How Does Chaucer Characterize the Summoner and His Relationship with the Church in The Canterbury Tales?
Geoffrey Chaucer characterizes the Summoner in “The Canterbury Tales” as a morally corrupt and physically repulsive church official who exploits his ecclesiastical position for personal gain. The Summoner’s relationship with the Church is fundamentally corrupt and hypocritical, as he abuses his authority to summon sinners to ecclesiastical courts by accepting bribes, manipulating the vulnerable, and living in flagrant violation of the moral standards he is supposed to uphold. Through vivid physical descriptions, behavioral details, and satirical commentary, Chaucer presents the Summoner as emblematic of the institutional corruption within the medieval Church, particularly its lower officials who wielded power over ordinary Christians while themselves engaging in immoral conduct. This characterization serves Chaucer’s broader critique of ecclesiastical corruption in fourteenth-century England.
What Is the Summoner’s Role in Medieval Church Structure?
Understanding the Summoner’s characterization requires first examining his official function within the medieval ecclesiastical system. A summoner, also known as an apparitor, served as an officer of the ecclesiastical court whose primary responsibility was to summon individuals accused of moral or religious offenses to appear before church tribunals (Howard, 1976). These courts held jurisdiction over matters including adultery, blasphemy, heresy, non-payment of tithes, and other violations of canon law. The position granted summoners considerable power over ordinary Christians, as excommunication and other severe penalties could result from these proceedings. The ecclesiastical court system represented one of the Church’s primary mechanisms for maintaining moral authority and social control during the Middle Ages, making the summoner’s role both influential and potentially lucrative through the collection of fees and the opportunity for accepting bribes (Patterson, 1991).
The summoner’s position existed within a complex hierarchy of church officials, subordinate to archdeacons who supervised ecclesiastical jurisdictions. However, summoners typically came from lower social classes and lacked the education and theological training of priests or higher clergy. This social positioning is significant to Chaucer’s characterization, as it highlights how even minor church officials could wield disproportionate power over laypeople while themselves remaining largely unsupervised and unaccountable. The potential for abuse inherent in this system provides the foundation for Chaucer’s satirical portrait. By the fourteenth century, summoners had gained widespread notoriety for corruption, extortion, and blackmail, making them particularly despised figures in medieval society (Bowden, 1948). Chaucer’s audience would have immediately recognized the Summoner as a representative of institutional corruption, bringing their own experiences and prejudices to their interpretation of the character.
How Does Chaucer Describe the Summoner’s Physical Appearance?
Chaucer employs grotesque physical description as a primary method of characterization, using the Summoner’s appearance as an outward manifestation of his inner moral corruption. The General Prologue presents the Summoner with a “fyr-reed cherubynnes face,” referencing both his inflamed, diseased complexion and ironically invoking cherubim, the angelic beings who represent divine purity (Chaucer, 1987, lines 624-625). This physical description continues with details of “piled” eyebrows, a scabby and inflamed face covered in pustules, and a “whelkes white” and “knobbès sittynge on his chekes” (Chaucer, 1987, lines 625-633). These symptoms suggest various skin diseases common in medieval times, possibly including leprosy, syphilis, or severe acne, conditions often interpreted as divine punishment for sin or immoral living. The explicit physicality of this description would have resonated powerfully with medieval audiences familiar with physiognomy, the belief that physical appearance reflected moral character.
The repulsive nature of the Summoner’s appearance serves multiple literary functions beyond simple grotesquery. Medieval audiences understood skin diseases and facial disfigurement as potential signs of moral corruption, sexual sin, or divine displeasure, connecting physical ugliness with spiritual degradation (Miller, 1977). Chaucer emphasizes that children are frightened by the Summoner’s appearance, suggesting a visceral, instinctive recognition of something fundamentally wrong or dangerous about him. Furthermore, Chaucer notes that “no oynement, ne noon oile of tartre / Ne ceruce, ne oynement that wolde dense and byte” could cure his condition, implying that his affliction runs deeper than surface ailments and resists all remedies (Chaucer, 1987, lines 629-631). This incurability metaphorically represents the depth and permanence of his moral corruption. The contrast between the Summoner’s hideous physical state and his official role as a church officer responsible for moral oversight creates a powerful satirical effect, highlighting the incongruity between the Church’s spiritual mission and the reality of its human representatives.
What Behavioral Characteristics Define the Summoner’s Character?
