An Interactive story told by Abe Van Luik (abevanluik@thoughtsandplaces.org),
and posted in the Libraries of Compuserve's Living History Forum.

Identifiers of other's contributions/questions have been removed
in the interest of privacy.

It was 1221, early spring, Marijke had just celebrated her 16th
birthday and there was some discussion that at this age she really should
be married, not living at home. But Marijke was a hard worker, who was
recognized by her parent's employer as necessary to a smoothly
functioning household, so she stayed on. Marijke's family, father, mother,
older sister and two older brothers do farm and domestic manual labor.
They are serfs, part of the estate of a not so well off noble, who is not a
great provider, but tries to be basically good to his employees and sees to
their comfort as long as they see to his well being by working his lands
well, growing flax for income grains, some vegetables, a few fruit trees
and berry bushes, a few cattle, and lots of chickens for the maintenance of
the family and horses for labor and transportation. They are self sufficient
except for building materials and cloth, which they buy by trading their
flax crop to cloth manufacturers in the region to the south of them.

They live near the North Sea on the southwest side of an island
called Walcheren, in what is now known as the Dutch province of
Zeeland. The area was continually windy, cold, and wet, with an
occasional dry and warm spell every few summers. Those were days
memories were made, but they were few. The area was also occasionally
flooded by the sea, especially in early spring. Usually, recovery was on the
order of a few months of replanting. The salt water was quickly diluted by
the ever present rains.

A worse than usual flood hits the island soon after Marijke's
birthday, and a good part of the nobleman's lands are ruined for a time,
meaning that he can't support all his help. The nobleman's liege-lord, from
whom he receives title to his property and to whom he pays a portion of
his annual surplus, is told that he will not be extended credit, ans so to
hold on to his remaining lands he has to cut his costs. Since the part of his
estate that is the most hopelessly damaged is the part assigned to Marijke's
family, he sets them free with some coin in a little bag to allow them to
buy necessities for a few days. Marijke's family moves or starves.

The floods also ravage the lands where the older sister's
husband-to-be is employed, but with some hard work there is enough to
supply the manorial residents and the resident help. A marriage is rushed,
and Marijke now faces the prospect to leave for the unknown without her
sister, her best friend. In addition, one of her brothers finds employment
helping another flax farmer recover from the disaster. So it is only four
who head south on another cold, wet and windy spring day. The farewell
was tearful on all sides.

They could have stayed on Walcheren where two large cities,
Middelburg and Vlissingen, were located. There was a generally positive
economic climate because of the growth of something new in the land:
manufacture and trade, commerce. But because of a fortunate opportunity
for a boat ride south, arranged by their liege-lord, and the father's desire to
get a little further inland where they would feel safer, their path led south,
to Blankenberg by boat, and then a few days on foot, begging for scraps of
bread along the way, to finally arrive at Brugge.

In Brugge, the family survives poorly at first. The father does hard
manual labor in the city for an import/export company, loading and
unloading freight from Venetian and ships. The remaining brother stays
nearer to the country hovel they are able to rent, and works on flax farms
in the area when he can. Marijke and her mother go from house to house
offering domestic services. Our young 16 year old subject and her mother
are able to bring home enough pay, in terms soap, flour and butter,
cabbage, and an occasional chicken, to feed the four of them tolerably
well. Other pay is traded for linen and other materials from which every
scrap of family apparel is manufactured at home. Frequent forages into
nearby forests provide fuel, but every land owner wants a fee for the
privilege of extracting scrap wood from their lands, so nothing is exactly
cheap.

As time goes on, the father's dedication comes to the notice of one
of the owner's relatives, and he is promoted. He allows it to be known
that his family is hard working, but living under rather grueling conditions.
His new boss inquires among his relatives, and one of them offers his wife
and daughter domestic positions, and his son a job in their warehouse.
Almost overnight, this troupe of lowly peasants finds itself enjoying the
benefits of being a lowly part of the new life of the merchant class. The
merchant class is a new thing in the land: men of wealth and power who
did not trace these blessings to a blood line, but to effort and luck and
shrewd alliances with manorial families willing to risk capital to make a
profit.

