The Beguines of Breda

A relief on the chapel wall. 

What does a woman want? Family, Career, Independence, Relationships, Power? Freud asked a version of this question in the late 19th century and concluded he was unable to answer it. Prior to the modern period, asking a woman what she wanted from life was largely seen as unimportant. A woman's life was mostly determined by family and social station. Options were often few and those with more power determined if and who one married, if education was possible, and how one's time and life energies would be spent. Yet history is always varied and sprinkled with fascinating social experiments.

From the porter's gate. The Beginage of Breda.

In the later part of the middle ages an rising number of women chose lives devoted to prayer and service. Rather than withdrawing to a windswept monastery to take vows and live by an established rule of life, lay women began gathering in consecrated communities to live together in populated areas, mostly market towns. A papal dispensation of 1215 permitted women to live together encouraging each other in lives of virtue. This new urbanized way of life was neither monastic nor family-centered.

This was something between.

Some of the women had been married and were widowed. Some had grown children. Many were from peasant families, although noble women appear as founders or benefactors. All who joined chose to be chaste while living in the community but were free to leave or marry at any time. This was a provisional community. They sought to live as the apostles mandated in the book of Acts: Live simply. Devote yourself to prayer and service. Break bread together. Live in awe of God's presence. Work for the common good. Each woman was required to have an income.They owned no private property but lived side-by-side in independent rooms cooking and caring for themselves.

Textile work and bookmaking were two common occupations. Some members offered rudimentary nursing to the young, old or sick. Most offered some type of religious instruction and education for girls. These were early "working women". Most communities had the approval and patronage of local nobles or leading families. Who wouldn't want a group of devout women offering service to the larger community for a simple fee that would allow the women to live independently?

By the year 1320, documents indicate more than 200 such communities existed in the Low Countries of Europe--today's Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg. Large communities numbering 2,000 members existed in Louvain, Brussels and Strausbourg, (once in Germany now, France). As many as 600 communities dotted greater Europe and many lasted until the 16th century when the Reformation's antipathy for anything resembling monasticism challenged their existence.

Comparing their days? Telling secrets. Who knows? 

Most of these communities were locally focused and run. Collectively they were referred to by various names but often are considered together under the moniker of the Beguines. (Male communities are known as Beghards.) There are several theories of the origin of the name. Some say it is a derivative of "mumbling" which detractors said the Beguines did as they recited Psalms or other prayers as they went about their lives outside of the community in the larger village. Others say it comes from a Latin word for women who burn with pious idealism.  Existing texts written by Beatrix of Nazareth, Marguerite Porete, Mechtild of Magdeburg, and Hadjewich offer a mystical theology written in the emerging vernacular languages of the people that stands alongside scholastic writings in Latin to give a wider-angled view of actual belief and practice. In the 13th century women were often identified with the human (suffering) nature of Jesus and men, the divine (rational) nature.  Hadewich wrote to her female community members, "With the humanity of God you shall live here in suffering and exile, and with the powerful eternal God you shall love and jubilate inwardly with a sweet confidence the the truth of these both is a single delighting. (Letter 6, Hart trans.).

Organizational structures for the communities varied. In the one I visited, a "mistress" of the community was elected by the community for a three year term. She lived in a separate house and granted permission for members to come and go. A female gatekeeper lived in the the gatehouse to supervise coming and going. A sextoness was responsible for the chapel and sacristy. She prepared the daily mass and six daily services and oversaw preparations for marriage and burial ceremonies that could be held by there for a small fee. Other members of the community sang in the choir, played the organ or other instruments. A male priest, selected by the community, would come and go to officiate while all ministries of the community were quite self-directed.

I mapped out travel to several Beguinages but then settled on Breda, an hour train ride east of Rotterdam. This Beguinage dates from 1267 when Hendrick, the local Lord, granted the community a title to a plot of land. The community relocated a short distance from the original site in 1531, and the convent house is now is a short walk from the train station.  We arrived from Rotterdam, tried to pronounce Beguinage in an understandable way but only the woman at the tourist information desk could understand what we wanted to see. She pointed us in the right direction. The brick U-shaped cloister was restored in the 20th century. It is easy to imagine the women walking down the cobblestone streets to tend to the sick or carry in another basket of cloth to bleach. At the small museum, the words that echoed through the video presentation were independent, devout, working, women.

St. Catharine's was narrow. We could not
enter so photos of the windows were
not possible. Trust me they were great.

St. Catharine's Church occupies the center of the Beguinage at Breda  On the left is a stained glass window celebrating St Begga, a 7th century lowlands saint, the daughter of a noble who was widowed as a young woman and set off on pilgrimage to Rome. She returned to found seven chapels and a nunnery on the River Maas. This river region is often considered the birthplace of medieval women's religious communities.

Some says the Beguines take their names from this local saint. On the right of Breda's chapel, is a window to St. Catharine of Alexandria, a 4th century martyr. The legends that surround her suggest she was a young, noble convert who saw a vision of the Madonna and child that convinced her of the veracity of Christianity. She is said to have been a scholar, and one version of her story says she was set up by the emperor Maximin to debate the leading court philosphers in hopes she would be discredited and recant. Her performance, however, had the opposite effect and convinced several to convert (perhaps even the emperor's wife). Catharine was sentenced to death by torture on a spiked wheel that broke when she was placed upon it. She was then beheaded. In the 6th century, the first monastery of the still undivided church was established in Sinai. It still exists. (See the monastery!) In the 15th century, Joan of Arc, said St. Catharine visited her in a vision giving her counsel on how to self-govern her life in virtue.

The Witch's orb. It's my husband
waving, not the devil. 

A herb garden of medicinal herbs fills the the cloister's center at Breda. A witch's orb, a reflective globe on a metal stand is there to remind that these communities existed in a pre-scientific world. The orb was thought to deter demons, diseases, and adversity. The Beguines were the "brides of Christ" and thought to be of great temptation to evil spirits or the devil. If he flew by or crept near he would see his own distorted image in the mirror and flee in fear.

The Beguines of Breda ran a textile repair and bleaching business. A great lawn remains where the spread church linens and laundry to dry. In the earliest centuries, they also prayed for the souls of the departed for a small fee. Grieving families would pay the women to remember the dead through intercession. Perhaps this aided them in grief and lessened their fears that their loved ones would get stuck in purgatory.

I pretended to talk to one of the last Beguines of Breda
depicted in a hologram in the museum.  

Cornelia Catherine Frijters, the last Beguine of Breda, died in 1990. Now 750 years after is founding, the 29 small brick row houses are rented to single women. Small gardens or outdoor sitting areas show individuality. A peek in the window reveals simple living in these medieval tiny houses. One can cross the main room with a couple of paces. This  remains a community of women who go about their business each day and return to the comaraderie of a cloister. In a new era they continue to live as independent, self-supporting women who do much good in the world.