Beyond physical description, Chaucer develops the Summoner’s character through detailed accounts of his behavior, habits, and personal vices. The Summoner demonstrates a particular fondness for strong wine, with Chaucer noting that he loves “garleek, oynons, and eek lekes” and to “drynken strong wyn, reed as blood” (Chaucer, 1987, lines 634-635). This excessive consumption of wine leads to loud, foolish behavior, as when drunk “thanne wolde he speke no word but Latyn” (Chaucer, 1987, line 637). His use of Latin is particularly satirical, as he knows only a few legal phrases learned from his work in ecclesiastical courts—”Questio quid iuris” and similar terms—which he repeats mindlessly like a parrot. This detail emphasizes his intellectual limitations and the superficiality of his connection to learning and religion, despite his official position within the Church structure (Benson, 1987).
The Summoner’s moral character reveals itself most clearly in his corrupt professional practices and manipulation of those under his jurisdiction. Chaucer explicitly states that “for a quart of wyn” the Summoner would allow “a good felawe” to keep a concubine for a year, and would even instruct the sinner on how to avoid church prosecution (Chaucer, 1987, lines 649-652). This passage demonstrates how the Summoner commodifies moral authority, selling exemptions from religious law for personal benefit. Additionally, Chaucer reveals that the Summoner maintained his own network of informants—”yonge girles of the diocise”—whom he exploited for information about others’ sins while simultaneously engaging in immoral relationships with them himself (Chaucer, 1987, lines 664-665). This hypocritical behavior, wherein the Summoner both commits and facilitates the very sins he is sworn to prosecute, encapsulates Chaucer’s critique of ecclesiastical corruption. The Summoner represents not merely personal failing but systemic dysfunction within the Church’s disciplinary apparatus (Cooper, 1996).
How Does the Summoner’s Relationship with the Pardoner Reflect His Character?
The General Prologue presents the Summoner in close companionship with another corrupt church official, the Pardoner, describing them as traveling together and singing a duet: “Com hider, love, to me!” (Chaucer, 1987, line 672). This pairing is significant both for what it reveals about the Summoner’s character and for its contribution to Chaucer’s broader satirical critique. The relationship between these two figures suggests a partnership in corruption, as both abuse ecclesiastical authority for personal profit—the Summoner through accepting bribes to dismiss charges, the Pardoner through selling false relics and indulgences. Their friendship indicates a shared moral universe and mutual understanding based on their exploitation of church office (Pearsall, 1985). The fact that they harmonize together in song creates a darkly comic image of two morally bankrupt officials cheerfully making their way through the pilgrimage, seemingly oblivious to or unconcerned with their spiritual jeopardy.
The specific details of their companionship further illuminate the Summoner’s character and his degraded relationship with religious institutions. Chaucer describes the Summoner bearing a “bokeler” (a small shield) that the Pardoner uses as a protective screen, with the Summoner metaphorically serving as the Pardoner’s accomplice and protector (Chaucer, 1987, line 666-668). This image of mutual support between corrupt officials suggests an organized system of ecclesiastical corruption rather than isolated individual failings. Their singing of a love song during a religious pilgrimage represents an inversion of proper devotional behavior, replacing sacred hymns with secular, potentially lascivious music. This detail exemplifies how thoroughly these figures have corrupted their religious roles, transforming even a pilgrimage to Canterbury into an occasion for worldly entertainment rather than spiritual contemplation. The Summoner’s close association with the equally corrupt Pardoner reinforces Chaucer’s argument that corruption within the medieval Church extended across various offices and positions, creating networks of mutual enablement (Mann, 1973).
What Does the Summoner’s Tale Reveal About His Character and Church Relationship?
The Summoner’s own tale, told in response to the Friar’s preceding story that mocked summoners, provides additional insight into his character and his antagonistic relationship with certain elements of the Church hierarchy. The narrative recounts the story of a greedy, hypocritical friar who attempts to extract money from a sick man named Thomas, only to receive an obscene “gift” that he then must divide equally among his fellow friars (Chaucer, 1987). This scatological tale demonstrates the Summoner’s crude sense of humor and his willingness to engage in vulgar mockery directed at religious figures. The tale’s explicit purpose is revenge against the Friar who has just told an unflattering story about summoners, revealing the Summoner’s vindictive nature and his inability to respond to criticism with dignity or spiritual reflection (Hines, 1989).
