Foxe moved the short tract on the life and acts of Innocent III from the end of the section on King John in the 1563 edition to the beginning of the section on Henry III's early reign in the 1570 edition. The account is almost entirely extracted out of John Bale, Scriptorum Illustrium maioris Brytanniae …Catalogus (Basel, 1557), pp. 234-5 but also supplemented with evidence from Innocent III's papal decretails, commonly called Corpus Juris Canonici. There were various manuscript versions in existence making it difficult to know which version is used here.
[Back to Top]From this summary Foxe indulges in anti-papal polemics from the thirteenth century as a framework for his rewriting of the Cathar heresy into agents of Christ's church. First Foxe attacked the increase of Monastic Orders as a sign that the Roman Church could not even agree from within itself. The text is largely lifted from John Bale's Catalogus pp. 234-5 and The Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough, ed. Harry Rothewell, Camden Society, 3rd Series, 89 (London, Camden Society, 1957), pp. 150-1. The list of 101 Orders is interesting. Martin Luther did not produce any such list despite Foxe's reference to him. The unidentified English book that Foxe refers to is also unknown. It is possible that Foxe was relying on an unprinted list compiled by John Bale.
[Back to Top]Next follows the prophecy of the nun, Hildegard written down in her Scivias, Liber vitae meritorum and Liber divionorum operum, which represented a popular prophecy about the Antichrist from the early thirteenth century that had transmitted to the fourteenth-century primarily through Gebeno, Prior of Eberbach's Speculum Temporum Futurorum (1220). This text had attempted to link Hildegard's prophecy to the growing Cathar heresies. Hildegard was the abbess of Disibodenberg and Rupertsberg. In the 1563 edition Foxe took this account from Matthias Flacius, Catalogus testium veritatis (Strasbourg, 1556), pp. 650-655. However, in the 1570 edition Foxe has corrected the date of the prophecy from 1170 to 1146 and rearranged the prophecy itself. This suggests that he had either consulted Flacius' source, the Chronica Martini Poloni from Matthew Parker's collection (probably CCCC MS 372 or CCCC MS 59) or alternatively from a composite manuscript (CCCC MS 404) containing various prophesies including Hildegard.
[Back to Top]Once this prophecy is outlined Foxe begins his discussion of the Cathars (Albigenses). Foxe publishes a letter by the Pope's legate concerning the Cathars setting up of a rival Pope. This account was first printed in the 1563 edition but from the 1570 edition onwards would be followed by a larger account of the Albigensian crusade (1209-1229) after further discussion of England's financial plight. The inclusion of the 1563 account without change even though Foxe had discovered more details reveals something of Foxe's working practise for the second edition. The account is extracted from either Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, ed. Henry Richards Luard, Rolls Series (7 vols., London, 1872-1884), vol. 3, pp. 78-9 or Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, ed. Henry G. Hewlett, Rolls Series (3 vols., London, 1886-9) vol. 2, pp. 272-3.
[Back to Top]This section is then completed by a full reproduction of a post-Wyclif Lollard tract attacking the practises and corruption of friars probably written in the early fifteenth century. Jack Upland was either mistaken as a work of Chaucer or for political and religious reasons attributed to the famous author of the fourteenth century to by-pass the ban on Lollard writings under the Six Articles. The popularity of Chaucer also made the association a powerful propaganda tool. In 1550 Robert Crawley had published a similar tract for reformist purposes entitled Piers Plowman, which had proved successful. See John N. King, 'Robert Crawley's editions of "Piers Plowman": A Tudor Apocalypse', Modern Philology, 73:4 (1976), pp. 342-352. If the reformists could show that Chaucer was a 'proto-Protestant' then this would help to popularise acceptance of the Elizabethan Church. P.L. Heyworth, 'The Earliest Black-letter editions of "Jack Upland"', The Huntingdon Library Quarterly, 30:4 (1967), pp. 307-314 has suggested that its original publication in the 1530s by John Gough and then again by John Day was to support the Henrician break from Rome and the subsequent dissolution of the monasteries. Jack Upland allowed Foxe to trace, through the association of Chaucer with Wyclif as 'faithful witnesses', the apostolic church at a time when the Antichrist was in full control of the church. The decision must also be, in part, related to John Day's earlier publication of the tract in the 1540s, which made its inclusion in the Acts and Monuments an easy addition to print. Its publication in the midst of Henry III's reign was to demonstrate the corruption of monkish orders, which Foxe had listed two pages earlier.
