Notizen zu Johanniterschwestern in Mitteleuropa (außerhalb von Friesland) während des Spätmittelalters

Notes an Hospitaller Sisters in Central Europe (outside Frisia) during the later Middle Ages The military-religious orders were supposed to fight and shed blood for the faith. Nevertheless, the Hospitallers included women, similar to the Teutonic Order. This should not be a surprize because both military-religious orders upheld caring for the needy and sick as important tasks. In Upper Germany, however, there were no convents of Hospitaller sisters. This was different from Frisia, where special socio-political conditions produced Hospitaller nunneries, and it was also different from other European countries where there had been enough female Hospitallers to concentrate them in special houses. Yet according to a list of 1367 the southern part of the Priory of Alamania had four commanderies where, in each case, seven sisters were supposed to live alongside with knights and priests: Heimbach, Dorlisheim, Freiburg im Breisgau and Villingen. From documents it is known that in many other commanderies married couples, widows or single women bought for themselves life-rents from and maintenance in Hospitaller houses. The legal status of such females was not always clear. Some of them may have hoped to be recognized as fully-professed sorores, in order to enjoy the privileged status of religious persons, whereas others may only have been consorores or donate. Others may have been female servants or just members of ecclesiastical fraternities.