Features

Phillipus Baldaeus:the Dutch Missionary who wrote of Ceylon

Published

3 years ago

2023/11/26

By Avishka Mario Senewiratne and Dr. Srilal Fernando

A recent reading of the life and works of the Dutch Minister, Rev. Phillipus Baldaeus reveals a man who fits the phrase “je ne sais quoi”, a quality that cannot be described or named easily. His Magnum Opus, “A True and Exact Description of the Most Celebrated East India Coasts of Malabar and Coromandel. As also the Great Island of Ceylon and the religion of the heathens.” Published in 1672, this work is the first of three great descriptions of Ceylon. The second one by the more famous Robert Knox deals with the interior of the island close to Kandy where he was incarcerated after being taken captive. A third book by Captain Ribeiro called Ceilao was an account of a soldier, of mainly the maritime areas under the Portuguese.

Baldaeus served as a Minister of the Dutch Reformed Church and accompanied the Dutch troops when they captured Jaffna from the Portuguese. He was there from 1658 to 1665 and recorded life in Jaffna, secular and religious buildings. The land, the inhabitants, and their customs are replete with many drawings and maps. A detailed account of the capture and the ensuing military activity, as events prior to and after are included in his book. This brief essay is an attempt to illustrate the life of Baldaeus.

Early Life

Baldaeus was born in 1632 in Delft, Holland. At the age of four, he lost both of his parents to the plague, within the span of just four days. His grandfather cared for Baldaeus till he too died four years later. The care passed onto a relative Robertus Junius, who had served in the overseas missions. It is possible that young Baldaeus was influenced by Robertus to serve in the Ministry. After completing his studies at the Universities of Groningen and Leiden, Baldaeus was appointed Minister of the Dutch Reformed Church at age 21. He married his cousin and embarked for Batavia as a Dutch East India Company employee. (VOC). Unfortunately, his wife died three months after his arrival in Batavia in July 1655.

Missionary in Ceylon

After the capitulation of Colombo to the Dutch in May 1656, Baldaeus was ordered to serve in Ceylon. He married Elizabeth Tribolet on board the ship and arrived in Galle later that year. In both marriages, Baldaeus was childless. He stayed in Galle for one year mainly serving the needs of the Dutch troops and the community.

In January 1658, the Dutch launched a campaign to oust the Portuguese from South India and Northern Ceylon, under the leadership of Ryckloff van Goens (Snr). Baldaeus accompanied the troops as Chaplain. The Sinhalese force led by Mudliyar Don Manoel Andrado and his brother Don Louis Andrado joined the Dutch troops. They captured Tuticorin, and Mannar easily. On the June 21, 1658, Jaffna capitulated. The fleet sailed to Negapatam which surrendered without fighting.

Baldaeus was now appointed Predikant (Minister of the Dutch Reformed Church) of Jaffna. He had the difficult task of converting the Hindus and the many Catholics to the Dutch Reformed Church and managing the church’s affairs. This task was challenging as the Portuguese had ruled the North for over 40 years and Roman Catholicism was widespread. Dutch possessions were owned by the Dutch East India Company, the VOC. Unlike the Catholic Church under the Padroado, the Dutch Reformed Church had to function under the VOC. Baldaeus, like the other predikants were appointed by the VOC. So was another grade of clergy lower than the predikants who had to work in the parish and minister to the sick. Baldaeus had to deal with a large number of Catholics who had at one time had nearly forty priests ministering to them. All the Catholic churches and schools were vested in the Dutch Reformed Church.

Work in Jaffna

The predikant had a strong influence on the population. He could appoint schoolmasters. They could impose fines for non-attendance. The locals were required to attend. These fines were a source of income for the schools. They performed other functions such as recording births and marriages and keeping records of the Thômbos. Baldaeus was astute and a hard worker. He acquired a knowledge of Tamil and Portuguese so that he could listen to and speak with locals in their own tongue. He also preached in these languages. Later, he compiled books in these languages so that native proponents and schoolmasters could address the masses widely.

