The thirteenth-century Dialogus miraculorum of Caesarius of Heisterbach includes the tale of a vexed and unhappy novice who was ill-suited to his avowed monastic profession. Deciding to return to his prebend, the novice was confronted by the abbot, who on hearing of the novice's plans to abandon the Cistercian life announced: "Bring me an axe." When the novice inquired why, the abbot replied: "That your feet be cut off. Believe me, I would rather keep you without your feet than to let you go away and bring disorder upon our house.") This cautionary tale has a number of didactic functions , not the least of which is the seriousness with which thirteenth-century Cistercians like Caesarius of Heisterbach expected novices to regard even their preliminary vows. Anxiety over apostasy and the ensuing scandal that apostates might bring to a monastery are also important here, as is monastic fear of the triumph of temptation: this story is the fiftieth capitulum in the fourth book of the Dialogus miraculorum, collectively entitled De tentatione. Such themes and concerns are familiar to any student of the Cistercian order, an order which continued to privilege withdrawal from the world and stabilitas as the foundations of monastic life even after more "radical" notions of men-dicancy and apostolic emulation had begun to direct the purpose, function and expression of other forms of monastic life from the late twelfth century.2 Unfamiliar to the modern reader, however, may be the implicit agenda of forcible enclosure hidden behind the abbot's threat to disable the novice in this exemplum. The text's suggestion of violence may appear hyperbolic at first reading, despite the very real gravitas of the author's message. Yet even if the reader does acknowledge the didactic purpose embedded in Caesarius's rhetoric, the tale nevertheless continues to hint at a profoundly disquieting element of monastic life-confinement by force. Searching for instances of abbatial violence against recalcitrant novices thankfully turns up very little evidence that this was a common practice,3 yet it is clear that forcible enclosure was certainly present in other ways in the Cistercian monasteries of western Europe. ICaesarii Heisterbacensis monachi ordinis Cisterciensis dialogus miraculorum (hereafter Dialogus miraculorum) ed. J. Strange, 2 vols. (Cologne 1851) bk. 4 chap. 50: Item de tentatione Reneri successoris eiusdem. "Afferte mihi securim. Cum cui diceret novicius, quid debet securis? respondit: Ut praecidentur pedes vestri. Credite mihi, magis yolo vos sine pedibus semper pascere, quam vos sinarn abire et confun-dere domum nostrarn." "Pascere" can also have the meaning of nurture, or rear.

Paper presented at Leeds IMC 2015 on the changing role of the medieval monastic porter in England

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A broad survey of Benedictine monasticism from the time of Benedict to the present with sections on the Benedictine Office and music and monasticism. The bibliography (completed 2017) is divided by topic.

In a description of a trip through the Midi of France in 1835, Prosper Merimée devotes a lengthy paragraph to the analysis of the Christ in Vézelay's Pentecost tympanum (fig. 1). He marvels at the carving of the figure's feet and “blessing” hands, as well as the placement of the thighs in relation to the torso. Later in his treatment of the abbey church and its sculpture, the author notes that figures on the nave capitals convey a “savage zeal” (zèle farouche) by means of posture and facial expressions. Gestures, in the widely construed, medieval sense of the word, clearly struck the celebrated French author as a salient feature of Vézelay's sculpture. Merimée sympathized with Romantic visions of the Middle Ages as a period less tainted by the stifling effects of civilization, and perhaps his fascination with the dramatic body movement carved throughout the abbey church reflects the belief that these were unfettered by the artistic or social constraints of the early nine...

This PhD dissertation examined diverse narrative, legislative, and epistolary texts concerning conversion and leadership patterns in new religious communities of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, with particular reference to Bernard of Clairvaux and early Cistercian monasticism. Congregations such as the Fonte Avellanesi, the Grandmontines, the Premonstratensians, and the Benedictines of Molesme were analysed to provide comparative perspectives. The thesis described the eleventh-century background of Cistercian asceticism and the secular contexts for Bernard of Clairvaux's early career. It examined the evidence on his extreme and idiosyncratic asceticism and situated his practices within the context of submission to abbatial and episcopal governance..