This article will show how the concept of
In the year 1445, a small community of Brothers of the Common Life took up residence in the Dutch city of Gouda, in a house located in the Spieringstraat. This community represented an urban branch of the
The name 'Collatiehuis' reveals a strong connection between the location and the meetings that took place there, a prime example of what Christian Jacob has termed
The concept of
To explore these three levels of
In the course of the fifteenth century, three different buildings were known as the Collatiehuis. The first Collatiehuis had been the home of Dirk Florisz., priest in Gouda.
The first Collatiehuis was destroyed by a great fire in 1438, and from its ashes the Regular Canons raised the second Collatiehuis. They continued the
Herp left the Collatiehuis in 1450, joining the Observant Franciscans instead. Leadership passed to Johan Pupper van Goch but the community struggled, both financially and physically: when Johan van Goch was forced to leave Gouda in 1454 because his
Between 1460 and 1485 the house was intensively renovated and expanded, to the extent that the Collatiehuis was effectively rebuild as a new building.
From the history of the Collatiehuis, it is clear that it offered a place for
Determining the exact floor plan of the Collatiehuis is by necessity something of an educated guess. Certainly the building must have had at the least one room large enough to contain a small gathering, or it could not have functioned as a designated place for
Later on, it is possible to identify several locations in particular where (parts of) the
To facilitate the individual part of the
As to the physical (dis)comfort of the
None of the inventories of other houses have survived—at least, not any that concern the furniture or any household items—so it is unclear whether this was standard practice or a peculiarity of the Collatiehuis. Quite possibly other communities either gathered when necessary the available chairs, benches, or cushions to provide seating for their visitors, or perhaps they owned a number of seats. Alternatively, visitors might have brought their own seats: some laypeople owned special, portable chairs known as 'small sermon chairs' (Dutch:
When the
The Collatiehuis, then, was itself composed of multiple
The most obvious location for preaching in Gouda was the parochial church: the monumental Sint-Janskerk, which had served the parish since 1280. A line can be drawn between the Sint-Jan and the Collatiehuis, both spatial (the Collatiehuis was located right behind the parochial church) and institutional: well within the parish borders, the Brothers of the Common Life had to be in contact with the pastor of the Sint-Jan. Agreements between the parties were put down in 1448, and again in 1462.
The Dominicans did not have a proper monastery in Gouda, but the city was within the territory (Dutch:
Still, Sint-Jan's church was not the only place in Gouda where laypeople could enjoy a good sermon or other religious exercise. From the start of the fifteenth century, the city saw a sudden increase in the number of religious institutions within its borders, among them the Cellites or Alexians (a charitative religious order, who obtained a house near Sint-Jan's church in 1395) and the Franciscans, who settled near the city castle around 1418/1419.
The Gouda city council also maintained good relations with the Friars Minor within the city, though the council does not seem to have paid the friars directly for their preaching activity. Instead, the convent regularly received gifts of wine on special occasions, such as Christmas or St. Francis' day. At times the council would also dine with the Franciscans and pay for the wine and the meal on St. Francis' day. In 1447 the council even decided to give part of that year's financial surplus to the convent.
With this flourishing of religious life in the fifteenth century, the citizens of Gouda thus had multiple locations in which they could engage in devotional activities – even excluding the private devotional exercises which might call upon the individual believer to withdraw themselves in a secluded space. Importantly, all of these locations were relatively close to each other as Gouda was not exceedingly large: around the year 1500 the city had a population of some 10,000 people, of which 500 were part of a religious community.
Moreover, the Collatiehuis itself maintained relations with both the city council and other religious communities. They were responsible for celebrating a weekly Mass in the hospice of St. Catharina, as well as the daily Mass at the altar of the Holy Spirit in the Sint-Jan and in the chapel of the castle.
In the introduction to
The concept of books as
In the first place, the books of collations are collections of knowledge in that they contain multiple texts which explain religious doctrine or provide material for increased personal devotion. This is especially apparent when looking at some of the individual collations, for instance those in the First Book of Collations by Dirc van Herxen (1381–1457).
The collations of Van Herxen vary in structure: some are largely translations of one source in particular, while others comprise a multitude of sources. For instance, one of the collations on the Last Judgement can be directly traced to two main sources, which were translated by Van Herxen: the seventh chapter of the first book of the Henry Suso's
Most importantly, the sources on which the collations draw—and therefore the information they contain—are the same sources the Brothers of the Common Life themselves read to shape their own spirituality.