[Back to Top]Matthew Phillpott
University of Sheffield
MarginaliaThe Minorite friers descended from sainct Fraunces.The order of the Minors or Minorite Friers descended from one Fraūcis an Italian, of the Citie Asisium. This Assisian Asse, whom I suppose was some simple & rude Idiot, hearyng vpon a tyme how Christ sent forth his Disciples to preach: thought to imitate the same in him selfe and his Disciples, and so left of shoes, had but one coate, & that of course clothe. In stede of a latchet tohis shoe, and of a girdle: he tooke about him an hempen corde, & so apparelled his disciples, teaching thē to fulfil (for so he speaketh) the perfection of the Gospell, to apprehend pouertye, & to walke in the way of holy simplicity. He left in writing to his disciples and folowers, his rule whiche he called Regulam Euangelicam. 1. the rule of the Gospell, as though the Gospell of Christ were not a sufficient rule to all Christen men, but it must take his perfection of franticke Francis. And yet for all that great presumption of this Francis, and notwithstādyng this hys rule, soundyng to the derogation of Christes Gospell, he was confirmed by this pope Innocēt. Yea, & such fooles this Frauncis founde abroad, that not onely he had followers of his doltish religion (both of the nobles, and vnnobles of Rome) but also some there were, which builded mansions for him and his Friers. This Francis, as he was superstitious in castyng all thynges frō him (as his girdle, girding a coard about him) so in outward chastising of him selfe, so streight he was to his fleshe (leauyng the ordinary remedy appointed by God) that in winter seasō, he couered his body with yse and snow. He called pouerty his Lady: he kept nothyng ouer nyght. So desirous he was of martirdom, that he went to Siria to the Souldane, whiche receyued him honorablye: whereby it may be thought, that (surely) he told him not þe truth, as Ihon Baptist did in Herodes house. For truth is seldom welcome in courtes, and in the world. But it is hard to make a martyr of him whiche is no true confessor. I wil here passe ouer the fable, how Christ and hys saints dyd marke him with fiue woundes. MarginaliaDiuers sectes of Franciscans.These Franciscanes or beggyng Friers, although they were all vnder one rule and clothyng of S. Francis: yet they be diuided in many sectes, and orders: some go on treen shoes or Pattins, some barefooted, some regulare Frāsciscanes, or obseruantes, some Minors, or Minorites, other be called Minimi, other of the Gospell, other de Caputio. They all differ in many thinges, but accord in superstition and hipocrisy. And for somuch as we haue here entred into the matter of these two orders of Friers: by the occasion hereof I thought a litle by the way to digresse from our story, in recityng the whole cataloge or rablement of monkes Friers, and Nunnes, of all sectes, rules, and orders set vp and confirmed by the pope. The names of whom here in order of the Alphabet follow vnder written.The rablement of religious orders.MarginaliaThe table of al religious orders.
AVstinians the first order. | |
Ambrosians two sortes. | 490. |
Antonies heremites. | 324 |
Austines heremites | 498 |
Austines obseruauntes. | 490 |
Armenians secte | |
Ammonites and Moabites | |
Basilius order. | 384 |
Benets order. | 524 |
Bernardes order. | 1120 |
Barefooted Friers. | 1222 |
Brigittes order. | 1370 |
Beghartes or white spirites. | 1399 |
Brethren of Ierusalem. | 1103 |
Brethren of sainte Ihon de Ciuitate blacke Frier. | 1220 |
Brethren of wilfull pouerty. | |
Cluniacensis order. | 913 |
Chanons of saint Austine. | 1080 |
Charterhouse order. | 1086 |
Cisterciensis order. | 1098 |
Crosbearers or crossed Friers | 1216 |
Carmelites or white Friers. | 1212 |
Clares order. | 1225 |
Celestines order. | 1297 |
Camaldulensis order. | 950 |
Crosse starred brethren. | |
Constantinopolitanish order | |
Crosse bearers | |
Chapter monkes | |
Dutch order | 1216 |
Dominicke blacke Friers | 1220 |
Franciscanes | 1224 |
Graundmontensis order | 1076 |
Gregorian order | 591 |
Georges order | 1407 |
Guilhelmites | 1246 |
Gerundinensish order | |
Galilei or Galileans | |
Heremites | |
Helenes brethren Humiliati. | 1166 |
Hospitall brethren | |
Holy Ghost order. | |
Ieromes orders two sortes | 1412 |
Iohns heremites | |
Iustines order | 1432 |
Iohns order Ioannites | 380 |
otherwise knights of the rods | 1308 |
Iniesuati | 1365 |
Ieromes heremites | 490 |
Iosephes order | |
Iacobites secte | |
Iames brethrens order | |
Iames brethren with the sweard | |
Indians order | |
Katherine of Senes order | 1455 |
Keyed monkes knightes of rhodes | |
Lazarites or Marye Magdalenes our Lady brethren | 1304 |
Lordes of Vngary | |
Minorites whiche be deuided into | Conuentuales. |
Obseruantes. | |
Reformate. | |
Collectane. | |
De Caputio. | |
De Euangelio. | |
Amedes. | |
Clarini, and other. | |
Minores, or Minorites | 1224 |
Maries seruaunts | 1304 |
Monkes of moūt Oliuete | 1406 |
Marouinies secte | |
Moronites secte | |
Monachi and Monache | |
Morbonei and Meristei | |
Menelaysh and Iasonish sect | |
New Chanons of S. Austen | 1430 |
Nestorini | |
Nalharte brethren | |
New order of our Lady | |
Nazarei | |
Paules heremites | 345 |
Premonstratensis order | 1119 |
Preacher order, or blacke Friers | |
Peter the Apostles order | 1409 |
Purgatory brethren | |
Rechabites | |
Sarrabaites |