The Past and Present Society

The Mass as a Social Institution 1200-1700

Author(s): John Bossy
Source: Past & Present, No. 100 (Aug., 1983), pp. 29-61
Published by: Oxford University Press on behalf of The Past and Present Society
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 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL
INSTITUTION I 200- I 700
Thannepipedpees of poysyea note,
"Clariorest solitopostmaximanebulaphebus,
Post inimicitias
clariorestet amor.
Aftersharpeshoures",quod Pees "mostsheneis the sonne
Is no wederwarmer thanafterwaterycloudes.
Ne no loue leuere ne leuerfrendes,
Thanafterwerreandwo whanLoue andPees be maistres.
Wasneuerewerrein this worlde ne wykkednesseso kene
That ne Loue, andhym luste to laughyngene brou3te
And Pees thorwpacience alle perillesstopped".
"Trewes",quod Treuth* "thowtellestvs soth, bi Iesus!
Clippewe in couenaunt andvch of vs cusseother!"
"Andlete no peple",quod Pees "perceyuethatwe chydde!
For inpossibleis no thyng to hym thatis almy3ty".1

MAX WEBER BELIEVEDTHAT THE GREATACHIEVEMENTOF THE JUDAEO-

Christiantraditionwasto establisha universal,"rational"or Kantian
ethics; to transcendmoralloyaltieswhich were foundedon kinship
* This piece appearedin French in Annales.E.S.C., xxxvi (I98I), pp. 44-7o
underthe title "Essaide sociographiede la messe, I200-I700", andI ammostgrateful
to the editors for permissionto publish this versionhere. It has been somewhat
revised.I shouldlike to thankthe membersof the Schoolsof Historyand of Social
Sciencein the Institutefor AdvancedStudy,Princeton,I976-7, to whomit wasread
in its originalform,andthosewho participatedin a seminaron the topicat the Ecole
des Hautes Etudes en SciencesSociales,Paris, in March I980. I am also obliged
to MargaretAston, MargheritaBiller, Claus-PeterClasen,SherrillCohen,Patrick
Geary,EdithHirschand LionelRothkrugfor valuableinformationandsuggestions
and greatlyobligedto the BibliothequeMazarine,Paris,for the illustration.
' WilliamLangland,The Visionof Williamconcerning PiersthePlowmanin Three
ParallelTexts,ed. W. W. Skeat,2 vols. (Oxford,I886), i, B-text,Passusxviii, lines
407-I9, p. 548. The modernversionby J. F. Goodridge(Penguinedn., Harmonds-
worth, I966), p. 229, reads:
Then Peaceplayedon her pipe, singingthis song
"Clariorest solitopostmaximanebulaPhoebus
Post inimicitiasclariorest et amor
Afterthe sharpestshowersthe sun shinesbrightest
No weatheris warmerthanafterthe blackestclouds,
Nor any love freshernor friendshipfonder
Thanafterstrifeand struggle,when Love and Peacehaveconquered.
Therewas nevera warin this world,norwickednessso cruel
That love, if he liked, mightnot turnto laughter
And Peace,throughPatience,put an end to its perils".
"I give way",saidTruth. "Youarein the right,Mercy.
Let us makeour peacetogether,and sealit with a kiss".
"Andnobodyshallknow that we everquarrelled",said
Peace, "fornothingis impossiblewith almightyGod".
3o PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

and dividedthe socialuniverse,from the individual'spointof view,

into moralbrothers,with whom the higheststandardsapplied,and
moralothers, with whom they did not. He seems to have detected
fourstagesin the transcendingprocess:amongtheJews,theestablish-
ment of a monopolyof public worshipat Jerusalem,superseding
privatesacrificeand institutinga professionalpriesthood;the fusion
of Jew and Gentilein the earlyChristiancommunities;the worship
of the medievalcity, whichunlikethe ancientcity did not in his view
representa confederationof kinship groups but an associationof
individuals;and, finallyanddefinitively,the moraleconomyof such
"ethicalandasceticist"Protestantsectsas he held Puritanismto be.2
Historiansof Christianitymay do betterto think aboutthe general
drift of Weber'sview of their subjectthan to argueaboutparticular
aspectsof it: thoseof the sixteenthcenturymayfindthatin interpret-
ing the Reformationit suggests a rough sense of direction,while
remainingsilent on all particularquestions save one, and that a
problematicone. I take this flexibilityas an invitationto applythe
model with due libertyto the objectof my concern:the historyof
the mass as a socialinstitution,and the implicationswhich may be
drawnby a socialhistorianfromits supersessionas the centralact of
Christianworship,in much of the west, by otherritualforms.
For the authoror Englisherof the so-calledLayFolks'MassBook
in the latefourteenthcentury,"theworthiestthing,mostof goodness
in all this world, it is the Messe";for the ReformerThomasBecon
in the middle of the sixteenth, the mass was "the fountain,well,
headspringand originalof all idolatry,superstition,wickedness,sin
and abomination".3At least they were agreed that the mass was
centralto the Christianityof pre-Reformation Europe,and it can do
no harm to historiansto investigatewhetherthey may have been
correct.They will not be much helpedby the existingliteratureon
the subject,at leastin English,arisingas it does out of the liturgist's
concernto revealthe idealChristiancommunityexistingsomewhere
in the past, or the apologist'sinterest in theologicalor practical
abusesthoughtto have affectedthe massat the close of the middle
ages; and will be helped, I think, only to a certainextent by the
anthropologically mindedhistorian'sconcernwith"magic",his tend-
encyto see popularfeelingsaboutthe massas governedby a deficient
technology,when a simplesociologymightbe moregermane.4At a
2 R. Bendix,Max Weber:
An Intellectual
Portrait(London, I966), pp. 70 ff., 77,
I 38 ff., 236.
-3TheLay Folks'MassBook, ed. T. F. Simmons(EarlyEnglishText Soc., lxxi,
London, I879), p. 2; ThomasBecon, TheDisplayingof thePopishMass,in Prayers
andOtherPiecesof ThomasBecon,ed. J. Ayre(ParkerSoc. [xvii],Cambridge,I844),
p. 286.
Dugmore,TheMassandtheEnglishReformers
4 C. W. (London,I958); F. Clark,
TheEucharisticSacrificeand theRefonnation,2nd edn. (Oxford,I967); K. Thomas,
Religionand the Declineof Magic (Harmondsworth,I973 edn.), pp. 36-40. The
(cont. on p. 32)
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 3I

Sacrificeand Sacrament:detailfromfirstpageof canonin a Parismissalof the

fifteenthcentury(BibliothequeMazarine,MS. 4I2, fo. 8)
Photo: Giraudon
32 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

timewhenit hasonce again,like the Englishritualwhichsuperseded

it, come under the improvinghammer,it is worthtakingup again
that venerabletext and its rubrics;consideringthem in the light of
the commentariesmade upon them before, during and after the
Reformation;5 and doingwhatwe can to extendourknowledgefrom
the theoreticalto the practicalby drawingon suchevidenceof actual
practiceas we can muster. As we do, we shall find that Weber's
concerns,andsomeof his instances,wereunderstoodby his medieval
and Reformationpredecessors:he mightor mightnot havefelt grat-
ified by my own elaborationof their views, which appearsin one
respect contraryto his, does not distinguishmuch between pre-
ReformationChristianityin cities and countrysides,andhas little or
nothingto say aboutPuritanism.
A word of descriptionfirst. With variationsof rite which were
seasonal, local or personal but did not, all told, extend beyond
marginalmatters,the full, public, sungmassof the lasttwo hundred
yearsor so beforethe Reformationconsistedof the followingevents:
anintroductorypsalmexposingthe predicamentof unredeemedman,
anda confessionof sin; the announcementof redemptionin the hymn
Gloria;a series of declarationsof faith includingreadingsfrom the
epistlesand gospelsand the Nicene Creed;the offertory,or prelimi-
narypartof the ritualas such, duringwhichthe priestpreparedthe
breadand wine for sacrificeand the congregationprepareditself by
such meansas contributingto the supportof its pastor;the central
part of the ritual, called the canon, expressedin terms of sacrifice
and includingas its chief event the consecrationby the priestof the
breadandwine, by whichthey becamethe bodyandbloodof Christ;
the communion,or sequenceof eventsconnectedwith the reception
of the eucharist;andvariousconcludingmattersat the end, including
a blessingof the congregationby the priestbeforeits departure.Such
developmentsas occurredto the ritualduringthe latermiddleages
were eitherprayersaddedtowardsthe beginningor end of the rite,
and diminishingas one moved towardsits centre;or actionsof the
priest which might be introducedthroughoutthe rite, notablythe
elevationof the host and chaliceaftertheir consecration,and often
on later occasions,in order that the congregationmight see them.
(n- 4 cont.)
essentialcontributionsfromthe liturgicaltraditionareJ. Jungmann,Missarum sollem-
nia, 2 vols. (Vienna,I949- I use herethe Frenchversion,3 vols., Paris,I95I-4)- A.
Franz,Die Messeim deutschen Mittelalter(Freiburg,I902; repr. Darmstadt,I963);
cf. E. Delaruelle,L'egliseau tempsdu GrandSchismeet de la criseconciliaire, 2 vols.
(Histoirede l'eglise,xiv [Paris],I962-4), ii, p. 742, wherehe commentsthatby this
time the masshad "cessed'etrel'affairede tout le peuplechretlen".
5 I have used those of InnocentIII, De sacroaltans mysterio (Patrologiaecursus
completus,ed. J.-P. Migne,Serieslatina,ccxvii Paris,I855, cols. 763-9I6)- William
Durandus,Rationaledivinorum officiorum (Napies, I859 edn.), pp. I39 ff., Gabriel
Biel,Canonismisseexpositio,ed. H. A. ObermanandW. J. Courtney,4 vols. (Wiesba-
den, I963-9); Becon,Displayingof thePopishMass;Pierrele Brun,Explicationde la
messe,4 vols. (Paris,I726; repr.Farnborough,I970).
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 33
This was the central public ritual of the Latin church from the
thirteenthcenturyto the Reformationand of the RomanCatholic
churchthereafter.It is truethatoneof the majortendenciesof thepre-
Reformationperiodwasfor the publicritualto be ratherswampedby
a multiplicationof private, said or low masseswhich to a varying
extent accordingto localityand milieu had trenchedon the public
rite beforethe close of the middleages. The tendencymaybe felt to
blur some traits of the picture I proposeto drawof the mass as a
socialinstitution,while underliningothers.
To leave descriptionat this point would be like presentingan
intendingtheatre-goerwith the programmeof a play while giving
him no idea of the natureof the dramaenacted. On the face of it
thereis much in what the commentatorssay to give credenceto the
view of reformersand modernhistorianswho haveput the massinto
the categoryof magical rites: particularlyin what is said by the
less penetratingbut more frequentlyquotedcommentatorslike the
authorof TheMannerandMedeof theMass.6 For thereis no question
but that the mass was universallyfelt by orthodoxopinion, both
skilled and unskilled, to have the characterof a powerfulwork. It
was powerfulin manner,in that much of it was enactedin secret,
behinda screen;much of the words, and in particularthe wordsof
its solemnandcentralpassage,the canon,wasinaudibleto the public
and not thought proper to be divulged to them. An enterprising
publisherin Nurembergwho in about I840 publisheda vernacular
text of the ordinaryof the mass, includingthe canon,was obligedto
withdrawhis edition;the full text wasnot publishedin Germanuntil
the I530S.7 The taboowas not totallyobscurantist,in that the usual
defence offered, that if commonfolk knew the exact wordsof the
canontheywouldundoubtedlyuse themforconjuringandcharming,
was certainlyrealistic.Whethertheir motive was obscurantismor
prudence,the authoritiesof the late medievalchurchwere at one
with most of the peoplein holdingthat the wordsand actionsof the
masswerethingsof greatpower.Whatthat powerprocuredwas the
salvationof man; or, to recapturethe largerovertonesof the word
salus,the deliveranceof the Christianfromthe whole concatenation
of dooms,dangers,anxietiesandtribulationswhichloomedoverhim
in his corporalas in his spiritualexistence:overtonesmore exactly
renderedby the GermanHeil than by any Englishequivalent.
It procureddeliveranceor salvationin two ways. As the sacrifice
of the new law, it was a reparatoryor satisfactoryritualin whichwas
renewedor recapitulatedthe self-immolationof Christatoning,on
socio-legalprinciplesexpoundedin Anselm'sCurDeushomo,to his
6 A Treatise
of theManerandMedeof theMass, printedin Lay Folks'MassBook,
pp I28-47-
7 Franz,Messeim deutschen
Mittelalter,p. 632.
34 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