All goes exceedingly well until a son of the employing family tells
the now 17 year old Marijke that since she is in their employ she has to do
what he says. She is a believing Catholic, and is horrified at the domestic
services he wants her to provide for him. She runs, and hides from him,
until she can discuss this with her parents and brother in the early evening.
They are in a pickle: they are scared to offend the master's son, and are in
a no win situation. If they go to the young man's parents he would no
doubt give a very different account and be the one that was believed.
They are horrified at his demand, but they are even more horrified at the
prospect of returning to the leaky shack in the country, returning to a life
of begging for a chance to earn scraps of food and clothing and fuel. They
suggest she run away and take shelter in a convent.

Later that same night, after four faces are once again wet with
tears, she is escorted to a local convent by her brother, who waits about
twenty minutes after she is safely inside and then tiptoes away. Since
convents require dowries for entry, it wasn't at all clear that she would be
welcomed, except perhaps for a night or two. Hence the brother's waiting
to make sure she wasn't sent right back out. Then he would escort her to
another convent. There were several.

To Marijke's surprise, what she thought was a convent was not. It
was a place where women congregated as if part of a religious order, and
took only temporary vows, effective while resident there. The vows were
for chastity, and for obedience to the leader of the group. Although
dowries were welcomed, even solicited, they were not required. It was,
however, required that all residents follow a strict routine of prayer, work
in the gardens and kitchens, and work in the cloth manufacturing industry
that was creating articles of clothing and decorative items of lace, for sale
to local merchants. Marijke works as hard as she always has.
Marijke is accepted, and learns weaving and other skills. She also
learns to read and write, and sits at the feet of visiting leaders of this lay
order to learn aspects of her religion she never knew existed. These
visiting leaders were not from very far away, but the fact that these ladies
were able to travel at all was a radical departure from most formal
religious orders for women.

One lady she heard was particularly memorable, she spoke of
experiencing a mystical oneness with God. When she spoke of God and
her soul melting into one entity, Marijke felt as if she were melting herself
and knew the truth of that which she heard. She began to study the
contemplative methods that this mystically experienced woman
recommended, when she wasn't working, which wasn't often.

After about a year in the lay order, visits from her parents or
brother had become infrequent, and she began to come into her own as an
adult. At 18, most normal women were either married, in a religious
order, or outside respectable society. In this lay order, it was OK to leave
to get married if one really wanted to, but there was no pressure.

One day, to her surprise, she heard talk that her favorite local
mystic, the woman whose account of experiencing oneness with God had
so inspired and affected her, had been questioned by a representative from
the local Bishop. It appears there was a heresy spreading in the land that
suggested that once one has experienced unity with God, religious and
moral laws no longer applied. It seems that this woman's account of
feeling totally free in the presence of God's Spirit made her sound like a
Free Spirit. The Free Spirit heresy was being taken very serious, and
unrepentant heretics, it was rumored, would be harshly and brutally dealt
with by the local law- enforcement apparatus, which enforced religious as
well as civil law.

Marijke was aghast at the glee displayed by some of the women in
spreading this story, they seemed to be saying "I told you so," when in fact
she could recall no one questioning the reality of this woman's testimony
until this very moment. She decided they were jealous, and forgave them
as she had been taught she should.

Eventually, Marijke replaces her leader, who died in her early 50's.
Under her leadership, she saw, with some misgivings, her group of
"Beguines," as her lay order was now known, brought under closer
control and supervision by the local clergy. It was explained to her that
this was necessary to assure orthodoxy among the women. In fact, she
was aware that in other localities there was a crackdown on the Beguines,
they were in many places disbanded and members given a choice of either
returning to secular life or becoming affiliated with, and subscribing to the
rules of, formal religious orders. Thus, she felt that the closer direction
and attention she was now receiving from the local clergy was probably
necessary to retaining her order. She got along well with the local priest,
who in turn was an acquaintance of and got along well with the local
Bishop, hence she felt her group of religious women were secure.

At the height of her career as a lay religious leader, at the ripe old
age of 25, Marijke purchases supplies from, gets to know, and finally falls
in love with a wealthy merchant of the city. They marry, have three
children, two boys and a girl, and in her old age, in her early 50's, after her
husband dies, she divides the family holdings so that her children can run
the business and live comfortably from the proceeds. With her sizable
share of the family fortune, she returns to her Beguinage, and remodels
and refurbishes the residences, kitchens, and work areas. She is elated,
after her daughter's husband dies of injuries received in an accident, that
her daughter joins her in her order.

