Abstract
Here is Sydney Smith once more, writing about conditions in the mid-nineteenth century whereas he might just as well have been reflecting on those of the twelfth. He, himself, is proof that nepotism had a long history, but there is no reason to assume that an account of it, whether medieval or modern, has to be tiresome. On the contrary, some of the more interesting prelates of the Anglo-Norman period in this regard played a prominent role in plot and action. Moreover, the only sure way to see how and why it was “notorious,” or “known to all,” is to look at the practice in each of the cathedral churches in turn, to analyze the evidence, and to compare the results. What emerges is an astonishing picture of ecclesiastical patronage that was so extensive as to be almost routine, the life-blood, one might say, of medieval ecclesiastical administration. As to a judgment whether it was good or bad, as we have seen, there were men to testify for each side. Certainly, the promotion of a son or brother to a prebend or to an archdeaconry in 1150 was no worse than the nomination of yourself to a canonry or a deanery, of which you were the patron, in 1830!2
I do not want to go into a long and tiresome history of episcopal nepotism; but it is notorious to all that bishops confer their patronage upon their sons, and sons-in-law, and all their relations.1
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Notes
Selected Writings of Sydney Smith, W.H. Auden, ed., (New York: Farrar, Straus & Co., 1956), p. 132, from the first letter to Archdeacon Singleton in 1837.
Peter Virgin, Sydney Smith (London: Harper, 1994), p. 259.
An earlier example of episcopal dynasty-building as normal practice is sketched out at Narbonne by Frederic Cheyette, Ermengard of Narbonne and the World of the Troubadours (Ithaca: Cornell, 2001), chapter 6.
For a survey of the historical development, see James A. Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society in Medieval Europe (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), pp. 214–225, 314–319, 401–405, 536–539, 554–555; and for some useful comments, see Medieval Purity and Piety. Essays on Medieval Clerical Celibacy and Religious Reform, Michael Frassetto, ed. (New York: Garland, 1998).
Peter Damian, De celibatu sacerdotium in Patrologiae cursus completus, series latina, J.-P. Migne, ed., 221 vols. (Paris: 1844–1864), 145: 159–190. The argument ran that Christ was the son of a virgin, Christ was a virgin himself, Christ was present in the Eucharist, therefore the Eucharist could only be administered by a virgin priest. See Georg Denzler, Das Papsttum und der Amtszölibat, Bd. 5/1 (Stuttgart: Anton Hiersmann, 1973), pp. 56–62. Gregory VII complained to William I in 1076 about the sad state of the church of Dol caused by Bishop Joel who not only was said to have bought his way into the see, but once installed, entered into a marriage and then endowed his children with property of the church.
The Epistolae Vagantes of Pope Gregory VII, H.E.J. Cowdrey, ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972), #16;
and H.E.J. Cowdrey, Pope Gregory VII: 1073–1085 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 550–553;
The Register of Pope Gregory VII: 1073–1085, H.E.J. Cowdrey, ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), #2.66–2.68, 4.20. For a general commentary, see James Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society, pp. 214–223. In the later Middle Ages, Guicciardini makes clear the widespread and persistent nature of the problem: “primo di tutti i pontefici, che per velare in qualche parte la infamia loro solevano chiamargli nipoti, gli chiamava e mostrava a tutto il mondo come figliuoli,” Storia d’Italia in Francesco Guicciardini,
Opere, Vittorio de Caprariis, ed. (Milano: Riccardo Ricciardi, 1953), p. 386.
The Letters of Lanfranc, archbishop of Canterbury, Helen Clover and Margaret Gibson, eds. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979), #41. OV, III, pp. 25–37, 120–121.
Robert Somerville, The Councils of Urban II (Amsterdam: A.M. Hakkert, 1972).
Eadmer, Historia novorum in Anglia, Martin Rule, ed. (London: 1884), RS-81, pp. 172–174, 193–195.
Councils and Synods with other Documents Relating to the English Church, vol. I, i-ii, D. Whitelock, C.N.L. Brooke, and M. Brett, eds. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981); vol. II, i-ii, F.M. Powicke and C.R. Cheney, eds. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1964), I, ii, pp. 674–681, 699–703.
Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum, Diana Greenway, ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 484–485. For Stephen: Diceto, RS-68, I, p. 249.
For John: Christopher R. Cheney, “King John and the Papal Interdict,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 31 (1948): 306.
The catalogue of clerical vices is printed in The Historians of the Church of York and Its Archbishops, James Raine, ed., 3 vols., RS-71 (London: 1879–1894), III, p. 115. “Au XIe siècle, canonistes et prédicateurs appellent au célibat, mais reconnaissent qu’ils ne peuvent y contraindre. Malgré les peines dont il est menacé, le mariage des prêtres et des évêques, avant ou après ordination, est partout répandu.” Jean Gaudemet, “Le célibat ecclésiastique. Le droit et la pratique du XIe au XIIIe s.,” Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte-KA 68 (1982): 1–31. Cullagium was a payment by priests made to the bishop for a license to allow them to keep women, or made by a peasant to his lord to allow him to marry his daughter outside the village.