Fatherfor man'soffence. It securedor re-enactedthe "paying"8of

God, the appeasementof his anger,the restorationof diplomaticor
socialrelationsbetweenGod and man, the returnof the universeto
a conditionof peace. The expositionof this theme was the chief
concernof all the medievalexpositorswe shallbe consulting,and it
wasannouncedat the beginningof whatonemighttermthe overture,
wherethey commentedon the openingwordsof the Glorna:"Glory
be to God on high, and on earthpeaceto men of good will".
FollowingInnocentIII, WilliamDuranduscommented:"Before
the nativity of Christ, there were three barriersof enmity in the
world.The firstwas betweenGodandmen. The secondwasbetween
angelsandmen. The thirdwasbetweenmanandman".The pacifica-
tion of all these enmities was announcedby the angels in their
greetingto the shepherdson the hill above Bethlehem:the act of
greetingwas in itself, for contemporaries,a declarationof peaceand
friendship.In at leastone nativitypaintingof the fourteenthcentury
one may see one of the angels descendingtowardsthe shepherds,
carryingan olive branch.9Duranduscontinued:
The angelspeaksto, andrejoiceswith, the shepherdsin as muchas peacehasbeen
renewedbetweenthe angelsandmen, Godis bornas manbecausepeacehas been
restoredbetweenGodandman;he is bornin themangerof anox andanassbecause
peacehas been repairedbetweenmanandman.1''
The last of these points, which is not self-evidentfrom the second
chapter of St. Luke's gospel, requiresthe ox and the ass to be
understoodas figuresof the Jewsandthe Gentiles,whosereconcilia-
tion with each otherChristachieves.It is a symbolicpresentationof
one of Weber'suniversalizingmoments.As a sacramentthe mass
completeswhatthe pacifyingsacrificemakespossible:the eucharistic
eating wherebythe Christianparticipatesin communion,common
union,1lthe wholenessof Christand of his church,the tokenof his
entryinto transcendantlife.
It is commonlyheld that the cleardistinctionmade by medieval
theologiansbetween the sacrificialand sacramentalaspects of the
masswasoverdone.Theirexaggerations,if suchtheywere,maygive
credenceto what I havetakento be a fact aboutthe massas a social
institutionduringthe latermiddleages:thatas a sacrificeit tended,
like the originalbiblicalsacrificesof Cainand Abel, to representits
socialuniverseas a concatenationof distinctparts,while as a sacra-
8 "Pay"= pacare,"satisfy","placate": Lay Folks'MassBook, p. 58, line 3 from
end;accordingto p. 244 n., obsoleteby sixteenthcentury,thoughthepresentmeaning
of the wordin Englishis evidentlyderivedfromthis one; OxfordEnglishDictionary,
s.v. "pay".
9 So in Bartolodi Fredi(of Siena),"TheAdoration of the Shepherd":theCloisters,
MetropolitanMuseumof Art, New York.
10Durandus,Rationaledivinorum officiorum,p. I72; from InnocentIII, De sacro
altarismysterio,col. 8 I 0.
1I So interpretedin the Book of Ceremoniesof the southernConvocationof the
clergyin England,I539-40: Lay Folks'MassBook,p. 295.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 35

ment it representedamd embodiedunity and wholeness.This may

seem a gratuitousassumption.I shall arguefor it laterin the essay,
but since I proposeto proceeduponit fromthe startI drawattention
to two items of Englishevidencewhich may give it a certainprovis-
ional credibility.The first is a piece of politicaltheologywhich has
a modest place in the history of English constitutionaltheoryand
was expoundedin the anti-Lollardparliamentof I40I: it likeneda
meetingof parliamentto a mass consideredas a sacrifice,in that it
servedamongother things to integratethe otherwisedisparatepur-
poses of king, lords and commons.The secondis the thirty-firstof
the Thirty-nineArticlesof the Churchof England,which did not
formallycondemnsacrificeas such but the pluralityof "thesacrifices
of masses in which it was commonlysaid that the priest did offer
Christfor the living and the dead''.l2 Both the Lancastrianparlia-
ment and Cranmermust have had in mind the tripartitefractionof
the host which will be discussedlater. The discussionmay leave it
unclearwhetherthe segmentalityentailedin late medievalsacrifice
was a benign tripartitionof status or somethingmore malignantly
disintegrative;I shouldbe surprisedif it failedentirelyto conveythe
messagethatsacrificeand segmentalitywerein somewayconnected.
Afterso muchpreliminaryjustificationI proceedby takingthedistinc-
tionbetweensacrificeandsacramentin the massof thewaningmiddle
agesto be equivalentto a distinctionbetweenthe Christiancommun-
ity consideredas an assemblyof distinctpartsand that community
consideredas a transcendantwhole.
Criticslike Beconobjectedthatthe massrepresentedthe Christian
communityneitherin its partsnoras a whole, sincethe entireaction,
both sacrificialand (normally)sacramental,was monopolizedby the
priest, took placewherethe congregationcouldneithersee nor hear
what was being done, and was performedin a languageit did not
understand.13 Most of this was true, but did not entirelymakeBe-
con's point. The congregationat a parishmasswould see itself pre-
sentedas a complexentity at the parson'sprone, with its readingof
marriagebannsand other socialinformationand the biddingof the
bedes;it wouldbe invitedto act as sacrificerby makingits contribu-
tion to the offertoryand, in principle,by respondingto the priest's
invitationto prayfor the successof their sacrifice;it wouldbe able,
and was certainlyanxious, to verify the presenceof Christon the
12 RotuliParliamentorum, 6 vols. (RecordComm.,London,I783), iii, pp. 459-60
465-6, discussedin S. B. Chrimes,EnglishConstitutional Ideasin theFifteenthCentury
(Cambridge,I936), pp. 68-9, andE. Kantorowicz,TheKing'sTwoBodies(Princeton,
justitiae.E. J. Bicknell,A Theological
I957), p. 227; cf. pp. I I7-20, on the sacrificium
Introduction to the Thirty-nineArticlesof the Churchof England,2nd edn. (London,
of this article,see Clark,Eucharistic
I925), p. 5I5; for the historyof the interpretation
SacrificeandtheRefortnation, pp. 38-55.
13 Becon,Displaying of thePopishMass,p. 279.
36 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

sacrificialaltarat the elevationof the host. It doesnot seemunreason-

ableto supposethatmanyattenderswouldhavemarkedthe transition
from sacrificeto sacramentby sayingtheirPaternosters at the same
time as the priest, and they certainlyparticipated,if still present,in
the ceremonyof the Pax; at the end of the massthey kneltto receive
the priest'sblessing, which was felt to convey to them its salutary
protection.The sequence covers all the essentialelements in the
commentators'description.If we take the late medievalmasson its
own terms, not as a serviceof instructionor a liturgicalfossil but as
a contemporaryand evolving social ritual, we may agree that it
involveda good dealof participation:the pointwasmadesixtyyears
ago by B. L. Manningand has been repeatedby EmmanuelLe Roy
Ladurie.14
The claimis, then, that the canonpresentsin its sacrificialmode
the Christiancommunityconsideredin its divisions.Fond as they
wereof tripartitedistinctions,the commentators explainedthat,apart
from the act of consecrationitself, threethingswere going on in it:
Godandthe saintswerebeinghonoured(in the prayersforacceptable
sacrificewhich precededand followedthe consecration);the living,
beforethe consecration,andthe dead,afterit, werebeingprayedfor,
that the benefitsof the sacrificemight be appliedto theirrespective
needs.15 The divisionis a slightlyodd one, andnot at all self-evident
fromthe text;it is not clearthatit couldhavebeenmademuchbefore
the thirteenthcentury,for it wasnot untilthenthatall publicmasses
containeda commemorationfor the dead.16But from that date at
least it was universallyapplicable,and there had also accumulated
a considerablevarietyof forms of the votive mass, or privatemass
properlyspeaking,which madeuse of the variabilityof manyof the
prayersin the mass other than those of the canon to elaboratethe
two commemorationsand make more specifictheir applicationto
particularpersonsor objects.
From my discussionI proposeto leave out the saints, who are
certainlypart of the church but having achievedsalvationcan no
longerbe benefitedby sacrifice,andthespiritualandtemporalauthor-
ities, who areprayedforamongthe livingbutwhosetreatmentwould
14 Delaruelle,Egliseau tempsdu GrandSchisme,p. 743; Lay Folks'MassBook
pp. 229, 6I-2; J. de Viguerie, "Les fondationset la foi du peuple chretien:les
fondationsde messesen Anjouau XVIIesiecle",Revuehistorique, cclvi(I976), p. 304
(prone);Y. Brilioth,EucharisticFaith and Practice,trans. A. G. Hebert(London
I930), p. 92, for the offeneSchuldor public vernacular confessionof sin customary
at this point in Germany;TheSarumMissal,ed. J. WickhamLegg (Oxford,I9I6)
p. 2I9; J. Toussaert,Le sentiment religieuxen Flandrea la fin du moyenage (Paris
I965), p. I53 (offertoryprayers);Lay Folks'MassBook, p. 46 (Paternoster), B. L.
Manning,ThePeople'sFaith in theTimeof Wyclif(Cambridge,I9I9), pp. I 5-I 6; E.
Le Roy Ladurie,Montaillou,trans.B. Bray(London,I978), pp. 265-6.
5 Franz,Messeim deutschen Mittelalter,p. 653.
6 Jungmann,Missarum sollemnia,iii, pp. I58-60.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION
37
takeus intoquestionsof medievalpoliticaltheorywhichI amanxious
to avoid;they alsoreceiveno particularemphasisas objectsof prayer
or sacrifice.17What we are left with is the social communityby or
for whom sacrificeis offered,and a view of how it is composed.On
the face of it, the division is twofold:there are the living and the
dead. The divisionis an ancientone, but by the thirteenthcentury
it hadbeencomingto acquiresomecharacteristics whichseemspecial
to late medievalChristianity,and accountfor its prominencein the
thoughtsof commentators.Even before the doctrineof purgatory
hadbeen fully formulated,the deadhad come to be seen as a double
of the society of the living, their "souls", in the imaginationof
ordinarypeople, scarcelyless physicalthan their own bodies;they
formeda collectivitywhichhadits allotedspacein the territoryof the
community,an "age-group"betweenwhom and the living intricate
relationshipsof concern,devotionand fear, and a complicatedpass-
age, obtained.18Whetherone is to take this sentimentas explaining
or explainedby the socialtheologyof the massandits commentators,
I do not feel competentto decide. For our purposesit is only neces-
saryto graspthe quick and the deadas two distinct,contrastedand,
in somerespects,opposedarticulationsof a singlesocialwhole;their
distinctionbeingemphasizedin the canonby the interventionof the
consecrationbetweentheirrespectivecommemorations. Visuallyone
mightpresentthe communityso consideredas a circledividedin the
middleby a horizontalline.
Otherarticulations,which cut acrossthis division,are also stated
in the canon;that for examplebetweenmen and women, to which
attentionis drawnin both commemorations.But one cross-cutting
articulation,not formallystatedbut clearlyunderstoodby the com-
mentatorsand by the populationin its practice,seemsmorepromi-
nent thanany other;prominentto a degreethat, for the latermiddle
agesone maylegitimatelypictureit as constitutinga verticaldivision
of the circlealmostas well-definedas the horizontaldivisionbetween
the quickand the dead. If we wereusing the terminologyof Weber,
or of BenjaminNelson, we might speak of a distinctionbetween
brothersand others;19in the languagPof the medievalpopulation
17 It seems likely that prayingfor the king was on the increaseduringthe later
middleages:J. Rosenthal,ThePurchaseofParadise(LondonandToronto,I972), pp.
I9, 2I.
18 N. Z. Davis, "SomeTasks and Themesin the Studyof PopularReligion",in
C. Trinkausand H. Oberman(eds.), ThePursuitof Holinessin LateMedievaland
RenaissanceReligion(Leiden, I974), pp. 326-36; N. Z. Davis, "Ghosts,Kin and
Progeny",Daedalus,cvi no. 2 (I977), pp. 92-6; cf. P. Chaunu,"Mourira Paris"
Annales.E.S.C., xxxi (I976), pp. 29-30; G. and M. Vovelle,Visionde la mortet de
l'au-delaen Provence(Cahiersdes annales,xxix, Paris, I970), illustrationp. I6- Le
Roy Ladurie,Montaillou,pp. 343-4. See now J. Le Goff, La naissancedupurgatoire
(Paris,I98 I ).
'9 B. Nelson, TheIdea of Usury:FromTribalBrotherhood to UniversalOtherhood
2nd edn. (Chicagoand London, I 969).
38 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

and its spokesmenwe may speakof friendsand enemies.I propose

to attempt an exposition of the social doctrineembeddedin the
canon accordingto the quadripartitearticulationcreatedby these
two c lv1slons.
. . .

