Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Glastonbury Abbey.
and literary scholars alike. For historians, it seems, these legends, with their
historical source to be worthy of their attention. The last ten years, however,
have seen a slight raise in interest in these legends, especially since the
– even though a lot of the source material has always been relatively easily
Sadly , the majority of these legends from English monasteries have not
comprehensive study is clearly outside of the scope of this paper, I will use
for how many of these monastic communities created a legend that not only
provided them with an identity, but also allowed them to tie that identity to a
Before talking about the legend, I would just like to take a few
moments to also talk about the chronicle in which is occurs. The Waltham
Chronicle “an account of the discovery of the holy cross at Monatcute and its
have started writing shortly after the secular college at Waltham was
dissolved in 1177. While it doesn’t seem likely that he had any other
narrative sources of the house to draw upon – he did draw heavily on other
The legends opening lines take on a tone that almost reminds one of a
fairy tale: “When Cnut was on the throne ruling the English, there lived in a
man who was a smith by trade. He was a very honest, good-natured and
benevolent man who feared Gand and shunned evil, one of the kind of men
God loves with a holy regards for their piety.” Indeed, the opening chapter
goes into great detail about the live of this smith. We learn that he was
entrusted with the responsiblility of looking after the water, fire and the
this vision, a figure, bathed in light, orders the smith to tell the priest that
God wishes the congregation of the town to climb upon a hill (which hill is
God’s grace, they find a treasure hidden for generations; a cross, the symbol
but the repetition of this vision over the next few nights, as well as the threat
and eventual reality of violence by the holy figure, which “looking at him
fiercely and uttering threats” and in addition to those threats “it did
something frightening, for it gripped the smiths arm with such violence that
it left clear imprints of its sharp fingernails and weakened the power of his
arm for wielding the hammer” – this violent reaction leads him to run to the
After calling the parish together, they finally climb the hill and discover
two crosses (one large, one small), a bell, and a book at the top of the hill –
clearly a case of the angel underpromising and overdelivering. The local lord,
Tovi the Proud, a prominent advisor to Cnut, promises the cross to all the
large cathedral cities in England, yet the oxen who draw the wagon the cross
was loaded on refuse to move until Tovi finally mentions the small town of
Waltham and the cart starts moving. On its way, the cross already starts
lives.”I think it is important to note here that the author very explicitly draws
Tovi and his wife later become important benefactors to the church at
The reason I have to spend so much time telling you the foundation legend is
because as far as monastic foundation legends go, this one is very, very
part of the chronicle, tends to place a lot of emphasis on the fact that he
either has talked to witnesses for the events described (no matter how
of English monasteries between the 11th and 13th century, one thing that
quickly becomes apparent is how often these legends speak of the exact
provides a good example for this, with not just one, but two instances of this
region to another is made possible (from heaven to earth and vice versa;
one or another of certain images, all of which refer to the axis mundi: pillar,
hierophany is not even needed for the creation of a sacred space. According
to Eliade, any sign that can be explained as not belonging to this world can
argues that ‘religious man’, as he puts it, needs to create a sacred space set
aside from profane space, because “the irruption of the sacred does not only
project a fixed point into the formless fluidity of profane space, a center into
between the cosmic planes […] and makes possible the ontological passage
shows itself to us”. It is through these hierophanies, for example, that a tree,
a stone, or a place becomes different from the profane world. Eliade also
them that he is able to explain and order the profane world. As an example
for how this takes a concrete form, Eliade cites how medieval city walls were
Waltham in order to create an identity for his own house that is set very
the whole 9th chapter to what is basically a litany of all the great cathedrals
and London and Winchester, only to have the cross stubbornly stay put.
Reading, he prayed to Christ with many tears that He be pleased to grant the
and his descendants.” But clearly Christ was not very pleased with this idea,
But, at last, Tovi remembers “a lowly hut which he had begin to build in
by luxurious woods, provided with a river full of fish which is called the Lea,
The chronicler here almost sounds like he is writing a tourist guide, but
his choice of words here is also clearly not accidental. This is the first time
Waltham is mentioned in its own chronicle, one third into the text, and so it
seems only right to praise this place, where the author and most of the
readers he is writing for have spend the largest part of their lives. At the
same time, the chronicler has set this scene up very carefully as well. The
place mentioned before, Reading, had, in the life-time of the author seen the
foundation of Reading Abbey in 1121 by Henry the 1st. One might wonder if
In the course of its history, Waltham becomes very closely associated with
Harold II, who not only builds a larger church for the cross, and installs the
monastic community there in 1030, but also donates a large number of relics
to the abbey (including a piece of the True Cross) (NOTE archeological find!)
and makes it his last place to pray before going into battle at Hastings. After
his death, the monks, according to the Chronicle, ask the Conqueror for his
body and bury him in the church. However, while the Conqueror looks
benevolently upon the abbey (and the chronicler goes through great pains to
stress this), his successors feel no such connection and the fortunes of the
monks start waning rapidly. In 1177, Henry II dissolves the community and
early on by the chronicler who himself was a member of the original group of
monks installed by Harold. It’s worth pointing out, though, that the house
profited from this and quickly became one of the wealthiest Augustinian
houses and profited greatly from the royal patronage, which, in some ways,
might explain why it was also to become the last of all English monasteries
to be dissolved (1540).
Scholars have often assumed that the Waltham Chronicle is only an
incomplete document. However, as I will argue in this paper, I think that the
author has actually carefully crafted the legend of the invention of the cross
with a framing narrative that reaches from the discovery of the cross to the
dissolution of the early community. Not only did the chronicler provide the
helped them to explain the rise and fall of the original monastic community
at Waltham.