This cache has its date of birth on 20 January, the day Rolle is celebrated in the Church of England
Hampole is a little village about 4 miles north-west of Doncaster. There in a cell lived and died Richard Rolle (1290 - 1349), the hermit poet and philosopher, whose works are known to every collector of books.
Rolle was a Yorkshireman, born at Thornton, near Pickering. He studied at Oxford, and then, after wandering about the country, he established himself at Hampole, near a Cistertian Nunnery. His fame as a writer and the manner of his life as a hermit in a cell, brought him many visitors; and we may be sure that Doncaster was proud of the simple figure of its neighbour, philosopher and recluse.
Rolle’s claim to fame is that he was a prolific writer, that he was the first Englishman to use the English language almost solely for his writings, and that one of his works was one of the very earliest books to be both printed in English and actually illustrated as well. It was printed in London in about 1500 by Wynkyn de Worde, the successor to William Caxton, the inventor of printing. Rolle died at Hampole in 1349, so that his book was not printed until about 150 years after his death.
In one of his best-known works, The Fire of Love or Incendium Amoris, Rolle provides an account of his mystical experiences, which he describes as being of three kinds: a physical warmth in his body, a sense of wonderful sweetness, and a heavenly music that accompanied him as he chanted the Psalms. The book was widely read in the Middle Ages, and described the four purgative stages that one had to go through to become closer to God: described as open door, heat, song, and sweetness. Because of the wide proliferation of his works, there was a movement to have him canonized.
His books and manuscripts are priceless, being preserved in the British Museum and in the Oxford and Cambridge libraries. The first of them, the one printed in about 1500, is entitled Richarde Rolle Hermyte of Hampole in his Contemplacyons of the Drede and Love of God – and it is generally known as “Rolle’s Contemplations". A literary critic says of him: “The originality and depth of his thought, the truth and tenderness of his feeling, the vigour and eloquence of his prose, the grace and beauty of his verse, everywhere is detected the mark of a great personality, a personality at once powerful, tender, and strange, the like of which perhaps was never seen again.”
Another of his works was called The Pricke of Conscience, and this is partially illustrated by an extraordinary 15th century window, in the church of All Saints, North Street, York.
An excavation of the site of Hampole Priory, undertaken in 1937 by the Rev. Professor C. E. Whiting, revealed that some of the foundations of priory buildings lie beneath the village green, but is there a missing sign to the whereabouts of his hiding place? However, nothing now remains in situ above ground of the nunnery which once contained the tomb and shrine of one of the greatest mystics of the 14th century, Richard Rolle. There is no trace of his cell, no clue to his burial place, but somewhere in the little village of Hampole the emerald green grass grows above the soil where sleeping in peace is this early master of our language. Richard Rolle is long dead, but he remains in post as the Hermit of Hampole. The cache is as reclusive as Richard himself, look for him but do not disturb his solitude.
Please replace exactly as found for the next cacher and be careful when removing and replacing the cache. You will need to bring your own pen with you as the cache contains a log sheet only.
There is a shrine to Richard Rolle in the Church of All Saints South Kirkby. Currently the nearest cache to that is to be found here