It seems correctto start, not with what was certainlythe most

densely populatedquarterof the circle at the close of the middle
ages, but with the one which is logically,and was perhapshistor-
ically,prior:the categoryof livingfriends.The textis the commemor-
ation of the living, of which, ignoringcomplicationsintroducedby
a long history,I reproducean abridgedversion:
Memento, Domine, famulorum famularumque tuarum [space for names] pro quibus
tibi offerimus hoc sacrificium laudis, pro se suisque omnibus, pro redemptione
animarum suarum, pro spe salutis et incolumitatis suae . . .

Remember, O Lord, thy servants [space for names], for whom we offer this sacrifice
of praise, for themselves and all theirs, for the redemption of their souls, in
furtherance of their hope of well-being and security . . .2')

Froma socialpointof view the obviousquestionis who arethe "sui"

of "suisqueomnibus",the corpusof thosewhobelongwiththe living
sacrificers?By contrastwith modernEnglishinterpretations,which
incline to a mildly sentimentalview,21the medievalexposition,of-
feredby InnocentIII, takenup verbatimby Durandus,andstandard
thereafter,is preciseand formal:"Suisomnibus:thatis to say blood-
relations(consanguineis) and affines(vel affinibus),householdmem-
bers and companions(familiartbus) [by the thirteenthcenturyI as-
sume that it would be the second rather than the first of these
meaningswhich would occur most stronglyexcept, I suppose, for
membersof a monasticor ecclesiasticalhousehold]and friends(vel
amicis)".22 the view of a person'ssui as embodiedin the massin
So

the later middle ages was that they were an externallyratherthan

interiorlyconstitutedgroup, kin-based,and consistingof peoplein
some formalmutualrelationship.They were also, it may be noted,
21) Jungmann, Missanum sollemnia, iii, pp. 7I-83. For salutis et incolumitatis s2xae a
variety of authorized English translations is available. My own Latin missal (Bruges
imprimatur I940) has "safety and salvation"; a recent American Latin missal (I957)
has "the health and welfare they hope for"; the vernacular version for Ireland (I966)
has "security and salvation". 'one of these seems entirely satisfactory, the American
version is perhaps nearest to the original intention, and provides the necessary contrast
with the "redemption of their souls", but it misses the important sense of incol1lmitas.
This means "remaining unscathed in the face of dangers", and is therefore a negative
well-being to be contrasted with the more positive well-being of salus.
21 The English and Irish versions cited in n. 20 above have "all those dear to them"
and "all those who are dear to them"; again the American version is less inhibited:
"their families and friends".
22 Durandus, Rationale, p. 245, from Innocent III, De sacro altaris mysterio, col.
846; further comments in Biel, Canonis misse expositio, i, pp. 293-5. On friendship,
cf. J. Catto, "Ideas and Experience in the Political Thought of Aquinas", Past and
Present, no. 7I (May I976), pp. 9, I6, I8; L. Stone, The Family, Sex and Marriage in
England, ISOO-I800 (London, I977), pp. 97-8; J. Pitt-Rivers, "The Kith and the
Kin", in J. Goody (ed.), The Character of Kinship (Cambridge, I973), pp. 89-I05, iS
an important theoretical discussion.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION
39
a "horizontal"group:the expositorsdo not give largespaceto the
lineage,and I know of no publiclyauthorizedvotivemassfor ances-
tors.23 The legitimacyof presentingthisgroupof relativesandfriends
as the prime and restrictedarea of a Christian'sresponsibilityin
prayerand sacrificegave rise to a good deal of debate.GabrielBiel,
the principalfifteenth-centurycommentatoron the canon, gave a
justificationmarkedlynaturalisticfor the representativeof a school
of theologiansthoughtto be especiallyconcernedto segregatenature
fromsupernature:"becausethisis in accordancewithnaturalinclina-
tion, whichis alwayscorrect". Otherswerenotso sure:sometheologi-
answereworriedthatthe prayer,so interpreted,mightseemto make
short work of the Christian'sobligationto love his enemies, and
arguedthattheseshouldbe prayedfortoo. This wasa minorityview,
and Innocent III and Durandus,who saw the point, nevertheless
solvedit withoutmuch difficulty:indeedthe Christianwas required
to prayfor his enemies, but must all the samemaintainthe proper
order in charity, which roughly speakingbegan at home. Their
solution, which became the standarddoctrineof Christiansocial
relationshipsin the late middle ages, may well have reflecteda
realisticsensethatpeoplewerenot goingto payfor massesto be said
for the well-beingof their enemies.24
From at least the Carolingianperiodparticularformsof a votive
masson behalfof one's friendswere availablein westernliturgiesto
elaboratethe indicationsin the Memento.The earlyversionsof the
Sarummissal, dating from about I300, have three such:pro salute
amici, pro fratnbuset sorortbus,profamiliarzbus; the collects from
the lattersurvivedin the post-Reformation Romanmissal, "for our
friends",thoughnot as partof a completevotive mass.25It is clear
fromanalyseswhichhavebeenmadeof the termsof fifteenth-century
wills in England and seventeenth-centurymass-foundationsin
Francethat the presenceof such massesin missalscorrespondedto
23 The missalseemsto be morein agreement with Davis, "Ghosts,Kin andProg-
eny", than with Stone, Family, Sex and Marriagein England,pp. 4-5, about the
natureof the traditionalfamily.Cf. Rosenthal,Purchaseof Paradise,pp. I7-I8, 2I-
2, 25-6, on the prevalenceof either horizontalor verticalbonds in Englishmass-
foundations,accordingto the sourcein whichthey arefound.
24 Cf. Rosenthal,Purchase of Paradise,p. I4, on the needto avoidthis as a motive
for not over-extendingthe numberof beneficiariesof a foundation,BrianTierney
TheMedievalPoor Law (Berkeleyand Los Angeles, I959), pp. 56-7, II8-I9. The
alternativeviewseemshoweverto havebeenfavouredin France:cf. JeanGerson,De
sollicitudineecclesiasticarum personarum,in his Oeurrescompletes, ed. P. Glorieux,ix
(Paris,I973), p. 445, on whethera benefactorcanstipulatethatno onemaybe prayed
for at the Mementobut "se et sui". In manyFrenchmissalsof the fifteenthcentury
thecommemoration of the livingadds,afterthenamedbeneficiaries andthosepresent
"andof all faithfulGhristians":V. Leroquais,Lessacramentaires et lesmisselsmanus-
critsdesbibliotheques publiques deFrance,4 vols. (Paris,Ig24), iii, nos. 555, 557, 558,
etc.
2s Franz,Messeimdeutschen pp. I 35-6;SanumMissal,pp. 399, 392 and
Mittelalter,
n. I j the Romanmissalin the Englishversioncitedin n. 20 above,p. [861.
4o PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

a steadydemand. In the lattercase, of a groupof I83 foundations

fromAnjou,one-thirdcontaineda mentionof the founder's"parents
et amis".26All such founders,I imagine,would have acceptedthe
accountof theirpurposesgiven by BishopOdo of Cambraiearlyin
the twelfthcentury:we pray, he said, "forour friends'peacewhen
they are in conflict,for their safe returnwhen they areon journeys,
for their healthwhen they are sick, for theirconversionif theirlife
is vicious, and in generalagainsttheir incommoditates, that with the
help of Godthey mayescapethem";andwith the thirteenth-century
Austrianpreacherwho said, of those who were actuallypresentat
such masses, that "you will come backhappierthanyou went out,
becauseif you have had masses said for your friendsthey will be
freedfrom danger".27
Such glosses, along with the commentsof InnocentIII already
noted, show that at least among the living you could not really
admitthe category"friends"to liturgicalstatuswithoutadmittingthe
category"enemies"as well. Eventhe post-Reformation Romanritual
followedits set of collects "for our friends"with another"for our
enemies";admittedlyit asked God to give them the gift of charity
and remissionof their sins, but it also invitedhim "powerfully[to]
deliverus from theirmachinations".The propersensesof salus and
especiallyof incolumitas entitledthe medievalChristianto makethe
transition:Biel at least, amongthe commentators,had understood
the relationas one of strict logicalimplication:"For a good partof
the hopeof salvation(salutis) is the hopeof evadingthe machinations
of one's enemies".28The implicationwas evidentin the archetypal
referencein Gregorythe Greatto the man held by his enemiesin
fetters, which fell off when his wife had a mass said on his behalf;
the storyreappearsin the Sarummissalas the votivemasspro eo qui
in vinculis detinetur.29So althoughit had long been pointedout that
mass should be offered for good things, not for evil, pro carttate
fraterna and not pro odio, it was strictly impossible to prevent the

26 De Viguerie, "Fondationset la foi du peuple chretien",p. 298 Rosenthal

Purchaseof Paradise,pp. 20-2, 25-6. Cf. QueenCatherineof Aragon,in k Maynard
Smith,Pre-Reformation England(London, I938), p. I02: "I think the prayersof a
friendbe most acceptableto God".
27 Odo of Cambrai,Expositio in canonem missae(Patrologiae
cursuscompletus,ed.
J.-P. Migne, Series latina, clx, Paris, I854, col. I058), Franz,Messeim deutschen
Mittelalter,pp. I I 9, 36.
28 Romanmissal (n. 20 above), p. [87]; Biel, Canonismisseexpositio,i, p. 297;
also p. 253, wherea grammaticalmnemonicaboutwho is to be prayedfor at the
commemoration of the living offersan "accusative"case, concerningenemies,after
a "dative"concerningbenefactors.
29 Franz, Messeim deutschen Mittelatter,p. 6; SarumMissal, p. 407. There is
also the French story borrowedby Schillerfor his ballad "Der Gang nach den
Eisenhammer", wherea servantfalselyaccusedof adulterywithhis mistressis rescued
frombeingthrowninto a furnaceon his master'sorderthroughhavinggoneto mass
on his way there, while the accuseris (presumably)carriedoff to hell: Samtliche
Werke,ro vols. (Stuttgartand Berlin,I904), i, pp. 99-I07 andn., pp. 3I2-I3.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 4I

