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Haemerken.[1] His parents (John and Gertrude) were in humble circumstances. He was born in 1380, and had a brother, John, fifteen years older than himself. Soon after his birth his brother left Kempen, and a few years later joined the "Brotherhood of the Common Life " [2] at Deventer. When
- ↑ The Latin form of the name is Malleolus; englished it would be "Little-hammer." John Haemerken the elder is believed to have been a worker in metal, and he was probably also known as John Hamer. In the monastery chronicles Thomas's elder brother is not called Haemerken, but is referred to as "John Hamer," "John Hamer de Kempis," "John a Kempis," "John Kempis," or "John Kempen."
- ↑ The "Brotherhood of the Common Life," founded by Gerhard Groot, was approved by Pope Gregory XI in A.D. 1376. Its principles were that, although its members should not be bound by perpetual vows, they should live in obedience and chastity, should have everything in common, should earn their own livelihood, and should spend their leisure in prayer and in works of charity. When dying (of the plague) in 1384, Gerhard Groot named riorentius Radewyn as his successor, and advised the adoption by the Brotherhood of the rule of the Canons Regular of St. Augustine, with a condition that those only should be admitted to the Order who were prepared to work for their living. Effect was given without delay to these instructions; and in 1 387 a monastery was founded at Windesheim, a place lying about four miles to the south of Zwolle (the now chief town of the province of Overyssel) in the diocese of Utrecht. Two new Houses and one already existing Augustinian foundation soon placed themselves under the jurisdiction of the Prior of Windesheim; and in A.D. 1395 the Windesheim community was by Pope Boniface IX constituted an autonomous congregation, to which convents in other dioceses might associate themselves. The Augustinian canons of Holland, Germany, and the north of France largely availed themselves of this permission, with the result that, by the absorption of existing foundations, and the establishment of new (of which Agnetenberg was among the chief)} the Windesheim congregation numbered in the early days of the sixteenth century more than eighty affiliated Houses of men and women. There was also another branch of the Brotherhood (chiefly lay and educational) with its headquarters at Deventer. Both branches suffered greatly in the troublous times of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and at the close of the eighteenth century only one House of each branch was in existence. Both were suppressed by a decree of the Emperor Napoleon I, dated 14 November, 181 1. The last surviving brother died at Zevenaar in 1854.
