Plural of bedesman; multiple men employed to pray for benefactors' souls.
Plural of bedesman, formed by adding -en in Middle English (a variant of the -men plural). Both forms derive from bede (prayer) and man.
Almshouses often housed bedesmen who were given rooms, food, and small pensions specifically so they'd pray for their benefactors—it's like a medieval retirement home with mandatory spiritual duties.
Plural default to masculine; obscures presence and contributions of bedeswomen in medieval parish structures.
Specify 'bedeswomen and bedesmen' when discussing mixed groups, or use 'bede officers' to avoid gender assumption.
["bede officers","bede servants","prayer servants"]
Bedeswomen and bedesmen together sustained parochial charity systems; women's labor remains underacknowledged in historical and archaeological literature.
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