, winepresses, windmills, ovens, agricultural produce and land.

A Walk about Beaugency

Much of medieval Beaugency exists today. To get a sense of the scope of the village and the relationship of sites to each other, this site will take you on a walk around Beaugency. Sites to be visited are on the map below and the route indicated by red arrows. The tour will essentially go west along the Loire, then north up to the Tavers Gate, east toward the castle and church, then north through the residential district, then west to the market and St. Sepulcher, end up along the eastern twelfth-century wall and ending at the Loire.

Image 1: Map

We will approach Beaugency from the east side bridge. You can see the bridge, the castle tower, as well as the towers of Notre Dame de Beaugency and St. Firmin.

Image 2: Beaugency view

Crossing the bridge, you arrive on the banks of the Loire by the bridge. The Beaugency bridge was an important resource for its lords and one of the few bridges across the Loire. It was bombed in World War II precisely because it provided a route east for the Germans. This is a view of the bridge (looking east), much of which was built in the middle ages but rebuilt after World War II.

Image 3: Beaugency Bridge.

Beaugency, like most medieval towns, was a walled. The walls were rebuilt twice in the middle ages. If you were coming into medieval Beaugency via the bridge you would have passed through a gate to get into the city. The walls ran along the side of the Loire river and had towers at strategic points, as you can see from this image:

Image 4: Tour Diable and wall

Following where the wall would have been along the Loire, you will eventually turn up the hill (north). Gates, like the Tavers Gate pictured here, pierced the walls and allowed control of who could enter Beaugency. Today the green space provides a place for elementary students to exercise and play

Image 5: Tavers Gate and children

Walking through the Tavers gate going into town, you will find the Hôtel Dieu on the left and then the remaining tower of the parish church of St. Firmin

Image 6: Hotel Dieu

Image 7: St. Firmin tower

Standing by the tower of St. Firmin, the castle and Notre Dame de Beaugency are in view.

Image 8: Castle and Notre Dame

Image 9: Front of Castle and Notre Dame

In the middle ages, the castle and cathedral were surrounded by a wall that demarcated their precincts. Remember that a lord of Beaugency had to negotiate with the abbey about maintaining the wall and then altering it to provide an entrance into the abbey precincts.

Walking straight ahead between the castle and church, there is a passage that goes through the oldest medieval wall that surrounded castle and the abbey church. Above this passage is the Chapel of St. George built in the thirteenth century as a family chapel.

Image 10: passage

As you walk through the passage, this is a view of the entry into the castle grounds with the chapel above the passage. Note the stained glass lancet window above.

Image 11: looking back at chapel

Continuing north along the eleventh-century wall, you can hear the sound of running water. Medieval Beaugency had seven mills within its twelfth-century walls. In order for these mills to work, water had to be diverted. On the map of Beaugency you can see a canal and pond in the eastern side of the village. This may have been the “industrial” zone of the medieval city where flour was milled. A tannery, where animal hides were processed was also located to the south by the river. Tanning was a smelly business that used animal urine to treat the hides. They also require a lot of water. Hence tanneries tend to be located far from the center of town.

In addition to water for manufacturing and trades, the residents of Beaugency also required water for drinking and household use. Scattered through Beaugency are wells used for just this purpose.

Image 12: Well

Heading back into the portions of the village enclosed by the eleventh-century walls, you would pass by houses, including those of merchants as they would be located near the market place. This house has been labelled the “House of the Templars” although it’s unlikely a Templar ever lived here. It does give an idea of a twelfth-century townhouse, however.

Image 13: House of Templars

Like the residences of nobles, the homes of urban dwellers also changed over the course of the middle ages. Here is an example from Beaugency, just a few streets over from the House of the Templars. Note this house is built from timber, as compared to stone from the earlier house. Timber framed houses were common in urban centers throughout the middle ages and part of the reasons that cities were so susceptible to fires.

Image 14: Late medieval house

By the Renaissance, houses could be quite ornate and were built of stone. Here is an example from Beaugency that currently houses the offices of the town’s mayor. This was obviously a residence built for a wealthy individual or family.

Image 15: Mairie

Walking past the House of the Templars, continue through the eleventh-century walls of Beaugency toward the newer areas of town. Soon you will come to the Square of the Martyrs, where the new market was held. The square bears this name because it was built next to the cemetery of St. Sepulcher, indeed perhaps over parts of the old burial ground. It is still used as a market place today, as this image shows.

Image 16: Market Square

As you walk north through the market place, you will find the church of St. Sepulcher. This church was built in the eleventh century by Lord Lancelin II of Beaugency. It was named after the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem and likely housed a round tomb in imitation of Christ’s tomb in Jerusalem in its interior, perhaps at the crossing of the name and transept. It became a priory of the abbey of St. Trinité of Vendôme. The Beaugencys would have been familiar with this church and visited it quite often. It is also possible that members of the Beaugency family were buried here until the family chapel, which was also to serve as a necropolis for the Beaugencys, was built in the thirteenth century in the castle grounds.

Image 17: St Sepulcher_exterior

Today St. Sepulcher acts as a community center, where exhibits are put on. It is no longer used as a sacred space, which accounts for the couch in the middle of the church’s nave.

Image 18: St. Sepulcher_interior

If you were walking through medieval Beaugency, you would see gardens across from the church of St. Sepulcher. This is what a medieval garden in Beaugency might have looked like.

Image 19: Medieval Garden

Gardens were scattered throughout medieval towns and villages. (See map for location of some medieval gardens in Beaugency). Some gardens were reserved for lords or monks, others were common allotments where residents grew their own vegetables (much like modern community gardens or allotments). Medieval scholars have become interested in medieval gardens and many have been reproduced at historic sites across Europe. Plants – for both eating and medical purposes - were cultivated on raised beds. Gardens could also include the cultivation of fruit, as you can see the grapevines growing along the wall of this medieval garden.

