Thecla of Kitzingen: An Important Abbess in Her Day

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Benedictine Nuns, Francia, Kitzingen, medieval, Middle Ages, Saint Thecla, Saints

She is little remembered now. Heck, we can’t be certain of the year she died or her feast day. But Saint Thecla of Kitzingen must have been a remarkable abbess.

With other nuns, she left the security of the double monastery at Wimbourne in her native Britain around 748 to cross the Channel and assist St. Boniface in his mission to strengthen Christianity in Francia. Travel in those days meant bad food and the danger of brigands, and women risked being raped.

The destination east of the Rhine had its own problems. In the 770s and after, Saxons to the north were not above burning churches and slaughtering indiscriminately to avenge a previous year’s defeat at the hands of the Franks. However, most of the fighting was to the north, and the Saxons did not attack Thecla’s area during her lifetime.

Boniface must have trusted Thecla a great deal because he put her charge of two abbeys, one at Ochsenfurt and the other at Kitzingen. See English Historical Fiction Authors for more about her.

A 1904 image of a Benedictine nun, public domain image via Wikimedia Commons.

Hooked on a Legend and History

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Charlemagne, Francia, Middle Ages, The Ashes of Heaven's Pillar, The Cross and the Dragon

Blame it on a legend. A tale about the origin of Rolandsbogen, castle ruins on a high Rhineland hill, drew me to Roland, a prefect of the March of Brittany during Charlemagne’s reign. The history of this era has me intrigued me enough to write two books (The Cross and the Dragon and The Ashes of Heaven’s Pillar) and get started on a third (about Queen Fastrada).

So, when Unusual Historicals asked authors to write something on the theme of Five Fascinating Facts, how could I resist sharing a sample of what fascinates me about Charlemagne’s Francia? Visit Unusual Historicals for more.

The legend behind Rolandsbogen led me to study Frankish history (photo by Tohma via Wikimedia Commons, used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License).

Medieval Folk Would Think Our Lent Was Easy

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Francia, Franks, Lent, Medieval Lent, Middle Ages

Go back 1,200 years to eighth-century Francia – the setting for The Cross and the Dragon and The Ashes of Heaven’s Pillar – and you will find Christians took Lent seriously. No meat. No eggs. No dairy. Only one meal a day around 3 p.m., and that was a relaxation of not eating until evening. Sort of like being a vegan with the exception of fish.

Salmon like this one would have been acceptable at the dinner table during Lent (Fish and Wildlife Service image via Wikimedia Commons).

Lent might not have made that much of a difference in what commoners had on their tables. They could not afford to eat meat every day anyway, and food stores likely were running low at this time of year. Yet the folk found a few loopholes. The term fish also covered frogs, beaver tails, and barnacle geese (believed to have hatched from barnacles).

If you were young, old, sick, or pregnant, you were not required to fast. One does wonder whether claims of illness rose during Lent.

And the self-denial did not affect only your diet. You were supposed to abstain from sex, even with your spouse (although the penance for the act was less if you were drunk).

Most of the faithful followed the dietary rituals because that is what the priests told them to do to avoid any more days in purgatory or worse spend eternity in hell. Yet these rituals must have also made Easter all the more joyous.

Sources
Catholic Encyclopedia on new advent.org

Recreating Medieval Lent, Agnes deLanvallei (Kathy Keeler)

Daily Life in the World of Charlemagne, Pierre Riche, translated by Jo Ann McNamara

Charlemagne: Translate Sources, P.D. King