This entry somehow never got published in March, 2013 as drafted and saved.
Like monks, people in the world began by dying legally: writing a will and making last confession. The availability of paper in the 14th century made actual written wills much more common and, at last, mandatory.
Outside the monastery, dying people were usually worried about the afterlife. The church could not assure them that they’d go to heaven, though it could reassure them that purgatory wasn’t forever. People with violence on their consciences, or those who had been wealthy and not very charitable, often became very afraid. What if last confession was not enough?
The average man owned some furniture, a shop, a house, and some animals, with perhaps some silver stored in a hidden sack. A married woman owned some of the furniture, her clothes, some of the pots and pans, and maybe some money from ale selling or from inheritance. Wealthier people owned larger or more houses, much more furniture, extra farms and fields, larger sums of money, jewelry, books, and perhaps even investments in other businesses (by the late Middle Ages, shareholding was a new trend in Italy). So with this, the dying man or woman began to bargain with Heaven. Perhaps those with young children or clean consciences just left it all to the family, but that’s certainly not what some did.
Monasteries, churches and other forms of religious ministry received most of the willed goods. The Knights of the Temple, the fighting monks sworn to defend the Holy Land, received so many gifts of property that their order had to take in many lay brothers just to farm their vast holdings. Although individual monks (even Knights Templars) could own nothing, the order could own a great deal. Many peasants found themselves deeded over to monasteries; the Abbot was now the landlord. Each order, beginning in pious poverty, eventually found itself weighed down with worldly goods.
Gifts of money also went to local churches and monasteries. A man might will a sum of money to the local church to buy its candles for a year, with the request that they pray for his soul in purgatory. Gifts could buy annual Masses said just for the donor, or they could pay to build a small chapel added onto the main building. Especially by the late medieval years, this chapel would have some kind of statue or plaque proclaiming the donor and asking the visitor to pray for his or her soul.
Gifts of land, houses and money also went to charitable projects like orphanages, hospitals, leper colonies and schools. Again, the residents were requested (required) to pray for the donor’s soul in perpetuity. The prayers of the sick and poor were considered more meritorious than the prayers of one’s friends and family. (You may recall that this is how colleges began: as dormitories funded by a donor in exchange for perpetual prayer.) Pretty much anything could be willed to an orphanage or hospital; if you had a chair or bed, or even a copper pot, you could will it.
Wills also gave to family and friends. They were usually very detailed. Every pot, spoon, hat, book and gown was willed to someone. It seems creepy to us when clothing appears in an old will, but clothing at the time meant a relatively big investment. Dying people would have listened to visiting family and friends saying good-bye but also asking if anyone else had already requested the new hat or the green gown? We live in a culture that can’t figure out what to do with its left-over, broken, wasted material goods; in their time, the ends of candles, pried from candle-sticks, were paid to servants as part of wages and benefits. Things were relatively more valuable and were treated with great respect. You didn’t sneeze at the chance to own anything additional; a set of two spoons or a bone-bead necklace was worth putting into a will and was received gratefully.