Image 20: Beds and Vines

One would also find orchards in urban areas as you can see from the map there was an orchard across from St. Sepulcher. Near the orchard – perhaps located amongst the trees -- was a dovecote or a place to keep birds for consumption, much like a chicken coop. In addition to the human occupants of Beaugency, the streets and yards would also have been populated with fowl (chickens, ducks and geese), pigs, cows, mules and horses. Streets could get quite messy and it was the dung-collectors job to collect the manure and dispose of it -- likely to be used as fertilizer in the gardens and orchards.

Heading north toward the Vendômoise gate, you will now follow the twelfth-century wall to the east and then south going toward the river. As you can see from the image here, much of the wall remains. Modern residents of Beaugency have adapted to it and adapted it for their own purposes.

Image 21: Twelfth century wall

Continuing south, you come to the Loire river once again; back where you started the tour. Beaugency remains a quaint and thriving village today; one that is very proud of its medieval past.

Image 22: Loire

CHAPTER ONE: THE BEAUGENCYS AND THE WORLD AROUND THEM

To explore various aspects of the lives of the Beaugencys and the world around them, go to the Places Tab to take tours of the castle, the rural landscape, the patrimony of St. Avit of Châteaudun, and the village of Beaugency.

Websites: Beaugency

To get a sense of the layout of Beaugency, watch this YouTube video. The video starts by crossing over the medieval bridge from the west and then provides an aerial view of Beaugency. You can get a sense of the landscape around the village.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WB4Qu5pMinQ

Here is a link to a French morning show that showcased Beaugency, particularly the early modern château next to the tower at Beaugency.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgnGNHpuBVk

Modern Beaugency:

Beaugency was the site of the surrender of 20,000 German troops in World War II. This video captures the surrender. You can see the tower of castle and that of St. Firmin in the background. The surrender itself seems to have taken place on the destroyed bridge, which had been bombed by Allies in 1944 in pursuit of the Germans. The German prisoners of war were kept in a fenced in area just outside the walls of the towns of Beaugency

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycnYjDiKPw4

Here is another video that is a bit less fuzzy, but without sound:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b5iGub5dw4

To get a sense of Beaugency in more modern times, take a look at these old post cards. Flooding has always been an issue for Beaugency – as recently as 2016. The flood of 1907 was particularly severe:

http://www.beaugen.net/beaugency/pgs/crw.htm

Websites: Medieval Life

For an entertaining introduction to life in the middle ages told by a member of Monty Python, who is also a medieval scholar, check out Terry Jones’ Medieval Lives. Some of these shows are available on YouTube.

The Luttrell Pslater contains many images of daily life in the middle ages. This site from the British Library provides information about the manuscript, but if you go to the bottom of the page you can click on “see more of the Luttrell Pslater on Turning pages” to be able to page through the entire pslater.

https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/the-luttrell-psalter

The BBC has developed a website that provides useful information about everyday life in the middle ages (although it is aimed at children). There are clear diagrams and information about life in a castle and village, as well as the church:

https://www.bbc.com/bitesize/guides/zm4mn39/revision/6

To get a sense about how castle architecture changed, visit this site on the château of Blois:
http://en.chateaudeblois.fr/2370-the-historic-periods.htm

This video provides information on how castles, particularly those in England were built:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pu3O70GeQFY

Merchants were an important part of medieval society – and in Beaugency as well. Here is a video on the life of a medieval merchant.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1MNW4TR2zo

As the economy changed and more became engaged in trade, towns began to grow and flourish. This website from the British Library contains lush images of medieval towns, but also good information about these urban centers.

https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/inside-the-walls-exploring-towns-in-the-middle-ages

The change from a subsistence economy to a cash economy was a profound transformation in the middle ages and led to the rise of the merchants. Coinage was key to this change. This video provides information about the minting of medieval coins:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGsc2TeeAkg

This video demonstrates how medieval pennies were made in the eleventh century:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgGSybQZyps  

This article provides information about one of the medieval trade: cloth. The sale of cloth was an important feature of the medieval economy.

http://www.medievalists.net/2018/09/working-in-the-middle-ages-the-medieval-clothier/

Although discussing late medieval England, this video provides a nice overview of London merchants and their homes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2ItHzJtrLQ

The Landscape around and within Beaugency

The medieval rural landscape was populated with many structures: houses, granges, barns, mills, winepresses, ovens, wells, etc.. Here are links to some of these structures:

Water Mills:

To see how a water mill works, watch these videos. The medieval water mill would have had the wheel, gears and other mechanisms fashioned from wood rather than metal, however. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rauJq_LTMYI

The technology of mills did not change too much from the middle ages until early modern times. The Grist Mill on George Washington's estate shows how grain is processed from start to finish.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tp7nvAvuwk&t=144s

Windmills served a similar function. The Beaucerain plane just north of Beaugency is especially windy and the site of many medieval – and modern – windmills. In areas where there wasn’t a running water feature – like the Beaucerain plain – windmills could be employed and serve the same function as a water mill.

Windmills were built on turnstiles so that they could be turned into the wind to optimize power. This old film shows how a medieval windmill would have worked.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9Jg1xuw8Uk&t=8s

The Netherlands is famous for its windmills, which were used to pump water to create arable land. Many of those build in the pre modern era stand today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9O6QvXIGHFk

Some are also used to mill grain, as evident in this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_xdmzvCSw8

Like grain, grapes also had to be processed into wine. Human labor was used to break down the grapes, as evident in many manuscript illustrations. But there were also mechanical wine presses that could be used.

For the history of the wine press, please follow this link:
http://www.wikiwand.com/en/History_of_the_wine_press

A medieval winepress was recently discovered in Armenia:
https://allinnet.info/history/medieval-wine-press-facility-discovered-in-yeghegnadzor/

Winepresses have long been a feature of civilization. One has been recently found in Israel:

Granges were another feature of the rural landscape. A grange was an enclosed agricultural community that often started out as a priory of an abbey and hence was home to a community of monks. Monks from the abbey of Marmoutier built, inhabited and controlled granges at Nottonville and Meslay.