See Henry C. Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church (Philadelphia: 1867; 4th ed. New Hyde Park, N.Y. 1966), p. 212; DuCange, Glossarium (1883), III, p. 647;
Jan F. Niermeyer, Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus (Leiden: Brill, 1954–1976), I, p. 374, as culagium.
Conciliorum oecumenicorum decreta, Joseph Alberigo et al., eds. (Bologna: Istituto per le scienze religiose, 1973): Lateran I (1123), c. 7, p. 191; Lateran II (1139), c. 6, p 198; Lateran III (1179), c. 11, p. 217; Lateran IV (1215), c. 14, p. 242.
For the questionable impact of the legislation on the practice of celibacy, see Paul Beaudette, “In the World but Not of It. Clerical Celibacy as a Symbol of the Medieval Church,” in Medieval Purity and Piety, Michael Frassetto, ed., pp. 23–24 and n. 4; and C.N.L. Brooke, “Married Men among the English Higher Clergy: 1066–1200,” Cambridge Historical Journal 12 (1956): 187–188.
Mary Cheney, Roger, Bishop of Worcester: 1164–1179 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980), pp. 69–70, 348. A summary of the uneven application of the law from Alexander III to Innocent III is in Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy, pp. 269–278. Although Alexander III ordered the sons of priests in their fathers’ churches to be dismissed, with some exceptions, little was done in any effective way until the next century.
See C.R. Cheney, From Becket to Langton. English Church Government: 1170–1213 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1956), pp. 128–129,
and Charles Duggan, “Decretals of Alexander III to England,” in Miscellanea Rolando Bandinelli, Papa Alessandro (Siena: 1986), III, pp. 87–151, especially pp. 101, 112, and 129 (#510). The problem of enforcement can be seen in a letter of Paschal II of April 1102 in which he adheres to the canons of the council of Rome held by Urban II in 1099, compared to another of May 1107 in which he allows the competent sons of priests to be promoted to ecclesiastical office,
and Charles Duggan, “Decretals of Alexander III to England,” in Miscellanea Rolando Bandinelli, Papa Alessandro (Siena: 1986), III, pp. 87–151, especially pp. 101, 112, and 129 (#510). The problem of enforcement can be seen in a letter of Paschal II of April 1102 in which he adheres to the canons of the council of Rome held by Urban II in 1099, compared to another of May 1107 in which he allows the competent sons of priests to be promoted to ecclesiastical office, The Letters of Saint Anselm of Canterbury, Walter Fröhlich, ed., 3 vols. (Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications, 1990–1994), #223 and 422.
For a survey, see Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society, pp. 251–253, 314–319; and for the period to 1125, Augustin Fliche, La réforme grégorienne et la reconquête chrétienne: 1057–1125. Histoire de l’église 8 (Paris: Bloud & Gay, 1946), pp. 413–418. A useful catalogue given by Denzler, Das Papsttum und der Amtszölibat, pp. 64–101, provides a systematic chronological analysis of papal legislation.
Patrologiae cursus completus, series latina, J.-P. Migne, ed. 160: 57. See also Ian S. Robinson, Authority and Resistance in the Investiture Contest. The Polemical Literature of the Late Eleventh Century (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1978), pp. 162–189.
Bernhard Schimmelpfennig, “Ex fornicatione nati. Studies on the Position of Priests’ Sons from the Twelfth to the Fourteenth Century,” Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History n.s. 2 (1979): 21–22.
Charles Duggan, “Equity and Compassion in Papal Marriage Decretals in England,” in Love and Marriage in the Twelfth Century, Willy van Hoecke and Andries Welkenhuysen, eds. (Louvain: University Press, 1981), p. 67. The canonical prohibition on inheritance was laid out by Innocent III in a letter to Peter, bishop of Winchester, in 1205, (Selected Letters, #26.) In the case of the disputed election over Mauger at Worcester in 1200, Innocent III accepted a postulatio, that is, a request from the chapter to have the pope recognize a case as exceptional, but nonetheless valid (ibid., #6.) There was a similar ruling in the election of a bastard to Lincoln in 1206 (ibid., p. 21, n. 17).
Gerald of Wales, Gemma ecclesiastica, RS -21, II, p. 304. Gerald’s father was William de Barri who had married the sister of David, bishop of St. Davids (1148–1176). Gerald himself was, therefore the nephew of a bishop and he, in turn, promoted his own nephew, also named Gerald, the son of his brother, Philip, to the archdeaconry of Brecon. In the course of the long and bitter quarrel that arose between the two Geralds, the uncle referred to the word nepos that he said “rightly comes from nepa meaning scorpion,” see Giraldus Cambrensis, Speculum Duorum, or a Mirror of Two Men, Yves Lefèvre, R.B.C. Huygens, and Brian Dawson, eds. (Cardiff: University of Wales, 1974), p. 2. See also Fasti IX, p. 55. Nepos as “nephew” is usual, but other translations in context are “grandson,” “cousin,” or simply “relative.” For “grandson,” see The Domesdsay Monachorum of Christ Church, Canterbury, David Douglas, ed. (London: RHS, 1944), pp. 44–47, 109–110,
and English Lawsuits from William I to Richard I, R.C. van Caenegem, ed., 2 vols. Selden Society 106–107 (London: Bernard Quaritch, 1990–1991), #552. For specifically “sister’s son,” JSL, I, p. 222.
