Agnes of Harcourt, Felipa of Porcelet, and Marguerite of Oingt: women writing about women at the end of the thirteenth century

Church History, June, 2007 by Sean L. Field

Felipa of Porcelet (died ca. 1316), for her part, resembles Agnes of Harcourt in important ways. (31) She came from a noble family of Provence. Her father, Guilhem of Porcelet, fought alongside Charles of Anjou in his Italian campaigns, was well rewarded with Sicilian lands, and continued in Charles's service after managing to survive the Sicilian Vespers in 1282. (32) Her brother Bertran was Seigneur de Fos, and one of her sisters, Audiarda, was abbess of the Cistercian abbey of Molleges. (33) But unlike Agnes of Harcourt, Felipa had been married (to Fouques de Ponteves, seigneur d'Artignosc) and had had several daughters. After her husband's death she devoted herself to Douceline, became a beguine, and upon Douceline's death in 1274 was elected her successor as leader of the houses in Hyeres and Marseille. Surviving records show she continued to use her family's wealth and influence to benefit her community. (34) Thus Felipa, like Agnes, inherited the leadership of a community somewhat tenuously tied to the Franciscan Order after the death of the house's charismatic founder. If Agnes of Harcourt's texts are the first female-authored works of vernacular religious literature in the north of France, Felipa's biography has a similar standing in the south. (35) Moreover, Charles of Anjou forms an interesting link between the two texts, as the commissioner of one and a prominent actor in the other.

Beatrice of Ornacieux (died 1303) is more obscure than Isabelle or Douceline, yet she was the daughter of a noble house of the Dauphine. Her father, Jean de la Chambre, was Seigneur d'Ornacieux, her brother Jean succeeded him, and another brother Pierre became bishop of Ivree. (36) Beatrice became a Carthusian nun at the house of Parmenie (near Beaucroissant, Department Isere, founded ca. 1259) at the age of thirteen, and was chosen as first prioress of its ill-fated daughter house of Eymeux in 1303. (37) Beyond these few facts, virtually nothing is known about her except what Marguerite of Oingt's biography relates. Beatrice was eventually beatified by Pius IX in 1869. (38)

Marguerite of Oingt (ca. 1240-1310) was the most prolific and is today probably the best known of our three authors. But we actually possess relatively little information about her own life. She came from "one of the most powerful and ancient families" of the Lyonnaise and became a Carthusian around 1268. By 1288 she was fourth prioress of the house of Poleteins (near Mionnay, Department Ain, founded around 1225). She died in 1310. (39) She was the author of a Latin Page of Meditations (begun 1286), a Franco-Provencal Mirror (finished by 1294), and a number of letters, as well as her vernacular Life of the Virgin Saint Beatrice of Ornacieux (after 1303). She was the only one of our three authors to write a Latin text (40) or to compose works concerning her own spiritual life.

Isabelle of France, Douceline of Digne, and Beatrice of Ornacieux had a good deal in common. Though they ranged in status from a princess to a noble woman to the daughter of a merchant, certainly all three can be considered "elite." Moreover, they were all three founders or leaders of monastic communities. Isabelle and Douceline remained influential laywomen, while Beatrice became the prioress of a new Carthusian community, albeit a short-lived one. Isabelle and Douceline shared a position on the margins of the still-young Franciscan Order as women who created innovative new female Franciscan forms of life, but Beatrice's role as leader of a precariously situated new Carthusian house held something of the same marginal quality. Each sought institutional innovation or growth and left an uncertain legacy.