To tour the grange at Meslay, follow this link.

http://www.meslay.com/Apage6.htm

Click on this link to read about its history:

http://www.meslay.com/Apage2.htm

Study questions:

1. Using figures 1.1, 1.2 and 1.3, describe and analyze the social orders. How did they change throughout time and through artistic depictions? What could have caused these changes? How did the social orders interact with the spaces of Beaugency?
2. What was the function of a medieval castle? Why did lords build castles and fortresses? How is this evident in the castle at Beaugency? What were the main functions of the rooms and spaces in the castle in Beaugency?
3. What are charters and how might they be used in the everyday setting of medieval Beaugency? How could they be used now as historical documents? What might they tell us about contemporary life?
4. What was the “feudal revolution?” Do historians seem to agree on its concept? Is it true of Beaugency and applicable to its society? How has the historiography of this topic changed and developed?
5. Describe the role of the church in Beaugency. To which saints was the church dedicated? Why? How do saints play a role in personal and communal identity? What effects could have come from pilgrimage?
6. What are saints' lives and what are the challenges of using them to reconstruct the past? How can they be useful sources for historians?
7. How was the marketplace an equalizer of the social orders? What types of economic exchange happened at the marketplace? Describe the birth of a profit economy in Beaugency.
8. How would you describe the region surrounding Beaugency? What types of crops were grown in the area? Which natural resources could they utilize to their advantage? How might these resources affect life inside the walls of Beaugency?

CHAPTER TWO: BEAUGENCY FAMILY LIFE

To explore where the Beaugencys lived, go to the Places Tab to take a tour their castle.

Websites:

The Beaugency family lived in their castles. This video provides an overview of life in a medieval castle:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PejJGGJKZiw

Lucy Worsley, the curator of Royal Palaces in Britain, has a four part series on the history of domestic spaces through the ages. She considers four rooms: the bathroom, the bedroom, the living room and the kitchen. These videos are available on Amazon and Youtube.

Most aristocrats were born in the family castle. For images and discussion of medieval childbirth, visit this page:

https://sarahpeverley.com/tag/childbirth/

Helen Castor, a medieval historian, provides an overview of medieval life, in this video. She discusses birth, life and death.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLvwsetzu4kXgWnsvJwRA1dnI3cJzmxOmT

For a humorous interpretation of growing up in a medieval castle, watch this video from the BBC:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVMvl05hCrI

Medieval childhood has an extensive historiography, with most recent works pushing back against Philippe Ariès outmoded thesis. For a summary of these arguments and discussion of medieval playtime, follow this link:

https://www.historytoday.com/archive/medieval-childhood-games-frontiers

This short abstract of an article in British Archeology on Medievalists.net also provides some useful information about medieval toys.

This website provides links to sites with information and images of medieval toys.
http://www.larsdatter.com/toys.htm

What did the Beaugencys and their peasants eat? This website gives an overview of the medieval diet:

https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/the-medieval-diet

For a discussion of the experiences of medieval women, visit this website from the British Library:
https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/women-in-medieval-society

Aristocratic women were responsible for educating their children. This blog about medieval manuscripts contains some images of pslaters – which medieval mothers used to help teach their children to read – and a discussion of women and their books.

https://blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanuscripts/2014/03/the-books-of-remarkable-women.html

Marriage was an important moment in the life of a medieval aristocrat. This article offers an overview of medieval marriage.

http://www.medievalists.net/2013/11/love-and-marriage-medieval-style/

Noted historian Ruth Mazo Karras offers her view on medieval marriage on this podcast:
http://www.medievalists.net/2019/02/medieval-marriage-ruth-mazo-karras/

What did medieval women wear? Follow this link to a video about what women in twelfth century wore and how they dressed:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Un5ipTjDms

What did medieval people eat? Watch this video to find out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeVcey0Ng-w

Life in the middle ages was fraught with many physical dangers, most particularly illness and injury. This website contains some images of medical treatises, but also explains medicine and treatment in the middle ages.

https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/medicine-diagnosis-and-treatment-in-the-middle-ages

As is true for the modern era, medieval people also had physical and mental disabilities. The website “In the Middle” contains scholarly articles and discussions about disability in the middle ages.

http://www.inthemedievalmiddle.com/2010/02/medieval-disability-studies.html

Death was also very much a family affair. To learn about medieval attitudes toward death, and how death affected the living, read this article from the British Library:

https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/death-and-the-afterlife-how-dying-affected-the-living

Study Questions:

1. How and why has the interpretation/historiography of pre-modern family life changed?  What interpretation does the author offer? How is her interpretation informed by the historiography of this topic?
2. What are the challenges of investigating medieval aristocratic private life?
3. What were some of the dangers presented to young children around the castle? How did this influence the way they were raised? How did parents care for their children?
4. How did gender shape the lives of medieval aristocrats?
5. By whom were children taught or fostered? What aspects influenced how, where, and what they were taught (gender, intended profession, etc.)? Did children raised away from the family receive beneficial opportunities for advancement or were they at a disadvantage? How so?
6. What was chivalry? How were the Arthurian Romantic ideals of chivalry intertwined with knighthood? What does this say about societal expectations and the relationships between the social orders? Describe its association with courtly love; was this a fictitious construction or a demonstration of reality?
7. What political and social motivations were enacted in the contracting of marriages? How did affection play a role in medieval marriages? What processes did couples go through in marriage? What laws were there regarding marriage? What role did the church play?
8. What do the experiences of the three couples examined tell us about married life among the Beaugencys? What made the marriages successful or unsuccessful?
9. How did the Beaugencys handle inheritance? Who could inherit? What types of things could be inherited? What do these traditions say about family life in the Middle Ages?
10. What role did family play throughout the life course of a member of the Beaugency family?