Marijke becomes a well respected and loved leader, and in her very
old age, at 63, she has her heart's greatest desire granted her: she
experiences that same ineffable unity with her God as in that story which
had thrilled her so many years ago. But except for the light in her eyes as
she passed away, and the whispered words: "Oh, my Soul! Oh, my God!"
attested to by those standing by her bedside, she left no spoken or written
words of her theophany. Her daughter wrote the story of her life that has
been passed down as part of the order's heritage for hundreds of years.

Marijke was buried in the flower garden. To this day -even though
the little dwellings placed around the circle of grass is now a minimum
care residence for old persons- there is a spot in the green lawn where an
oval of brilliant white flowers comes up weeks before the flowers in the
rest of the grass, every spring.

Although the neat residences and gardens no longer serve the same
purpose, every once in a while someone sees this lovely place and reads up
on its history. When they do they learn of the Marijke Garden that has
spontaneously produced flowers for over 600 years. The legend is based
on a biographical work no longer in existence, but which supposedly
testified that she was so filled with the love of God when she died that she
shone with a bright inner light, which warms the ground where she is
buried, making it just a little warmer than the surrounding ground,
allowing the bulbs planted in that spot to sprout just a bit earlier than in
the rest of the grounds.

Maybe so. Maybe not. But that is the stuff Medieval legends are
made of. Who knows? Perhaps in an era when belief was more universal,
there was a more fertile field for miracles.

One thing that is clear from reading the surviving stories of
religious women of the High Middle Ages, however, is that they believed
and experienced their religion very deeply. An interesting side note is that
the most profound women of that time, in terms of their religious thought
and experiences, were also amazingly lacking in what we would today call
superstition.

The idea that the Middle Ages were extremely superstitious times
may be a common one, but the religious sensibilities of many of the
women mystics of the High Middle Ages were downright modern,
especially when compared with the outrageously superstitious climate that
prevailed later on, in the Early Modern period, when both the Catholic and
Protestant churches engaged in a foul-spirited and bloody search for
witches. The last gasp of this cruel madness took place in the colony of
Massachusetts, very close to home.

Speaking of miracles, Marijke has let it be known that she has a
link into the Information Superhighway. Her link, believe it or not, is a
person currently alive and residing in Las Vegas, Nevada. He has agreed
to be Marijke's hands on the computer keyboard. She will get even with
him if he messes up the answers, she says. She knows the gatekeeper, and
eventually the link-person will approach that gate. Believe me, he is on his
best behavior and will type exactly what he is told.

Marijke will entertain questions about her life from those who are
truly curious. She can tell when a question comes from one who feels
superior to Marijke because she lives almost 800 years later, in a more
modern time. Marijke reserves the right to be snippy if she detects
smugness or assumed superiority in questions. Questions may be directed
at any stage of her life or times: such things as what life was like being so
much at the mercy of the weather, what local crops were, living conditions
on the poor manor and in the rich merchants' city, keeping clean and
clothed, farming practices, abuse of peasants by those with power, etc.
The early deaths of people in Marijke's time, by our standards, could lead
to questions about health care and sanitation.

The Beguine order and why it was such an innovation, and why it
was eventually drummed out of existence because of a suspected
susceptibility to heresy except where the local clergy took control could
also be fit food for questions. But be prepared, this is Marijke's favorite
subject and may result in lengthy replies. Marijke will need a week to
think about the questions and come up with replies! It isn't that she is a
slow thinker, but she wants to put no undue strain on her somewhat feeble
link. He can't spell worth a hoot if he is pushed, so she will be kind and
urges you to be patient.

THE END
 

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS, PART ONE

Dear Marijke,

Please describe the mystical experience you had.
What was it like to have a baby?

Thank you.

MARIJKE'S ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS: MYSTICAL EXPERIENCE
AND CHILDBIRTH

Interesting that these two questions came together. You see, these
two experiences arevrelated, in my life.

When I had been at the Beguinage long enough to have learned a few
things from the more spiritually inclined sisters, I had a hard time with the
commonly held notion that one must suffer, like Christ suffered, in order
to have a true spiritual experience. Some of the sisters fasted to an
extreme and wore hair shirts, coarse garments made of rough animal hair
that kept them continually uncomfortable. Some prayed for hours on end,
some lay on a cold stone floor contemplating spiritual things and others
afflicted themselves with an ingenious variety of sufferings. The idea was
to be in a state of total misery, wherein one could identify more closely
with the suffering Christ.

