The Risk of Writing:Disobedient Scribes in Medieval Monasteries

This article investigates an important but hitherto little studied aspect of medieval monasticism and manuscript culture by discerning and analysing four ways in which writing (or not writing) could constitute disobedience: refusal, deviation, subversion, and presumption. Aiming to establish a working typology of scribal disobedience, the author offers a conceptual and terminological framework for discussing and distinguishing different strategies of negotiating, circumventing, and undermining abbatial authority and control through acts of writing, each with its own implications. Drawing on a wide range of published and unpublished sources from across the Latin West with a focus on the area North of the Alps in the period c.1000–1250, the article hopes to both broaden and nuance our understanding of the risks taken by medieval monastic scribes, and of the severe consequences and punishments they faced for their lack of obedience.