CHAPTER THREE: “THOSE WHO FOUGHT”: MEDIEVAL LORDSHIP

Castles were central to lordship. To explore the castle at Beaugency, go to the Places Tab to take a tour their castle.

Websites:

Lordship and Warfare:

The power of lords was affected by the power of the French monarchy. This video shows how the borders of France, and the power of the king, ebbed and flowed over the middle ages:

http://www.medievalists.net/2018/12/how-the-borders-of-france-changed-in-the-middle-ages/

Medieval lords were warriors, charged with fighting for their lord and protecting their lands. Modern audiences continue to be fascinated by medieval knights. The History Channel has debuted a program “Knight Fight” about medieval knights and warfare. This blog from Medievalists.net provides a useful critique of this program, as well as important points about what we think we know about medieval warfare:

http://www.medievalists.net/2019/02/the-history-channels-knight-fight-how-historically-accurate-is-it/

To learn more about medieval warfare – particularly that of the Norman conquest – this website from British Heritage has some useful information:
https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/learn/story-of-england/medieval/war/

If you would like to learn more about medieval warfare, this page from Medivalists.net has an extensive bibliography with links to articles but also videos. For example, there is a video of a modern reconstruction of a trebuchet and how it works.

 http://www.medievalists.net/2009/12/medieval-warfare/

How might the Beaugency lords have been armed? Watch this video to find out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ofqIc1g1nI

Women were also lords in the middle ages. In this article, noted historian Helen Nicholson discusses medieval aristocratic women and their defense of castles:

http://www.medievalists.net/2019/01/la-damoisele-del-chastel-womens-role-in-the-defence-and-functioning-of-castles-in-medieval-writing-from-the-twelfth-to-the-fourteenth-centuries/

Castles:

Castles were key to lordship. They served as defensive sites, but also residences and centers of justice. Follow this link to view some French medieval castles:

http://www.medievalists.net/2014/07/top-10-medieval-castles-france/

Archeology has provided an abundance of information about life in a medieval castle. Here is an interview with an archeologist specializing in medieval castles:
http://www.medievalists.net/2013/09/interview-with-matthew-johnson-on-medieval-castles-and-archaeology/

Like castles, seals were also an important sign of lordship. To learn more about medieval seals, visit this website from the National Archives:

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/seals/

You can also search for individual seals on this database of seals: Digisig:

http://www.digisig.org/

To learn more about medieval seals, you can read these articles examining various aspects of the medieval seal:

https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/publications/research_publications_series/2008/medieval_seals.aspx

This blog, “First Impressions,” is by noted scholar Elizabeth New, who is leading a research team investigating medieval seals. This blog has many interesting articles, including one on a woman’s seal:

http://imprintproject.blogs.lincoln.ac.uk/

Study Questions:

1. What power did medieval lords wield? Over whom and what were they in charge? How did the Beaugencys use lordship as a means of constructing a network of power and influence? What challenges might a lord face?
2. What can you glean from the analysis of the Lavardin family? What does it tell us of lordship in the eleventh century and how they achieved  power? What role did their wives play?
3. How have historians viewed noblewomen’s involvement in lordship? How have opinions changed and why?
4. Define the relationship between Beaugency lords and vassals. How did they interact with one another?
5. What kind of conflicts do we see arising between lords and vassals? Over what did they disagree? How were these disagreements enacted or solved?

CHAPTER FOUR: RALPH I, LORD OF BEAUGENCY, C. 1080-C.1130

Websites:

To understand the important of Jerusalem in the minds and world view of medieval people, look at this medieval map:

http://www.bl.uk/learning/timeline/item99816.html

What were the Crusades?

For an overview of the crusades, visit this website: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcGzQ3ga5R8

This video provides some interesting insights on how the crusades have been viewed:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0zudTQelzI

To learn about myths surrounding the crusades, read this interview with medieval historians Andrew Holt and Alfred Andrea.

http://www.medievalists.net/2015/10/seven-myths-of-the-crusades-an-interview-with-alfred-j-andrea-and-andrew-holt/

Here is a video of an interview with Dr. Holt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD_jwnFKubE

For a view of the contemporary importance of the crusades, watch this lecture by noted Crusades historian, Dr. Thomas F. Madden:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFt1ZRVqNOE

The Crusaders:

To learn about the first crusaders themselves, you can access this database:
https://www.dhi.ac.uk/crusaders/about/

Did women go on crusades? Read this article by Helen Nicholson to find out:
http://www.medievalists.net/2019/01/women-and-the-crusades/

The Holy Sepulchre was the center of medieval Christianity. To learn more about this sacred place, watch this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QyvavfIGyLs

For a brief history of the Holy Sepulchre, visit this web page.
https://churchoftheholysepulchre.net/

This doctoral dissertation contains many images of the Holy Sepulchre, as well as discussion of what the Holy Sepulchre meant to crusaders:

http://www.medievalists.net/2011/07/the-crusader-church-of-the-holy-sepulchre/

What would Lord Ralph I have seen in Jerusalem, this video provides some beautiful images of Old Jerusalem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzdpVZFUkMI

How did Muslims and crusaders interact? This article addresses that question:
http://www.medievalists.net/2013/12/the-interaction-between-the-crusaders-and-muslims-in-the-east-myth-and-reality/

Study Questions:

1. Describe how the young Lord Ralph might have learned how to rule. Why would his father, Lord Lancelin, want him to have this training?
2. What conflicts and hardships would Lord Ralph I and his fellow crusaders have experienced? Who might they have encountered?
3. What made the siege at Antioch such a challenge for the crusaders, and how was that challenge overcome? Explain how Ralph earned distinction from this battle, and what it meant for his military legacy for years to come.
4. What was returning from crusade like for Lord Ralph I and his companions? What was expected of him, and what did he do and implement upon return?
5. What was Lord Ralph’s political relationship with the king? How did his relationship with Count Thibaut of Chartres influence his other political relationships?
6. On what did Lord Ralph focus on in the later years of his life? How did his decisions live on to affect his children and grandchildren?
7. What does Lord Ralph I of Beaugency's life experience suggest about the challenges and triumphs of being a medieval lord?

