Alexandra F. Johnston

University of Toronto

We are all familiar with the misogynist tradition of the late middle ages. Since Eve was the cause of man’s loss of Paradise, the daughters of Eve carried with them the stigma of her sin. St Paul decreed that women must be silent in churches and "obedient to their husbands as to the lord". Augustinian dualism associated the spirit and soul with man and the body and the flesh with woman. A woman, by her very bodily function, was deemed polluted and the most arcane of ancient Hebrew law was invoked to reinforce her inferior position. Despite the position of Hildegard von Bingen that "Man signifies the divinity of the Son of God and woman his humanity", the majority of medieval treatises relegate women to inferior positions. Hard texts expressing such views have been examined and re-examined by feminist scholars. As a result, the common view of women in the middle ages is that of Jankyn, fifth husband of Chaucer’s Wife of Bath, that women are sinful and inferior. But there is a second view of woman in the period – that of the wise and virtuous counsellor. Drawing on classical models, authors drew portraits of such influential and strong-minded figures as Lady Philosophy in Boethius’ Consolations of Philosophy and Chaucer’s Dame Nature, vicar of the Almighty God, in the Parliament of Fowls. In English drama we have the seven virtuous ladies who defend the castle in the Castle of Perseverance against the onslaught of the militant sins and, in the same play, the Four Daughters of God who plead successfully for the soul of the central character, Humanum Genus, before the throne of God. It is these powerful allegorical ladies who are the subject of this paper. How did these figures who share the authority and learning of their classical predecessors come to be part of a late medieval Christian drama? Are they not also the daughters of Eve?

Psychomachia, the concept of a pitched battle between virtues and vices for the soul of an individual comes from the fourth century writings of Prudentius. It is part of what Morton Bloomfield has called "the ordered disorder … of the mental climate of the Middle Ages" In Prudentius’ scheme, since he was writing in Latin, "both virtues and vices are portrayed by women." All the Latin nouns for the abstractions are feminine. The list of the sins – Pride, Wrath, Envy, Covetousness, Gluttony, Lechery and Sloth was established by John Cassian in the fifth century. Set against the vices was the concept of the virtues. These were defined in the early church as the four classical virtues from Cicero going back ultimately to Plato – fortitude, prudence, temperance, and justice – combined with the three Pauline virtues of faith hope and charity. Unfortunately for the tidy schematic minds of late medieval writers, the seven vices and the seven virtues of the early church were not closely matches to provide meaningful patterns. As Bloomfield puts it,

In his Parson’s Tale, Chaucer makes no pretense to be presenting the Cardinal Virtues but calls the virtues he does present to counter the vices remedia. This solution is typical of fourteenth and fifteenth century writers.

Bishop Robert Grosseteste’s Constitutions (issued on his election to the see of Lincoln in 1235) in response to the decrees of Lateran IV in 1215 required that "the clergy must know and teach the parishioners – in their own language – the Decalogue, the Seven Deadly Sins, the Seven Sacraments and the Creed". In this highly influential document, the virtues were not considered important for the penitent. It was therefore the seven vices or deadly sins that became codified and became the controlling list against which the virtues were defined in English didacticism. But the gender of the vices and virtues continued to be ambiguous. The issue is complicated by the fact that in Anglo Norman vice was le vice and virtue la vertue. Writers devising allegories in English where the gendering of nouns had disappeared, had two traditions to choose from – Latin where all the abstractions were female and Anglo Norman where the vices were male and the virtues female. In Robert Mannyng of Brunne’s Handlyng Synne the virtues do not appear, but the long section describing the vices refers to them as "þe dedly doghters of helle" (l. 2992). The fact that the sinners in the poem are all men lends a typical ambiguity to the presentation of the sins as women. The virtues are similarly absent from the parade of sins in Piers Plowman Passus V. Here the vices (lacking Lechery) are all masculine except for Pride (Pernele proud-herte, V 62) who is portrayed as so often in the iconographic tradition as a vain woman. In Gower’s Mirour de l’omme, seven daughters come from the union of the Devil and Sin who are the Seven Deadly Sins making them the grandchildren of Satan. They all polygamously marry the World and Gower describes all seven sins going to their weddings (I, 13ff, ll. 841 ff). Lydgate’s translation of Guillaume de Deguileville’s Pélerinage de la vie humaine describes all the sins assailing the pilgrim as old hags, with the exception of Wrath.

