Klostereintritt und Bildung

This book takes a good look at life in the convents of the late Middle Ages as described in the diary of a Cistercian nun written over a period of more than 20 years. It shows how the convents and the families of the girls entering the convent interacted. If the girls were underage, canon law regulations had to be taken into consideration, and the author deals with the development of the part of canon law pertaining to this from the early Middle Ages until the Reformation. The study accompanies the girls from their entry into the convent until they became nuns, a process which often took ten years and which culminated in their marriage to Christ. It deals with their education in the convent, their knowledge of Latin, their secular surroundings, their understanding of themselves and their own spiritual life and, in particular, the function of the nuns in medieval society as brides of Christ.