 | The Anglo-Saxon Monk is scandalised by the goings on at Rochester Priory's twelfth-century mill. Robin the miller, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. From the Ellesmere Manuscript, c. 1400, folio 34v. Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons License: click on image for further source information. |
Medieval millers have a bad name. I’m quite sure, knowing as I do, blessed readers, the bent of your minds, that you’ve come across Robin, the drunken, wrestling-loving miller of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (pictured above). I have to say that I only know about this miller's outrageous contribution to the pilgrims’ tales because my alter ego, Dr Monk, told me about it. He lectured on Chaucer at the University of Manchester, you see. But the less we say about hot pokers and arses the better!
My own mind is even more troubled, dare I admit, by a real life scandal involving medieval millers and monks. Though the details of the scandal are tantalising sparse, I think you should nevertheless know what waywardness took place in the monastery of Rochester at the beginning of the twelfth-century... just in case it may help you in your journey through life.
My own mind is even more troubled, dare I admit, by a real life scandal involving medieval millers and monks. Though the details of the scandal are tantalising sparse, I think you should nevertheless know what waywardness took place in the monastery of Rochester at the beginning of the twelfth-century... just in case it may help you in your journey through life.
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