A Feature, Not a Bug: The Legal Ambiguity of the Secular Chapter of Nivelles

By the end of the twelfth century, the Abbey of Nivelles (Low Countries, present-day Belgium), which had been founded in the seventh century, had become a mixed chapter of secular canonesses and canons. The abbacy was retained, and an abbess stood at the head of the chapter with approximately forty canonesses and twenty canons under her leadership. While such a model held secular esteem as an institution of the Holy Roman Empire, its ecclesiastical status was more ambiguous. Because canon law did not officially regulate this specific structure, especially in terms of its female members, the canonical rights and duties of the abbess and chapter were subject to interpretations that varied based on time, place, and most importantly, the interpreter. Traditional historiography tends to present this lack of regulation as a failure on the part of the institutional Church to rein in errant women, who should have been made subject to claustration and a recognized religious rule. I argue, however, that the legal ambiguity of the secular chapter is not a failure, but rather a feature, of such a structure. This paper will explore this feature and will examine how the ecclesiastical hierarchy, the abbess, and the chapter could choose to read the law in a manner that best suited their present purposes. Special attention will be given to the fluidity of the term persona ecclesiastica in reference to the members of Nivelles and to the emphasis that the chapter especially placed upon custom and tradition over ecclesiastical law.