downfallof enemiesfrombeingprayedfor in the commemoration of

the living,ora stringof votiveformsdeorproinimicis,contraadversan-
tes and so on, from appearingin the missal alongsidethose for
friends.30The missalsof monasteries,whichoftenfelt the masstheir
most effectivemeansof reprisal,are particularlyrichin such forms;
towardsthe close of the middle ages the usual vehicle of monastic
protest,the masscontrainvasores,seems to have gone throughsome
processof fusionwith the ultimatemonasticdeterrent,the dramatic
clamoragainsta namedenemy or enemies;the retaliatorycapability
of the mass pro pace spoke for itself to the monks of Hildesheim,
whosemissal,at thatpoint, containsthe rubric:"seeabove,as when
proceedingagainstenemies".Provisionwasmadeforelaboratingthe
prayersof the masspropace with stirringmaterialdrawnfrom the
mass contraadversantes and elsewhere.31For centuriesthe masspro
furtuhad been used by the laity to a similareffect: like the forms
alreadymentioned, it was a mass againsta theoreticallyunknown
thief, was sometimescombinedwith the ordeal,and seems to have
spreadfromGermanyto both FranceandPoland,whereit wasbeing
prohibitedin the sixteenth century. Among other strong texts it
containedan epistle concerningthe stoning to death of Achan by
Joshuafor bringingGod'sangeron Israelthroughtheft, and a com-
munionprayerwhichdid not minceits words:"Erubescant et contur-
benturomnesinimicimei, avertenturretrorsumet erubescantvalde
velociter"("Mayall my enemiesbe put to shameand coveredwith
confusion;may they be turned back and put to shameas soon as
possible"). The late medieval missal of Passau containeda mass
againstdefamers,contrainfamiammalorumhominum,which must
have been a recentinventionsince it was dedicatedto St. Joseph.32
In short, despitescripturalinjunctionsand the nervousreservations
of ecclesiasticalauthority,therewasa rigorouslogicaboutthe process
whichmadethe commemoration of the livinga vehicleforthe pursuit
of socialhostilitiesas well as for the consolidationof socialaffection:
Mittelalter,pp. 70-I00, I35,204 ff.; SarumMissal,p.
3() Franz,Messeim deutschen
4I I (contra thoughby comparisonwith Germanyit seemsweakin such
adversantes),
forms.CharlesV's AugsburgReformDecreeof I548 describedsecuritatem in aggressi-
bustemerariis thatthe peoplemustbe taughtnot to
as one of the formsof incolumitas
prayfor in the mass:ConciliaGermaniae, ed. J. Hartzheim,II vols. (Cologne,I769-
70), Vi, pp. 74I-67, sectionxii; cf. Thomas,Religionand theDeclineof Magic,pp.
48, I35.
Mittelalter,pp.205,206
31 Franz,Messeim deatschen ff.; L. K. Little, "Formules
monastiquesde maledictionaux IXt et Xe siecles",RevueMabillon,lviii (I975), pp.
377-99; L. K. Little, "La morphologiedes maledictionsmonastiques",Annales.
E.S.C., XXXiii (I979), pp. 46-60; P. Geary, "L'humiliationdes saints" Annales.
E.S.C., XXXiii (I979), pp.27-42; SarumMissal,p. 408. I am gratefulto Dr. Patrick
Gearyfor introducingme to this subject.
32 Franz,Messeim detltschen Mittelalter,
pp.2I I-I4,2I7. Therewasno feastof St.
Josephuntil the fifteenthcentury;the referencewas to the Old TestamentJoseph
("Butthey thatheld dartsprovokedhim, andquarrelledwithhim, andenviedhim")
as well as to scandalaboutJosephand Mary.
42 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

Biel was respectinghis own logicin suggestingthatit wasnot a good

ideafor the clergyto enquiretoo closelyinto the intentionsof laymen
who asked,and paid, for massesto be saidfor them.33
The two segmentsof the upperhalf of the circlearenow, I hope,
adequatelyfilled, and anyone who has the slightest acquaintance
with late medievalChristendomwill recognizethat the difficulty
aboutthe firstsegmentof the lowerhalf, the categoryof deadfriends,
is to containits massiveoverpopulation."A cult of the livingin the
serviceof the dead",latemedievalChristianityhasbeendescribed;34
I think myselfthat the descriptionwouldbe moreexactwereone to
say"acultof livingfriendsin the serviceof deadones".The devotion,
theology,liturgy,architecture,finances,socialstructureandinstitu-
tions of late medieval Christianityare inconceivablewithout the
assumptionthat the friendsand relationsof the souls in purgatory
had an absolute obligationto procuretheir release, above all by
having massessaid for them. The sociologyof the relationhas re-
cently receivedsome investigation,thoughas yet variousaspectsof
it remainunclarified;35 interestis certainto increase.Withoutmaking
any sort of attemptto encompassthe unmanageablehistoryof this
subjecthere, I offer a few observationsof a formalkind.
The wholeof this enormousconstruction,underwhoseweightthe
medievalchurch collapsed,was built on the foundationof sixteen
words in the canon: a fact which may bring some supportto the
concernfor textualnicetieswhich I havetriedto showin this essay.
The commemoration of the dead,placedin a positionafterthe conse-
crationwhich moreor less exactlybalancedthatof the commemora-
tion of the living beforeit, spoke in an archaiclanguagemarkedly
out of keeping with the emotionsand anxietieswhich ravagedthe
peopleof the west on the subjectduringthe pre-Reformation centur-
ies: "Memento,Domine, famulorumfamularumque tuarum[names]
qui nos praecesseruntcum signofidei, et dormiuntin somnopacis"
("RememberO Lord thy servants[names]who havegone beforeus
with the sign of the faithand sleep in the sleep of peace").36Devel-
opedinto a full liturgyin the Requiem,it wasfurtherelaboratedfrom
the Carolingianage with versionswhich provideda distinctvotive
mass for a wide variety of the relationshipswhich might inspire
-33 Ibid., p. 3?3
34 A. N. Galpern,"The Legacyof Late MedievalReligionin Sixteenth-Century
Champagne",in Trinkausand Oberman(eds.), Pursuitof Holiness,p. I49.
35 See Rosenthal,Purchaseof Paradise.Contradictory viewson the subjectwill be
foundin P. Aries, Essaissurl'histoirede la morten occident(Paris,I975), pp. 32-45;
Davis "Tasksand Themesin the Studyof PopularReligion";Davis, "Ghosts,Kin
and Progeny";J. Bossy, "Blood and Baptism",in D. Baker (ed.), Sanctityand
Seculariw(Studiesin ChurchHist., x, Oxford, I973), p. I36. K. L. Wood-Legh,
PerpetualChantriesin Britain(Cambridge,I965), iS an invaluablesourceof informa-
tion.
36 Jungmann,Missarum sollemnia,iii, pp. I58-69.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION
43
donorsto offer:in the Sarummissal,propatreet matre,proparentibus
et benefactort
bus, pro amico,pro familiaribusvirts, pro familiarz
bus
feminis,etc. Becon, in his jocularway, envisagedthe priest at the
Mementoas praying:
forPhilipandCheny,morethana goodmeany[meany= household;i.e. hisparents],
for the souls of your great grand Sir and of your old beldamHurre, for the
souls of fatherPrinchardand of motherPuddingwright,for the soulsof goodman
Rinsepitcherand goodwifePintpot,for the souls of Sir John Huslegooseand Sir
SimonSweetlips,for the souls of all your benefactors,founders,patrons,friends
and well-willers,which have given you eitherdirge-groates[dirige:the firstword
of the office of the dead], confessional-pence,trentals,year-services,dinneror
supper,or anythingelse thatmaymaintainyou.
He was thinkingof the priest'sown obligations,as the lay founders
of the chantrieswhich multipliedspectacularlyfromthe fourteenth
century to the Reformationwere thinking of theirs, and often in
their instructionsadded considerablyto the standardliturgy. So
the Cambridgeshire gentlemanWilliamWhaplode,who in an early
sixteenth-centuryfoundationreplacedthe Requiesca(n)t in pacenor-
Inalby this time at the end of the massfor the dead,with: "Maythe
souls of the kings of England,of WilliamWhaplode,his father,his
mother,his brothers,his sisters, his wives, his blood-relations,his
friendsand his benefactorsrest in peace. Amen". In practice,then,
the commemorationof the dead, the text of which did not actually
suggest that the dead might be anyone'sparticularrelations,acted
so as to introduceinto the socialuniverserepresentedat the sacrifice
the categoryof deadfriends.37
In commentingon this fact, whichlike the particularprovisionfor
living friendsseemedto be in conflictwith a scripturaltext, in this
case that every man must be judgedaccordingto his (own) works,
Biel took over from Aquinas a fundamentalstatementabout the
sociologyof salvationin the middle ages; he also offeredparallels
which help to explainwhy the doctrinewas foundconvincingfrom
Aquinas'sday to his own. He wrote:
The suffrageswhicharemadeforthe livingandthe deadcanbe saidto be theworks
of thoseforwhomtheyaredone . . . For the workis appropriated to [therecipient]
(i) by the intentionof him who doesit, and(ii) becausethatwhichis his whois one
with me, is in a certainsense also mine. Whenceit is not againstdivinejusticeif
onemanreceivesthe fruitsof worksdoneby anotherwhois onewithhimin charity
particularlywhen they are done specificallyon his behalf.
The firstof his parallelswastakenfromAquinas."Forit alsohappens
in the course of human justice that the satisfactionof one man is
accepted for another":satisfactionfor sin was to be seen in the
light of systemsof compensationfor offencesamongmen, wherea
comparableresponsibilityrested on the "friends"of the offender.
37 Franz, Messeim deutschen Mittelalter,pp. 2I8-46; SarumMissal, pp. 436-4I;
Becon,Displayingof thePopishMass,p. 276, whichmaybe comparedwiththe actual
example(RobertParkyn)in A. G. Dickens, TheMarianReactionin theDioceseof
York,2 vols. (London, I957), ii, p. 22. Wood-Legh,PerpetualChantries in Britain
p. 290.
 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00
44
The secondcomparisonwas perhapsmore up to date,
and possibly
his own. The relationof the deadto thelivingin thechurch
the associationprevailingin a companyof merchants resembled
activemembers(the living)who labouredaboutthe world consistingof
ing partnerswho took theirshareof the profitthoughthey andsleep-
at home.38The parallelwasnot conceivedin the satquietly
happiestterms,and
may well have inspired in Luther, expoundingin the
Captivityhis own theologyof the massas the effect of a Babylonian
will or testament,an unbalancedrejectionof the social non-mutual
on whichthe developmentof the medievalmasshad assumptions
beenpremised.
Becon,as usualcoarseningthe argumentby pretendingthat
the
relationshipin question was that between the priesthoodandonly
laity, conveyedthe doctrineto the English: the
But as ye massmongerscannotbe baptisednor
receivethe sacramentfor other. As everymanisbelievefor other, no morecan ye
baptisedfor himself,so must he
eatanddrink. . . forhimself.Canmy eating slakeyourhunger?No morecanyour
eatingof the sacramentdo me good. "Therighteousman",saiththeprophet,"shall
live by his own faith".39
Theissue, Biel mighthavereplied(not to Luther,but to
wasconfusingtwo differentquestions),was not only Becon,who
also sacrifice,and about this he had a Weberianpoint sacramentbut
to
Christhadlimitedthe powerof consecrationto the apostles make.
and
descendantsin the priesthood,that sacrificeand sacrament their
serveto diffuselove amongChristians."Forif any might
individualcould
consecrate (conficere),therewouldbe no needof a breaking[of bread]
betweenone and another,but each man would
himselfthe object] of his own individualsacrifice":'communicate'[to
an exclusive
priesthood, thatis to say, tendsto convertsacrificeinto sacrament.40
Theargumentmay to some extenthavebeen a dialogue
butit gives a certainsolidityto the expositionof the canon of the deaf,
here,and in particularto the view that the relationof attempted
sacrament sacrificeto
is that of the partsto the whole.
Leavingaside for the momentsome questionswhich
toariseat this point, I proceedto the finalquarterof may be felt
the circle, the
category of deadenemies.A rapidview will suggestthatthe
isempty: that the symmetryof the socialuniverse segment
canon, deployed in the
the ungovernableambiguityof the powerof the
beforethe horrendouspossibilityof offeringmass to sacred,fails
procurethe
damnation of the souls of one's dead enemies. The rapidview will
probably turn out to be correct,but we shall not have wastedour
38 Biel, Canonis misseexpositio,i, pp.
376-7;ThomasAquinas,Commentain 4 libros
d. xlv q.2, a.I, in his Operaomnia, 25 vols.
Sententiarum,
(Parma,I852-72),vii pt. 2,
p.II20.
39 Martin Luther: Selectionsfrom his Writings, ed. J.
N.Y.,I96I), p. 283, and critiquein Brilioth, Dillenberger(GardenCity,
Io2-3;Becon,Displaying of the Popish Mass,Eucharistic
9, p. 280.
Faith and Practice, pp. 98-
40 Biel, Canonis misse expositio, i, p.
4I.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION
45
time if we look a little harder. It was not unusual in medieval
Christianityto prayfor the damnationof enemies.The prayermight
be perfectlylegitimate,as in the monasticClamor,or on the borders
of legitimacy,as in the use of Psalm I08 as centrepieceof the ritual
curseknown in Germany,where it seems to have been a good deal
in demand,as the Mordbeten.41 If it could be establishedthatby the
closeof the middleagesthe Mordbeten werebeinginfiltratedinto the
Reqniemin the way that the antiphonMediavita ("In the midst of
life we are in death"), which normallyformed part of them, was
gettinginto the ordinarymass, we should have an exact reverseof
the normalmassfor the dead, and somethingto fill the finalsegment
of the circle.42But I knowof no evidenceto provethatthis occurred,
and the probabilitiesseem againstit. A venal priestmight well not
have scrupledat the difficultyof reconcilingsuch prayerwith the
text of the commemoration of the dead,andin particularwith its last
sentencewherehe was to prayfor the salvationof "all those resting
in Christ";the difficultywas afterall not much greaterthanthat of
reconcilingthe commemoration of the livingwitha votivemasscontra
adversantes. But it is doubtfulif the hypotheticalsacrificerof such a
masswouldfeel thathe was likelyto get valuefor money.To qualify
for admissioninto the commemorationof the dead a soul must, in
the late medievalunderstanding,be assumedto have been already
the object of God's judgement,and to be in purgatory:if that was
wherehe was, there was no way of preventinghim fromgetting to
heavenin the end, andit wasfruitlessto prayfor his finalcondemna-
tion.
Facedwith thesedifficulties,the medievalChristianseemsto have
abandonedthe prospect of treatingthe mass as a vehicle for the
pursuit of vengeancebeyond the grave, but used his ingenuityto
devisea substitutewhichinvolvedno theologicaldifficultiesandwas
4t Franz, Messe im deutschen Mittelalter,pp. 98-9- H. Bachtold-Staubli(ed.)
Handworterbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens, IO vols. (Berlinand Leipzig, I927-42)
viii, col. 97I, recordsa use of the Mordbeten allegedin a lawsuitin Baslein I926. See
PsalmI08, VV. 6-9, I4-I5 (Vulgatenumbering,Douaiversion):
Set thou the sinneroverhim: andmaythe devil standat his righthand.
Whenhe is judged,mayhe go out condemned:andmayhis prayerbe
turnedto sin.
Mayhis daysbe few: andhis bishopriclet anothertake.
Mayhis childrenbe fatherless:andhis wife a widow. . .
Maythe iniquityof his fathersbe rememberedin the sightof the Lord:
and let not the sin of his motherbe blottedout.
Maythey be beforethe Lordcontinually:and let the memoryof them
perishfromthe earth.
Cf. n. 3I above.
42 Franz, Messeim deutschen Mittelalter,pp. 207-8. What was sung at mass was
presumablythe hymn"Mediavita",basedon the antiphonandcomposedby Notker
the Stammererin the tenthcentury,it wasextremelypopularin Germany,andits use
as a weaponagainstenemies,"withoutpermission",wascondemnedby a fourteenth-
centurycouncil.P. Nettl, LutherandMusic,trans.F. BestandR. Wood(Philadelphia
I948), p 48
46 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

