Our Lady of Walsingham
Encyclopedia
Our Lady of Walsingham is a title used for Mary, the mother of Jesus
. The title derives from the belief that Mary appeared in a vision to Richeldis de Faverches
, a devout Saxon
noblewoman, in 1061 in the village of Walsingham
in Norfolk
, England
. Lady Richeldis had a Holy House built in Walsingham which became a shrine and place of pilgrimage.
In passing on his guardianship of the Holy House, Richeldis's son Geoffrey left instructions for the building of a priory in Walsingham
. The priory passed into the care of Canons Regular
sometime between 1146 and 1174.
The Holy House, containing the simple wooden structure which Richeldis had been asked to build in imitation of the home in which the Annunciation
occurred, became both a shrine
and the focus of pilgrimage to Walsingham. The chapel was founded in the time of Edward the Confessor, about 1053, the earliest deeds naming Richeldis, the mother of Geoffrey of Favraches as the founder. In 1169, Geoffrey granted 'to God and St. Mary and to Edwy his clerk the chapel of our Lady' which his mother had founded at Walsingham with the intention that Edwy should found a priory. These gifts were, shortly afterwards, confirmed to the Austin Canons of Walsingham by Robert de Brucurt and Roger, earl of Clare. By the time of its destruction in 1538 during the reign of Henry VIII, the shrine had become one of the greatest religious centres in England, and Europe, together with Glastonbury
and Canterbury
. It had been a place of pilgrimage during medieval times, when due to wars and political upheaval, travel to Rome
and Compostella
was difficult.
Royal patronage helped the shrine to grow in wealth and popularity, receiving visits from Henry III
, Edward II
, Edward III
, Henry IV
, Edward IV
, Henry VII
, Henry VIII
and Erasmus. It was also a place of pilgrimage for English queens - Catherine of Aragon
was a regular pilgrim and her successor, Anne Boleyn
, also announced an intention of making a pilgrimage. Its wealth and prestige did not, however, prevent its being a disorderly house. The visitation of bishop Nicke in 1514 revealed that the prior was leading a scandalous life, that, among many other things, he treated the canons with insolence and brutality; the canons themselves frequented taverns and were quarrelsome.The prior William Lowth was removed and by 1526 some decent order had been restored.
project. On the pretext of discovering any irregularities in their life, Thomas Cromwell organised a series of visitations, the results of which led to the suppression of smaller foundations (which did not include Walsingham) in 1536. Two years earlier the Prior, Richard Vowell, had signed their acceptance of the king's supremacy, but it did not save them. Cromwell's actions were politically motivated but the Canons, who had a number of houses in Norfolk were not noted for their piety or good order. The prior was evidently compliant but not all of the community felt likewise. In 1537, two lay choristers organised 'the most serious plot hatched anywhere south of the Trent', intended to resist what they feared, rightly as it turned out, would happen to their foundation. Eleven men were executed as a result. The suppression of Walsingham priory came late in 1538, under the supervision of Sir Roger Townshend, a local landowner. Walsingham was famous and its fall symbolic: bishop Latimer wrote of the image of Our Lady"She hath been the Devil's instrument, I fear, to bring many to eternal fire; now she herself with her older sister of Walsingham, her younger sister of Ipswich, and their two sisters of Doncaster and Penrhys will make a jolly muster in Smithfield. They would not be all day in burning".
According to Wriothesley, Windsor Herald, who wrote the informative Chronicle of England during the reigns of the Tudors: - "It was the month of July, the images of Our Lady of Walsingham and Ipswich were brought up to London with all the jewels that hung around them, at the King's commandment, and divers other images, both in England and Wales, that were used for common pilgrimage . . . and they were burnt at Chelsea by my Lord Privy Seal". Two other chroniclers, Hall and Speed, suggest that the actual burning did not take place until September.
The buildings were looted and largely destroyed, the sub-prior executed, but the memory of it was less easy to eradicate. Sir Roger wrote to Cromwell in 1564 that a woman of nearby Wells, had declared that a miracle had been done by the image of Our Lady after it had been carried away to London. He had her put in the stocks on market day to be abused by the village folk but concluded 'I cannot perceyve but the seyd image is not yett out of the sum of ther heddes'.
The site of the priory with the churchyard and gardens was granted by the Crown to Thomas Sydney. All that remained of it was the gatehouse, the chancel arch and a few outbuildings.
