Beguinage

A beguinage, (French – béguinage), is an architectural complex which was created to house beguines: lay religious women who lived in community without taking vows or retiring from the world.

Originally the beguine institution was the convent (Latin: conventus, Dutch: convent, French: couvent, German: Beginenkonvent), an association of beguines living together or in close proximity of each other under the guidance of a single superior, called a mistress or prioress. Although they were not usually referred as 'convent', in these houses dwelt a small number of women together: the houses small, informal, and often poor communities that emerged across Europe after the twelfth century. In most cases, beguines who lived in a convent agreed to obey certain regulation during their stay and contributed to a collective fund.^[1]

In the first decades of the thirteenth century emerged much larger and more stable type of community that emerged in the region of the Low Countries: large court beguinages were formed (Latin: curtis, curia beguinarum, Dutch: (begijn)hof, French: court (de beguines), German: Beginenhof), which consisted of several houses for beguines built around a central chapel or church where their religious activities took place, and often included also functional buildings such as a brewery, a bakery, a hospital, and farm buildings.

Several beguinages these are now listed by UNESCO as World Heritage. By the mid-thirteenth century, the French king Louis IX founded a beguinage in Paris, which was modeled on the court beguinages of the Low Countries.^[2]

Etymology

The Oxford English Dictionary, citing Du Cange, gives the origin of the word "beguine" in the name of Lambert le Bègue, "Lambert the Stammerer", an early supporter of the movement but who died around 1180.

Description

View of the Groot Begijnhof in Leuven

While a small beguinage usually constituted just one house where women lived together, a Low Countries court beguinage typically comprised one or more courtyards surrounded by houses, and also included a church, an infirmary complex, and a number of communal houses or 'convents'. From the twelfth century through the eighteenth, every city and large town in the Low Countries had at least one court beguinage: the communities dwindled and came to an end, over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries). They were encircled by walls and separated from the town proper by several gates which were closed at night. During the day the beguines could come and go as they pleased. Beguines came from a wide range of social classes, though truly poor women were only admitted if they had a wealthy benefactor who pledged to provide for their needs.

Beguinage at Sint-Truiden with its chapel, left

Our understanding of women's motivations for joining the beguinages has changed dramatically in recent decades. The development of these communities is clearly linked to a preponderance of women in urban centers in the Middle Ages, but while earlier scholars like the Belgian historian Henri Pirenne believed that this "surplus" of women was caused by men dying in war, that theory has been debunked. Since the groundbreaking work of John Hajnal, who demonstrated that, for much of Europe, marriage occurred later in life and at a lower frequency than had previously been believed, historians have established that single women moved to the newly developed cities because those cities offered them work opportunities. Simons (2001) has shown how the smaller beguinages as well as the court beguinages answered those women's social and economic needs, in addition to offering them a religious life coupled with personal independence, which was a difficult thing to have for a woman.

Beguinages in Belgium

Thirteen Flemish beguinages have been listed by UNESCO as World Heritage Sites since 1998.^[3]

Other beguinages

See also

• Beguines and Beghards

References

Sources

Further reading

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Beguinage.

Belgium's beguinages offered refuge for women CNN

World Heritage Sites in Belgium
The Architectural Work of Le Corbusier1 Belfries of Belgium and France2 Flemish Béguinages Four Lifts on the Canal du Centre and their Environs Historic Centre of Brugge La Grand-Place, Brussels Major Mining Sites of Wallonia Major Town Houses of the Architect Victor Horta Neolithic Flint Mines at Spiennes Notre-Dame Cathedral in Tournai Plantin-Moretus House-Workshops-Museum Complex Stoclet House
1 Listing shared with six other countries, which includes Belgium's Maison Guiette; 2 Listing shared with France.