Moreover, the books of collations facilitate the communication of the religious knowledge contained within. The collations are to be read during the
Moreover, the books of collations show an engagement with the religious knowledge they contain. Authoritative texts are not just scoured for useful quotes to be presented without interpretation. Instead, the collations carefully frame their source materials: both within the collation (references are attributed to their source; multiple quotations on the same issue are presented alongside each other) and in the book of collations as a whole (a single book can contain a multitude of collations on a wide range of topics). The collations employ a myriad of authoritative texts to express the desired devotion. Just as the Collatiehuis was more than the sum of its constituting
Thus, the books of collations—and by extension the
As this article has shown, the concept of
On the level of the entirety of Gouda, the Collatiehuis constituted but one of several
At its core, the
The Brothers drew up several inventories of the books found in the house: Gouda, Streekarchief Midden-Holland (hereafter: SAMH), Archieven van de kloosters te Gouda, 0091.16 (Lijsten van huisraad en boeken, met het Collatiehuis van de Heilige-Geestmeesters ontvangen, en een opsomming van huisrenten, toebehorende aan het Collatiehuis, ca. 1438–1447/1456, 1438–1456). Jan Willem Klein came to a total of 11 complete copies of this list and another partial copy: Jan Willem Klein, "De Goudse boekcultuur tot 1600: Het begin en de Collatiebroeders,"
See also Pieter H. Boonstra, "Causa Spiritualis Instructionis. The Modern Devout Collatio as a Community of Learning,"
Theorized in Christian Jacob,
See for instance John Van Engen, "Multiple Options: The World of the Fifteenth-Century Church,"
Indeed, the Brothers of the Common Life, or the Modern Devotion more generally, are a clear example of a textual community where the text need not always be physically present to be influential. Such might even be the core of a textual community: see Brian Stock,
For a concise history of the house and the community living there, see Anton G. Weiler,
Johannes H. Carlier, "Het Fraterhuis of Collatiehuis op de Jeruzalemstraat,"
On the Holy Ghost masters in Gouda, see Koen Goudriaan, Martha Hulshof, and Ad L. Tervoort, with Bart Ibelings, "Rijk liefdewerk in een arme stad," in
Weiler,
Anna Dlabačová,
Weiler,
On the conflict between Johan van Goch and the local clergy, see Anton G. Weiler, "The Dutch Brethren of the Common Life, Critical Theology, Northern Humanism and Reformation," in
Carlier, "Het Fraterhuis of Collatiehuis," 56.
See in particular Johannes Taal,
Anton G. Weiler,
Weiler,
Michael Schoengen, ed.,
John Van Engen,
Bonaventura Kruitwagen, "Het "Speculum Exemplorum","
On the building history of the Collatiehuis, also see Koen Goudriaan, "De verdwenen kloosters," in
Albert Hyma,
Taal,
Taal,
Madelon van Luijk,
Van Beek,
Hyma,
Thom Mertens,
Hyma,
Schoengen,
Gouda, SAMH, 0091.16 (Lijsten van huisraad en boeken, met het Collatiehuis van de Heilige-Geestmeesters ontvangen, en een opsomming van huisrenten, toebehorende aan het Collatiehuis, ca. 1438–1447/1456. 1438–1456). The suggestion that these were used during the
Dlabačová,
See Berend Dubbe, "Het huisraad in het Oostnederlandse burgerwoonhuis in de late middeleeuwen," in
Hyma,
For instance Gerrit C. Zieleman,
Weiler,
Henny van Dolder – de Wit,
Goudriaan, "De verdwenen kloosters," 193. Compare Taal,
Harry Pegel, "Prediking voor leken in de stad Utrecht, 1500–1580," in
Taal,
See Roger Andersson, "Sermon Manuscripts of Different Kinds,"
On the Friars Minor in Gouda, see Mirjam Schaap, "Over "quaclappers" en ander schadelijk volk. De laat-middeleeuwse Noord-Nederlandse minderbroederkloosters bezien vanuit de interne machtsstrijd binnen de orde," in
Damianus van Heel,
Van Heel,
SAMH, 0001 Archief van de stad Gouda, inv. nr. 1130 (stadsrekening 1447), f.25r.
Goudriaan, "De verdwenen kloosters," 172. Also see Goudriaan, "Gouda in de middeleeuwen."
Weiler,
Taal,
See the introduction, here paragraph 6, of Jacob,
On the etymology of the term, see Van Beek,
On Dirc van Herxen and the First Book of Collations, see in particular Van Beek,
Schoengen,
Alphonsus M.J. van Buuren, ""Wat materien gheliken op sonnendage ende hoechtijde te lesen." Het Middelnederlandse collatieboek van Dirc van Herxen," in
See Van Beek,
Compare Utrecht, UB 3 L 6 f. 21v-22r and Henricus Suso,
On the references and quotations in this collation, see Lydeke van Beek, "Tussen de doornen pluk ik de rozen. Devote opvattingen over huwelijk en kuisheid in het Eerste Collatieboek van Dirc van Herxen (1381–1457),"
On the close relation between religious texts and reading, and the Modern Devout spirituality, see Thomas Kock, "Lektüre und Meditation der Laienbrüder in der Devotio moderna,"
Van Beek,
As is prescribed in the