Ghostly GladnessThe Soul Music of Richard Rolle, Fourteenth Century Mystic
Other SourcesThe English are nothing if not antiquarians, and in this century there has been more interest in Richard Rolle than at any time since the Middle Ages. Indeed, he has become something of a folk hero in South Yorkshire. While visiting Hampole in 1988, I encountered a lovely lady, Mrs. Mary Scott, who gave me copies of several brief tracts about Rolle, each the work of enthusiastic local historians. In addition to the works of professional scholarship shown in the bibliography, such amateur studies help to give students of medieval history a sense that Richard Rolle continues to exert a fascination upon moderns like us seeking a link to the distant past. The first example is a brief history of Rolle and the Priory at Hampole, written by a local person named Wright — that’s all that is legible on the mimeographed copy I was given. This document appears to have been produced as a program for a neighborhood architectural tour, but in addition to the local lore, there are some fascinating tidbits, such as a short description of medieval monastic life and a list of miracles attributed to Rolle. Mrs. Scott also gave me a little booklet that had been prepared by David R. Lunn, the Bishop of Sheffield (in whose Yorkshire episcopate lies the village of Hampole). The very title of this booklet, A Saint for South Yorkshire: A Brief History of Richard Rolle of Hampole, certainly shows how far the English have come since the Reformation. Evidently local pride trumps any lingering vestiges of the anti-Catholic zeal that led to the dissolution and destruction of most English abbeys and priories, such as the little nunnery at Hampole.
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