In Grosseteste’s Chateau d’amour written in Anglo Norman in 1230 we find three of the major elements of the Castle of Perseverance – the castle itself, the warring vices and virtues and the four daughters of God. As we will see, the allegory is quite different from that of the Castle but a brief passage describing the seven barbicans of the castle provides a clear source for the battle scene in the Castle,

Here the castle has seven barbicans each defended by one of the virtues or remedia who defend it against a vice: humility, pride; charity, envy; abstinence, gluttony; chastity, lechery; largesse, avarice; patience, anger; and spiritual joy, "male tristesce". Only the last pairing does not match the scheme in the Castle where the last virtue is Solicitudo (Busyness) matched with Sloth. An adaptation of the Chateau d’amour is even closer to Castle. In the Myrour of Lewed Men (BL Egerton 927), the division of the vices among their masters, the World, the Flesh and the Devil matches the play. Another work related to the Chateau is more concerned with the virtues. The Charter of the Abbey of the Holy Ghost once attributed to Richard Rolle introduces a whole new set of complexities into the discussion. In this curious piece, the world is conceived as a convent with 29 "gostly ladyes, among whiche Charite is þe abbesse, Wisdome priouresse, Mekenes suppriouresse", with the other 26 as sisters. In the conceit, the Abbey becomes Eden and Adam and Eve are placed there. Then the "foure foule feendis douзtren" – pride, gluttony, covetousness and folly help Sathanas tempt Eve and Adam. With the fall, the 29 virtues are scattered. The story of the Old Testament and the patriarchs crying for man to be redeemed follows and God convenes the Parliament of Heaven. The Four Daughters succeed in their persuasion and Christ descends to Mary. In the course of the story of redemption first the Virgin recovers the virtues of Cleaness and Poverty and then Christ, through the Atonement, recovers the rest of the virtues and the Abbey is re-established. At the end of the fable, the Four Daughters reappear,

Although this version emphasizes the feminine virtues and the Daughters of God, the tempting vices supporting Satan are also feminine – the "foure foule feendis douзtren". It would seem, then, that though by no means totally consistent, the non-dramatic English late medieval tradition is to follow the Latin grammatical designation and create, through the extravagant caricatures of the vices, yet another class of misogynist portraits. Grosseteste’s warrior virtues convey strength and power but their descendants in The Charter have become weak and in need of the intervention of Christ protection to restore the abbey and then must be given the protection of the Four Daughters of God.

The formidable Daughters, however, stand uncompromisingly in the tradition of the wise female counsellors. They derive ultimately from St Bernard’s sermon on the Annunciation, where he takes verse 10 of Psalm 84 "misericordia et veritas obviaverunt sibi, justicia et pax osculatae sunt" (mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other) and weaves the story that became the motif of the Parliament of Heaven where the Trinity is persuaded to redeem man after a display of the formidable forensic skill of the four abstractions Mercy, Truth, Justice and Peace. The normal position for the motif of the Parliament of Heaven is just before the Annunciation and Bernard saw his conceit as belonging to that key moment in salvation history. Yet in The Castle of Perseverance, the Daughters respond to the cry for Mercy from the dying Humanum Genus and argue the case of sinful mankind not in the time before the Incarnation but decidedly in the historic time after the establishment of the church.

