ANST - Medieval Monastic time-keeping

[Mark.S Harris]

Friar Galen of Ockham asks some questions about the keeping of time
in the monestaries.

> Now comes the details that I am trying to dig out, but have been
> unsuccessful. In my readings of monastic life, I have not seen mention
> anywhere of who in the monastery was responsible for keeping track of the
> time. One good gentle (Philippa) thought it might have been the sacristan.
> I appreciate that lead and will look into it. The on-line Catholic
> encyclopedia does not give the sacristan's duties in medieval times.
> References would be appreciated.

Check out this book:
"Revolution in Time, Clocks and the Making of the Modern World" by
David S. Landes. 1998 Barnes & Noble Books ISBN 0-7607-1074-0

I picked up this book at Barnes & Nobles on sale for $12.98 in the past
month or two. It is fairly thick, 482 pages but only the first part covers 
our time period.

This book does confirm that this was one of the sacristan's duties.

The book also goes into why the monestaries kept such accurate hours and
why. This was apparently a deviation from any religions in the past.
(around page 60). 
 
> The other question is how? Candles could be made specially for each season
> to reflect the difference in hour length. Water clocks could be marked for
> different seasons, but these were probably later period additions. Sundials
> are fixed-hour devices, but can be adjusted seasonally, but require fair
> skies, something that isn't too common in Europe in the winter, and not
> available at night. Likewise, astrolabes and nocturnals require
> visualization of the sky.

This is also covered some. As you mention it was done by setting short-term
timekeeping devices which have alarms so that someone doesn't have to stay
awake all night watching the device. Since the length of daylight changes
throughout the year and not in a linear fashion, the church worked out
elaborate tables to indicate how the length of the hour should be changed
throughout the year.

These timekeeping devices were more like what today we would call timers
rather than clocks. Apparently a variety of devices were used. Part of
what makes the determination of what was used difficult is that the
word used for these was often horologia and this was applied to both
the clepsydra (water clock) and sundial and the mechanical clock when
it came into use. (page 68) These short term timing devices were reset
with the fall of dusk each day thus they didn't need the long term
accuracy of a mechanical clock.

Water clocks were apparently used from early on. Most of the Cistercian
abbeys were built near water so this eased their use of waterclocks as
well as the fact that they often reshaped the waterways around them 
with prodigious amounts of labor.

This is all pretty rough from what I found glancing through the first
section of this book. I haven't had time to read it yet.

Hope this helps.

Lord Stefan li Rous
stefan at texas.net
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