Brother Cadfael: The Hermit of Eyton Forest Online Trivia | Literature

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. The Abbot was concerned that if he let Richard go to his father's funeral alone, Dame Dionesia would keep the boy at the manor. Other then Brother Cadfael, whom did the Abbot send with Richard to the funeral?

Answer: Brother Anselm and Brother Paul

Brother Paul, as master to the boys, and Brother Anselm accompanied Richard to his father's funeral along with Brother Cadfael. This prevented Dame Dionesia from keeping the boy at the manor against his father's final wishes.

Brother Robert should actually be Prior Robert and Brother Jerome is his aide. Brother Edmund runs the infirmary, Brother Porter mans the gate and Brother Urien is a scribe who isn't actually mentioned in this book. He is mentioned in the next book in the series, "The Confession of Brother Haluin".

2. Dame Dionesia was determined to get her grandson, Richard, away from the Abbot. When the Abbot refused to let Richard leave with the steward sent by his grandmother, what gift did Dame Dionesia send to try and convince Richard to stay with her?

Answer: A pony

On the day of the funeral, Dame Dionesia sent a groom with a Welsh pony for Richard in an attempt to lure him home. She also tried to convince the Brothers who had accompanied Richard to let him stay with her for the night but Brother Paul politely declined and insisted that it was his duty to see Richard safely back to the Abbey.

3. Dame Dionesia wanted to get Richard home so she could force him to marry a girl of her choosing. This girl was the daughter of Dame Dionesia's neighbours and she didn't want to marry Richard either. What was the girl's name?

Answer: Hiltrude

Hiltrude Astley was in love with her father's steward and had no desire to marry Richard Ludel. Richard was taken by force in the forest and kept locked up until he agreed to marry Hiltrude. In the end both agreed to the marriage but only because they knew something their guardians didn't!

4. Eilmund the forester, who cares for the abbey's lands, came to the abbey complaining of practical jokes being played on him, including blocking the drainage ditch and allowing deer to get into the coppice of young trees. One of these tricks went too far and Eilmund was injured. How was Eilmund injured?

Answer: A tree slipped and fell on him

Eilmund the forester tended the abbey coppice diligently. He got annoyed when someone played some tricks on him resulting in deer and sheep getting into the coppice and eating the young stems. While he was trying to shore up an undercut bank a tree slipped and landed on him, breaking his leg.

Coppicing is the process of cutting back young trees almost to the ground so that more shoots can grow. These young shoots can be used for many things and coppicing can keep a tree in its juvenile state for hundreds of years.

5. Shrewsbury Abbey has sheltered many guests in its time but not all were travellers just passing through town. Drogo Bosiet was one who came to Shrewsbury with a purpose in mind. Why did Drogo Bosiet come to Shrewsbury?

Answer: He was hunting a runaway villein

Drogo Bosiet came to Shrewsbury to hunt down a villein (serf) who had struck his steward and run away. By law, if the villein made it to a city and lived there for a year he/she was free of their lord and could make their own way in life.

Drogo Bosiet did not come to bury his son but when the son, Aymer, arrived in Shrewsbury he learned that he now had to bury his father who had been found murdered in the forest. Drogo Bosiet died without having the chance to make a final confession.

6. Some of the characters in this story use an alias to hide their true identity. One of these characters is the hermit's companion. What was this companion's original name?

Answer: Brand

Brand was Drogo Bosiet's villein. He ran away after an altercation with Bosiet's steward. He met the hermit and took the name Hyacinth to hide himself. Hyacinth was suspected of his Lord's murder but Richard got warning to him before the Sheriff's men came, therefore saving him from being hanged.

7. Young Richard Ludel, now Lord of Eaton, was kidnapped while on his way home to the Abbey. His grandmother, Dame Dionesia, wanted him to marry a neighbour's daughter. Richard didn't want to marry her but in the end he submitted because he believed the marriage unbinding. Why did Richard believe he was not married?

Answer: The hermit was not a priest

On his return to the Abbey after his escape, Richard denied being married because the hermit's companion had whispered through the shutters to him that the hermit who conducted the service was not a priest. A marriage conducted by someone who isn't ordained as a priest is not a marriage at all. Dame Dionesia and her neighbour, Fulke Astley, believed in good faith that the hermit was an ordained priest.

They got a considerable shock upon discovering that he wasn't.

8. In this story Brother Cadfael again leaves his herbarium to try to solve a murder or two. The first murder victim set out to find his missing villein and was next seen lying face down in Eyton forest with a stab wound in his back. Who murdered Drogo Bosiet?

Answer: Cuthred

The hermit Cuthred murdered Drogo Bosiet because Bosiet recognised him as the same man he had seen in a different town, with a different occupation, only a few weeks before. Cuthred panicked in case Bosiet reveal to someone the truth about him, so he killed Bosiet and tried to make it look as if thieves attacked him.

9. Here is another question about a character using an alias. What was the hermit's original name?

Answer: Renaud Bourchier

The hermit was really a knight, once of the Empress Maud's service, named Renaud Bourchier. He left Oxford with jewels belonging to the Empress and a message to her good friend Brian FitzCount. Instead of delivering the message, Bourchier stole the jewels and let his horse loose with a blood stained saddle blanket and saddlebags slit open so people would think he had been murdered.

He then took on Hyacinth and turned himself into Cuthred the hermit.

10. When the Abbot, Hugh Beringar, and Brother Cadfael went to visit the hermit to solve the problem of whether or not Richard was legitimately married, they discovered that a second murder had occurred. Who killed the hermit?

Answer: Rafe de Genville

Rafe de Genville, a supporter of Empress Maud, recognised Cuthred the Hermit as really being Renaud Bourchier who had betrayed Empress Maud, stealing her jewellery and the note to be carried to Brian FitzCount asking for aid in Oxford. Upon recognising Cuthred, Rafe challenged him to a fight to the death. Rafe put aside his sword, as Cuthred had none, and the fought with daggers until Rafe stabbed Cuthred, killing him.

Thank-you for taking the time to do my quiz.

Source: Author tigergirl04

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Brother Cadfael: The Hermit of Eyton Forest Quiz

Ellis Peters' "The Hermit of Eyton Forest" is a brilliant book with lots of unexpected twists and turns. Brother Cadfael at his finest.

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