The content and style of the Summoner’s tale also illuminate his relationship with the Church as an institution. Despite being a church official himself, the Summoner shows no hesitation in presenting clergy members as greedy, manipulative, and deserving of humiliation. This willingness to attack other church figures while occupying an ecclesiastical office himself reveals a profound alienation from the spiritual mission of the Church and a purely transactional view of religious authority. The Summoner sees the Church not as a sacred institution worthy of respect but as a system of competing interests and rival powers, each seeking their own advantage. His tale reduces complex questions of ecclesiastical authority and spiritual care to crude conflicts over money and status. Furthermore, the tale’s obscene humor and lack of moral elevation demonstrate how far the Summoner’s thinking diverges from the contemplative, spiritually focused perspective expected of someone serving the Church (Benson, 1987). Through this narrative performance, Chaucer shows that the Summoner’s corruption extends beyond mere bribery and extortion to encompass a fundamental inability or unwillingness to understand religion in spiritual rather than material terms.
How Does Chaucer Use Satire to Critique Church Corruption Through the Summoner?
Chaucer’s characterization of the Summoner functions as a vehicle for satirical critique of institutional corruption within the fourteenth-century Church. Medieval satire frequently targeted ecclesiastical figures who failed to live up to their spiritual responsibilities, and Chaucer participates in this tradition while demonstrating particular literary sophistication in his methods (Craun, 1997). The Summoner exemplifies estates satire, a genre that criticized various social classes and professional groups by highlighting the gap between their ideals and their actual behavior. By presenting the Summoner with such vivid physical repulsiveness, moral degradation, and intellectual limitation, Chaucer creates a figure who embodies everything contrary to the Church’s stated values of purity, charity, wisdom, and spiritual authority. The satirical effect emerges from the contrast between what the Summoner should represent—moral guidance and ecclesiastical justice—and what he actually represents: corruption, exploitation, and hypocrisy.
Chaucer’s satirical approach gains particular force from its specificity and realism. Rather than creating an abstract symbol of corruption, Chaucer grounds the Summoner in concrete, recognizable details that would have resonated with his contemporary audience’s experiences of church officials. The bribes of wine, the network of informants, the manipulation of legal proceedings, and the exploitation of vulnerable people all reflect actual abuses known to occur within ecclesiastical courts (Yunck, 1963). By rooting his satire in realistic detail, Chaucer moves beyond simple mockery to offer genuine social criticism. The Summoner’s characterization implicitly raises serious questions about accountability, oversight, and reform within church institutions. However, Chaucer maintains a complex tone that combines criticism with humor, never descending into pure denunciation or losing sight of the Summoner’s humanity. This balanced approach allows Chaucer to critique institutional corruption without seeming to attack Christian faith itself, a crucial distinction in the medieval context where religious skepticism could be dangerous (Leicester, 1990).
What Historical Context Influenced Chaucer’s Portrayal of the Summoner?
Understanding Chaucer’s characterization of the Summoner requires situating the text within the historical context of fourteenth-century England, a period marked by significant religious controversy and criticism of church corruption. The Church wielded enormous power during this era, controlling vast wealth, extensive lands, and maintaining parallel legal systems that competed with secular courts. However, this power increasingly generated resentment, particularly when church officials appeared to prioritize material wealth and institutional authority over spiritual care (Strohm, 1989). The period witnessed the rise of reform movements, including the Lollards led by John Wycliffe, who challenged papal authority, clerical corruption, and various church doctrines. While Chaucer’s relationship to these movements remains debated, “The Canterbury Tales” clearly reflects widespread contemporary concerns about ecclesiastical corruption and the behavior of church officials.
The specific institution of ecclesiastical courts and the role of summoners had become particularly controversial by Chaucer’s time. These courts exercised broad jurisdiction over moral and religious matters, allowing church officials to intervene in many aspects of daily life. Summoners, as the officers who initiated these proceedings, became associated with invasive oversight, arbitrary authority, and opportunities for extortion (Braswell, 1983). Historical records document numerous complaints and legal actions against summoners who accepted bribes, falsely accused innocent people, or used their position to coerce sexual favors or money. Chaucer’s characterization, while exaggerated for literary effect, reflects genuine social problems and widespread public resentment. The Summoner figure would have been immediately recognizable to Chaucer’s audience not as an isolated aberration but as representative of a known type, making the satire both pointed and relevant. By anchoring his critique in contemporary social realities, Chaucer ensured that his work spoke directly to the concerns and experiences of his readers (Hornsby, 2003).