After nearly four hundred years the 20th century saw the restoration of pilgrimage to Walsingham
as a regular feature of Christian
life in the British Isles and beyond. There are both Roman Catholic and Anglican shrines in Walsingham.
In 1897 Pope Leo XIII
re-established the restored 14th century Slipper Chapel
as a Roman Catholic shrine, now the centre of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. The Holy House had been rebuilt at the Church of the Annunciation at King's Lynn
(Walsingham was part of this Roman Catholic parish in 1897).
Father Alfred Hope Patten
OSA
, appointed as the Church of England
Vicar of Walsingham in 1921, ignited Anglican interest in the pre-Reformation pilgrimage. It was his idea to create a new statue of Our Lady of Walsingham based on the image depicted on the seal of the medieval priory. In 1922 the statue was set up in the Parish Church of St Mary and regular pilgrimage devotion followed. From the first night that the statue was placed there, people gathered around it to pray, asking Mary to join her prayers with theirs.
Throughout the 1920s the trickle of pilgrims became a flood of large numbers for whom, eventually, the Pilgrim Hospice was opened (a hospice is the name of a place of hospitality for pilgrims) and, in 1931, a new Holy House encased in a small pilgrimage church was dedicated and the statue translated there with great solemnity. In 1938 that church was enlarged to form the Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. Father Patten combined the posts of Vicar of Walsingham and Priest Administrator of the Anglican shrine until his death in 1958.
There is frequently an ecumenical dimension to pilgrimages to Walsingham, with pilgrims arriving at the Slipper Chapel and then walking to the Holy House at the Anglican shrine.
In the United States the National Shrine to Our Lady of Walsingham for the Episcopal Church is located in Grace Church, Sheboygan
, Wisconsin
. Our Lady of Walsingham is remembered by Roman Catholics on 24 September and by Anglicans on 15 October. A parish of the Pastoral Provision
named for Our Lady of Walsingham is in Houston, Texas. A Western Rite
Antiochian Orthodox
parish named for Our Lady of Walsingham is in Mesquite, Texas
.
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
. The title derives from the belief that Mary appeared in a vision to Richeldis de Faverches
Richeldis de Faverches
Richeldis de Faverches was a devout Saxon noblewoman. According to Roman Catholic and Anglican belief, Richeldis de Faverches had a vision in which the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to her in 1061 in the village of Walsingham in Norfolk, England...
, a devout Saxon
Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
noblewoman, in 1061 in the village of Walsingham
Walsingham
Walsingham is a village in the English county of Norfolk. The village is famed for its religious shrines in honour of the Virgin Mary and as a major pilgrimage centre...
in Norfolk
Norfolk
Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. Lady Richeldis had a Holy House built in Walsingham which became a shrine and place of pilgrimage.
In passing on his guardianship of the Holy House, Richeldis's son Geoffrey left instructions for the building of a priory in Walsingham
Walsingham
Walsingham is a village in the English county of Norfolk. The village is famed for its religious shrines in honour of the Virgin Mary and as a major pilgrimage centre...
. The priory passed into the care of Canons Regular
Canons Regular
Canons Regular are members of certain bodies of Canons living in community under the Augustinian Rule , and sharing their property in common...
sometime between 1146 and 1174.
Holy House and pilgrimages
Annunciation
The Annunciation, also referred to as the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary or Annunciation of the Lord, is the Christian celebration of the announcement by the angel Gabriel to Virgin Mary, that she would conceive and become the mother of Jesus the Son of God. Gabriel told Mary to name her...
occurred, became both a shrine
Shrine
A shrine is a holy or sacred place, which is dedicated to a specific deity, ancestor, hero, martyr, saint, daemon or similar figure of awe and respect, at which they are venerated or worshipped. Shrines often contain idols, relics, or other such objects associated with the figure being venerated....
and the focus of pilgrimage to Walsingham. The chapel was founded in the time of Edward the Confessor, about 1053, the earliest deeds naming Richeldis, the mother of Geoffrey of Favraches as the founder. In 1169, Geoffrey granted 'to God and St. Mary and to Edwy his clerk the chapel of our Lady' which his mother had founded at Walsingham with the intention that Edwy should found a priory. These gifts were, shortly afterwards, confirmed to the Austin Canons of Walsingham by Robert de Brucurt and Roger, earl of Clare. By the time of its destruction in 1538 during the reign of Henry VIII, the shrine had become one of the greatest religious centres in England, and Europe, together with Glastonbury
Glastonbury
Glastonbury is a small town in Somerset, England, situated at a dry point on the low lying Somerset Levels, south of Bristol. The town, which is in the Mendip district, had a population of 8,784 in the 2001 census...
and Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
. It had been a place of pilgrimage during medieval times, when due to wars and political upheaval, travel to Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
and Compostella
Santiago de Compostela
Santiago de Compostela is the capital of the autonomous community of Galicia, Spain.The city's Cathedral is the destination today, as it has been throughout history, of the important 9th century medieval pilgrimage route, the Way of St. James...
was difficult.
Royal patronage helped the shrine to grow in wealth and popularity, receiving visits from Henry III
Henry III of England
Henry III was the son and successor of John as King of England, reigning for 56 years from 1216 until his death. His contemporaries knew him as Henry of Winchester. He was the first child king in England since the reign of Æthelred the Unready...
, Edward II
Edward II of England
Edward II , called Edward of Caernarfon, was King of England from 1307 until he was deposed by his wife Isabella in January 1327. He was the sixth Plantagenet king, in a line that began with the reign of Henry II...
, Edward III
Edward III of England
Edward III was King of England from 1327 until his death and is noted for his military success. Restoring royal authority after the disastrous reign of his father, Edward II, Edward III went on to transform the Kingdom of England into one of the most formidable military powers in Europe...
, Henry IV
Henry IV of England
Henry IV was King of England and Lord of Ireland . He was the ninth King of England of the House of Plantagenet and also asserted his grandfather's claim to the title King of France. He was born at Bolingbroke Castle in Lincolnshire, hence his other name, Henry Bolingbroke...
, Edward IV
Edward IV of England
Edward IV was King of England from 4 March 1461 until 3 October 1470, and again from 11 April 1471 until his death. He was the first Yorkist King of England...
, Henry VII
Henry VII of England
Henry VII was King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizing the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death on 21 April 1509, as the first monarch of the House of Tudor....
, Henry VIII
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
and Erasmus. It was also a place of pilgrimage for English queens - Catherine of Aragon
Catherine of Aragon
Catherine of Aragon , also known as Katherine or Katharine, was Queen consort of England as the first wife of King Henry VIII of England and Princess of Wales as the wife to Arthur, Prince of Wales...
was a regular pilgrim and her successor, Anne Boleyn
Anne Boleyn
Anne Boleyn ;c.1501/1507 – 19 May 1536) was Queen of England from 1533 to 1536 as the second wife of Henry VIII of England and Marquess of Pembroke in her own right. Henry's marriage to Anne, and her subsequent execution, made her a key figure in the political and religious upheaval that was the...
, also announced an intention of making a pilgrimage. Its wealth and prestige did not, however, prevent its being a disorderly house. The visitation of bishop Nicke in 1514 revealed that the prior was leading a scandalous life, that, among many other things, he treated the canons with insolence and brutality; the canons themselves frequented taverns and were quarrelsome.The prior William Lowth was removed and by 1526 some decent order had been restored.
Destruction
The suppression of the monasteries was part of the English ReformationEnglish Reformation
The English Reformation was the series of events in 16th-century England by which the Church of England broke away from the authority of the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church....
project. On the pretext of discovering any irregularities in their life, Thomas Cromwell organised a series of visitations, the results of which led to the suppression of smaller foundations (which did not include Walsingham) in 1536. Two years earlier the Prior, Richard Vowell, had signed their acceptance of the king's supremacy, but it did not save them. Cromwell's actions were politically motivated but the Canons, who had a number of houses in Norfolk were not noted for their piety or good order. The prior was evidently compliant but not all of the community felt likewise. In 1537, two lay choristers organised 'the most serious plot hatched anywhere south of the Trent', intended to resist what they feared, rightly as it turned out, would happen to their foundation. Eleven men were executed as a result. The suppression of Walsingham priory came late in 1538, under the supervision of Sir Roger Townshend, a local landowner. Walsingham was famous and its fall symbolic: bishop Latimer wrote of the image of Our Lady"She hath been the Devil's instrument, I fear, to bring many to eternal fire; now she herself with her older sister of Walsingham, her younger sister of Ipswich, and their two sisters of Doncaster and Penrhys will make a jolly muster in Smithfield. They would not be all day in burning".
