| Abstrakt: |
This study arises from contextual (historical, legal, genealogical, economic, sexual) decoding of a body of occasionally referenced but mostly unpublished documents - letters, fragmenta, civil process affidavits, attestations witnessed by notary public, (in)formal accusations under Canon Law, and appeals at the Roman Curia (Italy). Collateral evidence ranges from data in the Portuguese Royal Chancery to documents from former religious institutions. The study focuses on amply supported allegations of sex scandals at the fifteenth-century female convents of Arouca and Tarouquela (Cistercian Order), involving Sub-Prioresses, Prioresses, Abbesses and even rank-and-file nuns who bore children to various men. The male partners were of varied social standings, mostly from nearby localities and from the harbour of Porto. The women of higher rank successfully defended their leadership offices and/or extensive emoluments plus granted properties. The accusations were not brought, at least initially, by any Church institutions, Inquisitors, or male 'authorities'. The evidence that may be deemed 'minimally mediated' ('authentic'), comes from other women - notably fellow nuns. The article explores the sexual, economic, and lineage dynamics, as well as cultural modalities of the struggle for control over convents and rural parishes as 'lineage assets'. It contextualizes the breaches of celibacy among similar phenomena across Europe, in a framework of broader socio-economic models of late medieval clerical sexuality. The study concludes with the life stories of two women enmeshed in this Douro Valley regional, conventual, and lineage matrix and also involved in migration (Portugal to England and England to Portugal), driven by intimate relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