The debate in the Castle, although it follows the general pattern of its antecedents, is unique in its argument. In the Chateau d’Amour and its two clear descendants the Middle English Castle of Love and the Myrour of Lewed Men give each of the Daughters only one speech and Mercy argues that God should honour her above her sisters by redeeming man since she is the eldest of his daughters. In another version, the King and Four Daughters, Mercy simply asks for mercy with no claims of primogeniture. In yet another version Foure Doughters she simply states that since she is his daughter he should have mercy. Each of these versions of the Parliament of Heaven are simple, with little dramatic tension and placed before the Incarnation

The version in the Charter of the Abbey of the Holy Ghost, however, although also pre-Annunciation, bristles with dramatic tension. As Peter Meredith has pointed out, this version is very close to the episode of the Parliament of Heaven in the N-Town Annunciation play. Before the Daughters appear in this version, God has already decided that,

The debate begins with Truth who argues against the salvation of mankind. Mercy responds supporting salvation. Righteousness then argues that mankind does not deserve salvation. Mercy then appeals to God that a decision in favour of Truth and Righteousness will banish her (Mercy) from God’s presence. Peace then intervenes and urges them all to come to God to settle an argument that threatens to keep the sisters at odds for ever. They approach the throne of God and God agrees to the salvation of man to keep the peace among his daughters.

The N-Town Annunciation, which is also part of the Mary Play, presents the figure of Contemplation pleading for God to redeem his people,

He is joined by the prophets and then the angels in a cry to God to redeem his people. God seems about to act when Truth enters and argues against the salvation of man. Mercy then argues for it and Righteousness supports Truth arguing that his sinful ways have brought on the human condition. Mercy has a second speech in which she argues that all things are possible with God "Endles synne God endles may restore" (l. 106). Peace then urges them to come to the throne of God. At this point God the Son takes over the debate and offers himself for the sins of man.

The debate of the Four Daughters of God in The Castle of Perseverance is entirely unlike any of the source material. They are summoned, not by the prayers of Contemplatio, the patriarchs and the angels but the dying utterance of a human sinner, Human Genus, who dies unshriven crying desperately for mercy with his last breath (l. 3007). His soul emerges from under the bed and repeats the cry for mercy (l. 3008) only to be confronted with the Good and Bad Angels who have fought over his living being from the beginning of the play. The Good Angel acknowledges that the only way for him to be saved is through the intercession of Mercy,

Even for the Good Angel, the argument of Righteousness has greater sway,

The soul laments that Mercy is too long in coming and cries "Holy wryt it is ful wronge,/ But Mercy pase alle þynge." (ll. 3062-3). It appears as if, indeed, the Bible is wrong since the Good Angel withdraws and the soul is carried to Hell by the triumphant Bad Angel.

Mercy then enters the playing area and immediately makes the point that mankind had been saved once and for all not by Christ’s birth but by His death,

She asserts that when Mankind cries for mercy

The church is witness to the forgiveness of a sinner who cries for Mercy. Justice immediately responds that Humanum Genus knew the rules and broke them. Truth asserts with details that tie this debate to this particular play and not to a generalized convention that he died in the sin of covetousness and should not be saved. Peace intervenes and urges her sisters to come to God’s sedes and after the four Daughters have saluted their father, the formal debate for the soul of Humanum Genus begins. Truth opens the attack arguing that he died in the sin of covetousness knowing what he was doing. He brought his fate upon himself and in the homely image used earlier by Justice (l. 3162) she states "Lete hym drynke as he brewyth" (l. 3274). He sinned knowingly and if he is pardoned then Truth will be banished from the throne of God. Mercy then appeals to the doctrine of the atonement. God became Man in order to save sinning mankind and invokes the concept of the "fortunate fall",

The next stanzas are a quick sketch of the Passion ending with the assertion that Humanum Genus had been saved by the water of baptism and the blood of redemption (ll 3361-3) and should therefore be received in to heaven. Justice scornfully replies that although had been baptized, he had knowingly gone over to Covetousness and had died without the benefit of the formulas of the church,