CHAPTER FIVE: “THOSE WHO WORKED”: THE BEAUGENCYS AND THE PEASANTS

To explore the lives of the peasants living on Beaugency land, and the landscape around them, , go to the Places Tab and examine the Peasant Life and the Rural Landscape.

Websites:

Historians, geographers and archeologists have learned a lot about rural life from abandoned villages. Click on this link to hear more about this and to see images of the remains of abandoned villages still evident on the landscape:

https://heritagecalling.com/2014/08/29/7-abandoned-villages-that-can-teach-us-about-medieval-life/

What was it like to live in a medieval village? This video reconstructs life in a medieval English village based on the Luttrell Pslater.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myRNKk0-63A

The British Library also provides information about peasant life, derived largely from the Luttrell Pslater:

https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/peasants-and-their-role-in-rural-life

These sites provide information about the material culture and houses of medieval peasants:

http://www.historynotes.info/in-the-medieval-peasant-house-3054/

http://www.medievalists.net/2008/10/the-medieval-peasant-house/

What did medieval peasants wear? This video shows you how a fourteenth-century ploughman would have dressed:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNAMbRt5eI8

A description of how medieval peasant women dressed can be seen at the end of this video on what medieval women wore:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ibj7GsfsCpI

What did medieval peasants eat? Watch this video to find out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeVcey0Ng-w

In addition to villages, granges also populated the medieval countryside. These granges were usually controlled by the medieval church and peasants would have brought their tithes to such places where they would be stored for the monks’ use.

http://www.meslay.com/Apage2.htm

Study Questions:

1. How did the Beaugencys associate with peasants? What was the importance in their connection to landscape and the agricultural world?
2. Define manorialism. What obligations were assumed through a manorial relationship? What was the life of a serf like? How could a serf change his/her circumstances?
3. What are the challenges of examining the lives of medieval peasants – serf or free? What sources can be used? Are there biases and limitations to these sources? How is archaeology utilized in studying the village life of a peasant?
4. How have historians' interpretations of the medieval peasantry developed and changed?
5. How did medieval people understand or justify serfdom?
6. What motivated some free peasants to become serfs? What could be some possible benefits to becoming a serf?  Provide a few examples.
7. What does the narrative of Maria Conversa tell us about relationships between monasteries and the peasantry? What did she and her children have to do in order to secure the freedom of her daughter? How was this advantageous to the family and the monastery?
8. To what extend were lords involved in the lives of their serfs and peasants? How might being involved in things such as their marriages benefit them? Consider the dispute involving Ohlem and Hilducia.
9. What changes, inventions, and customs arose in the eleventh century which allowed for a higher life quality for peasants? And how did transformations in agrarian life alter material lives of peasants, and was this seen in the structure of villages as a whole?

CHAPTER SIX: THE BEAUGENCYS AND THE COMMUNITY OF BELIEVERS

To explore where the Beaugencys would have worshiped, go to the Places tab and tour the church of Notre Dame de Beaugency.

The nuns of St. Avit represent an important feature of medieval religious life. Go to the Places tab to learn about their lives and to see how they assembled their holy patrimony.

Websites:

Religious life and belief:

Concerns about death and dying preoccupied medieval people. This website from the British Library discusses these issues and how they were connected to religion.

https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/death-and-the-afterlife-how-dying-affected-the-living

Relics were an important part of medieval spirituality. Watch this video from Medievalists.net:

http://www.medievalists.net/2019/01/relics-and-reliquaries-a-matter-of-life-and-death/

This article helps to explain why medieval people went on pilgrimage:
http://www.medievalists.net/2015/08/medieval-pilgrimages-its-all-about-the-journey/

Simon Reeve has a series called Pilgrimage where he traces the major pilgrimage spots of the middle ages, including Santiago de Compostella, Rome, Jerusalem and Canterbury. These videos are available on YouTube.

Although medieval people were Christian, older, pre-Christian traditions continued. Roberta Gilchrist, a noted medieval archeologist explores the intersection between landscape and belief.

http://www.medievalists.net/2018/12/the-medieval-ritual-landscape-archaeology-and-folk-religion/

Medieval people also believed in monsters. To see some images of these monsters and explanation for them, read this article from the British Library:

https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/medieval-monsters-from-the-mystical-to-the-demonic

Places of worship:

The Beaugency family witnessed an important transformation in medieval art from the Romanesque to Gothic. This timeline from the Met Museum in New York City provides an overview of medieval art.  Go to this website https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/
And select 1000-1400 AD as the time period and you can view works of art and also read essays about the art.

Episode 2: A White Garment of Churches of The Art of the Western World provides a satisfactory overview of the evolution from Romanesque to Gothic Art.

Chartres cathedral lay close to the Beaugency patrimony and the Beaugencys would have visited this church. The University of Pittsburgh has an amazing site that allows you to explore this magnificent structure.
https://digital.library.pitt.edu/collection/chartres-cathedral-notre-dame

Recently, the interior of the cathedral was restore and the restoration has generated much debate. This article sums of the issues and provides a sense of why some do not approve of these changes:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/01/arts/design/chartres-cathedral-restoration-controversial.html

Mapping Gothic France is another extraordinary site that lets you explore the development of Gothic architecture and the history of France:

http://mappinggothic.org/

Manuscripts:

Medieval illuminated manuscripts are beautiful works of art. To learn how a manuscript was prepared, visit this site: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuNfdHNTv9o

Alixe Bovey provides an overview of literature and medieval manuscripts on this British Library site:
https://www.bl.uk/the-middle-ages/articles/literature-music-and-illuminated-manuscripts

This site on Medievalists.net has links to seven short videos from the British Library on making medieval manuscripts:
http://www.medievalists.net/2018/12/seven-videos-on-making-medieval-manuscripts/