eminentlycompatiblewith the languageof the Memento.The trick

was to have insertedinto the commemorationof the dead the name
of a living enemy, on the assumptionthatGodwouldfeel obligedto
answerthe prayerand conveyhim as rapidlyas possibleto a place,
as the text said, of "refreshment,light and peace". Surprisingas it
may seem, this was not a totallyunlawfulor superstitiouspractice:
in a monasticritual from early medievalFrance,a series of votive
massesprofurtu containeda Requiem"in the name of the thief"
threateninghim with death; somethinglike it was employedas a
normalpartof the ritewherebyleperswereexcludedfromthe Chris-
tiancommunityand theirritualdeathenacted.43In its crudeformit
was the objectof numerousecclesiasticalcondemnations,beginining
in Visigothic Spain and seeminglymore frequentduring the late
middleages. It was used with the authorizationof the Sorbonnein a
seriesof massesofferedby the Catholicsof ParisagainstKing Henri
III in I589.44 Shortly afterwardsthe Dominican friar Jacques
Clementwas said to have had a visionduringthe Memento(? of the
dead) of a mass he was saying, in which God commandedhim to
assassinatethe king; this he did. In shortthe commemoration of the
deadwasas capableof negativeor aggressiveuse as the commemora-
tion of the living, thoughnot, it wouldseem, againstthe deadthem-
selves.
Numerousquestionsmay occur to anyonewho has followedthe
descriptionso far, and I shalltry to answertwo of them. First:how
far can we supposethese implicationsto have been appreciatedby
the mass-goersof late medievalEuropewho, as we know, were not
always very attentiveto what was going on at the altar?Second:
can the rejectionof the mass by sixteenth-centuryReformersbe
interpretedas a rejectionof these implications,clearlyenvisaged?
Afterthat I shall try to makemy accountof the sacrificialaspectsof
the mass plausiblein a context of the history of sacrificeand of
medievalChristianity.
Howeverill-informedthemass-congregations of latemedievalChri-
stendom,there can surelyhave been few amongthem who did not
know that the masswas a sacrificefor the quickand the dead;and I
should personallyagreewith B. L. Manningthat its incorporation
of prayerfor particularsouls gave it a "humaninterest"greater
43 E. Martene,De antiquis
ecclesiaeritibus,4 vols. (Antwerpand Venice, I736-8),
ii, p. 334; Franz, Messeim deutschen Mittelalter,p. 2I3; J. and F. Gies, Life in a
MedievalCity (London, I969), pp. II6-I7. The versionof the rite for separating
lepersgiven in P. Richards,TheMedievalLeperandhisNorthern Heirs(Cambridge
I97?), appendix?fromthe Sarummanual,omitsthe massto be said,andleavessome
cholceto the prlestor the leper;but the wholerite is designedto resemblea service
for the deadas closelyas possible.
44 Franz, Messeim deutschen Mittelalter,pp. 99-IOO; Thomas, Religionand the
Declineof Magic, pp. 37-8; Pierrede l'Estoile,3rournal du regnede HenriIII, ed.
L. R. Lefevre(Paris,I943), pp. 6I I ff.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION

perhapsthan that of reformedliturgies.45There is certainlya ques- 47

tion to what extent this human interest was concentratedon the
momentswhich the liturgyprovidedfor it, that is, on the two com-
memorations.If we consult the Lay Folks' MassBook, apparently
dating from about I375, we find the social dramaexpoundedby
InnocentIII and Durandusbeing carefullyand movinglytransmit-
ted, andparticularcarebeingtakenthatthe attender'sprayersshould
exactly follow the se4uence of commemorations.46 The poem was
beingcopiedin the fifteenthand sixteenthcenturies,but did not get
into print: perhapsit was thought ratherold-fashioned.Difficulty
would certainlyhave arisenin followingits recommendations,par-
ticularlyin respectof the commemoration of the living;forone thing
the periodbetweenthe end of the Sanctusand the consecrationwas
far too brief for anyoneto recallthe numerouspersonsand things
recommendedto his prayers;for another,rapidgrowthof devotion
to the consecratedelementsas such indicatedthe periodbeforethe
consecrationas a time of mentalpreparationfor the comingmiracle,
not of discursiveprayerabout friendsand relations,or the state of
the community.All the solutionsto this difficultyinvolveda weaken-
ing of the separationbetweenthe quickandthe dead.Presumablythe
averagepersonrememberedhis friendsduringthe proneor bidding
prayers,the vernacularprayerfor the communityand its members
madepubliclyby the priestbeforethe canon;commemoration of the
dead was includedin these, and had also, in northernrites at least,
got into the liturgicalprayersof the offertory,whereit had strictly
speakingno place.47The devout were encouragedto leave their
privateprayers,whetherfor the living or the dead, until after the
consecration,when the actualpresenceof Christon the altarmight
makethemespeciallyeffective;48of the non-devoutit wasa common
complaintthat many of them left after the consecrationanyway.
Withoutbeinga liturgicalpuristone mayfeel thatthe socialarchitec-
ture of the canonwas becominga little confusedby the eve of the
Reformation.Yet its foundationsremainedin place,andit wouldbe
45 Manning,People'sFaith in the Timeof Wyclif,pp. I5-I6.
46 Lay Folks'MassBook, pp. lxvi ff., lines 330-97, 452-79.
47 For the prone,see n. I4 above. Langland,PiersPlowman,trans.Goodridge,p.
64, describesEnvycursinghis neighboursunderhis breathduringthe prone.Sarum
Missal,pp. 2I8-I9, unlikethe Romanmissal,mentionsthe deadin its versionof the
SuscipesanctaTrinitas,and has an additionalOratefratresand responseto be saidin
massesfor the dead:thereis some evidencefromthe Netherlandsthatthe response
(Suscipiat)mightbe saidaloudby the congregation:Toussaert,Sentiment religieuxen
Flandre,pp. I53, 694, n. 94. The prayercited in n. 55 belowis includedin Innocent
III's versionof the Romanmass, De sacroalterismysteno,cols. 767-8, to be said by
the priestafterthe Suscipiat.
48 Toussaert,Sentiment enFlandre,p. I 50; cf. ManerandMedeof theMass,
religieux
p. I44
Yet shallye prayfor any thing
Betweenthe sanctusand the sacring.
48 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

surprisingif the diffusionof devotionaland liturgicalworksby the

printingpress had not done somethingto makethem more visible,
beforethe bulidozersarrived.Biel'sExposition,withthe strongdevo-
tionalbiaswhichmadeit so movingan experiencefor Luther,49and
Becon's displaying, however unsympathetic,must certainlyhave
done their bit to help.
It is convenientto approachtheviewsof theReformersby consider-
ing theirattitudeto an actionin the ritualwhichmay seem to make
explicitsome of the implicationsI have arguedfor. It occurssome-
whatafterthe end of the canonproperlyspeaking,afterthe sacramen-
tal partof the masshas got underway. This partwas introducedby
the Paternoster,followed by an elaborationof the last petition it
contained:"butdeliverus fromevil".Towardsthe endofthis prayer,
theLiberanos,the rubricsinstructedthe priestto performtheFractio
panis,or breakingof the host, firstverticallyin half, then one of the
halvesin half againhorizontally:the lines on which the host was to
be brokenwereindicatedby the imageof Christon the Crossstamped
on it. The action normallyoccurredimmediatelyafter the words:
"Da propitiuspacem in diebus nostris, ut ope misericordiaetuae
adjuti, et a peccato simus semper liberi, et ab omni pertubatione
securi"("Grantpeace in our days, that we may be helped by thy
mercifulassistance,alwaysfreefromsin, andsecurefromall disturb-
ance"). The settling of the completeFractioat this point, where
previouslythe priest had simplyremovedfromthe host a fragment
to be set asideas viaticumforthe dying,signifiedthe bringingforward
to an earlierstage of the ritualof what was in principlepartof the
concludingcommunionof the congregation,the breakingof bread.
The replacementof leavened bread by the unleavenedhost, the
multiplicationof these so thateachcommunicantshouldreceiveone
to himself, and the infrequencywith which congregationsactually
communicatedhad causedthe eucharisticfunctionof the Fractioto
disappearfrom sight. The medieval commentatorsevidently re-
gardedit as a partof the sacrificial,not of the sacramental
machinery
of the mass, a mutilationof the victimratherthanan act of distribu-
tion; so interpreted,it had necessarilyto be separatedfrom, and to
precede, the unifying Pax which earlierit had directlyfollowed.
Naturallythere was a good deal of difficultyin findinga plausible
interpretationof the tripartitedivision.One viewidentifiedthe parts
with Christon earth,Christin the graveand Christat the resurrec-
tion, a historicalinterpretationwhichmadeit plausibleto assimilate
the Fractionto the sacrificialbreakingof Christ'sbodyin his passion
and death. Most commentatorstook the host, as the body of Christ,
to representthe church,and the brokenpartsthe way in whichthe
49 MartinLuther, Table Talk, ed. T. G. Tappert, in Luther'sWorks,55 vols.
(Philadelphia,I958-67), liv, p. 264.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION
49
corpus might be divided: the usual view at the close of the middle
ages was that the three parts representedthe church triumphant
(saintsin heaven),suffering(soulsin purgatory)and militant(living
on earth).Perhapsbecauseit broughtout moreexplicitlythe sacrifi-
cial characterof the Fraction,Becon preferredan earliervariantof
t llS CilVlSlOn:
. . . .