I had a hard time with these attempts at imitating this aspect of the life
of Christ. If such sufferings as cold, hunger, and sleeping on hard surfaces
on a prickly surface actually brought one closer to Christ and increased
ones spirituality, then peasants, who suffer these privations routinely,
should be the most spiritual people in our society. They are not.

Of course, many of the sisters were extremely diligent in their imitation
of other aspects of the life of Christ. They gave of their time and means
helping out the poor, the sick, the lame, and confused young girls like me
who showed up at their door late at night with nowhere to turn. I was
grateful to these sisters for setting me on a path that led to a useful life.
And I'm grateful for their teaching me the meaning of the life of Christ by
example, as well as by words.

The birth of my first son was accompanied by so much pain, I felt I was
undergoing extreme torture, and ended with such sweetness, that for an
instant I believed that I had been wrong: suffering is required after all,
before a spiritual manifestation can be had. I was surrounded by a
midwife, one of the women from the Beguinage by several wives of the
employees of my husband's business and three other women. The other
women were a close friend from the Beguine order and two of the
household staff with whom I worked daily to assure that the household ran
smoothly and was always ready for the feeding of important clients,
potential clients, investors, and the amazing number of local dignitaries
who laid claim on portions of the profits and expected to be wined and
dined as well.

The birth was so difficult that I could sense the tension in the midwife's
face even as she purred reassuring words. This was particularly terrifying
because I was well aware that close to half the babies born in the region
died at birth or within a year or two after, and that a very large number of
women in the community, no matter what their social station, died in
childbirth. In hindsight, my three pregnancies resulting in three children
who grew to become adults was very, very unusual. But after
each birth I felt assured that all would be well with myself and
this child, but I am getting ahead of my own story.

During this difficult birth, I passed out a couple of times from pain,
which is not good since one can't push if not conscious. Then, suddenly,
or so it seemed, pain was transformed into a crying bloody bundle that I
instantly loved and that I instantly knew also loved me. The ladies
swabbed at the messy form held up in front of my face, and a minute later
handled me a pinkish bundle to put to my breast. I was so overcome with
relief and love that I momentarily slipped into another side of my
awareness and had a very clear and strong thought: "This child is an
embodiment of the love of God, created through love it has just come
forth out of water, and is to be raised immersed in love."

I thought this quite profound, but kept it to myself. It served an
immediate purpose: the pain was all but forgotten as my mind was fully
involved in wrapping itself around this spiritual insight.

Two years later my second son was born. An easier birth,
excruciatingly painful but mercifully swift. The profound experience of
before was not repeated as such, but I fully recalled that previous emotion,
and knew in my heart, with total certitude, that it was as true this time as
the previous time.

Three years later, when my daughter was born, after another painful
but short labor and delivery, I was trying to recreate that same sensation
and feeling, but to no avail. My excitement at having a girl at last
swamped my heart and mind. I so busy actively thinking grateful thoughts
that I was unable to relax my mind and listen to the voice within that had
spoken to me when on the line between consciousness and
unconsciousness five years ago. As excitement waned,
physical exhaustion took over and I drifted off into a peaceful sleep. In an
extraordinarily vivid dream, I saw an adult woman that I instinctively
knew to be my daughter, dressed in the plain, grey habit of the Beguines.
Then I realized I was sitting in a chair looking at her, and without seeing I
knew that I was also wearing that same style and color of garment. I
found this such a strange, yet welcome, notion that I suddenly awoke. As
soon as my eyes were half open I found
my little girl heading toward my bosom as if in fight. Of course I soon
detected the strong little hands of one of my coworkers and best friends
surrounding the baby's body. My friend was watching over the two of us,
all night long.

As my little girl found and then eagerly suckled my breast, and I felt my
own substance flowing into her, I sensed her growing with each tug. I
realized that this same sensation had brought unspeakable joy to a woman
who, over a thousand years ago, had given of her own substance so that
the incarnation of God would grow to become revealed to the world as
the Christ. Then, in his turn, Christ gave of himself to help us grow.

These associations swirled as if they were sweet aromas floating out of
a kitchen window, conjuring bittersweet childhood memories of stealthily
being handed little bits of some delicacy by a doting kitchen worker. The
memory of satisfying food was as strong as the memory of feeling what
made these morsels so memorable: they represented a tangible form of
love, just as this little one was now drinking both nourishment and love
from my body.