The first such book was “The Principal Precepts of our Religion”. Upon being approved by the Governor-General and Council of India as well as the Governor of Ceylon in 1659, this book was widely used in the Churches of Jaffna, Mannar, Galle, Negombo, Galle and Matara. He toiled by himself in these tasks for three years with only local assistants. Then two aides, Joannes A’ Breyl and Joannes Donker were appointed to assist him. Even with this help, the tasks were overwhelming as he had to preach three times on Sunday and once on weekdays, apart from his frequent visitations.

In 1661, Baldaeus again accompanied Ryckloff van Goens Sr. and his troops to take over Portuguese possessions on the Malabar coast. Wouter Schouten, a surgeon attached to the Dutch fleet, in his book “Oost Indische Voyagin”, records the presence of Baldaeus whom he refers to as “the pious predikant, a man faithful, zealous and unwearied in the work of the Lord”. Schouten also states that he visited and gave great comfort to the wounded. Hearing about the work of Baldaeus, Johan Maatsuycker, the Governor General of Netherlands India, wrote him a congratulatory letter. It is said that Baldaeus carried out his duties with extreme diligence.

After this brief interruption, he successfully continued his work in Jaffna. He reports the presence of over 15,000 children attending schools in Jaffna, over 62,000 Christians with many baptisms and marriages taking place. Nevertheless, these efforts were not totally fruitful as many would re-convert to their native faith of Hinduism or Catholicism. Seventy years later, the German traveller Johan Wolfgang Heydt commented the following on Baldaeus:

“I for my part have never seen any such great zeal among the local folk… In truth, Herr Baldaeus would wonder greatly should come today to these parts.”

By 1662, Baldaeus had learnt Sanskrit as well as studied Hinduism. All this he did to fathom the culture and traditions of the land he worked. Baldaeus truly loved the East, especially Ceylon. Baldaeus, though anti-Catholic, admired the methods of faith propagation by the Portuguese Catholic missionaries. He emulated them as much as he could. However, with the lack of predikants and the lack of enthusiasm, the faith of the Dutch Reformed Church did not make a sound impact in Ceylon as the Catholics. However, Baldaeus’ translation of the Lord’s Prayer to the Tamil language, although guilty of a few errors, was remarkable as the first treatise printed in Europe of any Indian language.

Challenges with the VOC

With the passing of time, he was increasingly dissatisfied with the VOC for their miserly attitude to dispensing funds, and the failure to obtain more clergy to maintain and expand the work he was doing. Unlike the Catholic missionaries who considered the Portuguese regime a separate entity, working independently yet with their protection, the Dutch missionaries were under the VOC; and employed by them. Thus, their hands were tied. Baldaeus clamoured for change. The final straw was when the authority to inspect schools was removed from the predikants and handed over to lay officials. Thus, in 1665 Baldaeus applied to Batavia for release from his duties.

As the Government of Ceylon was short of predikants, they requested Baldaeus to stay for another two years. However, he refused this request. As a result, Governor Ryckloff Van Goens Sr. was angered. He considered this refusal as an affront to the dignity and authority of the government and nearly alleged Baldaeus of financial misdeeds baselessly. Accordingly, Van Goens sent Baldaeus off in haste on the next ship to Europe. This was the inglorious end of the glorious mission in the East, of the zealous missionary, Philipus Baldaeus. He served over 10 years in the East, of which nine were in Ceylon.

Back in Europe – the final phase

After spending three months in the Cape of Good Hope Baldaeus reached Holland in 1666. Little is known about his activities in the next two years, and it can be presumed that he was working on his book on the subject of his experience of the East. He may have settled in the Hague in the late 1660s. However, through the dedication of his book, it is known that he took part in a Thanksgiving service at the Hague to celebrate the victory of Admiral de Ruyter at Chatham.

In 1669 he was appointed predikant in a small town in Holland and remained there until his death three years later. The cause or date of the death of Baldaeus is not known for sure. It is predicted that he passed away either in 1671 or 1672.

