Interactive map: Lollards, 1414–1522

Oliviana: Mouvements and dissidences spirituels XIIIe - XIVe siècles, 2023

This is the second of four articles I published in a special issue of Oliviana, the Open Edition journal, in honor of the 50th anniversary of Robert Lerner's "The Heresy of the Free Spirit in the Later Middle Ages". The four essays argue that the Church campaigns against the “heresy of the Free Spirit” of the early fourteenth century primarily targeted a new type of beguines and beghards, emerging in Cologne around 1290 and spreading across the Low Countries and the Lower Rhine in the following decades. Called swesteren, and “begging” or “wandering beghards”, or willige arme, or more properly “lollards”, these lay women and men distinguished themselves from traditional beguines and beghards by a stricter adherence to individual and collective poverty, by a special dress, and by a particular doctrine: their faith in human “good will” and personal enlightenment through God’s grace, and their skepticism of human regulations not based in Scripture, encouraged them to pursue a life of religious poverty free from material, institutional, or canon-law constraints. Around 1300, those ideals exposed them to suspicion of free-spirit tendencies. Part Two in this series deals with the campaigns against them undertaken by bishops of the Rhineland in the first half of the fourteenth century, with special attention to the trial of Walter “of Holland” and others in Cologne in 1326, followed by the diaspora of the movement. It examines the support they received from (wealthy) patrons who financed and maintained the lodgings of these voluntary poor, as they spread from the Lower Rhine across the Low Countries and into parts of northwestern and central Europe, reaching as far east as Poland, albeit almost exclusively within Dutch- and German-language areas.

Reformation and Renaissance Review, 2011

Socio-Historical Examination of Religion and Ministry, 2021

PREVIEW ONLY - READ FULL ARTICLE HERE: https://doi.org/10.33929/sherm.2021.vol3.no2.07 Though English supporters of the Oxford theologian John Wycliffe (d.1384)—known as “Lollards”—had been drawn from academic and noble/gentry circles during the later-fourteenth and early-fifteenth centuries, persecution, equation of heresy with sedition, and the failure of Sir John Oldcastle’s Rebellion (1414) ensured overt abandonment of Lollard ideas. Consequently, post-1414 (“later”) Lollardy in England has been characterized as an amorphous, introverted network—appealing to those of lesser socio-economic status—being unworthy of description as a sect because of its deficiency of organization. However, the movement’s consistency and infrastructure are reappraised by considering its heterogeneity in terms of society (demography, literacy, and socio-economic status), interactions (modes of dissemination), and motivation, participation, and organization (appreciating the dynamics of religious movements). From a comparative perspective, Lollardy’s acephalous, reticulate infrastructure—similarly to that of Waldensianism and other movements—may have proved beneficial by facilitating adaptability during persecution thereby ensuring Lollardy’s survival until the Reformation.

Mouvements et dissidences spirituels XIIIe -XIVe siècles, 2023

This is the first of four articles I published in a special issue of Oliviana, the Open Edition journal, in honor of the 50th anniversary of Robert Lerner's "The Heresy of the Free Spirit in the Later Middle Ages". The four essays argue that the Church campaigns against the “heresy of the Free Spirit” of the early fourteenth century primarily targeted a new type of beguines and beghards, emerging in Cologne around 1290 and spreading across the Low Countries and the Lower Rhine in the following decades. Called swesteren, and “begging” or “wandering beghards”, or willige arme, or more properly “lollards”, these lay women and men distinguished themselves from traditional beguines and beghards by a stricter adherence to individual and collective poverty, by a special dress, and by a particular doctrine: their faith in human “good will” and personal enlightenment through God’s grace, and their skepticism of human regulations not based in Scripture, encouraged them to pursue a life of religious poverty free from material, institutional, or canon-law constraints. Around 1300, those ideals exposed them to suspicion of free-spirit tendencies. The first article examines the origins and implementation of the Clementine decrees against lay religious following the Council of Vienne (1311-1312) and their impact on beguine communities. It then clarifies the early history of the beghards, still poorly known, and the divisions within the world of beguines and beghards, from which the swesteren and lollards arose as a distinct movement in this time of crisis.

Oliviana: Mouvements et dissidences spirituels XIIIe - XIVe siècles, 2023

This series of four articles argues that the Church campaigns against the “heresy of the Free Spirit” of the early fourteenth century primarily targeted a new type of beguines and beghards, emerging in Cologne around 1290 and spreading across the Low Countries and the Lower Rhine in the following decades. Called swesteren, and “begging” or “wandering beghards”, or willige arme, or more properly “lollards”, these lay women and men distinguished themselves from traditional beguines and beghards by a stricter adherence to individual and collective poverty, by a special dress, and by a particular doctrine: their faith in human “good will” and personal enlightenment through God’s grace, and their skepticism of human regulations not based in Scripture, encouraged them to pursue a life of religious poverty free from material, institutional, or canon-law constraints. Around 1300, those ideals exposed them to suspicion of free-spirit tendencies. Part Four of the series offers a catalogue of houses (or “convents”) of the swesteren and lollards in the region and period examined in these essays, with a map and references to primary and secondary sources; convents of (traditional) beghards are identified and added to illustrate developments explained in Part Two.

Oliviana: Mouvements et dissidences spirituels XIIIe - XIVe siècles, 2023

This series of four articles argues that the Church campaigns against the “heresy of the Free Spirit” of the early fourteenth century primarily targeted a new type of beguines and beghards, emerging in Cologne around 1290 and spreading across the Low Countries and the Lower Rhine in the following decades. Called swesteren, and “begging” or “wandering beghards”, or willige arme, or more properly “lollards”, these lay women and men distinguished themselves from traditional beguines and beghards by a stricter adherence to individual and collective poverty, by a special dress, and by a particular doctrine. Part Three, devoted to their beliefs and practices, returns to the well-known “confession” of John of Brünn (Brno) about his life in a “house of the poor” in Cologne in the first decades of the fourteenth century, but it is mainly concerned with the Middle Dutch “Dialogue between Meister Eckhart and a Layperson”, which I consider the work of a lollard or swester living in (northern) Brabant and writing in or shortly after 1333. It displays a complex affinity with the thought of Meister Eckhart (presented as a fellow martyr of an “unknowing” Church) on such issues as mystical union and good works. I argue that the apparent similarities between the movement’s doctrine and Meister Eckhart’s teachings, with which the author of the Dialogue was at least partly familiar, are not due to direct dependency but may best be explained by a common background in late thirteenth-century discussions about grace and human will; I also explain why the doctrine, while not antinomian, might have raised suspicion of free-spirit sympathies. I offer a brief sketch of developments after 1350: further expansion, now also into France (the Turlupins), despite still more intense persecution, and gradual transformation of lollards and swesteren into Cellite (Alexian) brothers and sisters in the second half of the fifteenth century. The essay ends with observations on the role of the poverty ideal and the possible use of books (in the German and Dutch vernaculars) in the movement.

The Innes Review 64:2, 2013

Space and Self in Early Modern European Cultures, 2012

Past & Present, 2005

Central European History, 2004