INDIAN HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -Monks and nuns performed many practical services in the Middle Ages, for they housed travelers, nursed the sick, and assisted the poor; abbots and abbesses dispensed advice to secular rulers. But monasticism also offered society a spiritual outlet and ideal with important consequences for medieval culture as a whole.

Detailed explanation-2: -Nuns who came from lesser means were expected to do more arduous labor as part of their religious life. Nuns who committed themselves to the highest scholarship were treated as equals to men of their social rank. Honored as heads of an abbey, they had more power than their female contemporaries.

Detailed explanation-3: -In the early Middle Ages, Benedictine monks and nuns copied manuscripts for their own collections, and in doing so, helped to preserve ancient learning. “Benedictine monasteries had always created handwritten Bibles, ‘’ he says.

Detailed explanation-4: -Their main foodstuffs included vegetables such as turnips or salad, dark breads, porridges, an occasional fish, cheese curds, beer, ale, or mead. Fish was smoked and meat dried to increase their longevity. As a rule, monks did not eat meat except if they were ill and on special occasions.