consulted their advocate before electing a new abbot. A layman who founded or reformed
a monastery in the 11th century normally became its advocate. Most advocates seem to
have taken their responsibilities seriously and sought to defend “their” monks from other
laymen, but the monks relied so much on their advocate that they were virtually helpless
if he turned against them.
Although almost all monasteries, including Cluny and her daughters, had advocates in
the 10th and 11th centuries, the office became much less common in the 12th century,
with the impact of the Gregorian separation of lay and ecclesiastical affairs. Cistercian
houses never had formal advocates, but they still hoped for the support and protection of
their secular neighbors.
Constance B.Bouchard
[See also: VIDAME]
Bouchard, Constance Brittain. Sword, Miter, and Cloister: Nobility and the Church in Burgundy,
980–1198. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1987, chap. 5.
Mason, Emma. “Timeo barones et donas ferentes.” In Religious Motivation: Biographical and
Sociological Problems for the Church Historian, ed. Derek Baker. Oxford: Ecclesiastical
History Society, 1978, pp. 61–75.
AFFRANCHISSEMENT
. Act granting freedom to an unfree person or privileges to a community. In granting
freedom to a serf or, in the earlier law, to a slave, affranchissement is synonymous with
manumission or emancipation. In affranchissements from slavery, the legal assimilation
of the freedman to the existing free population remained partial under the laws of the
state. It was only with the grandchild of the freedman that the last taint of servile status
vanished de jure. A lord’s affranchissement of a serf, on the other hand, would transform
personal status completely and immediately, but only when the act was properly
confirmed by the appropriate superior lord. This was because rights over serfs were
ordinarily appurtenant to fiefs. Typically, therefore, an affranchissement diminished a
fief. It followed that approval was necessary from the superior lord who (or whose
ancestor) had granted the fief and who continued to have residual interests in it, such as
the right of escheat and relief.
A closely related usage of affranchissement is for the act granting liberties or
privileges (“franchises”) to urban or rural, even servile, communities. The precise number
and extent of liberties granted were spelled out in formal charters and differed from
community to community depending on the political, social, and economic situation that
induced communities to seek and lords to grant the franchises. Since there was much
borrowing from one charter to the next, it is possible to talk about a “typical”
affranchissement, which usually provided for freedom of inheritance, freedom of trade in
the protected environment, relaxation of seigneurial taxes and hospitality, reduction of
some aspects of military service, and a degree of self-government. In return, either the
community made a fixed annual payment to its lord or individuals paid fixed rents to the
lord for their tenements in the franchise.
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