Music:

Music was an important part of medieval life and worship. Visit this site to explore the different kinds of medieval music:
http://www.medievalists.net/music/

Read about medieval music and see some manuscripts of medieval music by reading this article on Medievalists.net
http://www.medievalists.net/2008/12/medieval-music-manuscripts-treasures-of-sight-and-sound/

This video discusses how medieval Gregorian chant was sung, as well as showing some manuscripts of Italian choir books:

http://www.medievalists.net/2009/06/sounding-illuminations-the-music-of-the-manuscripts/

There was secular music as well as sacred. This article explores the experience of secular musicians.
http://www.medievalists.net/2013/07/secular-musicians-in-late-medieval-england/

This video plays the music found in a medieval codex from Montpellier:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CPHau772Hs

Philosophy:

This site provides several links to sites exploring medieval philosophy:
http://www.medievalists.net/2019/02/20-videos-about-philosophy-in-the-middle-ages/

Non Christians:

Robert Chazan is one of the most noted scholars of medieval Jews. Read his article on “The Arc of Jewish Life in the Middle Ages,” available here:
https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/the-jews-of-medieval-england/

Rebecca Abrams uses a bowl to examine the experiences of Jews in medieval England:
https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/the-jews-of-medieval-england/

This article, and companion video, explore a possible mass murder of Jews in medieval Norwich:

http://www.medievalists.net/2011/06/bodies-of-17-jews-from-medieval-norwich-may-have-been-mass-murder-victims-scholars-believe/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhaEg0Kva5g

Yet not all Jewish-Christian relationships were violent or unfriendly. This article explores how Jews and Christians interacted and lived in peace:

http://www.medievalists.net/2019/02/a-fruitful-partnership-jews-and-the-canons-of-st-kilian-in-twelfth-century-wurzburg/

Although the Beaugencys – with the exception of Lord Ralph who went to the east – would not have encountered Muslims, others in western Europe – particularly Iberia – lived near and amongst Muslims. The issue of conversion was one that preoccupied medieval minds. To learn more about this issue, and the role of women in conversion, watch this lecture:

http://www.medievalists.net/2019/01/debating-agency-women-and-conversion-in-the-multi-religious-society-of-late-medieval-spain/

Study Questions:

1. What ecclesiastical establishments could be found within the walls of Beaugency? How did these establishments contribute to the everyday life of the Beaugency family? How did the church set the rhythm of their lives?
2. How were the mental and intellectual lives of the people of Beaugency shaped by religion and the church? In what different ways were the peasants and nobles influenced by religion?
3. What does the library at Notre Dame reveal about what was of interest to the canons living there? How might it have had an impact on the lives of the Beaugency family?
4. Using the list of dues owed to Notre Dame de Beaugency and Lord Simon I's will, describe the economy and trade in Beaugency. How was the economy developing or changing? What impact would these changes have on the people of Beaugency?
5. How does Lord Simon I’s will offer insight into aristocratic piety and its transformation in the twelfth century? Use examples from the analysis on the will.
6. What consequences did the profit economy have for Jews? What were their associations to the Beaugencys? How did the Beaugencys and their neighbors view those whose views deviated from the main stream of Christianity?

CHAPTER SEVEN: THE BEAUGENCYS, THE ABBESS AND THE ABBOT

Websites:

To learn about the lives of monks and nuns – including how a nun dressed – visit this site on Medievalists.net for 10 videos about various aspects of being a nun or monk.

http://www.medievalists.net/2019/01/10-videos-about-monks-and-nuns-in-the-middle-ages/

Terry Jones’ Medieval Lives series features a monk in episode 2. These videos can be found on YouTube.

One of the questions often asked about medieval nuns was the extent of their literacy. A team of medieval scholars has discovered that nuns were scribes by examining the build up of calculus (or tartar) on the teeth of medieval skeletons:

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/2019/01/female-medieval-master-artist-revealed-dental-calculus/

Medieval monks and nuns chanted the liturgical offices seven times a day. They sang in Greogrian Chant.  Here are some videos of modern monks and nuns singing the daily offices:

Monks chanting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBwh1OXw6uI

Nuns chanting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrUPAUGgwUo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fytotsELZz4

Although not a prominent feature of modern life, some chose to dedicate their lives to God as monks or nuns. Watch these videos about modern monastic communities:

Benedictine Nuns cattle ranchers:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzmscOLisac

British Nuns Farmers:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBuSntFKqH4

This documentary follows the daily routine of a monk at Downside Abbey:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPwx4XGlm8U

This video explores the life of monks at a Trappist monastery (an offshoot of Cistercian monasticism) in the United States:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpIplIKq01U

Not all found the religious life to their liking. Read this article about a nun who faked her own death to leave her convent:
http://www.medievalists.net/2019/02/the-medieval-nun-who-faked-her-own-death/

Study Questions:

1. What role did abbeys and nunneries play in the lives of the Beaugencys and those living in Beaugency?
2. What are some of the challenges of recovering the history of the abbey of St. Avit and its nuns? How have historians approached the question of medieval nuns? Why might we know more about the monks of St. Trinité than the nuns of St. Avit?
3. How does Bishop Ivo’s advice to the abbess of St. Avit display a prescriptive role of a nun? Would nuns have behaved differently in actuality?
4. In what activities did the “average” nun or monk spend their time and effort? What might have led them to joining a monastery or convent? What would the structure of St. Avit been like? Would it have been similar to other abbeys? What might make it challenging to study the history of the abbey?
5. What was the role of the abbess? Who were the abbesses of St. Avit? What challenges did an abbess face?
6. Who were the donors and patrons of St. Avit? Why did they make gifts? What might they expect in return for their benefaction?
7. Describe Geoffrey of Vendôme as an abbot. Was he successful? What did he spend his time doing? What challenges did he face? What were his relationships like outside of St. Trinité and how might these relationships and correspondences have benefited him and the abbey?
8. Analyze Abbots Geoffrey’s letters. What does his correspondence reflect about ecclesiastical developments of the time?

