Monastic Reading at Thorney Abbey, 1323–1347

Abstract

The only records to survive from the annual Lenten distribution of books in English Benedictine abbeys are four years' notes from Thorney abbey. Although not from consecutive years, all date from the period 1324 to 1330, during the early part of the abbacy of Reynold of Water Newton (1323–47). In the last years of his tenure the monks of Thorney were found to be reading material of a less pious character: two visitations discovered that a scandalous book was circulating among them during the years 1345 to 1347. Like the survival of the Lenten distribution records, this story is unique among English monastic archives. These sources provide two distinct, yet complementary, glimpses of the reading culture at Thorney in the time of Abbot Reynold, which are discussed in turn below.