The Nobility and Ecclesiastical Patronage in Thirteenth-Century England (Studies in the History of Medieval Religion, 40) [Illustrated] 1843838125, 9781843838128

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DR ELIZABETH GEMMILL is University Lecturer in Local History and Fellow of Kellogg College, University of Oxford.

Series: Studies in the History of Medieval Religion

an imprint of Boydell & Brewer Ltd PO Box 9, Woodbridge IP12 3DF (GB) and 668 Mt Hope Ave, Rochester NY14620-2731 (US)

www.boydellandbrewer.com

THE NOBILITY AND ECCLESIASTICAL PATRONAGE IN THIRTEENTH-CENTURY ENGLAND

ELIZABETH GEMMILL

Cover image: Cloister Hailes Abbey

NOBILITY AND ECCLESIASTICAL PATRONAGE

This book provides the first full-length, integrated study of the ecclesiastical patronage rights of the nobility in medieval England. It examines the nature and extent of these rights, how they were used, why and for whom they were valuable, what challenges lay patrons faced, and how they looked to the future in making gifts to the Church. It takes as its focus the thirteenth century, a critical period for the survival and development of these rights, being a time of ambitious Church reform, of great change in patterns of land ownership in the ranks of the higher nobility, and of bold assertion by the English Crown of its claims to control Church property. The thirteenth century also saw a proliferation of record keeping on the part of kings, bishops and nobility, and the author uses new evidence from a range of documentary sources to explore the nature of the relationships between the English nobility, the Church and its clergy, a relationship in which patronage was the essential feature.

THE

‘While there has been work on the nobility as patrons of monasteries, this is the first real study of them as patrons of parish churches, and is thus the first study to tackle the subject as a whole. Illustrated with a wealth of detail, it will become an indispensable work of reference for those interested in lay patronage and the Church more generally in the middle ages.’ PROFESSOR DAVID CARPENTER, DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY, KING'S COLLEGE LONDON

ELIZABETH GEMMILL

Studies in the History of Medieval Religion VOLUME XL

THE NOBILITY AND ECCLESIASTICAL PATRONAGE IN THIRTEENTH-CENTURY ENGLAND

Studies in the History of Medieval Religion ISSN 0955–2480 Founding Editor Christopher Harper-Bill Series Editor Frances Andrews Previously published titles in the series are listed at the back of this volume

THE NOBILITY AND ECCLESIASTICAL PATRONAGE IN THIRTEENTHCENTURY ENGLAND

Elizabeth Gemmill

THE BOYDELL PRESS

©  Elizabeth Gemmill 2013 All Rights Reserved. Except as permitted under current legislation no part of this work may be photocopied, stored in a retrieval system, published, performed in public, adapted, broadcast, transmitted, recorded or reproduced in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the copyright owner The right of Elizabeth Gemmill to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 First published 2013 The Boydell Press, Woodbridge ISBN 978–1–84383–812–8

The Boydell Press is an imprint of Boydell & Brewer Ltd PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 3DF, UK and of Boydell & Brewer Inc. 668 Mt Hope Avenue, Rochester, NY 14620, USA website: www.boydellandbrewer.com The publisher has no responsibility for the continued existence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Papers used by Boydell & Brewer Ltd are natural, recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests

Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

For Margaret and James, with love.

Contents Acknowledgements ix List of Abbreviations

x

Introduction 1 Part I 1 Ecclesiastical Patronage Rights in the Thirteenth Century 2 The Exercise and Defence of Patronage Rights 3 Jobs for the Boys? Part II 4 Acquisitive Inquisitive Kings 5 Speaking With One Voice 6 Looking to the Future

17 46 68 101 129 149

Conclusion 174 Appendix of Documents

178

Appendix of Magnate Presentations

182

Bibliography 207 Index 223

Andrew, provost of Werden, to Edward I (The National Archives, ref. SC 1/21/51).

Acknowledgements I am grateful to many people – scholars, family and friends – who have helped and supported me in the writing of this book. I am especially indebted to my parents and my husband for their faith in me. I will always be grateful to the late Professor Jeffrey Denton, and to Mr Dennis Bradley and Professor Nicholas Mayhew, for their support, guidance, friendship and advice. The encouragement of Professor Paul Brand and the late Dr Diana Wood has been very much appreciated; and I have drawn great inspiration from colleagues and my students in the Department for Continuing Education at the University of Oxford. I am, finally, delighted to acknowledge the generosity of the Department in providing a contribution towards the cost of publishing this book.