The first part [left-handhalf], say they, is a sacrificeof thanksgivingto God the
Father,for his benefitsdeclaredto mankindin the deathof Christhis Son. The
second is a sacrificepropitiatoryfor the sins of the people that be living in this
world,but speciallyfor the sins of such as have boughtthe massfor theirmoney
. . . The thirdpiece . . . is a satisfactorysacrificefor the souls that lie miserably
pantingin the hot firesof purgatory.50
After this relativelyneutral descriptionof the Fraction, Becon's
referencesto it are extraordinarilyfierce:he followedthe lead of his
medievalpredecessorsin takingit to be symbolicof the separation
for sacrificialpurposesof the constituentelementsof the church,but
used theiranalysisagainstthem by implyingthata dividedhost was
the modelof a dividedchurch.He did not in so manywordspresent
the threefolddivision(or twofold,if one omits the left-handhalf)as
equivalentto the fourfoldone I have been using: the living and the
dead are distinguished,but not friends and enemies. Yet he was
certainlytrying to say somethingof this kind: the vigour of his
languageabout the broken cake in which Christwas cruellytorn,
pluckedandbrokenintothreepiecesevokessomethingmoreoutrage-
ous thana simplerepresentationof the differentabodesand statuses
of the living, the souls in purgatoryand the saints. This something
wouldseem to havebeen that the Fractionof the host was a symbol
of discordin the communityof the living, and this on threecounts.
First, that a cruel breakingof Christ into pieces was the kind of
action you must expect on a sacrificialaltarwhich, unlike a table,
was a place for violent emotions and actions. "Truly altarsserve
ratherfor the killingof beaststhanfor the distributionof the pledges
of amityor friendship".Second,thatit representeddivisionwithout
distribution,since the priestate up all the partshimself.Third, that
by allowingthe sacrificeto servethe interestsof particularpersons,
living or dead, the Roman church had sanctionedthe division of
the Christiancommunityinto groups united by profaneaffection
or greed, not by charity:the mass was not simply "popish"and
"prattling",but "peevish",meaningchildishand ill-tempered,and
aboveall ''private''.51Fraction,in short, he took to symbolizefac-
50 Jungmann,Missarum sollemnia,iii, pp. 228-37, H. de Lubac,Corpusmysticum
et l'egliseau moyenagev2nd edn. (Paris,I949), pp. 295-339;Biel, Canonis
l'eucharistie
mtsseexposttia,iV, pp. 4 ff.; SarumMissal,p. 225 n. 8; Becon,Displaying of thePopish
Mass,p. 267.
51Becon, Displayingof the PopishMass, pp. 267, 278, 284, ThomasBecon, A
Comparison betweentheLord'sSupperandthePope'sMass(ibid., pp. 35t-95), pp. 364
366, quotingGerardusLorichius,De missapublicaproroganda (I536). Cf. Dugmore
TheMassandtheEnglishReformers, p. 49 (Aquinason the Fraction),andthestatement
(cont. on p. 50)
5o PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

tion, much as Cranmercondemned"the sacrificesof masses",52

symbolof a communitynot properlyChristianbecausenot perfectly
one, too proneto believethat in socialexistencenaturalinclinations
were alwayscorrect.If he had used the usual interpretationof the
Fraction he could have added, like Erasmus,that contemporary
practicein honouringthe saints was not necessarilya recipe for
Christianconcordeither.53
The eminentdivisibilityof the host is probablypartof the reason
why Reformers,Bohemianandother, tendedto emphasizethe chal-
ice: the access of the communicatinglaity to the chalice and its
contentsrepresented,besidesthe eliminationof a cleavagebetween
the priesthoodand the laity, a moretotal, or fluid, integrationof the
laycommunityitself.54 The majoritywhowalkedbehindthe elevated
host in CorpusChristiprocessions,and the unsatisfiedminoritywho
demandedthe chalicefor the laity, wereat one in theirallegianceto
the principlestatedby InnocentIII andincorporatedinto the liturgy
of the feast: "Grantto thy Church,we beseechthee, O Lord, the
gifts of unity and peace, which are symbolicallydesignatedby the
elementswe offer". They differedin their judgementof what were
symbolicallyappropriateelements because they differed in their
conceptionof whatwas entailedin creatingunity and peace.55
I havetriedto conductthis argumentaboutthe massas a sacrifice,
andits sacrificialvictim, the host, withoutbenefitof anthropological
or other discussionsof the social purposesof sacrificein general.
Thereis howeverno shortageof such discussions,and fourof those
I know seem relevant.Thereis firstthe Durkheimiantheoryexpou-
nded by Hubertand Mauss:sacrificebindsman to God and men to
each other. Second, there is the English anthropologicaltradition
representedby GodfreyLienhardt:sacrificebinds people together,
especiallyat the actualmomentwhen the victimis sacrificed,but at
the stage when it begins to move towardsthe consumptionof the
victimit reactivatesthe sense of division.Third, thereis the view of
the French hellenistsMarcelDetienne and J. P. Vernant:sacrifice
is aboveall a methodof cookeryand represents,in the carvingof the
victim, the distinctionof men from each other and their general
separationfromthe gods. Finallythereis the theoryof ReneGirard:
(n. SI cont.)
of the ecumenicalBook of Ratisbon(I540) that "whenthe Churchremembers,she
does not divide,but gathers":Brilioth,Eucharistic
FaithandPractice,pp. II5,I39.
s2 See n. I2 above.
53 Cf. R. H. Bainton,Erasmusof Christendom
(London,I972 edn.), p. 97.
54 The Bohemianpracticeof infantcommunionseems significantin this respect:
M. Lambert,MedievalHeresy(London,I976), pp. 309, 3II. Cf. N. Z. Davis, "The
Sacredand the Body Socialin Sixteenth-Century Lyon", Past and Present,no. go
(Feb. I98I), pp. 40-70.
55Romanmasscontainedin De sacroalterismysterio,col. 767; Romanmissal,mass
for the feastof CorpusChristi.Cf. MervynJames,"Ritual,Dramaand SocialBody
in the LateMedievalEnglishTown",PastandPresent,no. 98 (Feb. I983), p. I0, and
passlm.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 5I

sacrificeis not a methodof cookerybut a judicialact. It represents

the separationbetweenmen in so faras sacrificialmurdersymbolizes
the mutual murder which is the extreme expressionof conflicts
subsistingwithin a population;it binds them togetherin so far as
ritualmurdertakesthe placeof actualmurderandhenceenablesthe
populationto live in peace.56I have to confess that of these four
conceptionsit is the last and probablymost journalisticwhich is
nearestto my own.
The trouble with the Durkheimiantraditionis, as always, its
confusionbetweenthe social and the collective,and in this case its
unduedependenceon the idea in the Christiancontexta Reforma-
tion idea that all sacrificeis self-sacrifice.The difficultyaboutthe
culinaryview of sacrifice,attractivein itself, is that its relevance
here is limited by its Greekorigins. Christis not Prometheus;the
eucharist,thoughflesh, is not cooked, at least not duringmass, and
could not normallybeara conflictualinterpretation.All the sameit
does seem to have somethingto offer to the historyof the Fraction,
to the understandingof Reformers'complaintsabout priestlyglut-
tony and of the argumentabout communionin both kinds.57One
difficultyabout it is that it does not make the distinctionbetween
sacrificeand sacramentwhich seems calledfor in the interpretation
of the Christianrite; here Lienhardt'sexposition, though equally
derivedfromextra-Christian sacrifice,hasthe advantage.His descrip-
tion of the passagefrom one to the other in the courseof a single
ritualsequence,andhis elaborationof the socialovertonesof the two
phases,aredistinctlyevocativeof the generalprocedureof the mass.
They are also of course preciselycontraryto my own. Accepting
themas generallysound,andas incorporating whatseemedplausible
in both the precedingtheories,I was movedto wonderwhy descrip-
tionof the massin the latermiddleagesseemedto suggestanopposite
description,andto explorethe historyof the massforsometransposi-
tion whichmight haveoccurredin the Christianrite, say, at the end
of the ancientworld;for some reversalof polaritybetweensacrifice
and sacrament,betweenthe partsand the whole. I think some such
historicaltranspositioncan actuallybe discovered.
The medievalmass was a compositeof two ritual traditionsin-
heritedfromearlyChristianityand throughit fromthe ritualcorpus
of antiquity:the traditionof the publicworshippractisedby whole
communities,and that of the private, family, domesticcult. It is
56 H. Hubertand M. Mauss,Sacrifice: Its NatureandFunction,trans.W. D. Halls
(Chicago,I964); G. Lienhardt,SocialAnthropology, 2nd edn. (Oxford,I976), pp.
I43 ff.; G. Lienhardt,Divinityand Experience: TheReligionof theDinka (Oxford,
I96I), chs. 6, 7, esp. pp. 263-4,M. DetienneandJ. P. Vernant,La cuisinedusacrifice
enpaysgrec(Paris,I979);R. Girard,La violenceet le sacre(Paris,I980 edn.), pp. I3,
I8, 27, 29-42
57 Detienneand Vernant,Cuisinedu sacrifice enpaysgrec,pp. 37 ff., 86.
52 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

