Beguinage
| Flemish Béguinages | |
|---|---|
| Name as inscribed on the World Heritage List | |
The Our Lady Ter Hoyen beguinage, one of three in Ghent
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| Type | Cultural |
| Criteria | ii, iii, iv |
| Reference | 855 |
| UNESCO region | Europe and North America |
| Inscription history | |
| Inscription | 1998 (22nd Session) |
A beguinage (From the French béguinage) is an architectural complex which formerly housed beguines, lay religious women who lived in community without taking vows or retiring from the world. There are two types of beguinages: those housing small, informal, and often poor communities that emerged across Europe from the twelfth century on, and the 'court beguinages' (begijnhof (Dutch)), a much larger and more stable type of community that emerged in the region of the Low Countries in the first decades of the thirteenth century. Several of these are now listed by UNESCO as World Heritage. By the mid-thirteenth century, the French king Louis IX founded a beguinage in Paris, which was modeled on the court beguinages of the Low Countries.[1]
Contents
Etymology
The Oxford English Dictionary, citing Du Cange, gives the origin of the word "beguine" in the name of Lambert le Bègue, "Lambert the Stammerer", an early supporter of the movement who died around 1180.
Description
While a small beguinage usually constituted just one house where women lived together, a Low Countries court beguinage typically comprised one or more courtyards surrounded by houses, and also included a church, an infirmary complex, and a number of communal houses or 'convents'. From the twelfth century through the eighteenth, every city and large town in the Low Countries had at least one court beguinage: the communities dwindled and came to an end, over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries). They were encircled by walls and separated from the town proper by several gates which were closed at night. During the day the beguines could come and go as they pleased. Beguines came from a wide range of social classes, though truly poor women were only admitted if they had a wealthy benefactor who pledged to provide for their needs.
Our understanding of women's motivations for joining the beguinages has changed dramatically in recent decades. The development of these communities is clearly linked to a preponderance of women in urban centers in the Middle Ages, but while earlier scholars like the Belgian historian Henri Pirenne believed that this "surplus" of women was caused by men dying in war, that theory has been debunked. Since the groundbreaking work of John Hajnal, who demonstrated that, for much of Europe, marriage occurred later in life and at a lower frequency than had previously been believed, historians have established that single women moved to the newly developed cities because those cities offered them work opportunities. Simons (2001) has shown how the smaller beguinages as well as the court beguinages answered those women's social and economic needs, in addition to offering them a religious life coupled with personal independence, which was a difficult thing to have for a woman.
Beguinages in Belgium
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- Aarschot
- Antwerp
- Bruges: Ten Wijngaerde
- Dendermonde
- Diest
- Diksmuide
- Ghent: Old Saint-Elisabeth, New Saint-Elisabeth in Sint-Amandsberg and Our-Lady Ter Hooyen
- Hasselt
- Herentals
- Hoogstraten
- Lier
- Leuven: Grand Béguinage, Leuven and Small
- Mechelen: Large and Small
- Kortrijk
- Sint-Truiden
- Turnhout
- Tongeren
Thirteen Flemish beguinages have been listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site since 1998.[2]
Other beguinages
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- Begijnhof, Amsterdam, Netherlands
- Begijnhof, Utrecht, Netherlands
- Breda, Netherlands
- Leeuwarden, Netherlands[3]
- Haarlem, Netherlands[4]
- Sittard, Netherlands[5]
- Béguinage de la rue Quentin-Barré, et al., St. Quentin, France[6]
- Béguinage de Saint Vaast, Cambrai, France
- Béguinage, Valenciennes
- Elm Hill Houses, Norwich, England
- Béguinage, Paris, France
See also
Gallery
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Begijnhof, Amsterdam
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Beguinage of Turnhout
,_Begijnhof_--_2015_--_7215.jpg)
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The Begijnhof / Beguinage of Breda (Netherlands)
Notes
References
- ↑ Miller 2014.
- ↑ UNESCO 1998.
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Sources
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External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.. |
Belgium's beguinages offered refuge for women CNN[dead link]
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1 Listing shared with six other countries, which includes Belgium's Maison Guiette; 2 Listing shared with France; 3 Listing shared with the Netherlands, which includes Belgium's Wortel; 4 Listing shared with France 5 Listing shared with seven other countries, which includes Belgium's Spa; 6 Listing shared with seventeen other countries, which includes Belgium's Sonian Forest.
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