The “secret closet of my soule”: The Role of the Anchoritic Impulse in Protestant Female Spirituality in Late Reformation England

Anchoritism as a practical vocation for women in England, though flourishing on the eve of the Reformation, was demolished with speed and finality. This article will argue that, nevertheless, elements of what may be termed an anchoritic impulse continued to influence and shape female lay spirituality through the late sixteenth- and early seventeenth centuries. Focusing on three case studies (Lady Margaret Hoby, Lady Grace Mildmay, and Dionys Fitzherbert), the article will illustrate how the mentalities and practices associated with the pre-Reformation anchoritic tradition shaped the devotional lives of these exceptionally devout Protestant women in decisive ways. This form of female religious expression, intense, complex, and improvisatory in character, has tended to be overlooked in traditional accounts of the Reformation, and the essay seeks to open a fresh line of enquiry into continuities and adaptations of anchoritic spirituality in late Elizabethan and early Stuart England as a contribution to the ongoing critical conversation about the changing nature of female Protestant spirituality in late Reformation England.