arguablethatduringthe firstcenturiesof Christianitythe publiccult

wasthe sacrifice,whilethe eucharisticsacramentwasa moredomestic
affair.Its incorporationinto the publicrite was not finallyachieved
until the Carolingianperiodin the west, and until somewhatlaterin
Byzantium.Meanwhilethe sacrificehad becomeprivatized,not in
its locationbutin its character,as one maysee by pursuingthehistory
of the text of the commemorationof the living. Whatwas in origin
a prayerfor the sacrificingcongregationbecamea prayerfor a group
of particularpersons, probablynot present, whose familialpiety
was offeredas a model to those who were.58When in its turn the
commemorationof the particulardead enteredthe public rite the
privatizingprocesswasaccelerated.This is no doubta verysummary
descriptionof a thousandyearsof Christianworship;I do not think
it can be entirelymistakensince it accordswith the well-established
historyof an element in the rite which will requiremore attention
in a moment, the Pax or Kiss of Peace. The Pax is an important
matterin any discussionof the massas a sacrificesince, as Lienhardt
remarks,sacrificeand peace are universallyheld to be complemen-
tarynotions:sacrifice"demands,and probablyto someextentcrea-
tes, a groupat peacewith itself". Our problemis preciselyto know
whetherthe Christiansacrificedemandedit or createdit; and there
can in fact be no doubt thlatin the earlychurchit demandedit as a
previouscondition, and in the medievalchurchsought to createit
throughthe performanceof the ritualitself. In the firstcenturiesof
Christianity,the Holy Kiss was exchangedas a greetingat the offer-
tory,beforethe sacrifice;this continuedto be the casein theorthodox
and eastern liturgies. In the west, accordingto traditionon the
instructionsof Pope InnocentI earlyin the fifth century,aboutthe
time of the sack of Rome by the Goths, it was movedto a position
after the sacrifice,immediatelybeforethe people'sreceptionof the
eucharist.59I doubtif one couldlook for a moreconvincingproofof
the reversalsuggested.Fromthis point the sacrificewas increasingly
a locus of specialpreoccupations,and fell outsidethe transcendental
unity which it becamethe functionof the ritual, in its entirety,to
attemptto construct.
This, I think, is whereone canmakeuse of Girard:for embedded
in medievalsacrificewas not simplyparticularitybut alsoparticular-
ism and occult violence.I haveno idea whetherGirardis entitledto
interpretas he does the historyof CainandAbel as a foundingmyth
abouta fratricidalvegetariankillingan innocentbutcherwho, unlike
his brother,had extrapolatedhis violenceinto acceptablesacrifice;60
s8 Jungmann,Missarum sollemnia,i, pp. 262 ff., and iii, pp. 78-80.
59Lienhardt,SocialAnthropology, p. I48; Jungmann,Missarium sollemnia,iii, pp.
249-6I * N. J. Perella,TheKiss,SacredandProfane(BerkeleyandLos Angeles,I969),
pp. I2-4I; Brilioth,Eucharistic Faith andPractice,p. 80.
6(1 Girard,La violerlce
et le sacre,p. I4.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 53
but I am sure that thereis a good deal to be said for envisagingthe
mass of the closing middle ages as a locus for the extrapolationof
socialviolence,whetherwe see it fromthe pointof viewof the people
sacrificingor, as would be fairlyconventional,from that of Christ
the expiatoryvictim. I think there is also somethingto be got, for
the understandingof the sixteenthcenturyand its vegetarianismof
the spirit,fromGirard'sideathatsincevengeance,sacrificeandlegal
punishmentperformthe samefunction,sacrificialritesmaylosetheir
powerto convincewhen systemsof public justicesupersedeprivate
systems of conflict settlement. An account like Huizinga'sof the
emotionsof legitimatevengeanceattendingthe executionof criminals
in fifteenth-centuryBurgundymakes such transpositionsof feeling
easy to credit:61even amongthose who believedthat the mass was
the worthiestthing in the world there had been somethingof the
samesentiment,moreor less clandestineon the side of the sacrificers
if not on thatof the victim, but possiblyindispensableif the ritewere
to achievethe catharticdenouementrequiredof it. At the beginning
of this essay I quoted Langlandto this effect; one might also cite a
historicalreflectionof MichelFoucault,which strikesme as true:
Until the seventeenthcentury,evil in its most violentandinhumanaspectscannot
be compensatedfor . . . unlessit is broughtinto the light . . . Thereis a cycle in
the working-outof evil whichmust of necessitypassfrompublicavowalto public
manifestationbeforeit can attainto the resolutionwhichfinallyeliminatesit.62
It may be said that this is more descriptionof Carnivalthan of the
mass;what I am suggestingis exactlythat therewas in the canona
certainelementof the carnavalesque.
As Carnivalto Lent, so in the massthe canonto the communion,
sacrificeto sacrament.Historianshave not been impressedby the
eucharisticaspect of the mass duringthe later middle ages, and it
was evidentlyless powerfulin its impactthanthe sacrificial.Priestly
gobbling, as the Reformersput it, usually left little over for the
congregation;the sacramentaltheologyof the scholastics,obsessed
with philosophicalconsiderationsabout the elements, did little to
diffuse a social conceptionof communion.But neither scholastics
nor Reformersnecessarilyprovideevidenceof popularpracticeor
feeling.An annualreception,occurringat Easterafterthe asceticisms
of Lent, was a moreplausibleembodimentof the unityof Christians
thanthe morefrequentandmoredevoutcommunionsof theCounter-
Reformation.In many ruralcommunitiesit was certainlyquite an
occasion.All the populationabovethe ageof reasonwas, in principle,
present;after receivingtheir host or fragmentthey were normally
given wine in the form of ablution-wine.63 It is clearfrom the case
61 J. Huizinga,TheWaningof theMiddleAges,trans.F. Hopman(London,I926),
pp. I5-I6.
62 M. Foucault,Histoirede la folie 2 I'ageclassique(Paris, I964), p. I78.
63 Manning,People'sFaithin theTimeof Wyclif,pp. 62-5; Franz,Messeimdeutschen
Mittelalter,pp. I07-8; Toussaert,Sentimentreligieuxen Flandre,pp. I62 ff.
 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00
54
of the Bohemiansthat people were well able to
cratedfromunconsecratedwine, but I doubtif the distinguishconse-
orthodoxclergythat the wine was not sacramentalinsistenceof the
of all symboliceffect. A parishor fraternity deprivedthe act
feast, held in church
after mass, was a fairly common conclusionto
the proceedings:
modestbequestsfor the purposewereone of the
nels of ruralcharity.64The medievalChristian, conventional chan-
then, had a time for
agapeas well as a time for Eros, and it was a
the universehe lived in, as well as a matterofprudentjudgementon
time could not be all the yearround. formallogic, that the
Stillhe wasnot left, in themasseshe attendedduring
of the year,withouta symbolto expressthe theremainder
ity. In the sung mass which, at least in the wholeness of his commun-
his Sundaysand holy-days,he had the Pax, countryside,shaped
which had in practice
supersededthe people'scommunion.65BetweenGregory
and Innocent III this part of the mass had been the Great
it receivedthose additions,beginningwith the much expanded:
mentioned,and a numberof others, all intended Paternoster, already
to assimilatethe
sacramental act to a ritualof socialpeaceamongChristians.
the last of them was the hymn AgnusDei, One of
settings of which, as
polyphonydeveloped,formedin churchesable to provide
accompaniment them the
of both the priest'scommunionand the
tionalkiss, and at its "donanobis pacem"provided congrega-
an appropriate
conclusion for the massas a musicalgenre.Like composers,
Dantefor whom the concordantrecitationof the andlike
throughthe acrid smoke generatedby wrathin Agnus Dei clove
humanrelations,66
commentators made much of this sequence,pointingthe text and
rubrics in the directionof their theme that repentance
forgiveness and mutual
amongChristianswould bringabouttemporalpeace
earth, and thatin turnensurethe peaceof the heartanda on
theeverlastingpeace of heaven: "that we may passage to
pass"
Durandus "fromexteriorpeace, throughthe peaceof to quote
tothe peace of the heart,
TheLay Folks' Mass Book of the late
eternity".67

fourteenth century,in the versereflectionsit suggested

attender at this point, elaborateda popularalternativeto the mass-
triad68
form of this
64 Cf. J. Bossy, "The
Past Counter-Reformation
andPresent,no. 47 (May and the Peopleof CatholicEurope"
I970), pp.6I-2.
65 Jungmann,Missarium
sollemnia,iii, pp. 249-6I- MaynardSmith,Pre-Reforma-
tion
England,pp. 96-7; Claudede Vert, Explication
(Paris,I709-I3; repr.Farnborough,I970), iii, . . . des ceremonies
vols. de l'eglise,4
Frenchritesof the Pax Durandus,Rationaledivinorum pp.357-63, containsa varietyof
Canonts
misseexposttzo,1V, pp.25-45.
officiorum, pp.309-I0; Biel,
66 Dante, Purgatorio, cantoxvi, lines I6-24.
67 Durandus,Rationaledivinorum
Salisbury, officiorum,p. 249- likewisein synodalstatutesof
I2I7-I9: CouncilsandSynodswithOtherDocuments Relatingto theEnglish
Church,
ed. D. Whitelocket al., 2 vols. in 4 (Oxford,
p.64. I964-8I), ii pt. I, I205-I265,
68Lay Folks'MassBook,
pp.48-54; cf. Biel, Canonismisseexpositio,iv, p. 26.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 55
Godslambthat best may
do the synneof the worldaway
of us havemerciandpite
and grauntus pese andcharite.
For in charitearethrekyns loves
thatto perfitepese nedlyngbehoves. . .
The first is love betweenthe Christianand his Lord, the secondis
love in the Christianbetweenhis soul and his body, and:
The thridlove is withouten
to love ilk neghtbourme abouten
andof thatlove for no thingcese.
ThereforeI praythe, princeof pese
thatthou wilt make,as thoumaybest,
my hertto be in pese andrest,
and redyto love alle manerof men:
my sib men namely,then
neghtburs,servandesandilk sugete,
frendesandfoes and foryectes69
[to]loveilk-ane,bothfarandnere,
als my-selvewith herteclere
and turnehorehertisso to me
thatwe may fully frendisbe
thatI of hor gode, andthaiof myne
haveay ioy with hertefyne.
Als I prayfor my selve here
grauntso til otheron selvemanere
so that ilk man love wele other
as he werehis ownebrothere.
Swilklove amongus be
thatwe be wel lovedof the
that be this holy sacrament
thatnow is herein present
and be the vertuof this messe
we mot haveforgyvnesse
of all our gilt and al ouremys
andbe thi help, cometo this [sic: Xthi]blis. Amen.
The advice in the poem may, as has been suggested,have been a
counselof perfection,70but in so far as the feelingsexpressedwere
embodiedin an actualkiss St. Augustine'smagnum sacramentum-
we shouldbe unwiseto underestimatetheir force. In InnocentIII's
time the genuine kiss was still normal,and it was cited by Biel as
stillthe practicein comecongregationsduringthefifteenthcentury.71
Admittedly,ecclesiasticalnervousnesshad substitutedfor August-
ine's kiss on the lips a kiss on the cheek, and womenweresupposed
to be dividedfrommen in the congregationso that eachwouldonly
kiss among themselves.But complaintsthat mass was used as an
occasionfor assignationsindicatethat this was not necessarilythe
the editorsuggeststhatthis was the originalversionof the
69 That is, "outcasts":
line, supersededin latermanuscriptsby the feebler"felouse,frendes,none to for-
gete":Lay Folks'MassBook, pp. 52-3, 300.
70 Dugmore,TheMassand theEnglishReformers, pp. 74-5.
misseexpositio,iv, p. 43, reproducedin JohannesBechofen,Quadru-
71 Biel, Canonis
plex missalisexpositio(Basle, I505), quotedin Franz,Messeim deutschen Mittelalter,
p. 594 n 5
56 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

case in practice;as do storiesof loverscontrivingto steala profaner

kiss underthe protectionof the ritual.72 If we canregardSundayand
holy-daymassas a vigorouslysocialoccasion,andsee it as supported
by a denseundergrowthof privatesocialritualsof a similarkind, we
shallprobablywant to give the Pax of the high middleages a good
deal of weight.
By the Reformation,anddespiteBiel'sevidence,it wasin its earlier
formcertainlyin decline. A morediscreetsubstitute,the pax-board
or osculatoroum, to which the word pax became transferred,had
spreadfrom England,whereit had been inventedin the thirteenth
century.By I500 the generaluse was that this, or a similarobject
like a reliquary,would be passed aroundthe people by the parish
clerk or server, and kissed by them in turn. So far as I know no
attempt has been made to collect examplesof the pax, but there
exists a particularlybeautifulexamplefrommid-fourteenth-century
Italybearinga graveheadof Christand the text "MypeaceI give to
you"; this obvious text was likewise cited in the eleventh-century
Germanprayerfor peace, Domine3resuChriste,which was by this
time the priest'susualpreparationfor the Pax.73 Such instruments
were by the Reformationa compulsoryitem of churchfurniture.It
is quite likely that this substitutionitself weakenedthe forceof the
act; but the maindifficultyseemsto havebeen thatthe interposition
of an object called for sequentialratherthan neighbourlykissing,
whichgaveriseto severeproblemsof hierarchical order;theseappear
in literaryreferencesto the Pax. By all accountsthe overdoingof
the hierarchicalmodein the kiss, whichmadeit difficultto maintain
the relationshipbetweensocialreconciliation,the peaceof the heart
andthepeaceof eternity,hada counter-productive effect:it is conceiv-
able that becauseof the congregationalquarrellingto whichit gave
rise the Pax became a symbol of discord, not of amity.74But if
this had been a widely observablefact in the sixteenthcenturythe
Reformerswould have mentionedit, which so far as I know they
did not: they abolishedit from their eucharisticrites, but on more
theoreticalgroundsthanthis, notablyfor its suggestionof a contrac-
tual elementin the salvationof Christians.
72 Biel, Canonismisseexpositio,
pp. 30-2; Huizinga, Waningof theMiddleAges,p.
I I I (Guillaume de Machaut). It was often held that the introduction of the pax was
due to a failure to observe the segregation of men and women at mass: so Claude de
Vert, Explication desceremonies de l'eglise,iii, p. 362. To avoid confusion I have used
the forms "Pax" for the ritual and "pax" for the instrument.
73 M. Meiss, Paintingin Florence andSienaaftertheBlackDeath(New York, I964
edn.), pp. 35-8, and illustration p. 42; Enciclopedia cattolica,ix, cols. 499-500 and
tavola33 (four examples from fourteenth to sixteenth centuries).
74 Maynard Smith, Pre-Reformation England,p. 96, quoting a story of the woman
who stamped on the pax because she was not given her proper precedence; Huizinga,
Waningof theMiddleAges,p. 37, though this presents an idyllic picture of everyone
politely ylelding precedence.
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 57
LutherandCranmermayhavedonethis with somerelucl:ance, for
both of them retaineda version of it in their first attemptsat a
reformedmass. In his Latin Forrnulamissaeof I523, Lutherkept
thePax Dominispokenby the priestafterthe Fraction,but explicitly
intespretedthe peacein questionas exclusivelybetweenGodandthe
sinner,an annunciationof the remissionof sins to the faithful,and
individual, soul the social aspect of the medieval theory was
75

