The Nunnery
“The Iona Nunnery is one of only two Augustinian nunneries established in Britain, and it is the only female religious convent in Western Scotland. As such, it is of considerable architectural and historical importance. ”
Rainbow over the west side of the Nunnery.
The Iona Augustinian Nunnery was founded in 1208 shortly after the Abbey was established as a Benedictine monastery in 1203. Both the Abbey and the Nunnery were founded by Reginald, son of Somerled, King of the Isles.
Reginald’s sister, Bethoc, was the first Prioress of the Nunnery. The Nunnery’s Augustinian Order followed the teachings of St. Augustine of Hippo, Egypt, who died in 430 AD.
The Nunnery Church was known as ‘an eaglais dhubh’, the Black Church, and was dedicated to Saint Mary, the Virgin. In fact, some of the earliest representations of the iconic scene of the Virgin and Child come from Iona. They are found in the Book of Kells, and on the stone-carved, high crosses that the Island is famous for.
Nunneries of the Middle Ages offered women a chance to commit to the life of an ascetic while at the same time serving an important social function – that of being a home for the daughters and widows of the aristocracy for whom no suitable marriage could be found.
The nunneries were therefore quite aristocratic in nature and they formed socially exclusive communities. As endowments from the aristocracy supported the nunneries, women of humbler origins if admitted at all, were admitted only in the capacity of servants.
By the 10th and 11th centuries, women had been entirely excluded from any sacramental acts or ecclesiastical functions, including teaching.
Of note is the importance of music in Augustinian/Benedictine teachings. St. Augustine is quoted as saying, “To sing once is to pray twice”. Sound and music form a strong foundation of Iona’s history going back to the Celtic Druid bards that would have been part of the Druidic College of learning that existed there.
Sheela-na-Gig
A sheela-na-Gig is the name given to a particularly shaped female form that was cut out of a single large rock and placed in special locations.
More than a hundred Sheela-na-Gigs have been found in Ireland, and there are probably many more to be discovered. They have most often been found at Holy Wells and other sacred sites. Additionally, many are hidden away in storage in museums, or they are so weathered outside as to not be easily recognizable to the untrained eye.
In ancient times Sheela-na-Gigs represented the Goddess and her great Creatrix regenerative powers. Typically, Sheela-na-Gigs were carvings of women displaying their genitals. Given its prominence over a window opening on the farthest southern wall of the ruins of Iona’s Nunnery, one can assume it was of particular significance and importance. You can see Iona’s Sheela-na-Gig in the photo above. It is the stone located above the window opening; it is the rough-hewn, triangular-shaped, grey stone.
Given that archeological evidence shows that the Nunnery grounds housed an ancient burial site for women long before the Nunnery was built in 1208, it is quite possible that the Sheela-na-Gig was used by the Druidesses who lived on Iona prior to Saint Columba’s arrival in 563 CE, and that it was re-used in the building of the Nunnery.
The prayer below was written by Anne Kerr on October 10, 2012. At that time, she and I were both participants in a week-long retreat on Iona at the Saint Columba Hotel. Anne wrote the beautiful prayer and offered it as part of the pilgrimage tour that our group did to some of the notable sites on Iona.
Our group gathered in the beautiful ruins of the Nunnery on a bright and sunny day, and Anne read her prayer to us.
She read the prayer with a powerfully strong and clear sense of the necessity of bringing forward a greater awareness of the inequities in women’s lives. Anne brought our attention to the long-standing inequalities of women through, in this instance, pointing out the differences between the Abbey and the Nunnery in terms of attention or neglect of the ruins.
When I heard Anne’s prayer, it was a transformational moment that opened my eyes to the male dominance of the story of Iona.
“IONA PILGRIMAGE, PRAYER BY THE NUNNERY
LORD OF ALL THINGS,
As we pause on our pilgrimage beside the ruins of this old Nunnery,
help us to focus with our hearts and minds on women,
on their exploitation over the ages, on their lifetimes of unpaid labour,
on their roles of being second-class, and subservient, even to this day.
Note that the Nunnery has been left in ruins - albeit beautiful,
whilst the monastic Abbey holdings have been rebuilt.
BUT GOD IS IN THIS PLACE
So let us also remember with joy and gratitude all that women have to offer
and what they can and do contribute to the well-being of all humankind,
their practical and artistic skills, their gifts of peace-making and community building,
their insights, wisdom, and vision, and the gift given to so many of them of motherhood and home-making.
As we stand before this old Nunnery, let us praise God for women,
particularly remembering those who served here and dedicated their lives to serve God in this place.
So, remembering the feminine in all of us, we pray for blessings from our Mother God.”
The site of this beautiful Nunnery has a history even more ancient and mysterious than the visible ruins from the Middle Ages. The most recent excavation revealed an earlier chapel, possibly dated to the 700’s, when Saint Columba’s Monastery was flourishing. There was evidence also of burials from an even earlier date. Curiously, all remains belonged to women. For more information about some of the earliest known history of the spiritual roles of women, and their relationship to Iona, please see the sections on: ‘The Dove, Iona, and the Pleiades Seven Sisters Star Cluster’; ‘Brighid, Goddess of the Celts’; ‘Holy Wells’; ‘The Isle of Women’; and, ‘Ancient Goddesses, Divine Feminine, and Mother God’.