List of Abbreviations BL

The British Library, London

Bodl.

The Bodleian Library, Oxford

Canterbury Institutions Sede Vacante

Calendar of Institutions by the Chapter of Canterbury Sede Vacante

C. Ch. R.

Calendar of Charter Rolls

CCR

Calendar of Close Rolls

CFR

Calendar of Fine Rolls

C. Inq. Misc.

Calendar of Inquisitions Miscellaneous

C. Inq. PM

Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem

Close R.

Close Rolls of the Reign of Henry III

CPL

Calendar of Papal Registers

CPR

Calendar of Patent Rolls

CYS

Canterbury and York Society

EHR

English Historical Review

Extra

‘Decretalium D. Gregorii Papae IX Compilatio’

HMSO

His/Her Majesty’s Stationery Office

LA Dalderby Memoranda Lincolnshire Archives, Episcopal Register III: John Dalderby Memoranda LA Reg. Bek

Lincolnshire Archives, Episcopal Register VII: Register of Thomas Bek

LA Reg. Dalderby

Lincolnshire Archives, Episcopal Register II: Register of John Dalderby

LA Reg. Sutton

Lincolnshire Archives, Episcopal Register I: Register of Oliver Sutton

LA Sutton Roll

Lincolnshire Archives, Oliver Sutton Rolls I–V (Institutions) and VI (Custodies)

LRS

Lincoln Record Society

NRO DN REG 1/1

Norfolk Record Office, Norwich Diocesan Archives, DN REG 1, book 1, Institution book: Salmon, 1299–1325.



LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS  

xi

ODNB

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (references to the 2004 edition unless otherwise stated)

Paris, Chronica

Matthaei Parisiensis, Monachi Sancti Albani Chronica Majora

RC

Record Commission

Reg. Bronescombe

The Episcopal Register of Walter Bronescombe, 1257–80

Reg. Cantilupe

The Register of Thomas de Cantilupe, Bishop of Hereford (AD 1275–1282)

Reg. Corbridge

The Register of Thomas of Corbridge, Lord Archbishop of York, 1300–1304

Reg. Epist. Peckham

Registrum Epistolarum Fratris Johannis Peckham, Archiepiscopi Cantuariensis

Reg. Gandavo

Registrum Simonis de Gandavo, Diocesis Saresbiriensis, AD 1297–1315

Reg. Giffard

Episcopal Registers: Diocese of Worcester: Register of Bishop Godfrey Giffard, September 23rd 1268 to August 15th 1301

Reg. Grandisson

The Register of John de Grandisson, Bishop of Exeter (AD 1327–1369)

Reg. Gray

The Register, or Rolls, of Walter Gray, Lord Archbishop of York: with Appendices of Illustrative Documents

Reg. Greenfield

The Register of William Greenfield, Lord Archbishop of York, 1306–1315

Reg. Langton

The Register of Walter Langton, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, 1296–1321

Reg. Newark

The Register of Henry of Newark, 1296–9, in Reg. Romeyn

Reg. Pecham

The Register of John Pecham, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1279–1292

Reg. Pontissara

Registrum Johannis de Pontissara, Episcopi Wintoniensis, AD MCCLXXXII–MCCCIIII

Reg. Quivil

The Episcopal Register of Peter Quivil, 1280–1291

Reg. Roffense

Registrum Roffense

Reg. Romeyn

The Register of John le Romeyn, 1286–96

xii   

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

Reg. Stapledon

The Register of Walter de Stapledon, Bishop of Exeter (AD 1307–1326)

Reg. Sutton

The Rolls and Register of Bishop Oliver Sutton, 1280–1299

Reg. Swinfield

Registrum Ricardi de Swinfield, Episcopi Herefordensis, AD MCCLXXXIII–MCCCXVIII

Reg. W. Giffard

The Register of Walter Giffard, Lord Archbishop of York, 1266–1279

Reg. Wickwane

The Register of William Wickwane, Lord Archbishop of York, 1279–1285

Reg. Winchelsey

Registrum Roberti Winchelsey, Cantuariensis Archiepiscopi

Rot. Cart.

Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati, 1199–1216

Rot. Gravesend

Rotuli Ricardi Gravesend, Diocesis Lincolniensis

Rot. Grosseteste

Rotuli Roberti Grosseteste, Episcopi Lincolniensis, AD MCCXXXV–MCCLIII

Rot. Hund.

Rotuli Hundredorum

Rot. Parl., 1

Rotuli Parliamentorum; ut et Petitiones, et Placita in Parliamento Tempore Edwardi R. 1

Rot. Welles

Rotuli Hugonis de Welles, Episcopi Lincolniensis, AD MCCIX–MCCXXXV

RS

Rolls Series

Sext.

‘Liber Sextus Decretalium Bonifacii VIII’

TNA

The National Archives

TRHS

Transactions of the Royal Historical Society

VCH

Victoria County History

Introduction Ecclesiastical patronage was an essential part of the social and political cement of western Christendom. It was the only way in which the laity were permitted to exercise rights in the Church and its property. This work studies the deployment of such patronage by the higher nobility of later thirteenthcentury England. It is about the nature and extent of patronage rights, how they were identified and used, why and for whom they were valuable, what challenges lay patrons faced, and how these patrons looked to the future in the ways in which they made gifts to the Church. This book is not primarily about lay piety, although the piety of individuals will be encountered as a motive for making the endowments which resulted in the exercise of rights. But the main concern is with patronage rights as property that had to be defended and as resources to be managed. The term ‘patronage’ is, therefore, being used in a very particular sense. Patronage in general terms involves an inherently unequal relationship between a dominant party which chooses to offer favours and opportunities to a recipient who is more or less beholden and dependent. The nature of what is offered will vary according to circumstance, but the significance of patronage for the medieval political and social historian can hardly be over-stated. The use or abuse of patronage was a key factor in the success or failure of kings; it determined the character of office-holders; it underpinned the growth of factions; it was the driver of social mobility. In the context of the medieval Church, patronage had a special meaning. It referred to a series of rights which the founders of ecclesiastical institutions, and their heirs and successors, were allowed to exercise. These rights had, by the thirteenth century, been defined both in canon and secular law. On one side, the laws of the Church had limited the rights of patrons in order to ensure that the final say in appointments to Church office rested with the appropriate ecclesiastical authority. Thus, patrons were only allowed to present to parish churches, leaving the bishop of the diocese the authority to institute the person presented. In monasteries and cathedrals, patrons could only give licence to elect and consent to the choice when made by the monks, nuns or cathedral chapter. The patron could not actually choose the head of house or the bishop – or such, at least, was the theory. On the other hand, patronage rights were a form of real property and as such their descent and transfer were governed by secular law. Disputes about them were settled in the royal courts, and there were particular royal writs which initiated actions in respect of patronage cases. The specific nature of patronage rights depended on the kind of ecclesiastical institution in which they were exercised, but the system – for system it was – was at the heart of the life of the Church in the medieval West. Hence the subject has attracted considerable scholarly attention over the years. The

2   INTRODUCTION use and distribution of advowson rights (the technical term for the right to present to an ecclesiastical benefice) form an essential part of general studies of the later medieval Church, because the concerns and preferences of patrons played a critical role in determining the character of the clergy who served in it.1 From another perspective, the biographies of prominent individuals – kings, queens and nobles – tend to take in their endowment of the Church.2 Studying people’s gifts to the Church is possible because of the survival of deeds in which they were recorded. At a time when the private thoughts of individuals were rarely recorded on their own account, the expression of pious motives in deeds of endowment is of special value to the historian. There was an increasing tendency from the twelfth century, naturally fostered by the recipients, for gifts to be recorded in writing,3 and deeds of endowment are the backbone of the many histories of individual religious houses, some of which were written to accompany the publication of their cartularies.4 They have also made possible the case studies of particular families’ benefactions,5 and studies of endowments in particular parts of the country.6 There have also been studies seeking to understand how and why whole sections of the aristocracy – the higher nobility and the gentry – gave to the Church. David Crouch has explored the various motives of aristocratic donors to the Church in the period to 1300, examining in particular the aim of status enhancement.7 More recently, he has given a compelling portrait of the religious life of the aristocracy in the period to 1272, emphasising the centrality of the Mass, the engage1