And so, "Dampne hym to helle believe" (l. 3430). For Justice, to grant Mercy to Humanum Genus would be to wrong Justice and Truth. Mercy counters that not to grant Mercy would be to wrong her. Mercy, she cries, is above all things alluding to Psalm 144. Truth then reiterates that Humanum Genus does not deserve Mercy because, among other things, he has not performed the acts of corporal mercy (ll 3472-6). Here again the business of the church intrudes. Peace concludes the argument by entreating her sisters to be reconciled and pleading for the soul of man again in terms of the Passion,

God then agrees with Mercy and Peace and sends the Daughters to release the Soul from Hell and bring him to the throne of Grace.

The debate among the Daughters of God in The Castle of Perseverance bears only formal resemblance to the debate in the N-Town Annunciation or any of the earlier and parallel versions. It was clearly written for its place here at the end of this particular play referring as it does to Humanum Genus’ unshriven death in Covetousness. It is tightly argued and, even at the end of a very long performance, commands the attention of the audience. Yet it is an argument that above all enunciates the doctrines of the late medieval church. This is a spirited defence of basic Christian beliefs in the Atonement and the efficacious works of the pious. Mercy and Peace seem to be speaking on behalf of the Church.

The manuscript of The Castle of Perseverance begins with a set of banns laying out the whole scheme of the play as an inducement for people to come and see the show. There is, seemingly, one place where the banns do not agree with the text of the play as we have it. Secundus Vexillator says at line 123 after he has described the soul being carried to hell,

Only through the intervention of the Virgin will Humanum Genus be saved. Yet what we are given is not the Virgin but the Daughters of God speaking the doctrine of the late medieval church. Can these two facts be reconciled? Let me suggest how, in the complex and ever eliding world of late medieval allegory, they might be.

I have spoken of Grosseteste’s Chateau d’amour as one of the sources of the Castle not only for the episode of the Daughters of God but also for the close matching of the vices and virtues in a battle for the castle. In Grosseteste’s allegory, the castle is not just any castle, it is the castle of love and represents the Virgin Mary into whom Christ descends at the Incarnation. The virtues then become aspects of the Virgin herself. As one of the derivative poems of the Chateau, the Myrour of Lewed Men, renders the description of the vices and virtues in the Chateau cited above,

The Castle then, in at least one of its allegorical meanings, is the Virgin herself and the virtues aspects of her nature.

But the Virgin is not only the young woman of Palestine chosen to be the mother of Jesus. Very early in the life of the church she came to be associated with the church itself. In the iconographic tradition, as Christ ascends to heaven, it is Mary who becomes the centre of the apostles as they look up to heaven. She becomes the figure around whom the young church gathers and as time went on she became identified by the fathers with the institution itself. It is this association that connects her to the Shulamite Bride of the Song of Songs as, in the patristic interpretation of that great love poem, Christ seeks the love of his church just as in the Jewish exegesis God had sought the love of the people of Israel. These multiple associations were re-emphasised by St Bernard. In his writing "Christ is the lover of the Canticle, his bride sometimes the Church, sometimes the individual soul, sometimes the monks of Clairvaux, his audience, and sometimes the Virgin."

If the castle and its defending virtues represents the Virgin and the Virgin herself represents the Church then the castle itself can be seen as the Church where Humanum Genus is taught right living and defended from the onslaught of the sins until he falls a second time to the blandishments of Covetousness. Similarly, the Four Daughters of God, whose spirited defence of late medieval doctrine is so different from the traditional arguments of these figures can be seen as representing the church and so representing the Virgin as the Banns suggest. At one level, therefore, given the propensity of the allegorists to provide multiple associations, all eleven female figures in the Castle of Perseverance represent aspects of the Virgin Mary. Given this identification, it is entirely appropriate that in this play all the sins but Lechery be represented by male figures. All the pronouns associated with them and all the titles of address are masculine and to make the point irrefutable, Covetousness greets the arrival of the six other sins at his scaffold with the words

