a companion to the book of margery kempe

Indeed, in all her long life she will never disclose this secret to anyone. All this she does in order to avoid confessing her terrible sin. So on some days she will punish her ailing body further, eating only bread and water, while on other days she gives small donations to beggars, or devotes hours to long and fervent prayers. Yet she has declared that she will see no confessor, that she can do her own penance. This thing on the woman’s conscience is tearing at her, causing her intense agony.

For the same reason, medieval women often wrote their wills before going into labour. In the fourteenth century, it was considered especially important for pregnant women to confess a guide for parish priests says that when the mother is close to giving birth she must ‘schryve hem clene’ (make her full confession), because of ‘drede of perele that may befalle’ (fear of the physical injury that may happen). She knows she should have been absolved by going to confession and revealing her sins to a priest. There’s a guilty secret on her conscience. But the pregnancy has been utterly wretched, and fever and sickness ravage her body.Īt the same time her mind is in a state of torment. This is her first child, and she became pregnant shortly after marriage. She has a good house in the town centre and many material comforts. She is from a well-off background, a daughter of the town’s elite. In the bustling town of Bishop’s Lynn, Norfolk, around the year 1394, a young woman is going through a difficult pregnancy.

A companion to the book of margery kempe