In the midst of this reverie of pleasant thoughts the image of Mary and
Jesus arose again within my mind, and all at once Mary looked straight
into my eyes and smiled at me, and then at my little girl child, and without
speaking conveyed the idea that we were both engaged in transmitting the
love and substance of God into these little images of God.

I kept these things to myself. But from this moment forward I knew
that priestly men who taught that men were the image and glory of God,
but women were not, were wrong. I had never felt comfortable with the
idea that women were less than men in God's creation and estimation. I
mention this only because there is a man also answering your questions
from beyond your sphere of being. His name is Vincent, I believe, and I
would describe him as one so in need of feeling a personal sense of
superiority that he has taken religion as his personal weapon wherewith to
beat half the Christian world into acknowledging their utter depravity and
abysmal inferiority in comparison with a holy man such as himself. I never
see Vincent where I am. He thinks he is in heaven, no doubt. I don't want
to rain on his parade, I have useful work to do here, and this finally brings
us to a discussion of my most memorable mystical experience.

The visiting lady to whom I made reference in my life story was a
Beguine from Ghent, who had known and learned at the feet of some of
the ladies of our order who had received indescribable spiritual blessings.
She related her own story of being overcome by the Spirit, whether in the
body or out of it she could not tell. But her soul somehow found itself in
the presence of God, and became so thoroughly one with God that she
could not tell herself from God or God from herself. She felt as if totally
melted into a vat of boiling love. She was so much
part of God's love that when God separated from her she ached with loss
and emptiness and cried out in despair. Then there came an assurance
without words: "I became one with you to give you a taste of what you
yourself already are and will more surely become, seek for now to love
others as I have loved you, and you will find me ever more fully within
you."

She taught that the key to oneness with God was love and service to
our fellow beings. She never mentioned making yourself suffer, which
comforted me and thus magnified the impression she made on me.

Although the experiences recounted above, attending my birthing
experiences, are spiritual highlights in my life, I always and continually
learned to feel and experience unity with God as it had been recounted to
me in my early adult life. But it never happened, until . . . .

I was lying on my bed in my apartment in the Beguinage, surrounded
by a sizable number of my spiritual sisters, including my daughter. My
two sons and their wives and offspring were visible at times behind the
worried faces in white and grey, who propped and prodded me as if I were
a queen receiving a royal visitor in her bedroom. This image occurred to
me as so absurd that I smiled, which was apparently observed by everyone
in the room because I sensed their
whispered astonishment.

Then my expression must have changed as I realized that I was,
actually, about to receive a royal visitor, and began to feel the warmth and
light of his approaching love. As I realized I was beginning to melt, as it
were, I remembered the description of the soul melting into God given by
that Beguine so long ago. As this realization swept over me I must have
brightened up and said something with my dying breath that expressed my
amazement as my experience progressed into a
soul-melting reality. I recall only being able to get out the words: "Oh, my
soul!" "Oh, my God!"

So where have I been since then? I can't say. But I'll give you a hint:
early in the Christian era there was a religious work written by Hermas,
brother of the bishop of Rome. Hermas created a persona of an angel he
called "the shepherd," who answers all Hermas' questions about the
Kingdom og God. There is much in that collection of religious notions
that I personally do not agree with, but in the Eighth Similitude there is a
made-up vision of God's Mercy, personified as an angel, who works to
exhaustion to bring life back to spirits that left the earth seemingly dead to
spiritual things. These unfortunate souls are likened to dead twigs, and
the angel of Mercy plants them and waters them and watches over them.
Hermas is shown this and asks his guide why dead twigs are being cared
for, dead is dead. But after a long time and much labor, some of these
dead twigs turn green, and some even put forth buds, and eventually yield
flowers and leaves. Then they are transplanted into the Kingdom of
Heaven.

There is merit in this view. To me it is quite apparent that here in my
sphere, just as on earth, we are, singly and collectively, God's Mercy.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS, PART TWO

Dear Marijke,

What kind of clothing did you wear as a peasant?
What kind of recreational things did you do when you were young?
What kind of clothing when you were a lay nun?
What kind of food did you eat when just a peasant?
What were your daily chores when a peasant?
When a peasant - how did you feel about your overlord?
What was your house like when you were a peasant?

MARIJKE'S ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS: PEASANTRY
PLEASANTRY

What kind of clothing did I wear as a peasant?