According to Wriothesley, Windsor Herald, who wrote the informative Chronicle of England during the reigns of the Tudors: - "It was the month of July, the images of Our Lady of Walsingham and Ipswich were brought up to London with all the jewels that hung around them, at the King's commandment, and divers other images, both in England and Wales, that were used for common pilgrimage . . . and they were burnt at Chelsea by my Lord Privy Seal". Two other chroniclers, Hall and Speed, suggest that the actual burning did not take place until September.
The buildings were looted and largely destroyed, the sub-prior executed, but the memory of it was less easy to eradicate. Sir Roger wrote to Cromwell in 1564 that a woman of nearby Wells, had declared that a miracle had been done by the image of Our Lady after it had been carried away to London. He had her put in the stocks on market day to be abused by the village folk but concluded 'I cannot perceyve but the seyd image is not yett out of the sum of ther heddes'.
The site of the priory with the churchyard and gardens was granted by the Crown to Thomas Sydney. All that remained of it was the gatehouse, the chancel arch and a few outbuildings.
Modern revival
Walsingham
Walsingham is a village in the English county of Norfolk. The village is famed for its religious shrines in honour of the Virgin Mary and as a major pilgrimage centre...
as a regular feature of Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
life in the British Isles and beyond. There are both Roman Catholic and Anglican shrines in Walsingham.
In 1897 Pope Leo XIII
Pope Leo XIII
Pope Leo XIII , born Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci to an Italian comital family, was the 256th Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, reigning from 1878 to 1903...
re-established the restored 14th century Slipper Chapel
Slipper Chapel
The Slipper Chapel, or Chapel of St. Catherine of Alexandria, is a Roman Catholic chapel located in Houghton Saint Giles, Norfolk, England. Built in 1340, it was the last chapel on the pilgrims' route to Walsingham....
as a Roman Catholic shrine, now the centre of the National Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. The Holy House had been rebuilt at the Church of the Annunciation at King's Lynn
King's Lynn
King's Lynn is a sea port and market town in the ceremonial county of Norfolk in the East of England. It is situated north of London and west of Norwich. The population of the town is 42,800....
(Walsingham was part of this Roman Catholic parish in 1897).
Father Alfred Hope Patten
Alfred Hope Patten
Alfred Hope Patten , known as Pat to his friends, was an Anglo-Catholic priest in the Church of England, best known for his restoration of the shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham.-Life:An introspective only child, he became an Anglo-Catholic in Brighton whilst still a teenager, becoming...
OSA
Augustinians
The term Augustinians, named after Saint Augustine of Hippo , applies to two separate and unrelated types of Catholic religious orders:...
, appointed as the Church of England
Church of England
The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England and the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church considers itself within the tradition of Western Christianity and dates its formal establishment principally to the mission to England by St...
Vicar of Walsingham in 1921, ignited Anglican interest in the pre-Reformation pilgrimage. It was his idea to create a new statue of Our Lady of Walsingham based on the image depicted on the seal of the medieval priory. In 1922 the statue was set up in the Parish Church of St Mary and regular pilgrimage devotion followed. From the first night that the statue was placed there, people gathered around it to pray, asking Mary to join her prayers with theirs.
Throughout the 1920s the trickle of pilgrims became a flood of large numbers for whom, eventually, the Pilgrim Hospice was opened (a hospice is the name of a place of hospitality for pilgrims) and, in 1931, a new Holy House encased in a small pilgrimage church was dedicated and the statue translated there with great solemnity. In 1938 that church was enlarged to form the Anglican Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham. Father Patten combined the posts of Vicar of Walsingham and Priest Administrator of the Anglican shrine until his death in 1958.
There is frequently an ecumenical dimension to pilgrimages to Walsingham, with pilgrims arriving at the Slipper Chapel and then walking to the Holy House at the Anglican shrine.
In the United States the National Shrine to Our Lady of Walsingham for the Episcopal Church is located in Grace Church, Sheboygan
Grace Church, Sheboygan
Grace Episcopal Church located at 1011 North 7th Street in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, is an Anglo-Catholic parish of the Episcopal Church, part of the Diocese of Fond du Lac.-History:...
, Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
. Our Lady of Walsingham is remembered by Roman Catholics on 24 September and by Anglicans on 15 October. A parish of the Pastoral Provision
Pastoral Provision
The "pastoral provision" or "statute" for United States Episcopalians entering the Catholic Church authorizes some departures for them from the normal practice of the Latin Rite...
named for Our Lady of Walsingham is in Houston, Texas. A Western Rite
Antiochian Western Rite Vicariate
The Antiochian Western Rite Vicariate is the successor within canonical Orthodoxy of the Society of St. Basil.-Origins:The Western Rite Vicariate began when the Society of St...
Antiochian Orthodox
Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America
The Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America is the sole jurisdiction of the Antiochian Orthodox Church in the United States and Canada with exclusive jurisdiction over the Antiochian Orthodox faithful in those countries, though these faithful were originally cared for by the...
parish named for Our Lady of Walsingham is in Mesquite, Texas
Mesquite, Texas
Mesquite is a city located within the Dallas/Ft.Worth area of Texas. As of the 2010 US Census, the population was 139,824.-History:The city was founded May 22, 1873, by a Texas & Pacific Railway engineer who purchased land along the Texas & Pacific line outside of Dallas...
.
See also
- Religion in the United KingdomReligion in the United KingdomReligion in the United Kingdom and the states that pre-dated the UK, was dominated by forms of Christianity for over 1,400 years. Although a majority of citizens still identify with Christianity in many surveys, regular church attendance has fallen dramatically since the middle of the 20th century,...
- Walsingham House School, Bombay IndiaWalsingham House School, Bombay IndiaWalsingham House School is a private girls' school located in a former palace of the Maharajah of Kutch in South Mumbai, India.The school is managed by the Mittal Group, and is affiliated to the ICSE.-History:...
- Our Lady of WestminsterOur Lady of WestminsterOur Lady of Westminster is a late Medieval statue of the Madonna and child, now to be found at the entrance of the Lady Chapel in Westminster Cathedral, London, under the thirteenth Station of the Cross by Eric Gill. The image is made of English alabaster, is flat backed, 36 inches high and...
- Our Lady of DoncasterOur Lady of DoncasterOur Lady of Doncaster is a Marian shrine located in Doncaster, UK, whose original statue was destroyed during the Reformation.-The Carmelites & the Shrine:...
- Our Lady of CardiganOur Lady of CardiganOur Lady of Cardigan , also known as Our Lady of the Taper, the national Catholic shrine of Wales, is a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary located in a chapel in Cardigan, Ceredigion, Wales.-History:...
- Our Lady of IpswichOur Lady of IpswichOur Lady of Ipswich was a popular English Marian shrine before the English Reformation. Only the shrine at Walsingham attracted more visitors.-Location:The shrine was just outside the walls of Ipswich, Suffolk, England...
- Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of WalsinghamPersonal Ordinariate of Our Lady of WalsinghamThe Personal Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham is a personal ordinariate of the Roman Catholic Church within the territory of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales, but immediately subject to the Holy See in Rome and encompassing Scotland...
Studies
- Dominic Janes and Gary Waller (еds), Walsingham in Literature and Culture from the Middle Ages to Modernity (Aldershot, Ashgate, 2010).
- John Rayne-Davis, Peter Rollings, Walsingham: England’s National Shrine of Our Lady (London, 2010).
- Waller, Gary. Walsingham and the English Imagination. (Aldershot, Ashgate, 2011).
External links
- Official website of the Anglican and Roman Catholic shrines
- Roman Catholic National Shrine of Our Lady
- US Friends of Our Lady of Walsingham - Episcopal Church
- Our Lady of Reepham, Norfolk - Medieval Marian Shrine
- Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham, St Paul's Church (Episcopal) in Washington, District of Columbia, United States
- Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham, St Thomas the Apostle Church (Episcopal) in Hollywood, California, United States
- Our Lady of Walsingham Church Roman Catholic Church (Anglican Use) in Houston, Texas, United States
- St Peter's Church (Anglican) in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
- St John the Evangelist Church (Anglican) in Calgary, Alberta, Canada
- Our Lady of Walsingham Orthodox Christian Church in Mesquite, Texas, United States
- http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=38291 History of the shrine
- link to the text of the 15th century Pynson Ballad, recounting the story of the Walsingham shrine