CHAPTER 8: FROM WARRIOR TO ADMINISTRATOR

One way to visualize the evolution of the lords of Beaugency is to consider how the physical space of their château evolved over the centuries. Take a tour of the castle of Beaugency from the eleventh through the thirteenth century, which is located under the Places tab, and compare it with the images of the fifteenth-century château built next to it evident in this video of a French morning show (don’t worry about following the French; just look at the images).

Here is a link to a French morning show that showcased Beaugency, particularly the early modern château next to the tower at Beaugency.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgnGNHpuBVk

Study Questions:

1. How did the lives of the later lords of Beaugency compare with that of Lord Ralph I or Lord Simon I? What had changed? What new or different challenges did the later lords face?
2. What role did the king play in the lives and lordship of the later Beaugency lords?
3. Compare and contrast the two seals of Beaugency lords (figures 8a and 8b). What do they suggest about changes in the lives and functions of these lords?
4. How did the lord-peasant relationship change under the transition from barter to money economy? What benefits and consequences did this present?
5. How had the lives of the Beaugency family transformed from c. 1000 to 1292?

Glossary

Abbey A complex of buildings (church/chapels, dormitory, kitchen, refectory, library, etc.) which comprise the community dwelling of an order of monks or nuns.

Abbot/abbess The heads of an ecclesiastical community usually selected  by members of that community. For monks, this would be an abbot; for nuns, an abbess.

Almshouse See entry for Hôtel Dieu.

Alod Property not held in return for feudal service. Can be personal property, moveable or immoveable property, or inherited property.

Aula A hall, generally used by a lord for public proceedings and occasions, such as holding court and homage ceremonies. At the castle at Beaugency, this appears of have been an open-air hall.

Ban A set of powers and privileges exercised by lords which allowed them public authority to command, provide justice, adjudicate disputes, punish and collect exactions from those living under their authority. It signified not only their control and dominion over people, despite class, but also their control over land.

Benedictine A monk or nun who followed the rule created by St. Benedict, who wrote the Regula Benedicti which sets the guidelines for Benedictine monasticism.

Bishop The highest ranking clergy member in a diocese, a district entrusted to his care, supervision and administration.

Canon There were two types of canons: Regular and secular. Regular canons lived by a rule, like the Augustinian rule, and were sometimes cloistered. Secular canons lived in the world, often in their own houses and were not cloistered, and interacted with secular society. Some canons served secular officials as chancellors.

Canon Law The laws created by the church to regulate the lives of believers, but also to govern the hierarchy of the church.

Capetian   The royal dynasty that ruled France from 987–1328.

Cartulary A collection of documents called charters (see below) that were created to organize an ecclesiastical community’s property – like the cartulary of Notre Dame de Beaugency. Sometimes cartularies include histories of the foundation.

Charters Documents of practice that record transferal of property – usually, but not always – to the church.

Château   French for castle.

Chevage   A tribute or “head-tax” that serfs paid to their lords.

Cluny A monastery in Burgundy that became one of the largest monastic orders in medieval Europe. Founded in 910 by Duke William I of Aquitaine.

Cistercian Refers to the monastic order founded by Robert of Molesme at Cîteux, France, in 1098. Required a stricter observance of the Benedictine rule. Became one of the most popular forms of monasticism. St. Bernard of Clairvaux played a key role in the order’s expansion and popularity in the twelfth century.

Cognomen A name in addition to the first name that could denote geo-graphic association (Lancelin de Beaugency or of Beaugency) or a personal charateristic (Geoffrey the Red). Often passed down hereditarily.

Commercial Revolution A change in economy during the late eleventh and early twelfth century from subsistence and bartering to cash-based, profit motivated commerce.

Consanguinity Being from the same line of kinship as another person. Degrees of consanguinity or kinship determined who could marry. In the twelfth century, seven degrees of kinship were used to determine if a marriage could take place. If the couple was related within seven degrees, they were not supposed to marry.

Corvée   Unpaid labor a peasant owed his lord.

Count/countess A man or woman who controlled a region of a county. He or she held courts and called upon their vassals to provide them with counsel and military service. Also provided military service to their lord, often a duke/duchess or a king/queen.

Donjon French term for tower or castle. Also the root word for the modern term of “dungeon.”

Dower The share of his holdings that a husband gave to his wife upon marriage. It was used for her support when she was widowed. In northern France, most wives received one-half or one-third of their husband’s property as her dower.

Dowry A portion of family property, or cash, or goods, given to a woman  by her natal or birth family when she married.

Duke/duchess  A man or woman controlling a duchy, which could consist of several counties and/or lordships. Usually received the duchy directly from the king and had jurisdictional and legal rights over it. Often provided military service to the king or queen.

Fief Land or property given by a lord to a vassal in return for military service and counsel, as well as certain feudal aids like providing castle guard or cash for a lord’s ransom or a cash gift at the time of the marriage of his daughter.

Foremariage A fee paid by serfs to their lords if they wanted to marry a serf from a different lordship.

Gregorian  reform  movement  Reforms named for Pope Gregory VII   (r. 1073–1085) that dealt with the moral integrity of clergy members and establishing the independence of the church from secular control. Key ideals of the reform were prohibiting lay investiture, simony, pluralism and clerical marriage. Also asserted church oversight of which relatives the laity could marry.

Hagiography The life of a saint, written by a member of the clergy, that focused on their piety, martyrdom, as well as their posthumous miracles and interventions.

Heraldry A system of heraldic symbols and coats of arms designed to designate aristocratic families.

Heresy/heretic  A belief or practice that was not approved by the church   or not considered orthodox. A heretic is a person who adheres to heretical belief or practice.

Homage A ceremony where a vassal pledges fealty and loyalty to his/her lord.

Historiography The study of how history has been studied, how it has evolved as a discipline and how it has been written over the centuries.