The manorial village of which we were a part was largely dedicated to
the growing of flax for making linen. Because the soil needed rest from
growing just flax, however, it was left fallow every third year, and was
used to grow wheat and barley as well. If you saw our fields in any given
year, you would see a third fallow, a third in flax, and a third in grain, in
other words. In the surrounding grasslands, the cattle were pastured, and
a small flock of sheep were kept as well.

From this, it is easy to guess that spinning wool and linen were
common and time consuming activities. Also, cow hides and sometimes
other hides, especially from wild animals, were turned into leather. Much
time was spent making these three raw materials into coarse fabrics and
clothing. Felts were made from wool we provided as part of our tax paid
to our lord. He employed a felt maker in our village, who in turn sold that
fabric back to us in exchange for garden produce, eggs and chickens.
Besides these homespun types of cloth and felt, we did
manage to buy an occasional piece of finer cloth from the traders that
came through our village of about 20 families every once in a while.

I was had linen, as well as wool, pantaloons and petticoats. Over these
relatively light articles I wore a long wool robe with a girdle. When
working, the robe was pulled up a bit and tied to allow more easy
movement. About 10 months out of the year I wore a wool or leather
cape, coat, or hat. It was cold most of the year, and even indoors it was
both fashionable and often necessary to wear at least a linen headdress that
covered the top of the head and fell over the shoulders.

Wool socks and clogs of wood and leather were summer footwear.
Field work, given the clay-rich soils, required wooden shoes. My mother
received an old pair of leather boots from our lord's wife, and she and I
took turns wearing them on special occasions. Leather slippers with
multi-layered leather soles were our favorite daily indoor, and dry-weather
outdoor footwear.

If I'm describing a lot of clothing, don't be misled, most of our cloth
and clothes-making was done to keep my father and brothers dressed and
working in relative comfort. I only had a few sets of undergarments, two
robes for everyday wear and on top of that most of my clothing was used
and given me by my mother. Once the manor was redraped, and as part of
the household staff my mother was given one of the huge, thick and
colorful drapes. She and I cut and stitched our hearts out, and for a while
the whole family could be identified by the bright yellow outer garments
they wore, with crimson fleur-de-lis decorations.

What kind of recreational things did I do when I was young?

My earliest memories were of watching my mother work. My next
memories were of doing work myself. Children in my time were not
allowed to be children for very long. As soon as they were able, they were
out in the fields or other workplaces with their parents. Of course,
allowances were made for their childish ways and lack of ability, but the
idea that one had to work in order to survive was picked up about as fast
as language was.

Did that mean no fun? Hardly. The barnyard cats and dog were my
companions in mischief when very young, and it also didn't take me long
to catch on that Sundays were fun, and holy days were occasions for the
village to get together and sing, dance, and get crazy on ale. As a child I
loved singing and dancing. With my brothers I also played a variety of
outdoor games with sticks, and balls. The lady of the manor was fond of
playing chess and other board games, and sometimes when her husband
bought her a new game set, my mother would bring home an old game and
we would play it in our spare time.

Although it was serious work to my brothers, I thought it was the
greatest fun to go fishing with them, or to go with them to set or empty
traps. I became a competent fisher. Trapping eel in a nearby stream was
fascinating to me, and I soon found myself in charge of that business under
amused but respectful supervision. I was both fascinated and horrified by
the animal trapping business we had set up in the little piece of sand and
trees and bushes that played the part of the manorial woods.

Perhaps because of my youthful attachment to the furry dog and cats
that played with me, I felt sorry for the fuzzy things that died in our cruel
traps or soon thereafter at our hands. But like our cows and chickens, to
whom I also assigned names and became attached, I realized that this was
just another facet and fact of life.

When I approached a marriageable age, nearing 16, I found singing and
dancing to be my favorite pastimes. I was grateful that my parents were
not arranging a marriage for me as was the custom. They were very
protective of me, as were my brothers and older sister. If I were to lose
my reputation I'd probably never be able to marry, yet somewhat pretty
peasant girls like myself or my sister were the favorite sport of the sons of
more well to do families since they knew there could be no obligation.
Peasant girls were not easily married off into more well to do families, and
if they were to dress, talk and act above their class to snare a man of
means, and she is later found out, her deception is grounds for an
annulment.

My older sister got the same treatment, so it didn't seem all that
abnormal, but I still resented the short leash imposed on me by my family.
As I matured, I also came to fully realize, from the tragic stories even
within our own little village, that there was good reason to be very
cautious. These were not easy times to be a girl, or a woman for that
matter. Nevertheless, as young girls we did manage to have fun within
our family, and with some of the village youth.