What Literary Techniques Does Chaucer Employ in Characterizing the Summoner?
Chaucer demonstrates sophisticated literary craftsmanship in his characterization of the Summoner, employing multiple techniques that work together to create a memorable and meaningful portrait. The most obvious technique is physical description, through which Chaucer uses the Summoner’s diseased appearance as a visual representation of moral corruption. This approach draws on medieval understanding of physiognomy and the symbolic association between outward appearance and inner character (Whittock, 1968). However, Chaucer moves beyond simple symbolism by providing specific, concrete details that make the Summoner vivid and individual rather than merely allegorical. The references to particular foods he eats, specific Latin phrases he knows, and exact methods of corruption he employs all contribute to creating a fully realized character rather than an abstract type.
Another crucial technique is Chaucer’s use of narrative voice and irony throughout the General Prologue. The narrator presents information about the pilgrims with an apparently neutral, even admiring tone that often contrasts sharply with the actual content being described. When describing the Summoner, for instance, the narrator matter-of-factly reports his corrupt practices without explicit moral condemnation, allowing readers to draw their own conclusions about the gap between the Summoner’s official role and his actual behavior (Donaldson, 1970). This ironic narrative stance proves more effective than direct denunciation because it engages readers as active interpreters rather than passive recipients of authorial judgment. Additionally, Chaucer employs structural contrast, positioning the Summoner alongside other corrupt ecclesiastical figures like the Pardoner and the Friar, while implicitly comparing them to more admirable religious figures like the Parson. These contrasts highlight different possibilities within the same institutional framework, suggesting that the problem lies not with Christianity itself but with how human beings corrupt religious institutions (Kolve, 1984).
How Does the Summoner Compare to Other Religious Figures in The Canterbury Tales?
Examining the Summoner in relation to other religious characters in “The Canterbury Tales” illuminates Chaucer’s nuanced approach to critiquing church corruption while acknowledging genuine faith and virtue. The contrast with the Parson proves particularly significant, as the Parson represents everything the Summoner is not: learned, virtuous, genuinely devoted to spiritual care, and living according to the principles he teaches (Patterson, 1991). Where the Summoner exploits his position for personal gain, the Parson “first he wroghte, and afterward he taughte,” exemplifying Christian virtue through both word and deed (Chaucer, 1987, line 497). This comparison suggests that Chaucer does not condemn religious authority itself but rather the corruption of that authority by unworthy individuals. The existence of the virtuous Parson indicates that the ecclesiastical system could function properly when populated by people of genuine faith and moral integrity.
The Summoner also bears comparison to other corrupt church figures in the Tales, particularly the Friar and the Pardoner, creating a spectrum of ecclesiastical corruption. The Friar, like the Summoner, exploits his religious authority for personal profit, though he maintains a more sophisticated and socially polished exterior (Mann, 1973). The Pardoner represents perhaps an even more profound corruption, as he openly admits his fraudulent practices and lack of genuine faith while continuing to preach effectively about sin. By presenting multiple corrupt religious figures with different characteristics and methods, Chaucer suggests that church corruption was not limited to one particular office or type of official but permeated various levels and positions within the institution. However, the Summoner’s corruption appears particularly egregious because of his combination of physical repulsiveness, intellectual limitation, crude behavior, and the direct harm he causes to ordinary people under his jurisdiction. Where the Friar’s charm and the Pardoner’s eloquence provide some redeeming entertainment value, the Summoner offers nothing to offset his corrupt practices (Cooper, 1996).
What Is the Summoner’s Attitude Toward Religious Authority and Doctrine?
The Summoner’s relationship with religious authority and Christian doctrine reveals a fundamentally instrumental and cynical perspective that values church power only for the opportunities it provides for personal advantage. His limited Latin vocabulary, consisting primarily of legal phrases rather than theological concepts or scriptural passages, demonstrates that his engagement with religious learning extends only as far as necessary for his professional function (Chaucer, 1987, lines 637-643). He shows no interest in theology, spirituality, or the deeper meanings of Christian faith, instead treating religion as a system of rules and procedures that can be manipulated for profit. This superficial engagement with religious doctrine characterizes many corrupt church officials in medieval satire, but Chaucer emphasizes it particularly strongly in the Summoner’s case through the parrot comparison, suggesting that even his limited knowledge consists of meaningless repetition without understanding.