Baldaeus’ Tree

Baldaeus claims that the Church of Pariture was the finest in Point Pedro. The Dutch built a fort there which encompassed the Church and a certain tamarind tree. Baldaeus commented on it as follows: “The church was much decayed, but has been repaired of late. Just before the church stands a tall tamarind tree, under which, as it affords a very agreeable shadow in the heat of the day…”. Nearly a century after Baldaeus left Ceylon, Fredrick Schwartz a Danish missionary, made an effort to track this tree, under which the late revered preacher had preached his sermons. Later in 1906, a stone slab was set to commemorate this occasion.

Baldaeus Tree
1658
Visited by Schwartz
5^th September 1760

Though the slab still remains, the celebrated tree which had a circumference of approximately 15m at the base of the trunk and 22m at the crown, was blown over by a cyclone in 1952. The church there was demolished much earlier. However, a few fragments of the fort still linger.

The book

It is widely believed that Baldaeus spent his last few years writing this monumental work on the East, with a special emphasis on Ceylon. He was able to see this work being printed in 1671, a few months before his death at 39. The book printed in folio form is divided into three sections:

· Detailed description of the East Indian coast or of Lagoon areas of Malabar and Coromandel (includes: “short guide to the time sophisticated language arts”)

· Description of the great and famous island of Ceylon

· Abgotterey of the East Indian heathen. A truthful and detailed description of the worship of the Hindus and Hindu idols.

Each of these sections had a separate title page and pagination. The section on Ceylon counts to 240 pages, with eight unnumbered pages (These pages were printed after the main section was printed but before the publishing). This section also includes 57 illustrated engravings and 11 double-page prints containing maps and views of the main cities of Ceylon. The book also contains the portraits of Baldaeus and General Gerard Hulft, engraved by the well-known artist Blooteling, based on portraits drawn by Syldervelt and Govaart Flinck.

S.D. Saparamadu

With regard to the section on Ceylon, the first forty chapters are details of the events before 1656, which Baldaeus referred to from the Portuguese authors before his day. The first Chapter is a general description of the island, whereas chapters two to seven speak of the events of the arrival of the Portuguese to the Dutch visits in the early 17^th century. The next 32 chapters speak of the arrival of the Dutch till its capture of the Coastal region in 1656. Many scholars have considered this section as important though it is guilty of certain inaccuracies. It is a great book of reference to the scholar and student of history as well as the general reader interested in the affairs of Ceylon for it is all too important in every aspect it has been written.

The last ten chapters illustrate Baldaeus’ own observation and experience as a visitor of the island. His work as a Predikant is highlighted in this aspect. These ten chapters are useful for understanding the workings of the common men and women in Jaffna, which are not recorded in other sources. Baldaeus however is faulty of his biases like any other author. Firstly, he is a Dutch Imperialist. Secondly, after all, he is a Minister of the Dutch Reformed Church and is highly biased toward his own faith and is in antipathy with the indigenous faiths. These facts are not ambiguous in his writings and even the average reader can notice them. Dr. P. J. Veth comments on Baldaeus as follows:

“The style of Baldaeus is not free from faults; his construction of sentences is often faulty, and his mode of expression is not always exact. But nevertheless, that style is deserving of high praise, when we contrast it with the manner of most of the writers of his time, at which our language even by the most able men, as a rule so badly written and disfigured by the use of so many useless foreign words.”

Nearly 250 years later, the eminent historian, Donald Ferguson critically analyzed this work in the Ceylon Literary Register of 1936. In order to understand the era of Baldaeus in a much more comprehensive way, Prof. K.W. Goonewardena’s The Foundation of Dutch Power in Ceylon 1638-1658 (1958) and Prof. Sinnappah Arasaratnam’s The Dutch Power in Ceylon 1658-1687 (1958) are essential reading material. Reading these monologues along with Baldaeus gives a better perspective on the period in question.

The Translations

The 1672 first version of Baldaeus’ work was written and printed in Dutch. The publishers of this monumental work were Johannes Janssonius Van Waasberge and Johannes Van Someren in Amsterdam. The ‘privilegie’ or copyright was signed by Johann de Witt and Herbert Van Beaumont dated March 18, 1669. The book was dedicated to Cornelius de Witt, a Dutch political and Naval commander. After the book was printed in Holland, a German version was printed by the same publishers in 1672 as well. On the title page of this version, it is stated that it was “Carefully translated”. However, despite the assurance of the publishers, the translation was not a very accurate one as the translator was ignorant of many oriental terms.

