The Catholic Country House in Early Modern England : Motion, Piety and Hospitality, c. 1580–1640

The survival of a Roman Catholic minority in post-Reformation England did not depend merely upon social separation and isolation. By analysing missionary activities and patterns of hospitality at St Anthony’s Hall in Northumberland and Naworth Castle in Cumberland, I demonstrate how regulation of human motion in respective households shaped and displayed the social behaviour of their owners. I argue that religion was as much a driving force behind the seclusion of the Catholic home as an incentive for its accessibility. The permeability of Catholic houses and social integration of Catholics was encouraged through missionary mobility, indiscriminate charity, and Christmas hospitality. Examining human motion in Catholic houses further challenges the notion of the English Catholic community as an introverted social group.