Hôtel Dieu    Often synonymous with Almshouse. A building staffed by clergy where the poor and ill could find health services, food and shelter.

Leprosarium/Leprosaria (plural)   A house or community specifically for lepers to live and receive care. Staffed by clergy. Developed in the twelfth century.

Liberal Arts The curriculum at cathedral schools and medieval universities consisting of the trivium (study of grammar, rhetoric and logic) and quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, astronomy and music).

Lord A man or woman who controlled a lordship, including juridical authority, and the right to hold a court and collect revenue. Often entailed control of a castle and military service.

Lordship Land, territory or estate over which a lord (male or female) held authority or jurisdiction.

Mainmorte Fee paid when serfs passed their property from generation to generation.

Martyrology  See entry for “Necrology or Obituary.”

Monk Refers to a man who has taken the monastic vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. Lives in a monastery.

Noble Generally synonymous with aristocrat. Indicates a person of high status and elite family. Can be applied to those who were of the rank of lord, viscount/viscountess, count/countess or duke/duchess.

Necrology or Obituary A list of the souls for whom the monks or nuns would pray for on the anniversary of the person’s death. Can include members of the community or church, as well a lay patrons, friends or relatives.

Oblate Children who were given to the church, usually by an aristocratic family, who were taught and raised to join the clergy.

Ordeal (Judicial ordeal) An “ordeal” used to settle a legal dispute. Ordeals included those by fire, water and combat. Trial by fire entailed grasping a hot iron rod, bandaging the wound and then checking the wound after three days to see if had healed. Ordeal by water used a similar premise, but instead of grasping a hot iron, the person submerged their hand in boiling water. A judicial duel was another ordeal, where the two parties – or their representatives – would battle one another. Whoever won the duel won the dispute. The underlying assumption to all judicial ordeals was that God would intervene on the side of the just.

Pannage The turning out of pigs usually in a forest for them to forage for food.

Patrimony The land that had been the traditional territorial base of a noble family.

Patronage Financial support of an organization or individual – in the case of the Beaugencys, ecclesiastical foundations. Patronage played an important role in medieval culture as it was often used to create relationships and networks of power and influence.

Pilgrimage The journey to visit a saint’s shrine (oftentimes visiting several along the way) at a church or cathedral which housed relics, to seek intervention, grace or miracles on the pilgrim’s behalf or that of a family member.

Popular Crusade or People’s Crusade Part of the First Crusade. Led by the charismatic leader Peter the Hermit, and consisted of peasants and common people who were inspired by the message of crusade to leave their homes and go fight in the Holy Land. They were slaughtered by  the Seljuk Turks shortly after crossing over from Constantinople into Anatolia in October 1096.

Potestas   Latin term meaning power.

Prévot Officer in charge of a prefecture. Lords divided their lands into prefectures and prévots were responsible for collecting revenue from rent and other exactions to his lord, as well as providing peace and supervision over the lord’s lands.

Priory  A smaller dependent house of a monastery or nunnery, governed by a prior or prioress.

Regular Clergy Clergy who live by a rule or regula: Monks, nuns and some canons.

Relics A remnant of a saint’s body, clothing or other such artifact that was considered to have sacred powers to heal and grant miracles. Typically housed in a shrine or reliquary in a church or cathedral. Objects of veneration. Many made pilgrimages to visit relics, as they were a physical and tangible way of connecting with the divine

Religious/Religieuse   Man or woman who commit their lives to the church – for example, a monk or nun.

Romance A type of literature that developed in the twelfth century, usually centered on Arthurian legends. Instead of focusing on battles, as the Chansons de Geste – the other common type of medieval literature – romances explored emotions, human motivations and developed more well-rounded characters. Chivalry was often a common theme.

Royal Demesne The territory belonging to the French king centered around Paris.

Saint A person who was venerated, usually after their death, as particularly holy, virtuous and pious. Some saints had been martyred or persecuted for their faith. A saint was generally believed to be connected to God, and medieval people prayed to saints asking for their intercession. Saints were also believed to perform miracles.

Secular Clergy Refers to clergy members who participated in the secular world and resided in a community outside of monastery or abbey, including priests, canons and deacons. These are the clerics who are often in charge of education, preaching, administering the sacraments and interaction with the laity.

Seneschal   Officer who was in charge of an aristocratic or royal household. May have had judicial, administrative and military duties.

Sepulcher A tomb that usually houses the body of the deceased and maybe decorated with a sculpture of the tomb’s inhabitant. The Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem is the perhaps the best known and is the church built around the purported tomb of Christ.

Serf  An unfree agricultural worker who performed labor for his/her lord  and paid certain fees like mainmorte and foremariage. Attached to a piece of property that he/she worked and was able to pass along to his/her descendants for them to work.

Squire   An apprentice to a knight or a lord with some distant connection   to the nobility.

Simony   The buying or selling of church offices.

Taillage/Taille A tax collected by lords on the peasantry living in their domain.

Three Field System A type of crop rotation utilized to increase crop production. Arable land would be divided into three fields and two of the fields would be in use for a season, allowing the third to “rest” or remain fallow. Hence bringing two-thirds of the arable land under cultivation. A practice that replaced the two field system where only half of the arable land would be cultivated.

Tithes One-tenth of income or produce paid to support the church. Part of the Gregorian Reform Movement was to ensure that the laity did not control ecclesiastical tithes. If they did, they were encouraged to restore them to the church.

Usury The practice of charging interest on a loan. The church was hostile  to usury on the grounds that lenders who charged interest took advantage of a fellow Christian’s misfortune.

Vassal A male or female member of the nobility who held a fief from a lord. In return for they fief, they provided their lord with military service, certain feudal aids (like castle guard) and counsel. A vassal may have held fiefs from several different lords.

Viscount/Vicountess A viscount or viscountess controlled a viscounty, which was usually a portion of a county. They administered the viscounty by holding courts, collecting taxes, providing protection and military service.