OBITUARY. – A paraliturgical record widely used in the Middle Ages and preserved at the back of service books, containing the date of death, the name and dignity of the deceased for whom religious communities (chapters, monasteries, collegiate churches, parishes) commemorate them on their anniversary. For this purpose, the date was most often limited to indicating the name and day of death, without the year; in more recent times, biographical details and merits of the deceased have been added to the above-mentioned data.
Each has one in advance.
b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z.
They have an exceptional quantity of letters.
OBLATES AND OBLATE NUNS
Rev. égyptologique, 6 [1891], pp. 30-35, 150-53; 7 [1892], pp. 199-200, 146-49, article punctuated by H. Leclercq, Oblats, in DACL, XII, 11, 1867-71).
b) In the West. – The question concerns the presence of children in monasteries and their oblation, which they would ratify when they came of age, as seen in the Statuta Sanctorum Virginum of St. Caesarius of Arles (§§ 6-7: ed. G. Morin, S. Caesarii opera omnia, II, Maredsous 1942, pp. 103-104) and in the Regula ad monachos of St. Aurelian of Arles (§§ 17, 22: PL 68, 390, 392). The Regula Magistri (ch. 91: PL 88, 2042-45) also deals with noble youths who wished to enter the monastery and who were to be offered by their parents and disinherited by them. However, the norms governing the oblation of “pueri” throughout the Middle Ages were laid down by St. Benedict (Regula, ch. 59): the donor had to present the “petitio” and offer the child at the altar; if the oblator was noble or wealthy, he had to disinherit the child, while if poor, the offering was to be made before witnesses. The rite of oblation was later established as follows: after the Gospel of the abbot’s Mass, the child was led to the altar holding in hand the host, the cruet of wine, and the “petitio,” all wrapped in the corporal or the altar cloth (cf. the commentary on the Rule attributed to Paul the Deacon, ch. 59: Bibliotheca Casinensis, IV, Montecassino 1880, Florilegium, pp. 151-52; B. Albers, Consuetudines monasticae, II, Stuttgart 1900, p. 157; III, Montecassino 1907, pp. 180, 185). Oblation was considered irrevocable both within the Benedictine milieu (Riepenhoff, cited in bibliography, denies that it was so for St. Benedict) and outside it (cf., for example, for girls, canon 19 [irrevocable after one year or three years depending on the case] of the Council of Orléans of 549 and canon 12 [more severe than the previous one] of the Council of Mâcon of 583: Mansi, IX, 133, 934), and for much of the Middle Ages (until the 13th century) the norm laid down in canon 49 of the Fourth Council of Toledo of 633 would be reiterated: “monachum aut paterna devotio aut propria professio facit: quidquid horum fuerit, alligatum tenebit. Proinde his ad mundum reverti intercludimus aditum et omnem ad saeculum interdicimus regressum” (Mansi, X, 631; cf. Decretum Gratiani: causa XX, q. 1). Yet from the 7th century onward, attempts to mitigate this severe discipline can be seen here and there, as evidenced, for example, by canon 6 of the Tenth Council of Toledo of 656 (Mansi, XI, 36-37), the Capitulary of Aachen of 817, drawn up under the influence of St. Benedict of Aniane (§ 36: ed. A. Boretius, in MGH, Capitularia, I [1883], p. 346), and the Council of Mainz of 820, which discussed and resolved in the affirmative the case of the forced profession of the young monk Gottescalc (ed. A. Werminghoff, in MGH, Concilia aevi Karolini, II [1906-1908], p. 205), against which Rabanus Maurus, abbot, protested vehemently in his pamphlet Contra eos qui repugnant institutis beati Patris Benedicti (PL 107, 419-40). Only toward the end of the 11th century did some papal decrees, later incorporated into the Decretals of Gregory IX (1234), mitigate the previous legislative harshness and guarantee the personal freedom of the young person, setting the age of profession at 12 or 14 years completed, depending on whether they were women or men (X, III, 31 de regul.). This norm effectively contributed to the disappearance of oblation, which had already been repudiated by some monastic reforms of the 11th-12th centuries, such as Cluny (at a later stage), Hirsau, and the Grande Chartreuse, among others. Often, the oblates, who normally formed the intellectual part of the monastery, constituted within it a group in contrast to that of the “conversi,” who had entered the monastery as adults and were mostly illiterate. The little that is known about the life that young oblates led in monasteries in the early Middle Ages is contained in the Commentary on the Benedictine Rule attributed to Paul the Deacon (cf., for example, the commentary on ch. 37: ed. cit., p. 124).