Representing six of the vices as masculine clearly sets them apart from the Virgin. Representing Lechery as a female figure, besides having clear dramatic advantages, only emphasizes, as the Myrour of Lewed Men put it "hir clene maydenhed suffred no lecherie." The portrayal of the eleven strong women in the Castle of Perseverance, then, can be seen as part of the emphasis on Marian devotion in the late medieval English church. Furthermore, the Castle comes from East Anglia as do the N-Town Plays which are themselves remarkable for their Marian emphasis with the separate play on the childhood of the Virgin identified by Peter Meredith and a unique characterization of the adult Virgin in both the Passion Play and the Death and Assumption of the Virgin.

Medieval English drama is singularly lacking in strong female characters. In the non East Anglian plays, the characterization of the Virgin is much less complex. Mary, Martha, the Woman Taken in Adultery and the other women who have small parts in the New Testament stories are not memorable. The comic figures of Mrs Noah and Gyl in the Second Shepherds Play come from the fabliau tradition and only the Chester Eve whom we last see with the dead Abel in her arms is more than a theological cipher. The Marian emphasis of East Anglian drama, however, gives us several strongly drawn female characters including the eleven militant ladies of the Castle. These characters provide the antecedents for the strong heroines of the Tudor and Stuart stage from Lucrece to the Duchess of Malfi.

It could be argued when the text is merely read or performed (as it probably was) by an all male cast, that these characters are conceived as articulate men merely dressed in female costumes to fit the Marian allegory. However, in performance, an entirely different impression can created. When the Poculi Ludique Societas performed Castle in 1979, the virtues were portrayed as beautiful and accomplished young women. We broke for the single intermission after Humanum Genus had been received in to the castle and during the break he and the virtues stayed in the castle busying themselves with domestic tasks. The strong impression of their womanliness was made through that piece of stage business so that when they were called to defend the castle against the siege of the vices, complete with canon and martial display, they became warrior maidens but remained distinctly maidens. Similarly the theologically minded Daughters of God could be seen as simply mouthpieces for the doctrinal message of the play. However, in our production, there was a remarkable and unforeseen dramatic moment that has been captured on videotape. David Parry, the director, chose to portray the soul of Humanum Genus as a child so that the figure locked in hell whom the Daughters were sent to rescue was a small and vulnerable figure. We swept across the playing area four abreast in our red, green, black and white mantels towards hell and as I, as Peace, demanded the release of the soul, the child jumped from the hell scaffold to the ground and ran towards us. Instinctively, all four of us bent down to catch and protect him creating the impression of maternal concern. In that one moment, the formidable Daughters became caring women modelling the Virgin with whom they are associated in the text. We cannot know how these parts were played in the fifteenth century but, given the care with which these figures have been drawn as female characters, I would suspect that the original performance was not unlike ours.

Gail McMurray Gibson in The Theatre of Devotion has shown us the importance of cloistered and lay women in East Anglian society. Many recent studies of fifteenth century female communities emphasize their devotion to the Virgin. It seems to me that the Castle, in part, addresses that audience. The essential sin of Humanum Genus is the merchant’s sin of covetousness. It has always seemed to me that Castle is a quintessentially a bourgeois play addressing an educated urban audience. Among such an audience in East Anglia would be many pious and learned women – the wives and daughters of the wealthy merchants to whom this play seems to be addressed. In my article, "Acting Mary: the Emotional Realism of the Mature Mary in the N-Town Plays" that grew from my experience both as an actor and a teacher, I concluded that the N-Town Mary "provided for the mature women of East Anglia a mediatrix standing beside the throne of God with whom they could uniquely identify" If I am right in my identification of the allegory behind the female figures in the Castle of Perseverance we have, in this play, a much wider set of admirable women identified with the Virgin yet providing nuanced dramatic characters with whom the virtuous and intelligent women in the audience could identify.