![Sample our Information Science journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5940/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Communication-Studies.jpg"})
Abstract
In this article the author examines the composition of convent libraries in Renaissance Europe—specifically, Italy and Spain. While much research on monastic libraries has occurred, little has concerned convent libraries. They are unique because they include writing both by and for women. The author used previous historical research to form an overview of a convent library's composition. Examining monastic and Tridentine rules regarding literature collected and produced in convents allows one to understand if ecclesiastical legislation restricted convent literature. From there, examining scribal work performed in convents, a few known convent holdings, and the works written by nuns themselves can illuminate the holdings of a convent library. These methods lead to the conclusion that convent libraries contained collections rich in social history and women's history because they contained some of the only literature by, for, and about women.
Notes
1. “General” books being those books that are not related specifically to another facet of convent life such as the infirmary or kitchen. Presumably, the infirmary would keep medical books and the kitchen would keep recipe collections (Woodford 21).
2. In the Rule of St. Benedict, this is chapter 38, number 1 (105). In the Rule of St. Caesarius of Arles, this is number 18 (175).
3. Alcuni avvertimenti nella vita monacale by Bonaventura Gonzaga da Reggio, a Franciscan monk, used examples of self-discipline from the lives of various saints to advocate a similar virtue in nuns.
4. Clausura refers to the enclosure of women in convents from the outside, secular world. It was first introduced in a papal bull, Periculoso, years before the Council of Trent. The concept was that laypeople should not see nuns, as they were the “brides of Christ.” This made the exchange of ideas between nuns and laypeople more difficult as those who were not relatives or religious men were no longer allowed into the convent.
5. Nuns learned to read by reading the Psalms, other Scripture, saints’ lives, and alphabet books (abecedario) written specifically to teach virtues alongside the alphabet (Ambrosini 422; McKnight 36).
6. For further discussion on memories, histories, and convent chronicles, see Chronicles – social histories.
7. Sor Juana of Spain, for example, had over 4,000 volumes in her convent's library, and most of these were unpublished (Cushing-Daniels 31). Unpublished manuscripts circulated between convents before publication, allowing women to be the first audience for many nuns’ works. An Augustinian nun in Spain received a copy of Saint Theresa of Avila's Libro de la vida prior to its publication, and her diary stated that she was ecstatic to have access to such prolific writing (Cushing-Daniels 34).
8. Sister Bartolomea Riccoboni of Corpus Domini in Florence often refers to letters from the founding father of the convent, yet she did not write her chronicle until at least twenty years after the convent's foundation. Her references to such letters are extremely detailed, suggesting that the convent kept the letters (Riccoboni 25).
9. The full title of Bienewitz's book has been left in tact with punctuation unchanged.
10. Philip IV was not the first monarch to seek a nun's advice. His father, Philip III did so as well, but there is no record of the name of a specific nun or convent with which he formed a relationship (Cushing-Daniels 96–97).
11. The letters from Galileo to his daughter were not kept as the convent feared possible retribution in the years following his trial. While Suor Maria Celeste is known to have cherished the letters as she says “I set aside and save all the letters that you write me daily,” it is thought that the abbess burned them after her death (Galilei ix, 7).
12. For further information on transcription in convents and scribal work, see the section entitled Convent scribes – Writing to create a library.
13. For ease of wording, the author of this paper will used the term Ceremoniale to refer to the individual book and ceremoniale to refer to the type of literature.
14. Mariana de San Joseph of the Augustinian Recollect in Spain wrote a commentary on the Song of Songs (McKnight 67).
15. Sometimes only the convent kept a print copy of a sermon, but some sermons were printed for wider consumption, such as Maria de Santo Domingo's Libro de oración (McKnight 64).
16. Beatrice del Sera wrote Love of Virtue based on Boccaccio's Filocolo as a love story with a moral (Weaver 139; Zarri, “Prophecy” 108).
17. In a letter about the convent reformation, Ana de San Bartolomé predicts the defeat of the Spanish Armada in an attempt to warn the government (Arenal, “Leyendo” 217).
18. In Germany, nuns referred to chronicles as nonnenbucher (Riccoboni 22). This paper will use the term chronicle as it is more common in modern scholarship.
19. Some of these foundation stories are mythical and link the convent to a great religious event or person (Weaver 136).
20. Other surviving chronicles include one from San Girolamo mentioning a severe convent fire, a series of “memories” from San Paolo in Milan covering 1586-1635 and about the founding mothers and the convent priests, a published chronicle of S. Lucia di Foligno 1468-1536 by Suor Caterina Guarneri da Orimo, and a chronicle by Lucia Pioppi of Modena (Baerstein 806; Lowe, “History” 109; Weaver 133-134).
21. A ricordi was another name for a chronicle.
22. Because the nuns’ primary audience was their sisters or family, nuns’ writings are often addressed to women (Arenal, “Leyendo” 218).