Forms: α. 3–7 covent, (3 kuuent), 5–6 covente, 5 couvent; β. 6– convent. [ME. a. AF. covent, cuvent, couvent = OF. convent, mod.F. couvent = Pr. covent, Cat. couvent, Sp. and It. convento:—L. convent-um (u-stem) assembly, company, f. convenīre to come together, CONVENE. In OF. usually spelt convent, but already in 16th c. pronounced couvent, to which the spelling was conformed in the Academy’s Dict. after the first ed. In England on the contrary the latinized spelling convent was introduced c. 1550, and by c. 1650 superseded the M.E. form; the latter remains in Covent Garden. Cotgr. 1611 has ‘convent, a couent’; mod.F. dictionaries have couvent, a convent.]
† 1. An assemblage or gathering of persons; a number met together for some common purpose; an assembly, meeting, convention, congregation. a.
a. 1300. Cursor M., 18349 (Cott.). Þan cried dauid wit steuen strang … Þan ansuerd all þat clene couent.
1382. Wyclif, Ps. lxiii. 3 [lxiv. 2]. Thou hast defendid me fro the couent of warieris. Ibid. (1382), Jas. ii. 2. If ther shal entre in to ȝoure couent, or gedering to gydere, a man, [etc.].
1484. Caxton, Curiall, 9. The courte is a couente of peple that vnder fayntyse of comyn wele assemble hem to-gydre.
1565. Jewel, Def. Apol. (1611), 27. As for your Councell of Trident, God wot, it was a silly Couent.
1625. Bp. Mountagu, App. Cæsar., i. 7. A classical Dictator amongst the Covent.
β. a. 1534. trans. Pol. Verg. Eng. Hist., I. 47. Throughe the recours and convents of merchants.
1590. Greene, Mourn. Garm. (1616), 21. The King, fearing some man-slaughter would grow vpon these amorous conuents, and that Rosamond like a second Helena would cause the ruine of Thessaly.
1652. Gaule, Magastrom., 352. In the convent of other witches.
1661. Bramhall, Just Vind., ix. 247. We believe that Conuent of Trent to haue been … no lawfull Councel.
† b. transf. of things. Obs.
1578. Banister, Hist. Man, I. 16. As touchyng the conuent of Veynes and Arteries, within the inner scope … of the head.
† 2. A company; spec. the company of the twelve apostles; cf. 3 b. Obs.
1426. Audelay, Poems, 21. When he dyd wesche hem, And knelud lowly apon his knen to-fore his blessid covent.
1526. Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W., 1531), 266 b. The poore vnlerned fysshers, Peter, John, Andrewe, and James, and the resydue of ye holy couent. Ibid., 284. His couent the holy apostles.
1548. Udall, etc., Erasm. Par. John, 105 b. Neuer one of his couente or felowship hath perished excepte one.
3. A company of men or women living together in the discipline of a religious order and under one superior; a body of monks, friars, or nuns forming one local community.
Often applied to the brethren or sisters exclusively of the superior.
α. c. 1290. S. Eng. Leg., I. 71/25. Seint Wolston … was imaked prior of þat hous … his Couent he wuste swyþe wel and to alle guodnesse hem drouȝ.
c. 1300. St. Brandan, 267. Tho seȝe hi come a fair covent, and a croice tofore hem bere.
c. 1386. Chaucer, Prioress’ T., 185. Thabbot with his couent hath sped him for to burie him ful fast.
c. 1400. Maundev. (1839), xx. 210. Euery day, whan the covent of this Abbeye hath eten.
1513. Bradshaw, St. Werburge, I. 1514. Saynt Audry, than abbesse, toke her holy couent And mette the sayd kynge.
1613. Shaks., Hen. VIII., IV. ii. 19. The reverend Abbot With all his Covent, honourably receiv’d him.
1636. Prynne, Remonstr. agst. Shipmoney, 7. The Abbot without the Covent, the Master of the Colledge without the Fellowes.
a. 1659. Cleveland, Rust. Rampant, Wks. (1687), 466. This … was the answer of the Covent.
β. 1689. Burnet, Tracts, I. 36. He immediately called the Convent together.
† b. A company of twelve (or, including the superior, thirteen) ‘religious’ persons, whether constituting a separate community or a section of a larger one. Obs.
The number is believed to refer to the company of the Apostles with their Master (see sense 2), and was apparently of later introduction into conventual organization. Thorne (14th c.) says of St. Augustine’s, Canterbury, ‘Anno Domini mcxlvi. iste Hugo reparavit antiquum numerum monachorum istius monasterii, et erant lx monachi professi præter abbatem, hoc est, quinque conventus in universo’ (Decem Scriptores, 1652, col. 1807).
c. 1290. S. Eng. Leg., I. 286/304. A frere prechur of boloygne … hadde a couent of freres … his twelf freres bi-fore him comen, him-seolf was þe þretteþe.
c. 1386. Chaucer, Sompn. T., 550 (Harl. MS.). And bring me xij freres wit ȝe why For þrettene is a couent as I gesse [so 4 texts: Ellesm. & Lansd. For twelue is a Couent as I gesse].