It was using this German version that the first English translation by Churchill’s in England was translated. It went under one section of Churchill’s Collection of Voyages and Travels. However, as expected this translation made the obvious mistakes the German one made. In the later 19^th century, Pieter Brohier translated certain portions of Baldaeus’ work and published it in the form of a pamphlet. Later his great-grandson, Dr. R.L. Brohier republished this in the Dutch Burgher Union Journal from 1956 to 1959 as well abridged version.

When S.D. Saparamadu of Tisara Prakasakayo and Ceylon Historical Journal fame contemplated publishing a sound translation of Baldaeus’ text, Lyn Fonseka of the Colombo Museum Library informed him of another unpublished full translation by Pieter Brohier. Fortunately, the once-misplaced manuscript had been identified among several anonymously written papers in the library of the Royal Asiatic Society.

These letters were donated to the RAS by Advocate Weinman in 1897. Pieter Brohier who was born in 1792 and lived most of his life under the British had a sound knowledge of “High Dutch” as well as English. This paved the way for an excellent translation. However, Fr. S.G. Perera SJ, upon referring to the manuscript pointed out a few shortcomings.

He recommended changing the style of the language as well as maintaining the original Dutch names of various places. Realizing the importance of this unpublished manuscript, Saparamadu printed and published it for the first time in 1960. He made several changes as recommended by Fr. Perera and thus a new glossary was introduced by C.W. Nicholas pointing out the names and what they meant. This publication mooted under the able workmanship of S.D. Saparamadu is a phenomenal contribution to Sri Lankan history. Baldaeus’ legacy was sealed!

References

Ferguson, D.,
Prof. K.W. Goonewardena’s The Foundation of Dutch Power in Ceylon 1638-1658 (1958) and Prof. Sinnappah Arasaratnam’s The Dutch Power in Ceylon 1658-1687 (1958)
Saparamadu, S.D.,
Pierersz, S., (1908)

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Combining local resources,traditional knowledge and science to build a food-secure Sri Lanka

Published

13 hours ago

2026/10/16

Thilina Walpola

World Food Day 2026: Innovating today for a better food future

by Dr. Kaushalya Wijayasekara

What will be on the Sri Lankan dinner table ten years from now? Will our children be able to get nutritious food at a price their families can afford? Will farmers be able to grow enough despite changing weather and rising costs? And how much of the food we produce will actually reach the consumer, instead of being lost or wasted along the way?

These questions can’t wait. A farmer faces unpredictable weather. A family faces rising food costs. Fruit goes unsold after a good harvest. Some children do not get enough nutrition. The future of food is tied to the future of Sri Lanka itself.

World Food Day 2026 is a chance to look beyond the immediate problems and ask whether we can build a food system that feeds our people well, gives farmers better opportunities, protects the environment and makes better use of what we already have. The answer can be yes, but we will have to think differently.

We are not starting from zero. Sri Lanka has diverse crops, fisheries, traditional food knowledge, indigenous varieties, research institutions, universities and a young generation able to create new solutions. What we need is to bring these together and act. Producing more will not secure our food future on its own. It will depend on how intelligently we produce, process, preserve, distribute and consume food.

Making more of what we already have

Innovation does not always mean inventing something new. Often it means finding better uses for the resources we have.

Sri Lanka grows traditional rice varieties, kurakkan, green gram, cowpea, jackfruit, breadfruit, cassava, sweet potato, coconut and palmyrah. All of them have great potential for modern, nutritious, value-added foods. Jackfruit and breadfruit can be made into flour and other convenient products. Traditional rice varieties can go into new foods that suit changing consumer needs. Palmyrah, with its strong cultural heritage, can create new income through better processing, packaging, quality assurance and market development.

The aim is to connect our traditional food knowledge with modern consumer needs and technology, while keeping our food heritage.

Stop wasting the food we produce

Reducing food loss and waste should be a major priority. Seasonal fruits such as mango, banana, papaya and pineapple can be lost in large quantities when production exceeds demand or when storage, transport and processing facilities are inadequate. With suitable technology, these fruits can become dried products, pulps, powders, beverages and other shelf-stable foods.

