ABSTRACT
England in the period considered by this book saw the repeated involvement of clergy in the prosecution of warfare in diverse roles and circumstances. It also saw major growth and elaboration of learned law, particularly canon law, both produced within England itself and received from the continent. We are left, therefore, with a wide range of source materials to consider, from late Anglo-Saxon ecclesiological writing from Ælfric ‘Grammaticus’ of Eynsham (c.950-c.1010) and Wulfstan ‘the Homilist’ (d.1023) to the reforming councils of the Anglo-Norman period. The revolution in the teaching of canon law brought about by Gratian from the late 1140s onward, the learned glosses on Gratian’s text that followed, and the everrising tempo of appeals for clarification to Rome also produced particular canonical approaches to clerical involvement in warfare.