1536. in Strype, Eccl. Mem., I. xxxv. 274. All … houses of religion … whereof the number in any one house is or of late hath been less than a covent, that is to say, under 13 persons.
4. An institution founded for the living together of a number of ‘religious’ persons, monks, friars, nuns, etc.
α. a. 1225. Ancr. R., 12. Þus hit is i kuuent.
1362. Langl., P. Pl., A. XI. 207. Riȝt so be religioun it roileþ and steruiþ, Þat out of couent and cloistre coueiten to libben.
1531. Dial. on Laws Eng., II. xxxvii. (1638), 128. Abbies and Priories, and other houses that have colledge and covent.
1665. J. Webb, Stone-Heng (1725), 95. The Covent of Charity of the Canons regular at Venice.
1679. Hist. Jetzer, 2. He intreated the Fathers … to Receive him into their Covent.
β. a. 1699. Lady Halkett, Autobiog. (1875), 5. Go immediately and putt himselfe in a Conventt.
1708. Swift, Abol. Chr., Wks. 1755, II. I. 91. Convents … which are so many retreats for the speculative, the melancholy, the proud, the silent, the politick, and the morose.
1865. Morning Star, 4 Aug. During the present week a second convent of nuns has been established in the suburbs of York.
1871. Morley, Voltaire (1886), 196. Voltaire often compared the system of life at Berlin … to that of a convent, half military, half literary.
ǁ b. As a translation of Germ. kloster, the name of some Lutheran ecclesiastical corporations, retaining the property and some features of the constitution of pre-Reformation convents.
1762. trans. Busching’s Syst. Geog., VI. 343. The convent consists of a Lutheran abbot, a prior, and four conventuals.
5. The building or set of buildings occupied by such a religious community.
α. 1528. Roy, Rede me (Arb.), 82. Fryers … in coventis whereas they are, Thycke mantels of fryse they weare.
1615. G. Sandys, Trav., 180. Virgins who neuer past the bounds of their Couents.
1641. Milton, Animadv. (1851), 217. The building of Churches, Cloysters, and Covents.
β. 1686. J. S[ergeant], Hist. Monast. Conventions, A vj a. The places … were called Monasteries, Convents, or Cloisters.
1824. W. Irving, T. Trav., II. 104. The white towers of a convent peeped out from among the thick mountain foliage.
1851. Longf., Gold. Leg., 28. Out of his convent of gray stone … Walked the Monk Felix.
6. In senses 4 and 5 the word is often popularly restricted to a convent of women, a nunnery, a convent of men being distinguished as a monastery; but this is not warranted by historical usage.
1795. Trusler, Words esteemed Synonymous, II. 66. Cloister is a general term … Convent is … a religious house for nuns, and monastery for monks or friars.
1814. Stratford de Redcliffe, in S. Lane-Poole, Life (1838), I. 204. Tell me whether I am right in suspecting that San Lucar is a convent, and not a monastery.
1844. Lingard, Anglo-Sax. Ch. (1858), I. v. 196. No woman could obtain permission to come into the monastery of the men; none of the men to come into the convent of the women.
7. Applied to a Buddhist or other non-Christian monastic institution: cf. MONASTERY.
1598. Hakluyt, Voy., I. 115. Their Priests … liue an hundreth or two hundreth of them together in one cloister or couent.
1836. Penny Cycl., V. 532/1. Convents for priests, as well as nunneries, exist in all countries where Buddhism has been introduced.
ǁ 8. An administrative division of a province. Obs. rare–1 [cf. med.L. conventus ‘districtus, diœcesis episcopi’ (Du Cange).]
1658. Ussher, Ann., VI. 594. Pontus … being added to Galatia, and divided into eleven Convents, was called by the name of Bithynia.
9. attrib. and Comb. (in senses 3–5), as convent-cell, -chanting, -crowned, -prayer, -roof, -seal; convent-bred a., educated in a convent or nunnery; † convent-loaf, ? same as chapter-bread.
1886. Q. Rev., April, 529. *Convent-bred demoiselles.
1814. Scott, Ld. of Isles, VI. vi. The cheerless *convent-cell.
1847. Emerson, Poems (1857), 55. *Convent-chanting which the child Hears.
1847. Disraeli, Tancred, IV. xii. The *convent-crowned height.
1856. R. A. Vaughan, Mystics (1860), I. 114. This *convent-founding, convent-ruling business.
1530. Palsgr., 210/1. *Covent lofe, miche [Cotgr., Miche … a fine Manchet, or, particularly, that kind of Manchet which is otherwise tearmed, Pain de chapitre].
1842. Tennyson, St. Agnes’ Eve, 1. Deep on the *convent-roof the snows Are sparkling to the moon. Ibid., 5. The shadows of the *convent-towers.
1538–9. Instruct. Hen. VIII. Visit. Monast. (1886), 14. Whether the *Covent-seal of this House be surely and safely kept.
