This dissertation investigates the role and importance of ecclesiastical property between 1730 and 1800 in order to offer an original, broader conceptualization of the relationship between the Church of England and English society. It analyzes a mass of hitherto neglected material relating to impropriate rectories, glebe, tithes, advowsons, urban property and manors, all of which could be owned or leased by both clergy and laity. The results of this extensive analysis reveal that each type of property generated a different set of relationships, bringing together Church, clergy and laity both in rural and urban parishes. The diversity and complexity of these relationships demonstrate that it is not possible to conceptualize the Church's role without an understanding of the social and economic context of property ownership which shaped and supported that role. The management of ecclesiastical property was dictated by paradoxical perceptions of its status both as a public resource and a private source of income. This tension meant that relationships were not necessarily characterized by unity, yet there was room for modification rather than long-term fracture. Despite this adaptability, the decades after 1770 witnessed transformations in property relationships, brought about by the Church's response to the economic and political challenges posed to its rights and privileges during the American and French Wars. The dissertation investigates how property rights were secured and preserved by the professionalization of management practices, and the impact this process had on property connections and the relationship between the Church and society. The most significant consequence of the transformation of ecclesiastical property relationships was the reshaping of the Church reform agenda by 1800, from a restorative programme to proposals for structural reorganization.

This thesis explores how the metaphysical concept of participation shapes and informs Richard Hooker’s apology for the Elizabethan Settlement in Of the Lawes of Ecclesiastical Polity. While scholars have long noted the presence of participatory language in selected passages of Hooker’s Lawes, the implicit ways in which participation structures the metaphysical, epistemological, and political arguments across the work have never been uncovered or explored. Accordingly, this work shows how Hooker uses the architectural framework of ‘participation in God’ in order systematically to build his cohesive vision of the Elizabethan Church. This study shows how Hooker’s account of participation thereby deflates the range of modern accusations that the Lawe is an incoherent work. It also illuminates, critiques, and opens up ecumenical and theological possibilities as part of a modern theological ressourcement of participatory metaphysics. This thesis therefore explores the gestures between Hooker’s metaphysics, epistemology, and political vision in turn. The thesis first outlines as a heuristic device the ‘architecture of participation’ (the constituent ideas and themes which make up the polyvalent possibilities of the term) through which Hooker’s thought can be best understood. In the second chapter, this thesis explores two ‘mini-treatises’ in the Lawes that together reflect Hooker’s basic architecture of participation: the suspension of creation from God through the system of laws sharing in eternal law; and the redemption of creation through sacramental participation in Christ. The third chapter unveils how Hooker’s architecture of participation establishes a certain homology between his ontology and subsequent epistemology. As Hooker responds to his opponents in the Lawes, reason and desire emerge from the architecture of participation to become the constellating categories for a mixed cognitive ecology which circumscribes both natural and supernatural forms of cognitive participation in God. The fourth chapter investigates how the last three so-called ‘books of power’ in the Lawes represent a closing movement from the ‘general meditations’ of earlier books to the disputed ‘particular decisions’ of the Tudor polity, namely episcopacy and lay ecclesiastical supremacy. The chapter explains how the architecture of participation yields the substructure upon which Hooker constructs his political ecclesiology. The closing chapter addresses directly the opening provocations, arguing that Hooker’s architecture of participation provides a series of related gestures showing the logical and coherent connections in his thought that make him a systematic theologian of a particular type.

The subject of Lady Chapels and devotion to Our Lady in medieval churches is vast. This thesis investigates whether liturgical Marian observances required a particular setting or not, and the forms it might take. This is achieved by a careful selection of material that highlights the evolutionary development of the most influential physical manifestations of the cult of the Virgin and some of the more humble ones. Accordingly, attention has been focussed on three main areas that form the principal components of this study, Chapter one investigates the development and gradual inclusion of specifically Marian commemorations in the liturgical calendars that sustained the cult and fed its growth. Chapter two comprises case studies of Lady Chapels and other manifestations of the Marian cult in major churches. Each has been chosen to provide evidence of chronological and geographical diversity in terms of its respective contribution to the holistic picture, and /or because it has attracted little previous notice. In addition, the cumulative examination of the available material has permitted a degree of fresh and original insight. The third chapter focuses on the county of Northamptonshire in order to examine Lady Chapels and the cult of Mary in the context of the parish, in order to establish as accurately as possible the incidences of specifically Marian chapels and the degree to which devotion and the manner of its observance was manifest. The justifications for such a study are firstly, that it was at parish level that most people would have experienced and participated in any such observance, and secondly, that no countywide survey has previously been attempted. The conclusion draws the evidence together and argues that the veneration of Our Lady could take place in a variety of settings that reflected the diversity of Her cult.