2 3 4

5 6

7

E.g. A. Hamilton Thompson, The English Clergy and Their Organization in the Later Middle Ages (Oxford, 1947); Peter Heath, The English Parish Clergy on the Eve of the Reformation (London, 1969), and R.N. Swanson, Church and Society in Late Medieval England (Oxford, 1989), pp. 27–88. Most recently, entries in the new Oxford Dictionary of National Biography include details of their subjects’ gift-giving. See M.T. Clanchy, From Memory to Written Record: England 1066–1307 (London, 1979), esp. p. 38. For example, the histories of individual religious houses in the relevant volumes of the Victoria County History naturally include discussion of their foundation and endowment. Examples of published cartularies include The Cartulary of Chatteris Abbey, ed. C. Breay (Woodbridge, 1999), The Cartulary of Byland Abbey, ed. J. Burton (Woodbridge, 2004) and The Cartulary of the Collegiate Church of St Mary at Warwick, ed. C. Fonge (Woodbridge, 2004). The edition by Fonge is of particular interest for its discussion of policies and factors affecting endowment and the ongoing relationships with the patrons of the house. For example, J.C. Ward, ‘Fashions in Monastic Endowment: the Foundations of the Clare Family, 1066–1314’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 32 (1981), 427–51. For example, T. Burrows’ study of the benefactors of Nostell and Bridlington in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries: ‘Monastic Benefactors in Medieval Yorkshire’, Journal of Religious History, 12 (1982), 3–8. D. Crouch, The Image of Aristocracy in Britain, 1000–1300 (London, 1992), pp. 311–34. In addition, B.D. Hill’s English Cistercian Monasteries and Their Patrons in the Twelfth Century (Urbana, Ill., 1968) places the motives and expectations of noble and knightly benefactors into the context of contemporary politics and society.



INTRODUCTION   3

ment of the nobility in devotional practices and the evidence for personal spirituality well before the reforms of 1215 sought to enhance the religious life of the laity.8 Peter Coss, looking in particular at the area around Coventry, saw the relationships of the earls of Chester with local religious houses as an element in the consolidation of their lordship.9 J.T. Rosenthal some years ago examined the sociological role of gift-giving in the later Middle Ages.10 On the actual exercise of patronage rights, monastic patronage and the advowson of churches have generally been treated separately. The classic work on monastic patronage is still Susan Wood’s book, which addresses the status of such rights as property and in law, and examines the various ways in which patronage was exercised in the thirteenth century.11 Karen Stöber’s recent work continues the history of patronage relationships in England and Wales in the two centuries up to the Dissolution.12 Her book includes a special study of the burial preferences of patrons and case studies of the monastic patronage of five noble families.13 Stöber draws attention to the evidence for the vitality of patronal relationships and to examples of patronal intervention at the time of the Dissolution. She does, however, recognise that this was a time when patronage rights were changing hands and links between some houses and their patrons becoming as a consequence more remote. Benjamin Thompson, in a series of articles drawing in particular on the experiences of houses in East Anglia, pursues this line, emphasising the weakening of the relationships between patrons and houses as rights changed hands and as houses appeared not to offer the spiritual services that the laity needed and valued; and he argues that in the later medieval period the laity were much more specific than their antecedents had been with regard to the services that they wanted in return for their endowments. Thompson focuses on periods of particular stress in the history of monasteries and the attitude of patrons to them at such times: the reaction of patrons to papal provisions and to the royal government’s proscription, in the context of the war with France, of the dispatch of money abroad by religious; the

8 9 10 11

12 13

D. Crouch, The English Aristocracy 1070–1272: A Social Transformation (New Haven and London, 2011), pp. 224–46. P.R. Coss, Lordship, Knighthood and Locality: A Study of English Society, c.1180–c.1280 (Cambridge, 1991), esp. pp. 24–42. J.T. Rosenthal, The Purchase of Paradise: Gift-giving and the Aristocracy, 1307–1485 (London, 1972). S. Wood, English Monasteries and Their Patrons in the Thirteenth Century (Oxford, 1955). For work on an earlier period, E. Cownie’s Religious Patronage in Anglo-Norman England, 1066–1135 (Woodbridge, 1998) looks at the experiences of Anglo-Saxon houses after the Conquest and the factors affecting their ability to attract endowments, and at the gifts to houses on the Continent and to new houses in England. A helpful survey of the many dimensions of patronal relationships is in Janet Burton, Monastic and Religious Orders in Britain, 1000–1300 (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 210–32. K. Stöber, Late Medieval Monasteries and Their Patrons: England and Wales, c.1300–1540 (Woodbridge, 2007). The families are Montague, Berkeley, Clare, Howard, and Scrope of Bolton.