therebyabandoned,and accordinglyno provisionwas made for a

congregationalkiss. He abolishedboth the Fractionand the Libera
nos, placinghis residualPax directlyafter the Paternoster; he also,
in his catechism,expoundedthe relevantpetitionin the Paternoster
("Forgiveus our trespasses. . .") as an appealfor an unconditional
act of God, which given the rest of the sentencewas surelyrather
perverseof him.76In the GermanMassof I526, the Paternoster was
shifted to a place before the consecration,and took the form of
an explanatoryparaphrase;communionfollowed the consecration
without any interval, and there was no place for a Pax at all.77
Cranmer'sfirstrevisionof the mass,in I 549, wasmuchlike Luther's
Formulamissae,the priest'sPax followingthe Pasternoster and the
AgnusDei to be sung at communion;unlike Luther's, his liturgy
expresseda strongsenseof socialpeaceas conditionandeffectof the
eucharist,thoughthis was conveyedby exhortation,not by the rite
itself. In the I552 version, both Pax and Paternoster disappeared,
and communionimmediatelyfollowedthe words of institution.In
bothversionspracticallythe lastthoughtto be left with the congrega-
tionis thatthe peaceof Godpassethallunderstanding. 78The Swedish
mass retainedLuther'soriginalform, and looks as if it may have
temporarilyrevertedto a congregationalPax in John III's particu-
larlyconservativeRed Book of I576.79 Apartfromthese attemptsat
a middleway, no magisterialreformerincludedany formof the Pax
in his communionrite. Calvin,althoughshowingin the Institutesan
acute sense of the relatednessbetweenunity with one's neighbour
and unity with Christ,and of the sacramentas the bond of charity,
failed to get any feeling of this into his liturgy, whose exhausting
preachinesswas an unfortunatemodelfor the laterProtestantworld:
the sharpnesswith which it excludedthe ungodlyjustifiedthe ap-
prehensionsof otherProtestantsthatit wasmorelikelyto disintegrate
a Christiancommunitythan to unite it.80 So far as I know the only
75 Brilioth,Eucharistic Faith andPractice,p. II7; Liturgiesof theWestern Church
ed. B. Thompson(New York, I974 edn.), pp. IOI-2, II2.
76 Documents of the ContinentalRefor?nation, ed. B. Kidd (Oxford, I9I4; repr.
Oxford,I 967), p . 2 I 4.
77 Liturgiesof theWestern Church,ed. Thompson,pp. I32-4.
78 Dugmore, TheMass and theEnglishRefonners, p. I35; Liturgiesof the Western
Church,ed. Thompson,pp. 259, 264, 28I, 282.
79 Brilioth,Eucharistic FaithandPractice,pp. 242, 247, 259.
80 Ibid., pp. I7I-9; Liturgies
of theWestern Church,ed. Thompson,p. 206.
58 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

Reformersto take the Pax seriouslyin the sixteenthcenturywere

the Anabaptists.They revivedthe Holy Kiss, but were Protestants
enoughto practiseit in the primitiveformof a greeting,and hence
removedit from the position adjacentto the communionwhich it
hadmaintainedsince the earlymiddleages, restoringit to the begin-
ning of their rite.81Their enthusiasmfor the Pax was no doubtone
of the reasonswhy it disappearedin orthodoxProtestantism.
In Catholiccongregationsit disappearedmore graduallyduring
the Counter-Reformation. FromsoonafterI600 the RomanCongre-
gationof Rites was treatingit as a formof honourdue to rankto be
restrictedto the clergy and confinedwithin the choir; it might be
allowedto the most worshipfulamongthe laity, to princes,magis-
tratesand lords, but only by meansof the pax; it was never to be
given to women. Accordingto the OratorianPierrele Brun,writing
in the earlyeighteenthcentury,the layPax hadby then beenalmost
universallyabandonedbecause,it was alleged,of the troubleabout
precedenceit caused. He recommendedpeople to performin spirit
what was no longer being expressedin the languageof the flesh.82
These were perhapsGallocentricviews; visitorsto Dubrovnikmay
see a numberof well-usedexamplesof the paxin the formof a cross,
which show that it was not obsoletein eighteenth-century Ragusa;
and in Italy, where it had the authorityof CarloBorromeobehind
it, its declineseems to have been a gentleone. The use of the pax is
describedas only "practicallyobsolete"in parish churchesin an
authoritativesourcepublishedin the I950S; andI havebeentold that
the congregationalkiss was still known therein the earlytwentieth
century,as it also was in Spain. Apartfrom Borromeo,CharlesV
had done his best to revitalizethe Pax in the Empire,and Bishop
Bonnerin England.But for the most partthe formersof opinionin
earlymodernChristendomin the west weremarkedlyconcordantin
detachingthe eucharistfromthe ritesof socialreconciliation.It was
easyfor Hookerto scoreoff his Puritanopponentsby appealingto a
generalconsensusthat it would be "scandalous"to revive in the
sixteenthcenturythe Holy Kiss of the earlychurch.83
It would be reasonableto enquirewhatlong-rangeshiftsin Euro-
peancivilizationmightaccountfor so generala factas the disappear-
anceof the Pax fromearlymodernliturgies;hereI shallstick to the
two immediatelyrelevantfacts, whichareitemsin the historyof late
81 C. P. Clasen, TheAnabaptists:
A SocialHistoly(Ithaca, N.Y., Ig72), pp. I47-8,
280.
82 Decretaauthentica congregationis sacrorum ritoum,ed. W. Muhlbacher, 6 vols.
(Munich, I863-84), iii pt. I, pp. 702-7, 3I3, and i, p. 894; ibid., Supplementum,
iii,
p. 54; Le Brun, Explicationde la messe,i, pp. 595 n., 597.
83 Enciclopediacattolica,ix, cols. 499-500; Jungmann, Missarumsollemnia,iii, p.
257- Lay Folks'MassBook, pp. 295-6; Richard Hooker, TheLaws of Ecclesiastical
Poliy, 2 vols. (Everyman edn., London, I907; repr. London, I963), p. I I0 (Preface,
1V. 5).
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION
59
medievalCatholicism.The firstwas the rise of an asocialmysticism
of frequentcommunion,preachedfrom the earlyfifteenthcentury
with a rareunanimityby Thomasa Kempis,SavonarolaandIgnatius
of Loyola, not to mention the Hussites; it formed, despite some
Jansenistobjectionsin the seventeenthcentury,the devotionalprac-
tice of modernCatholicism,and frequentlyentailedcommunicating
beforeor afteror outsidemassentirely.84The secondwas the tend-
ency to transferthe sociallyintegrativepowersof the host awayfrom
the massas such and into the feastof CorpusChristi,and by way of
that feast to the ritualsof monarchyand of secularcommunity.The
characteristicsof CorpusChristias a ritualof Christianintegration
in the late medievalcity havebeen expoundedby MervynJamesand
therewill be no need to expoundthemagain.85The only thingworth
adding,since the contraryview has been expressedby Reformation
historians,is that the feast of CorpusChristiwas, takenas a whole,
an extremelypopularexpressionof the unity-seekingmotivein late
medievalCatholicism,and ought not to be writtenoff as an imposi-
tion of priestsor patricians.Erasmus,who detestedit, hadno doubt
thatit reflected"the affectionsof the multitude",andone need only
pursuethe historyof the feast throughthe Frenchwarsof religion
to discoverthe intenseloyaltywhichit couldevoke.86 It hademerged
about a century before frequent communionbegan to be widely
advocated,but the two developmentsseem complementaryphases
of a single obscure process, the withdrawalfrom the eucharistic
sequenceof the mass of the dimensionof "commonunion"which
the fathersof the earliermedievalchurchhadmadesuchconsiderable
effortsto put into it.
Scandalizedby such displacements,and confrontedin conse-
quenceof themby a masswhichwasmorepersuasivein its representa-
tion of the partsof the Christiancommunitythan of its whole, the
Reformersdid their best to restorethe eucharistto its place at the
centre of social unity. They translatedit into the vernacularand
H. O. Evennett,TheSpiritof theCounter-Reformation
84 (London,I968), pp. 34-
42; A. d'Addario,AspettidellaControriforrna a Firenze(Rome, I972), pp. I4 ff., 25
ff.; Lambert,MedlevalHeresy,pp. 279, 304.
8s James,"Ritual,Dramaand SocialBody in the Late MedievalEnglishTown"
cf. de Lubac,Corpusmysticum, chs. 4, 5, esp. pp. I29, I34, andKantorowicz,King's
TwoBodies,pp. 207-32, for the theory;cf. also B. Moeller,ImperialCitiesand the
Reformatton, trans.H. C. E. Midelfortand M. U. EdwardsJr. (Philadelphia,I972)
pp. 42-53, andC. Phythian-Adams, "CeremonyandtheCitizen:The CommunalYear
at Coventry,I450-I550", in P. Clarkand P. Slack(eds.), CrisisandOrderin English
Towns,ISOO-I700 (London,I972), pp. 57-85, for the practice.
86 R. W. Scribner,"CivicUnityandthe Reformation in Erfurt",Past andPresent
no. 66 (Feb. I975), pp. 29, 57; N. Z. Davis, "The Ritesof Violence:ReligiousRiot
in Slxteenth-Century France",Past andPresent,no. 59 (May I973), p. 73; my own
reviewarticle"Holinessand Society",Past andPresent,no. 75 (MayI977), pp. I3I-
3; Galpern,"Legacyof Late MedievalReligionin Sixteenth-Century Champagne"
p. I69. Erasmus'sopinion is in De amabiliecclesiaeconcordia, quoted by Becon
Comparison betweentheLord'sSupperandthePope'sMass,p. 359.
60 PAST AND PRESENT NUMBER I 00

borrowedthe cup fromthe Bohemians.The moretraditionalamong

them offereda mass which containedno canonand no visible sac-
rifice,and proceededdirectlyfromthe preachingof the Wordto the
communionof the people;the moreintellectuallyadvanced,bredin
a literarymilieu irritatedby symbolic rituals and persuaded,in
Zwingli'scase, that the traditionalregime amountedto a form of
cannibalism,87 preferringto scrapthe past and start againwith an
archaeologicalreconstructionof the Supperof the Lord.
Withoutdisparagingtheirambitions,one may feel that the object
theyhadin viewwas moreremotewhentheyhadfinishedtheirwork
than it had been in the fifteenthcentury. Speakingfor the more
traditionalReformers,Hookerput his fingeron one flawin the more
advancedeucharisticrites, a lack of otherness:"No nation under
heaven either doth or ever did suffer public actions which are of
weight. . . to passwithoutsome visiblesolemnity,the verystrange-
ness whereofand differencefromthatwhichis common,doth cause
populareyes to observeand to mark the same".88As a Reformer
nevertheless,and so committedagainstsacrifice,he was not in a
positionto dwell on their otherflaw, a lack of drama.They created
no sacred symbol as powerfulas the host. A sense of fatality,of
resultsachievedwhich were the oppositeof those intended,hangs
over their efforts:as if the currentof social and culturalevolution
whichwascarryingthemforwardwasat the sametimepushingthem
aside into shallow waters. In the Lutherancase the ambitionto
restorea communaleucharistresultedin a practiceof communionas
individualistand asocialas thatof the Counter-Reformation, though
the emotions attendingit were penitentialratherthan mystically
unitive. In defenceof the text of its liturgythe Churchof England
was driven to maintainthe scholasticnotion of the sacramentas a
communicationof grace to singularpersons;89and amongthose of
the Reformedtradition,who had attackedthe PrayerBookon these
grounds, the usual fate of communionwas to become a quarterly
appendageto the preachingof the word,thoughtherewerecertainly
exceptions.90Probablywe shouldnot be surprisedat these results,
anymorethanat the deficienciesof the massas a eucharisticsacrifice:
in eucharisticmattersfailure is no doubt the norm. At least one
success may be set againstthem. In the practiceof the vernacular
hymn the Reformersdid surelyachievesomethingof the immediate
Brilioth,Eucharistic
87 FaithandPractice,p. I56.
Hooker,Lazvsof Ecclesiastical
88 Polity, i, p. 36I.
Brilioth,EucharisticFaith and Practice,pp. I3I, I34, I88; Hooker,Laws of
89
Ecclesiastical
Polity,ii, pp. 33I, 333-4; J. F. H. New, AnglicanandPuritan(London,
I964), p. 42-
90 Exceptionsin Brilioth,Eucharistic
Faith andPractice,p. I88
(Scotland),andin
B. Voglerand J. Estebe, "La genese d'une societeprotestante",Annales.E.S.C.,
XXXi (I976), pp. 378-9 (France).
 THE MASS AS A SOCIAL INSTITUTION 6I

andunproblematic unityatwhichtheyaimed:a congregational homo-

phony which for Luther himself, and for Europeancivilizationin
general,did not entirelyexorcizenostalgiaforthe polyphonicmyster-
ies of the mass.91
Universityof York 3rohnBossy

91R. H. Bainton,HereI Stand(New York, I955 edn.), pp. 266-70.