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Fountains Abbey: History
Fountains Abbey: Buildings
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Charitable works (7/33) O
fount of gardens, paupers’ open gate
Men and women could also provide for their souls and ensure a swifter path to salvation, by helping the poor and needy. A number of Fountains’ benefactors in the late twelfth and thirteenth centuries made grants specifically to support the abbey’s charitable works within and outside of the precinct. In fact, about ten per cent of all grants made before the fourteenth century were for poor relief, and over 200 were intended for the poor outside the gate.(19)
A particularly interesting grant was made in the late twelfth century by Adam of Giggleswick, who gave forty pence annually to provide head-coverings for the poor folk infected by worms, who gathered at the abbey gate seeking help.(20) This offers an extraordinarily vivid and unusual insight to the nature of charity conducted by the abbey and of the ailments afflicting Yorkshire people at this time. The number of grants made to Fountains for poor relief suggests that the community was at this time noted for its charitable works, and was seen as a reputable dispenser of alms and good works.(21) As is clear from the account of its care for the needy who flocked to its gates during the famine of 1194, the community made a notable contribution to local charity.(22) |