See also Emile Beneveniste, Le vocabulaire des institutions indo-européennes, 2 vols. (Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1969), I, pp. 208, 231–232;
Wolfgang Reinhard, “Nepotismus. Der Funktionswandel einer papstgeschichtlichen Konstanten,” Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 86 (1975): 145–185;
Gérard Louise, “Népotisme épiscopal et politique capétienne dans la cité de Mans, Xe–XIe siècles,” in Les Prélats, l’église, et la société, XIe-XVe siédes, Hommage à Bernard Guillemain, Françoise Bériac, ed. (Bordeaux: Université Michel de Montaigne, 1994), pp. 29–40;
Frank Barlow, Edward the Confessor (London: 1970), pp. 301–302.
The Red Book of the Exchequer, Hubert Hall, ed., 3 vols., RS-99 (London: 1896), I, p. 413.
“Il nepotismo non è mai stato, nel medioevo e nell’età moderna un’esclusiva dei papi. Lo hanno practicato cardinali, vescovi, abati, spesso anche arcipreti, canonici et altri chierici di più modesta condizione in ogni angolo della cristianità,” Sandro Carocci, Il nepotismo nel medioevo. Papi, cardinali e famiglie nobili (Roma: Viella, 1999), p. 63.
For Alexander III, see Papal Decretals Relating to the Diocese of Lincoln in the Twelfth Century, Walther Holtzmann and E. Kemp, eds. (Hereford: LRS, 1954), #xx, pp. 50–51, and Fasti III, p. 64. Innocent’s uncle was Clement III (1187–1191); one nephew was Gregory IX (1227–1241) and another, Leonard, was settled with a prebend at York. A great-nephew was promoted to the papacy as Alexander IV (1254–1261). Other nephews, the sons of his brother, Richard, were Paul, lord of Valmentone; John, lord of Poli and cardinal of Sta. Maria; and Stephen, cardinal of St. Adriano. Another relative, a nephew or cousin, was Lando da Montelungo, who also provided for his sister’s husband, Peter Annibaldi. For the network,
see Constance Rousseau, “Pope Innocent III and Familial Relationships of Clergy and Religious,” Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History n.s. 14 (1993): 107–148,
and Daniel Waley, The Papal State in the Thirteenth Century (London: Macmillan, 1961), pp. 50–51. Innocent III was well aware of the strength of these bonds. In a letter chastising King John for refusing help to the Emperor Otto in order to placate Philip of France, he warned him that “reason prescribes and nature demands that an uncle should assist his nephew,” Selected Letters of Innocent III, #8.
The kinship ties as a basis for political promotion among the barons is discussed by S. Church, The Household Knights of King John (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), p. 28,
and Sidney Painter, The Reign of King John (Baltimore: JHU, 1949, Pb.1966), pp. 291–292. Kinship as an obstacle in military campaigns in which men of the same family were pitted against each other can be seen in the
Gesta Stephani, K.R. Potter, ed. (London: Nelson, 1955; 2d ed. K.R. Potter and R.H.C. Davis, eds., 1976), p. 27.
Graeme J. White, Restoration and Reform: 1153–1165. Recovery from Civil War in England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). p. 99.
Heinrich Fichtenau, Living in the Tenth Century. Mentalities and Social Orders (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), p. 186; with several examples of cases in which promotion to a bishopric was made possible through a man’s relatives.
Gregory of Tours, Historia Francorum, VI, 46, p. 380. The Letters of Peter the Venerable, II, pp. 233–246. Bruno Galland, Deux archévêchés entre la France et l’empire. Les archevêques de Lyon et les archevêques de Vienne du milieu du XIIe siècle au milieu du XIVe siècle (Roma: Ecole française de Rome, 1994), pp. 34–37.
Frank Barlow, “John of Salisbury and His Brothers,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 46 (1955): 95–109. For the Lucy family, see the Chronicle of Battle Abbey, pp. 142–143.
William Stubbs, Historical Introductions to the Rolls Series, Arthur Hassall, ed. (London: Longmans, Green, 1902), p. 45 et seq.
Marcel Pacaut, Louis VII et les élections épiscopales dans le royaume de France (Paris: J. Vrin, 1957), pp. 121–146.
Gerd Althoff, Family, Friends, and Followers. Political and Social Bonds in Medieval Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 61.
For later medieval practice, see John A.F. Thomson, Early Tudor Church and Society: 1485–1529 (London: Longman, 1993), p. 53;
and in the nineteenth century, Richard Altick, Victorian People and Ideas (New York: Norton, 1973), p. 204.
Chronica Jocelini de Brakelonda de rebus gestis Samsonis abbatis monasterii Sancti Edmundi, H.E. Butler, ed. (London: Nelson, 1949; D. Greenway and J. Sayres, eds. (Oxford: 1989), pp. 24 and 43.
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Crosby, E.U. (2013). A Network of Nephews. In: The King’s Bishops. The New Middle Ages. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137352125_5
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