Alice Henley
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Alice Henley (died 1470) was an English abbess at the Benedictine Godstow Nunnery, Godstow, Oxfordshire.[1]
Henley was a senior nun of Godstow Nunnery in 1445. She was elected abbess in 1446 and ruled until she died in 1470.[1] During her rule, a royal confirmation of Godstow's foundation charters was obtained in 1462.[1]
Her tenure as abbess was during a time when religious women's lack of education in Latin was beginning to cause administrative developments to meet their needs.[1] She commissioned a summarised English translation of her abbey's Latin charters[2][3] by a "poor brother and admirer" of Henley and her convert.[4] He created the "English Register"[4] which allowed the nuns to better understand their muniments and instruct their servants without having to consult an outsider.[5] According to medieval historian Katie Ann-Marie Bugyis, the cartulary is the only one that has survived intact and is also more extensive and covers a longer time period than other cartularies of the time.[6]
References
- 1 2 3 4 Orme, Nicholas (3 January 2008) [23 September 2004]. "Henley, Alice (d. 1470), abbess of Godstow". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/54450. Retrieved 8 January 2025. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.)
- ↑ Orme, Nicholas (1 January 2006). Medieval Schools: From Roman Britain to Renaissance England. Yale University Press. p. 276. ISBN 978-0-300-11102-6.
- ↑ Power, Eileen (31 October 2010). Medieval English Nunneries: C.1275 to 1535. Cambridge University Press. pp. 252–253. ISBN 978-1-108-01714-5.
- 1 2 Eckenstein, Lina (1896). Woman Under Monasticism: Chapters on Saint-lore and Convent Life Between A.D. 500 and A.D. 1500. University Press. pp. 359–360. ISBN 978-0-7905-4226-3.
{{cite book}}: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help) - ↑ Oliva, Marilyn (1998). The Convent and the Community in Late Medieval England: Female Monasteries in the Diocese of Norwich, 1350-1540. Boydell & Brewer Ltd. p. 75. ISBN 978-0-85115-576-0.
- ↑ Bugyis, Katie Ann-Marie (1 April 2019). The Care of Nuns: The Ministries of Benedictine Women in England during the Central Middle Ages. Oxford University Press. p. 242. ISBN 978-0-19-085130-9.