An unknown author translated the Old English version of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History (OEB) around the ninth century. Previous research focused on the text’s authorship, specifically on Mercian linguistic features in its earliest manuscript, rather than the reception and transmission of its manuscripts (Miller, 1890; Whitelock, 1962; Kuhn, 1972). This thesis considers the OEB’s reception and transmission as evident in its copyists’ scribal performances. Conservative and innovative textual variants are identified for the OEB, and scribal behaviour categorised according to the framework devised by Benskin and Laing (1981) in their study of Middle English scribes. A detailed linguistic comparison of OEB witnesses combined with a close examination of the physical manuscripts reveals the working methods of scribes involved in their production. The manuscripts examined are: Oxford, Bodleian Library Tanner 10 (T) Oxford, Corpus Christi College 279B (O) Cambridge, Corpus Christi College 41 (B) Cambridge, University Library Kk.3.18 (Ca) Each chapter analyses a particular scribal performance. O’s scribe created a Mischsprache text, combining Mercian and West-Saxon forms, yet conflicting views of what constituted a good text are revealed by O’s producers’ extensive textual corrections. Relict forms in B demonstrate that its exemplar was illegible in places and that the scribe was forced to make several textual repairs. Ca has long been considered a direct copy of O, however my detailed comparison of the two manuscripts reveals that this cannot be the case. Finally, some previously unnoticed and unpublished drypoint annotations to O’s text are presented and explored in the context of other Anglo-Saxon scratched material. This thesis shows the benefits of examining the OEB from a scribal viewpoint, identifying common modes of scribal behaviour across the medieval period. It proposes a set of features belonging to the original translation, some of which hint at an earlier date of composition than previously supposed.

This is a study of the structure within which the English church was governed and administered under Henry I, although it has sometimes been necessary to draw on evidence for a rather longer period. Although the Anglo-Norman church was recruited from a single bodey of men governed by a single powerful king there was still an importand sense of separate identity in the English church, particularly expressed in the celebration of 'national' councils. By 1135 it was also very rare for the Normans appointed to high office in the English churchto have spent any substantial period in a Norman benefice; the English church was at least as distinct from its Norman counterpart as English society. By the end of the reign it was easier to define the limits of this church; although York retained important claims north of the Scottish border the creation of the diocese of Carlisle has done much to make the ecclesiastical frontier coincide with political realities; in Ireland the primatial claims of canterbury had recieved a decisive check, but the absorption of the Welsh hierarchy into her province was almost complete, at least at the higher levels.

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Symeon of Durham's history of the church of Durham, a number of earlier narratives and the fine collection of twelfth century Durham charters formed the basis for this history of the Community of Saint Cuthbert before 1150. They generally concentrated upon the acquisition and maintenance of the community's lands, the changes in which reflected the major events in northern history. The survival of the sources and the story they tell bear witness to the remarkable resilience and continuity of the community. At no time did it suffer the destruction characteristic of northern monasticism, often flourishing at times of upheaval, as during the Scandinavian and Norman Conquests. In its first days the acquisition of land was, predictably, associated with early Anglian settlement, especially royal sites. Throughout the period the growth of the patrimony was largely dependent upon royal patronage, though some bishops were also avid acquirers of land. Royal and other lay patronage can be directly associated with the need to gather support in the north. Rulers secure in the north, as native northern earls, or strong enough to subdue the area were unlikely to be great benefactors and were inclined to despoil the church. For the Cuthbertine community jurisdictional rights were important and there is evidence to suggest that there existed a substantial jurisdictional immunity within the patrimony by the tenth century. The rights of sanctuary of a mother church and the immunities of church land in the seventh century seem to have been important factors in its establishment, rather than, as has generally been suggested, the alienation of comital rights to Durham in the late eleventh century. The combination of landed wealth, jurisdictional privilege and survival accounts for the immense power of the community in the north from the seventh century onwards.