What kind of clothing did I wear as a Beguine (lay nun)?

Grey habits, which were woolen robes tied with a sash and white linen
headdress. Undergarments were linen, as were some stockings. Most
stockings were woolen, however. The clothing was very similar to that
which I'd worn all my life, except that the cloth from which these outfits
were made were very high quality, manufactured, and not coarse
homespun. For me, the idea was to be plain, comfortable, and functional.
Whether taking care of the sick, working the
gardens, or carding, weaving or spinning, these clothes were appropriate.
Leather slippers were our usual footwear, and overcoats of wool, felt,
leather, and even fur were seen in foul weather, depending on the station
of the woman's life prior to her entry into the order. Jewelry was seldom
seen, and discouraged as not in keeping with the ideal of living with
sufficient material comfort, but without ostentation.
What kind of food did I eat as a peasant?

Wholesome, simple foods. We usually had wheat bread, butter, milk,
and barley or oat porridge. Eggs, and an occasional chicken or wild bird
such as a partridge, quail, thrush, peacock, or crane. Horse, pig and cow
meat were a rarer delicacy, with one or two, seldom three, killed, cut up,
and salted for winter preservation. Wild rabbit and some other furry
beasts were occasionally eaten, and the eels I caught were smoked and
eaten. Herring was caught by some members of the village, salted, and
traded for other staples. In season, there were several fruits and
vegetables from our family garden. Spices were not on added to our food,
except as the lady of the manor gave us some if she thought she had a
surplus.

We were not starving during my lifetime, but not everyone on the
island had as much as we did. Also, memories were still in my parents'
and other adults' minds of a spring flood followed by weather so cold and
wet that replanting was prevented and gardens did not mature. That next
winter there was malnutrition, disease, and death on the island. People
were eating livestock for which there was no winter food, assuring that in
spring, as crops began to look promising but were still inedible, there was
no meat or dairy product to be had. Adults ate wild things and green
shoots that made them sick, pets that controlled mice, and that kept foxes
away from remaining hens, were eaten. New babies were undernourished
at their mothers' breasts, and many died just as things were beginning to
look promising in the spring fields.

That memory is why, after the spring flood I mentioned in my life
story, my parents were anxious that they not re-experience such a
nightmarish time, and the lord agreed to set several families free, with
some coin wherewith to obtain food during a short journey. In return, we
left our remaining preserved meats and fish behind. As we took part in the
ceremony that set us free, there wasn't a dry eye in the village.

What were my daily chores while a peasant?

I've mentioned that as soon as I was able I helped my mother in her
duties in the garden, at home, and as a domestic in the manor. I learned
cleaning, cooking, sewing, and the preservation and care of foodstuffs.
The lady of the manor was our minute to minute supervisor, but she got to
where she trusted my mother so much that she left her in charge when she
was away or ill.

I also learned the growing of herbs and the collecting of wild herbs in
the woods and grasslands. These were dried and ground, to be stored,
and used in a large variety of medicinal potions and poultices, mixed
together with extracts of some things that were thought to have medicinal
value at the time such as bone, blood, urine and human feces for example.
I mention this unpleasantry because these were times when people were
very sincere, but ignorant about the existence of traces of poisonous
compounds in wastes, and germs were a complete unknown.

By the time I left the manorial village, I was capable of running a
complex household as well as any noblewoman, plus I was capable of
doing all of the menial as well as skilled work that such a lady directed. I
probably began doing small assignments under my mother's supervision by
the time I was five, and by the time I was 8 years old I was a contributing
member of the household staff. Not contributing much, perhaps, but
contributing small tasks, mostly in the cleaning department, that did not
need to be done over by anyone else.

When a peasant, how did I feel about my overlord?

I felt for him an awe just short of worship, probably because I had no
contact
with him. But I was with his wife daily, she treated me wonderfully, and
always spoke with respect and love about her husband.

She said he had never struck her or even yelled at her in all their years
together. This led some of the staff to speculate whether or not he was a
true Christian, since their husbands sometimes beat them, as was enjoined
on them as a duty by the law as well as the church, for the correction and
eternal benefit of the women in their charge. Since my father was a very
honest and even Godly man, and still occasionally saw fit to correct us
children, or our mother, with a sharp word, hard slap, or thunder clapping
belt across the buttocks for the boys, when he honestly thought we needed
it, the lord seemed almost holy in my estimation.

