Living in Religious Life in the Early Modern Period
Rules, Daily Life, and Reforms in Portuguese Nunneries—The Case of the Cistercian Order
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8135229 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Antónia Fialho Conde (0000-0002-8076-7337, University of Évora, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 17 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 98 |
| Publication date | 2026-01-15 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Religions (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2077-1444 • E-ISSN: 2077-1444 |
| Publisher | MDPI AG (PUBLISHER • IT) |
| DOI | 10.3390/rel17010098 |
| OpenAlex | W7124263029 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 8 |
This article focuses on the choice of the religious life for women during the early modern period, following a Rule that ensured harmony within the cloister. We trace the emergence of codes of life for female communities across time, with particular attention to the Rule of St. Benedict and its adoption by Cistercian communities, where silence assumed a particular significance. Silence, sounds, and monastic daily life as governed by the Rule, by the Tridentine decrees and, in the case of Portuguese Cistercian communities, obedience to the Autonomous Congregation of Alcobaça and to its supervisory mechanism of Visitations, were elements that shaped both the discourse presented here and its interpretive framework. While the Council of Trent emphasized the importance of vocation and simultaneously imposed upon women the so-called “fourth vow” (enclosure), documentary evidence allows us to observe to what extent the conventual milieu, composed of women from diverse social origins, remained engaged with the wider world outside cloister; nunneries became both a mode of existence and a space of affirmation for women, one that fostered creativity (in music, writing, painting) and upheld authority and power, embodied in the figure of the abbess and in the acts, rituals, and ceremonies associated with her
Autonomy · Creativity · Embodied cognition · Harmony (color · Kingdom · Obedience · Portuguese · Religious life · Silence · Early Modern Women Writers · Medieval and Early Modern Iberia · Medieval Literature and History
| Citations per year | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |