Beguines

Beguines (BEGUINÆ, BEGUTTÆ), a sisterhood within the Catholic Church, first formed during the 12th century in the Netherlands. The origin of the word is doubtful. It is ascribed by some to a St Begga, who is said to have founded the first sisterhood in 696; by others to a priest named Lambertus le Bègues or le Bèghe, who founded in Liège, about 1180, a society of pious women who were called by his name. The Beguines were not restricted by vows, nor did they follow the rules of any order, but were united under a superior for the exercise of piety and benevolence, and lived generally in separate small cottages, which, collectively, formed the Beginagium. Their establishments were often enriched by liberal donations. A church, a hospital, and a house of reception or common entertainment, generally belonged to every community. The sisters were distinguished from the rest of the laity only by their diligence and devotedness, piety, modesty, and zeal for the purity of youthful education. Their most flourishing period was during the 12th and 13th centuries, when they spread themselves widely over France, Germany, and the Netherlands. As the pietists of the middle ages, they were often subjected to persecution by the mendicant orders of friars; but on account of their practical usefulness were long sheltered by the popes and councils as well as by the secular authorities. In the 13th and 14th centuries, through their sympathy with the persecuted Fraticelli (q.v.) and the 'Brethren and Sisters of the Free Spirit,' they were brought under the scrutiny of the Inquisition; and on account of certain immoralities, a synod held at Fritzlar in 1244 required that all candidates must be forty years old before they could enter a society of Beguines. These sisterhoods maintained their position in Germany and the Netherlands longer than in other countries. In Holland, they existed at the close of the 18th century; and in the present day we find here and there so-called Beguinen-hauser in Germany; but they are now nothing more than almshouses for poor spinsters. At Ghent, there is still a celebrated institution, the Béguinage of St Elizabeth, containing some 700 sisters, who live in a separate quarter of the town in 103 little brick-built cottages, with 18 convents and 2 churches, arranged in streets and squares within a common wall, open to the visits of strangers. Living here a life of retirement and piety, the Beguines, in their simple dark dresses, go out as nurses to the hospitals, and perform other acts of kindness among the poor. Though they are under no monastic vow, it is their boast that none is known to have quitted the sisterhood. See BEGHARDS; also Hallmann's Geschichte der Bclg. Beghincn (Berlin, 1843).