Medieval Anticlericalism: Terms and Conditions

Abstract

This article grapples with the problem of applying a nineteenth-century neologism to the relationships between clergy and laity within pre-Reformation Catholicism, essentially between circa 1100 and circa 1530. Broad approaches to the history of “anticlericalism” identify a major shift in its character at the Reformation, without being specific about its nature. Historians employ “anticlericalism” as an analytical concept, but somewhat insecurely, referring sometimes to criticism of the behavior of individual clerics, sometimes to a more fundamental critique of church institutions and practices. While accepting that the vocabulary of “anticlericalism” is now too embedded in medievalist scholarship to be eliminated, the article argues for greater care and precision among medievalists in its use, especially if it is to be transposed from its Western origins to serve as an analytical concept for the “global middle ages.”