We always heard rumors that worried us greatly about the lord's being
in disfavor with his liege lord. The rumor was that our lord sometimes
failed to make the scheduled payments, rents and other obligations such as
food, cloth, building material, etc. The fear was that he might be replaced
with someone more willing to extract greater contributions from his serfs
and greater rents from his village freemen. The impression we had, and it
was probably correct, is that our lord felt that we needed to be well taken
care of for him to be well taken care of. With our lands being rather
marginal in terms of production, however, his liege-lord's expectations,
which were probably based on productivity experienced elsewhere, were
bound to be regularly disappointed.

Until our lord had a son, prayers were regularly said in serf households
to bring about that happy event. He must also have been praying about
the issue with his wife, because his third son was born when I was about
eleven and working in his household. Prayers resumed, however, when
two of the children died the same winter when a particularly bad stomach
ailment made its rounds through the village, causing such severe
dehydration that many older persons and children died.

The villagers feared that the lord may die without leaving an heir.
Sometimes a widow was allowed to take title to, and charge of, a
husbands holdings, but it was an unusual arrangement, and not expected in
this case. The expectation that the death of our lord meant his
replacement with another, more productive lord, was again fueled by the
perception that our lord's liege lord, who live in a very large house,
maintained a castle, armory, and small army, was often not seeing what
was his rightful due from our lord. [To us the word lord was simply a
word indicating he was our "law-ward," the administrator of the feudal
law system for our village, and it meant he was the man who gave us land
and protected us, and enforced the rules within our community that made
it a pleasant place to be. In fair exchange, he took a sizable part of all we
produced. He left us with enough for our needs however, even when his
own obligations were not fully met, and for
that we were grateful.]

What was my house like during my peasant years?

We had a wooden one room house, but it was large. The cracks
between the logs of the walls were filled with twigs and pressed clay that
dried very hard. In our wet climate, however, the walls had to be
continually maintained. The roof was straw, thatch. We bundled our own
straw to make the thatch for the roof, which had to be continually repaired
or replaced, it seems.

A fireplace kept us warm to a degree, and fickle winds assured we
often breathed smoke. We had an oven that was connected to the
fireplace, and several cupboards, two tables, a bench and four wooden
chairs. Windows were either open to let in outside air or shuttered closed,
no glass panes.

All our food preparation was done on one table, sewing and games on
the other. Since candles were a luxury, and since the workday was from
first daylight to dusk, we went to bed shortly after the evening meal
residue, if any, and utensils, were cleaned up.

Near the oven, which slowly cooled after the evening meal, we had a
very large wooden platform with a deep layer of straw that was regularly
turned over and replaced: the family bed. Our parents insisted we sleep
with the boys on one side, the girls on the other. Sometimes, especially
when I was younger, I thought my parents were behaving strangely and
making a nuisance of themselves. In summer I noticed they sometimes
snuck out in the middle of the night when they thought we were all asleep.
I recall being horrified when my sister explained what they were doing, but
at least now I knew meaning of the words used by my parents in warning
tones to my older sister and brothers. They always looked down and said
"yes sir" or "yes ma'am" in response. I wondered why they were so
embarrassed, but then I found out.

We were taught only married persons can do this embarrassing thing,
and they must do it only for the sake of making babies, or God will feed
them to the Devil's fire. Worked for me: fear was an effective deterrent
for me because I believed instinctively everything that I was taught in the
name of religion. As a youth, religion was simply the rules of God, and
there were all sorts of evil things out there ready to snatch your soul and
mark you for everlasting torment if you broke those rules. After I joined
the Beguinage I learned there was not only a negative, but also a positive,
experience-based side to religion.

Sleeping together as families, in those times and in those types of
dwellings was a necessary defense against the cold. When the cold was
unbearably bitter, even the family cow was brought in to add its warmth.
Oh, did I mention that the house could never be accused of being clean?
With work in the fields and forests for the men, and in the fields and
manor for the women, from sunup to sundown, there wasn't the time,
energy, or interest needed to make our house as clean as the manor house
was. Cleanliness, beyond that basic level needed for comfort or
organization, was considered just another one of those unexplainable and
frivolous luxuries that meant a lot only to the higher classes.

Well, hope this answers some of your questions. Hopefully, at some time
in the very distant future we can all sit around together and compare our
earthly lives? Why not? With love
--Marijke--

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