Chronicler: Matthew Paris, 1200-1259

Monasteries served many purposes in the Medieval era.  Along with Universities and royal courts, they could be repositories of learning and scholarship.  Many monks did more than just pray and copy manuscripts, they actually preserved knowledge of events and people around them.  Matthew Paris, or Matthew of Paris, 1200-1259, was a Benedictine monk based at the Abbey of St. Albans in Hertfordshire. Matthew was not only a talented chronicler, albeit with his biases, he was also an artist and cartographer, illustrating his manuscripts with his own drawings and even watercolors.

Matthew knew French, but despite his name, he was English and wasn't from France, let alone Paris.  He may have been a relation of the Paris family of Hildersham, Cambridgeshire.  He entered St. Albans Abbey in 1217.  Though many young men became monks as boys or even as teenagers, Matthew's access to royalty and other nobles of his day indicated either that he was older or that he or his family had important connections.  Except for a trip to Norway as a messenger from Louis IX of France to King Haakon IV, he remained at St. Albans, devoting himself to chronicling and illustrating English and European history.  He took over the Abbey's chronicle from another early historian, Roger of Wendover, and spent a great deal of time editing Roger's work and adding his own material.  This became the basis of Paris' Chronica Majora, his magnum opus.  The Chronica is often cited by historians for information on the early Plantagenet period, though Paris' versions of events were often slanted.  Despite being an Englishman, based in England, he developed a fascination for German Emperor Frederick II, then later criticized Frederick in other works.

So, how did a cloistered monk gather material for his works?  Matthew had a network of contacts to whom he sent books and received books, manuscripts and information.  Some of his notes are contained in his manuscripts.  He asked one correspondent to "keep this book till Easter."  He also made contact with the Countess of Arundel, asking her to send him works on St. Thomas the Martyr and St. Edward the Confessor.  The book about Edward he later sent on the Countess of Cornwall.  Thus, he functioned as an informal librarian for nobles whom he could mine for information about the outside world.  He illustrated his works with drawings and watercolors, sometimes collaborating with outside artists.  He instructed one watercolorist, working on a book for the Countess of Winchester, on which illustrations of saints were to go on what page. 

Many of his manuscripts survive in the Dublin University library, the British Museum and other museums around England.  Among the prose works, sketches and watercolors are several maps of the Isle of Britain.  In addition to his Major Chronicle, he also wrote a history of England and biographies of St. Edward the Confessor and St. Thomas Becket, among others.  He accompanied his prose text with illustrations, sometimes covering half the page, or in the margins of the work.  His reputation as a chronicler was such that Henry III of the England and his brother, Richard of Cornwall were frequent informants.  Henry visited St. Albans frequently, and talked openly with Paris about history and royal policy.  Though privately Paris was critical of the King, circulated copies of his manuscript omit much of the criticism.