adopted the custom of the pilgrimage from the ancient Church.
The young Germanic and Romance nations did precisely as the
Greek and Romans had done before them, and the
motives of these devotional journeys—now much
New Motives.
more difficult of execution in the general decay of
the great world-system of commerce-remained much the
same They were undertaken to the honour of God (Pipp
Cap 754–755, c. 4), for purposes of prayer (Ann. Hild. 992),
or in quest of assistance, especially health (Vita Galli, ii. 37; Vita
Liudg. iii. 10). But the old causes were reinforced by others of
at least equal potency. The medieval Church was even more
profoundly convinced than its predecessor that the miraculous
power of Deity attached to the bodies of saints and their relics.
But the younger nations-French, English and German—were
scantily endowed with saints; while, on the other hand,
the behef obtained that the home-countries of Christianity,
especially Rome and Jerusalem, possessed an inexhaustible
supply of these sanctified bodies. Pilgrimages were consequently
undertaken with the intention of securing relics. At first it
was enough to acquire some object which had enjoyed at least
a mediate connexion with the hallowed corpse. Gregory of
Tours (d. 594) mentions one of his deacons who made a pilgrimage
into the East, in order to collect relics of the Oriental saints;
and, on his return, visited the grave of the bishop Nicetius
(St Nizier, d. 573) in Lyons, where he still further increased
his store. His testimony showed how relics came to be distributed
among the populace: one enthusiast took a little wax
dropped from the taper; another, a portion of the dust which lay
on the grave; a third, a thread from the cloth covering the sarcophagus,
and he himself plucked the flowers which visitors
had planted above the tomb. Such were the memorials with
which he returned; but the universal belief was that something
of the miraculous virtue of the saint had passed into these
objects (Vit. patr. 8, 6). Before long, however, these humble
trophies failed to content the pilgrims, and they began to devote
their efforts to acquiring the actual bodies, or portions of them—frequently
by honest means, still oftener by trickery. One of
the most attractive works of early medievalism—Einhard's little
book, Translatio Marcellini et Petri—gives a vivid description
of the methods by which the bodies of the two saints were
acquired and transported from Rome to Seligenstadt on the
Main.
Far more important consequences, however, resulted from the fact that the medieval mind associated the pilgrimage with the forgiveness of sins. This conception of the pilgrimage, as a means of expiation or a source of pardon for wrong, was foreign to the ancient Church. It is quite in accordance with the keener consciousness of sin, which prevailed in the middle ages, that the expiatory pilgrimage took its place side by side with the pilgrimage to the glory of God. The pilgrimage became an act of obedience, and, in the books of penance (Poenitentialia) which date from the early middle ages, it is enjoined-whether for a definite period (e.g. Poen. Valicell. i. c. 19; Theod Cant. i. 2, 16) or for life (Poen. Cummeani, vii. 12, Casin. 24)—as an expiation for many of the more serious sins, especially murder or the less venial forms of unchastity. The place to be visited was not specified, but the pilgrim, who was bound by an open letter of his bishop to disclose himself as a penitent, lay under the obligation, wherever he went, to repair to the churches and—more especially—the tombs of the saints, and there offer his prayers. On occasion, a chain or ring was fastened about his body, that his condition might be obvious to all, and soon all manner of fables gained currency: how, here or there, the iron had sprung apart by a miracle, in token that the sinner was thereby absolved by God For instance, the Vita Liudgeri recounts the history of a fratricide who Was condemned to this form of pilgrimage by Jonas, bishop of Orleans (d. 843) he wore three iron rings round his body and arms, and travelled bare-footed, fasting, and devoid of linen, from church to church till he found pardon, the first ring breaking by the tomb of St Gertrude at Nivelles, the second in the crypt of St Peter, and the third by the grave of Liudger. The pilgrimage with a predetermined goal was not recognized by the books of penance; but, in 1059, Peter Damiani imposed a pilgrimage to Rome or Tours on the clerics of Milan, whom he had absolved (Acta medial. patrol. lat. 145, p. 98).
As the system of indulgences developed, a new motive came to the fore which rapidly overshadowed all others: pilgrimages were now undertaken to some sacred spot, simply in order to obtain the indulgence which was vested in the respective church or chapel. In the 11th century the indulgence consisted in a remission of part of the penance imposed in the confessional, in return for the discharge of some obligation voluntarily assumed by the penitent. Among these obligations, a visit to a particular church, and the bestowal of pious gifts upon it, held a prominent place. The earliest instance of the indulgential privilege conferred on a church is that granted in 1016 by Pontius, archbishop of Arles, to the Benedictine abbey of Montmajour (Mons Major) in Provence (d’Achery, Spicil. iii. 383 seq.) But these dispensations, which at first lay chiefly in the gift of the bishops, then almost exclusively in that of the popes, soon increased in an incessant stream, till at the close of the middle ages there were thousands of churches in every western country, by visiting which it was possible to obtain an almost indefinite number of indulgences. But, at the same time, the character of the indulgence was modified. From a remission of penance it was extended, in the 13th century, to a release from the temporal punishment exacted by God, whether in this life or in purgatory, from the repentant sinner. And, from an absolution from the consequences of guilt, it became, in the 14th and 15th centuries, a negation or the guilt itself; while simultaneously the opportunity was offered of acquiring an indulgence for the souls of those already in purgatory. Consequently, during the whole period of medieval ism, the number of pilgrims was perpetually on the increase.
So long as the number of pilgrims remained comparatively small, and the difficulties in their path proportionately great, they obtained open letters of recommendation from their bishops to the clergy and laity, which ensured them lodging in convents and charitable foundations, in addition to the protection of public officials. An instance The Pilgrim Resorts. is preserved in Markulf's formulary (ii. 49). To receive the pilgrim and supply him with alms was always considered the duty of every Christian: Charlemagne, indeed, made it a legal obligation to withhold neither roof, hearth, nor fire from them (Admon. gent 789, c. 75; Cap. Miss. 802, c. 27).
The most important places of resort both for voluntary and involuntary pilgrimages, were still Palestine and Rome. On the analogy of the old Itineraria, the abbot Adamnan of Iona (d. 704) now composed his monograph Do locis sanctis, which served as the basis of a similar book by the Venerable Bede (d. 735)—both works being edited in the Ilia. hierosol. His authority was a Frankish bishop named Arculf, who resided for nine months as a pilgrim in Jerusalem, and visited the remaining holy sites of Palestine in addition to Alexandria and Constantinople. Of the later itineraries the Descriptio terrae sanctae, by the Dominican Burchardus de Monte Sion, enjoyed the widest vogue. This was written between the years 1285 and 1295; but books of travel in the modern tongues had already begun to make their appearance. The initiative was taken by the French in the 12th and 13th centuries, and the Germans followed in the 14th and 15th; while the Book of Wayes to Jerusalem of John de Maundeville (c. 1336) attained extreme popularity, and was translated into almost all the vernacular languages Most pilgrims, probably, contented themselves with the brief guidebooks which seem to have originated in the catalogues of indulgences. In later periods, that of Romberch a Kyrspe, printed at Venice (1519), stood high in favour.
A long list might be compiled of men of distinction who performed the pilgrimage to Palestine. In the 8th century one of the most famous is the Anglo-Saxon Willibald, who died in 781 as bishop of the Frankish diocese of Eichstätt. He left his home in the spring of 720, accompanied by his father and brother. The pilgrims traversed France and Italy, visiting