The institution of oblation was also in force among the Canons Regular and the Mendicant Orders, the Dominicans and Franciscans. With the decree of the Council of Trent, which declared null and void professions made before the age of 16, the last vestiges of child oblation disappeared (cf. sess. XXV, de regularibus, cap. 15).
2. The oblation of adults
From the 7th century and throughout the Middle Ages, there are examples of women (“Deo dedicatae, Deo sacratae, Deo devotae”) who offered themselves not only to female monasteries but also to male ones. At St. Gall, for example, in the 10th century, the oblates wove, worked on bookbinding, and made hosts for the abbey (cf. G. de Valous, cited in bibliography, I, 46). Their dwelling was placed outside the monastic enclosure, and Abbots Ulrich and Peter the Venerable of Cluny (d. 1156) insist strongly that this precautionary norm be strictly observed (cf. PL 149, 637 [letter of Ulrich]; ibid., 189, 1038 [Statuta Congreg. Cluniac., 47]).Greater importance was assumed by the oblation of men who gave themselves, their labor, and their possessions to a monastery, sometimes retaining the usufruct of their goods while living in the world. Sporadic examples of such oblation are found from the 8th century onward; these were “hospites” who asked to be allowed to work toward their “conversio morum” in the monastery without assuming monastic obligations. The oblation of adults, which took on the most varied forms in the execution of the donation, found its first strong affirmation in the 11th century, a period in which monks increasingly abandoned manual labor to devote more time to liturgical prayer and intellectual culture. It began to flourish at Cluny, Camaldoli, Vallombrosa, then, toward the end of the century and the beginning of the 12th century, it developed more widely at Hirsau through the work of Abbot William, at Cîteaux, the Grande Chartreuse, and Prémontré; but in each of these centers it had its own regulation and character. In addition to individual oblation, there were also cases of entire families whose members became servants of the monastery. As for the rite of oblation, it was similar to that used for the oblation of children: the oblation took place in the hands of the abbot, and care was taken to wrap the hand of the oblate, who held the deed of oblation signed by the interested party and witnesses, with the altar cloth. These adult oblates, referred to in documents by the most varied names (“donati, devoti, commissi, offerti, lay monks, conversi,” etc.) and initially recruited from among the “famuli,” “hospites,” “nutriti,” and “monks ad succurrendum,” enabled the monastic congregations of the 11th and 12th centuries to largely dispense with mercenary “famuli,” whom Peter the Venerable, abbot of Cluny, rightly called “quorum domini monastico rum premisi destructores” (Statuta Congr. Cluniacensis, 48: PL 189, 1038).
Oblates and Oblate Nuns – The young Mauro offered to St. Benedict by his parents and received by the Saint. Miniature from cod. Vat. lat. 1202, f. 114² (second half of the 11th century), containing the Vita s. Benedicti, s. Mauri et s. Scholasticae, in the form of a lectionary.
At Camaldoli, Vallombrosa, the Grande Chartreuse, and Cîteaux, the canonical status of the *oblati* (those who entered to become part of the monastery, later commonly called "conversi") became increasingly defined: they became true religious (cf. can. 7 of the Second Lateran Council of 1139, where "professed conversi" are mentioned; Mansi, XXI, 527), though remaining separate from the monks to whom they rendered humble service. At Cluny, this "evolution" appears complete in the Statutes of Peter the Venerable already cited. By the end of the 12th century, those who, while offering themselves and their possessions to a monastery and promising obedience to the abbot yet retained a certain freedom of action were preferably called *oblati*, "donati," "recepti," etc. (the nomenclature varied according to the Order). This is reflected in can. 57 of the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 (Mansi, XXII, 1046) and in the concept of "donati" by Humbert of Romans (Creytens, art. cit. in bibliography, p. 12). To these *oblati* may be traced the modern "regular" oblates, whether priests or laypeople, admitted to some monasteries after a simple promise to live according to the Rule. For the present-day "secular" Benedictine oblates, which however have nothing in common with the ancient *oblati*: V. BENEDETTINI, V. Oblati.
Besides monastic orders, adult *oblati* belonging to the two broad categories mentioned above are found in hospitals, charitable hospices, collegiate churches, parish churches, and Mendicant Orders; and just as male monasteries had their *oblati*, so too did female monasteries.