Agricultural and fisheries by-products are resources too. They could be turned into food ingredients, animal feed, bio-based products and other useful materials, which would move us toward a more circular food economy.

Technology alone is not enough. We need stronger local processing facilities, cold storage, efficient transport, collection centres and market information systems, especially close to where food is produced. Cutting food loss raises the value of what our farmers and fishers already produce.

Nutrition and food safety come first

Food security means more than having enough food. People also need food that is safe and nutritious.

Sri Lanka can develop affordable, nutritious foods from local pulses, grains, vegetables, fruits and fish. Children and other vulnerable groups should get particular attention. Schoolchildren in particular deserve a focus: safe, nutritious, locally sourced products for school feeding programs would support child nutrition, local farmers and domestic food industries at the same time.

Food safety must stay at the centre of food innovation. Good hygiene, quality control, laboratory testing, traceability and appropriate food safety systems are what make new products safe as well as attractive and nutritious.

A food system that can cope with climate change

Climate change is already affecting agricultural production, water availability, crop yields and food prices. We need food systems that can handle changing conditions. That means climate-resilient crops, efficient water use, soil and water conservation, better storage and resource-efficient food processing.

Traditional knowledge matters here. Generations of Sri Lankan farmers have developed practices suited to local climates and ecosystems. Combining that experience with modern science can give us solutions that fit local conditions and are sustainable. Technology alone will not build the future of food. Science, experience and local knowledge together can.

Give young people a bigger role

Sri Lanka’s universities have an important part to play in shaping our food future. Young people should be encouraged to identify real problems in the food system and work on practical solutions in areas such as food waste, sustainable packaging, nutrition, food safety, modernising traditional foods and digital technologies.

A good research project should not always end as a research paper. Where appropriate, research should be supported to move on to products, technologies, enterprises and community solutions. That needs stronger partnerships between universities and industry, along with mentoring, research funding, business support and market connections. If young researchers and entrepreneurs can turn their ideas into viable food innovations, both consumers and producers will benefit.

A pathway designed for Sri Lanka

We do not need to copy food-system models from other countries. We can build a pathway that suits our own resources, culture and needs. It would bring together local resources, traditional knowledge, scientific research, appropriate technology and entrepreneurship, with farmers, fishers, universities, research institutions, food industries, entrepreneurs and policymakers working side by side.

The goal goes beyond selling raw materials. We need to create more value, reduce waste, improve nutrition, generate jobs and strengthen rural livelihoods. This matters especially for small and medium-scale food enterprises, which can drive local economic development when they get the right technical, financial and market support.

The choices we make today

The food future will not create itself. It will be shaped by what we grow, what we research, what we process, what we consume and what we choose not to waste.

So, the question for World Food Day 2026 is this: what can we do today so that every Sri Lankan has safe, nutritious, affordable and sustainable food tomorrow?

The answers are already around us, in our farms, fisheries, food businesses, universities, laboratories and communities. We have the resources, the traditional knowledge, the scientific expertise and talented young people. What we need now is to connect them and act.

A better food future begins with the choices we make today.

Dr. Kaushalya Wijayasekara

Senior Lecturer, Department of Biosystems Technology, Faculty of Technology, University of Ruhuna

Features

20th Anniversary of Digampathana blast – the day Sri Lanka Navy cried

Published

13 hours ago

2026/10/16

Thilina Walpola

Aftermath of the terror attack

By Admiral Ravindra C Wijegunaratne
WV, RWP and Bar, RSP, VSV, USP, NI (M) (Pakistan), ndc, psn, Bsc
(Hons) (War Studies) (Karachi) MPhil (Madras)
Former Navy Commander and Former Chief of Defence Staff
Former Chairman, Trincomalee Petroleum Terminals Ltd
Former Managing Director Ceylon Petroleum Corporation
Former High Commissioner to Pakistan

The Digampathana suicide truck attack on 16th October 2006 remains the deadliest single strike in Sri Lanka Navy history, leaving scars that time cannot erase.