Furthermore, the Summoner demonstrates active contempt for the spiritual and moral dimensions of ecclesiastical authority. His willingness to accept bribes to overlook sins reveals that he views church law as negotiable and subordinate to personal interests rather than as representing divine will or moral truth (Howard, 1976). Most tellingly, Chaucer reports that the Summoner would tell people “the Ercedeknes curs is nat to drede / But wel I woot he lied right in dede” (Chaucer, 1987, lines 657-658). The Summoner falsely tells people not to fear excommunication, the ultimate spiritual penalty, thereby undermining the very authority system he supposedly serves. Chaucer’s narrator immediately contradicts this claim, noting that the Summoner lies, but the damage to religious authority has been done. This passage captures the essence of the Summoner’s relationship with the Church: he occupies a position within the ecclesiastical hierarchy while simultaneously working to undermine its spiritual authority and moral credibility. His cynicism corrupts not only his own soul but also the faith of those subject to his influence (Craun, 1997).
How Does the Summoner’s Characterization Contribute to the Overall Themes of The Canterbury Tales?
The Summoner’s characterization advances several central themes that run throughout “The Canterbury Tales,” most notably the relationship between appearance and reality, the corruption of authority, and the gap between spiritual ideals and human behavior. The contrast between the Summoner’s official role as an ecclesiastical officer and his actual corrupt practices exemplifies how institutions and titles can mask rather than reveal true character (Leicester, 1990). This theme recurs across the Tales in various forms, as characters consistently prove more complex, more flawed, or more admirable than their social positions might suggest. The Summoner contributes to this theme by demonstrating how religious authority, which should guarantee moral superiority, can instead provide opportunities for enhanced corruption when held by unworthy individuals.
Additionally, the Summoner’s characterization reinforces the Tales’ exploration of hypocrisy as a fundamental human failing with particular dangers in religious contexts. Nearly all the pilgrims demonstrate some gap between their professed values and their actual behavior, but this gap becomes especially problematic for religious figures like the Summoner who claim spiritual authority over others (Benson, 1987). Chaucer uses the Summoner to illustrate how hypocrisy corrupts not only the individual hypocrite but also the institutions they represent and the people subject to their authority. The Summoner’s victims—those who pay bribes, those manipulated into providing information, those falsely accused—all suffer harm because of his hypocritical corruption. This extension of harm beyond the individual sinner distinguishes the Summoner’s moral failings from those of non-religious pilgrims whose vices primarily affect themselves. Through this characterization, Chaucer suggests that while all humans are flawed, those who hold religious authority bear special responsibility because their failures damage both individuals and the broader credibility of spiritual institutions (Strohm, 1989).
What Modern Relevance Does the Summoner’s Characterization Hold?
While rooted in medieval social structures and ecclesiastical institutions that no longer exist in their original forms, Chaucer’s characterization of the Summoner retains significant relevance for contemporary readers. The fundamental dynamics of institutional corruption, abuse of authority, and hypocrisy transcend historical specificity, appearing in various forms across different times and contexts (Pearsall, 1985). Modern readers can recognize in the Summoner the archetype of the corrupt official who exploits their position for personal gain while maintaining a façade of legitimate authority. Whether in religious, governmental, corporate, or other institutional contexts, individuals who use their positions to extract bribes, manipulate vulnerable people, and undermine the very systems they supposedly serve remain a persistent social problem. The Summoner thus serves as a timeless example of how institutional authority can be corrupted when accountability is lacking and when individuals prioritize personal advantage over their responsibilities to others.
Furthermore, the Summoner’s characterization speaks to ongoing debates about institutional reform, accountability, and the relationship between individual character and systemic problems. Chaucer’s nuanced approach—presenting both corrupt figures like the Summoner and virtuous ones like the Parson—suggests that institutions themselves are neither inherently good nor inherently corrupt but rather reflect the character of those who populate them (Cooper, 1996). This perspective remains relevant to contemporary discussions about institutional reform, which must address both systemic incentives that enable corruption and individual character formation that produces either virtuous or corrupt officials. The Summoner reminds modern readers that reforming institutions requires more than simply changing rules or structures; it demands attention to the moral character, training, oversight, and accountability of those who wield institutional authority. In this sense, Chaucer’s fourteenth-century satire continues to offer insight into perennial questions about power, corruption, and the challenge of maintaining institutional integrity (Hornsby, 2003).
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