This thesis seeks to re-examine theories of religious decline in the inner-city. From Edward Wickham (Church and People in an Industrial City) to Callum Brown (The Death of Christian Britain), decline and death have defined inner-city Christianity. In the late twentieth century the Church of England in Newham began a process of renewal by creating combined churches and community centres in a number of its parishes. Examining the motivation behind these projects creates a more nuanced understanding of the present secularization debate. Four churches were chosen that underwent this process to reflect the diversity and complexity of this approach. This work draws on minutes, reports, newspapers, interviews and oral histories. This is a study of how one area of East London renewed itself, inspired by the theological approach of J. G. Davies and his followers. Far from discovering the Church in its death knell, evidence emerges of an energetic, highly motivated Christian community, able to draw funds and expertise into this process of renewal. The Church of England is still willing to reassert its mission to the inner-city and expand its sphere of influence to encompass communal activities in a process of reclaiming a role within Newham life. The Anglican Church has defied notions of decline and secularization, and this study reveals an inner-city part of London that has a thriving religious culture. The renewal of its buildings has enabled the church to carve a role out within the community that ensure it remains positive, financially stable and numerically more resilient that its suburban neighbours. This suggests that the predictions of the death of Christian Britain are premature in this instant and arguments about decline have to be further evaluated in the light of this study.

The Priesthood in Anglo-Saxon England explores the life and work of priests in England between the arrival of St. Augustine in 597 and the reforming Council of Clofesho of 747. It seeks to reposition priests within the consciousness of Anglo-Saxon historians by demonstrating the essential role which they played first in the conversion of the English, and then in the pastoral care which the English people received up to the reforms instigated by Archbishop Cuthbert at the 747 Council of Clofesho. The thesis draws on several trends in recent Anglo-Saxon historiography, notably focus in recent years on the role and function of monasteria. Sarah Foot’s work, Monastic Life in Anglo-Saxon England, c. 600 – 900, is the primary study in this area. Many historians working in this area have read Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica, the main narrative source for our period, in a predominantly monastic light. Close attention to the text of this and other works of Bede’s however demonstrates that priests were indispensable in the initial conversion and continued care of the people, particularly because of their ability to celebrate the sacraments. This thesis contends that monasteria increasingly gained control over pastoral care through their continued endowment and royal privilege. This effectively removed the cura animarum from the bishops, to whom it was theoretically entrusted. Following the example of Theodore and Bede, and on the prompting of his contemporary Boniface, in 747 Archbishop Cuthbert recognised the need to reform the structure of the church in Southumbria, particularly the relationship between the episcopate and the monasteria, and so restore the cure to its rightful place. He and his fellow bishops achieved this by redefining pastoral care along sacramental grounds, thereby excluding monks from its exercise, and putting the priest back at the heart of the church’s mission to the people of England.

Religion and history became closely related in new ways in the Victorian imagination. This thesis asks why this was so, by focusing on arguments within British Protestant culture over progress and development in the history of Christianity. In an intellectual movement approximately beginning with the 1845 publication of John Henry Newman's 'Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine', and powerfully spreading and developing until the earlier years of the twentieth century, British intellectuals came to treat the history of religion - both as a past and present process, and as a didactic genre - as a vital element of broader attempts to stabilise or reconstruct religious belief and social order. Religious revivalists, determined to use church history as a raw material for the inculcation of exclusive confessional identities and dogmatic theology, were highly successful in pressing it on the attention of early Victorian audiences. But they proved unable to control its meaning. Historians rose to prominence who instead interpreted the history of Christianity as a guide to how religious culture, which many treated as indistinguishable from society as a whole, might eventually supersede denominational and dogmatic divisions. Humanity's spiritual development in time, which numerous British critics assessed with the aid of German Idealist thought, also became an attractive apologetic resource as the epistemological basis of Christian belief came under unprecedented public challenge. A major part of that danger was perceived to come from rival, avowedly secularising interpretations of human social progress. Such accounts - the ancestors of twentieth-century secularisation theory - were vigorously opposed by historians who understood modernity as involving not the decline, but the purification of Christianity. By exploring the ways in which Victorian critics - clerical and lay, religious and secular - approached religious history as a resource for solving the problems of their own age, this thesis offers a new way of understanding the importance of history, claims to knowledge, and the nature and ends of 'liberalism' in the long nineteenth century.