It was a seemingly ordinary Monday morning on 16 October 2006, but the calm of that day would soon be shattered in a way none of us could have imagined. As the Commandant of the Naval and Maritime Academy and Flag Officer Commanding Naval Fleet at Trincomalee, I was aware that a number of my cadets were travelling that morning, part of a convoy of fifteen buses carrying naval personnel from Trincomalee, Colombo, and other bases, heading toward Dambulla to rendezvous with another group. The convoy also included trucks and escort vehicles, a routine movement planned and coordinated with the army to ensure the roads were clear. The morning started quietly. Some personnel greeted friends, handed over their weapons, or strolled to a nearby tea shop. It all seemed so ordinary—too ordinary for what would come next.

Sri Lanka Navy sunk LTTE Ships carrying arms, ammunition and warlike materials thousand miles away from Sri Lanka in Indian Ocean in September and October 2007.

By late morning, both convoys had reached the small ground at Digampathana, near the Sigiriya junction, and personnel mingled briefly, unaware that a carefully orchestrated act of terror was waiting. Then, suddenly, an empty half-truck veered directly into the convoy. It exploded with a ferocity I can still recall as if it were yesterday. Nuts, bolts, and high explosives tore through the air. Pandemonium erupted instantly. I later learned that 107 of our naval personnel were killed on the spot and another 153 critically injured. The scene was indescribable—bodies scattered, vehicles mangled, personal effects strewn across the ground. I remember later hearing that the head of the suicide bomber was recovered more than 100 meters away from the blast, a grim testament to the sheer force of the explosion.

I was in my office at the Naval and Maritime Academy when my mobile phone rang. A young midshipman from the 21st intake called, his voice trembling: “Sir, there was a huge explosion at the convoy point! Many are dead … my batch mate Wijesundara is among them.” I immediately jumped into my jeep with my escort Chief Petty Officer and driver and rushed to Digampathana, relying on every ounce of my driving skill to reach the scene. The journey, which usually took little more than an hour, felt endless that day, each passing mile weighed down by dread.

When I arrived, I was confronted with a sight that no training can prepare you for. The injured were being rushed to Dambulla Hospital, where doctors and nurses worked tirelessly, improvising in ways that saved lives despite the overwhelming chaos. I went back to the site after visiting the hospital. The remains of our naval personnel were scattered across the ground, and someone had begun collecting weapons and protective gear. I immediately contacted Surgeon Rear Admiral Nico Jayasekara and received his instructions: collect all body parts in separate bags and transport them to the Trincomalee Naval Hospital mortuary. This gruesome work had to be done with care and dignity, and it filled the icebox in my vehicle. Through DNA testing initiated by Rear Admiral Nico, we were able to identify every naval personnel lost that day, bringing some closure to grieving families.

The Navy Commander at the time, Vice Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda, was devastated. I had worked closely with him and knew how deeply he cared for his men. He ensured that the fallen were honoured with full ceremonial naval funerals at Welisara Naval Base, attended by families and comrades. Sixty-seven funerals were conducted in a single day—a number that still haunts me.

The Digampathana attack remains the largest single loss of naval life in our history. It was a day of sorrow, but also a day that reinforced our resolve. The tragedy galvanized the Navy to target the LTTE Sea Tiger wing with renewed determination and reshaped our maritime operations forever. Every time I think of that day, I remember not just the lives lost, but the courage, professionalism, and dedication of those who survived, those who treated the injured, and those who ensured the fallen were honored properly. May the souls of our naval hero’s rest in peace, their sacrifice guiding us and inspiring generations of naval personnel to come.

Features

‘Murder at Whitby Abbey’

Published

13 hours ago

2026/10/16

Thilina Walpola

Tales of Mystery and Suspense – 24

I was intrigued by the title of a book I found in a book drop at the condominium of a friend, Murder at Whitby Abbey, and I brought it home with me though I will not be able to return it in the near future. It was described on the cover page as ‘a standout in the crowded medieval mystery field’, though I fear I do not know of other books in this field, apart from the Cadfael series, which I have dealt with earlier.

The book, by Cassandra Clark, is set during the reign of Richard II and has as a backdrop his precarious position, which led to his being replaced, and murdered, by his cousin Henry, who reigned as Henry IV. It is a gloomy book, the action taking place in the twelve days of Christmas leading up to the Epiphany. And the gloom is pervasive, even though this is supposed to be a time of festivity, with mummers performing, and many of those in the guest house where the heroine stays going to town to enjoy themselves, with much drinking and much music, which also fills the guesthouse.

The heroine Hildegarde is a nun, sent to try to acquire a relic being sold by Whitby Abbey, though this was also a penance set by the Abbot of the monastery that governed her abbess because she had had sex with a man. Soon after she and her companions reach the Abbey set high on a cliff, she finds that there are other bidders, and soon suspects that the hierarchy, not perhaps the Abbot who seems a weakling, but his rapacious bursar, is determined to make money, and not above creating false relics to sell to several aspirants.

After Hildegarde and her Cistercian companions – Whitby is a Benedictine Foundation – two monks, Gregory and Egbert, and a young priest Mark, reach the abbey, they find that Aelwyn, a monk they had met on their way to the guesthouse had died. This was in the apple store, and they realize, when they find the surplices of novices stuffed into the air vents, that he had been left to suffocate in the overwhelming scent of apples.

Clark

The Cistercians are asked to look into the death, perhaps because they are likely to get no cooperation from the Abbey folk, but perhaps because those in charge are keen to know what happened. And the infirmarer, an old monk, suggests Hildegarde talk to a man called Edred who worked for the bursar, and had been a friend of Aelwyn’s. But Edred too is killed, before he can keep an appointment he had made with Hildegarde, drowned in a pool near the farmhouse of the Abbey.

Meanwhile tensions arise between the fisherfolk and the abbey for the bursar wants to charge them for using the beach that technically belongs to the abbey to dry their fish and their nets. This leads to physical battles, when the guards used by the abbey, under the command it seems of the bursar whose determination to make money is not resisted by the abbot and the prior, try to storm the area where the fishermen live.

Hildegard finds out more about what had happened through two youngsters, one of whom Torold is the son of Aelwyn by a woman who worked as a prostitute for a cartel, and with whom Mark fell in love. The other works on the farm and had seen Edred meet someone near the pool, after which that someone left the place by himself. And the boy had also found in the pool a sort of dagger with the seal of the abbey.

He and his dog, and Torold who follows her, rescue Hildegarde from a man at arms who has waylaid her and tries to rape her earlier. Escaping into the abbey she was nearly been raped then by the bursar, but she managed to escape, in the process setting fire to him and the muniments room, which led, when he was rescued, to the discovery of a box with the money he said had been stolen, blame being cast on both Aelwyn and Edred.

Matters come to a head when the fisherfolk try to storm the abbey, being resisted by the men at arms stationed on the towers. But then Hildegarde realizes that behind the murders was the bursar’s clerk, whom she pursued to the cathedral. There is great drama then as she escapes from him when he tries to kill her, and then from the man at arms who had tried to both rape and kill her, but they both fall from the scaffolding she had climbed, the latter coming from a tower where he had been stationed.

Both of them think they run the rapacity of the abbey, the latter claiming to work for the nobles opposed to Richard, who is presented throughout the book as devoted to his subjects, not to power or money. But though the villains die, the bursar continues, having got over the hysteria the fire had caused and his acknowledgment then of guilt – and though the abbot and the prior seem less vicious, whether they will be able to assert themselves is questionable.

Before the climax, when the others in the guesthouse were leaving, Hildegarde found that two of them were in possession of the relic, for which they seem to have paid well. Hildegarde herself had made a derisory offer, but before she leaves the abbot gives her the relic, perhaps in gratitude for what she and her fellow Cistercians had discovered, the abbey having made as much money as it needed and more from the gullible other buyers.

Mark’s inamorata is saved from the stews because she moves in with Edred’s widow whom the bursar had thrown out of the rooms he occupied when her husband was found dead. Hildegarde had paid for lodgings, in a house run by the man who ran the brothels, but he had a kindly side and was going to finance them to make nets for the fishermen.

So, the Cistercians set off for their home as swiftly as they can to get there on the day of the Epiphany, having stopped en route to pray for King Richard whose birthday it was.