4   INTRODUCTION threatened position of alien priories; the financial difficulties of some religious houses in the fifteenth century; and the Dissolution of the monasteries.14 The right of advowson has received most scholarly attention in the context of its exercise by the Crown. This is natural enough, given that royal presentations are systematically recorded in the patent rolls from the early thirteenth century.15 In addition, there have been studies of the advowsons belonging to particular noble or gentry families, particularly those of the later medieval period, and based primarily on bishops’ registers. R.I. Jack, in a pioneering article, demonstrated how the Greys of Ruthin in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries used their advowsons to provide for members of their family, their servants and their families, local men, and university graduates. Jack juxtaposed the Greys’ businesslike use of their advowson rights to advance the members of their affinity with a certain parsimony in giving to ecclesiastical institutions with which they were connected.16 Jack’s work showed that the Greys did not rely exclusively on benefices in their own gift to advance their clerical protégés, and this was also the case with the Stanleys of Lathom in Lancashire in the fifteenth century, although, as P. Hosker reveals, the Stanleys were highly acquisitive of advowsons as well as relying on those in the gift of others.17 R.W. Dunning’s study of the Courtenay earls of Devon shows how they used their patronage to benefit their family, administrators, potential allies and graduates.18 Studies

14

15

16 17 18

B. Thompson, ‘From “Alms” to “Spiritual Services”: The Function and Status of Monastic Property in Medieval England’, Monastic Studies, 2 (1990), 227–62; ‘Habendum et Tenendum: Lay and Ecclesiastical Attitudes to the Property of the Church’, in Religious Beliefs and Ecclesiastical Careers in Late Medieval England, ed. C. Harper-Bill (Woodbridge, 1991), pp.  197–238; ‘Monasteries and Their Patrons at Foundation and Dissolution’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6th series, 4 (1994), 103–25; ‘The Statute of Carlisle, 1307, and the Alien Priories’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 41 (1990), 543–583; ‘The Laity, the Alien Priories, and the Redistribution of Ecclesiastical Property’, in England in the Fifteenth Century: Proceedings of the 1992 Harlaxton Symposium, ed. N.J. Rogers (Donington, 1994), pp.  19–41; see also ‘Introduction: Monasteries in Medieval Society’, in Monasteries and Society in Medieval Britain: Proceedings of the 1994 Harlaxton Symposium, ed. B. Thompson (Donington, 1999), pp. 1–33. R.A.R. Hartridge, ‘Edward I’s Exercise of the Right of Presentation to Benefices as Shown by the Patent Rolls’, Cambridge Historical Journal, 2 (1927), 171–7; Ann Deeley, ‘Papal Provision and Royal Rights of Patronage in the Fourteenth Century’, EHR, 43 (1928), 497–527; P.C. Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England, 1199–1351’ (Oxford DPhil thesis, 1978), and ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage from Winchelsey to Stratford’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 83.3 (Autumn, 2001), 95–114. R.I. Jack, ‘The Ecclesiastical Patronage Exercised by a Baronial Family in the Late Middle Ages’, Journal of Religious History, 3 (1965), 275–95. P. Hosker, ‘The Stanleys of Lathom and Ecclesiastical Patronage in the North-west of England during the Fifteenth Century’, Northern History, 18 (1982), 212–29. R.W. Dunning, ‘Patronage and Promotion in the Late-Medieval Church’, in Patronage, the Crown and the Provinces in Later Medieval England, ed. R.A. Griffiths (Stroud, 1981), pp.  167–82; and also M. Cherry, ‘The Courtenay Earls of Devon: The Formation and Disintegration of a Late Medieval Aristocratic Affinity’, Southern History, 1 (1979), 71–97.



INTRODUCTION   5

based on particular regions and localities have been able to draw conclusions about the overall distribution of patronage rights in a given area and the availability of benefices.19 Of particular interest are the studies which show a shift of the distribution of advowson rights towards the Church, the barons, and the more substantial gentry families.20 As this very brief survey shows, the rights of ecclesiastical patronage of the laity have been studied in particular in relation to strategies of status enhancement and patterns of local influence. There is as yet no full-length, integrated study of the subject in relation to both churches and religious houses. Such a study is important¸ in order to see how monastic patronage and the advowson of churches complemented each other and gave the patron who exercised them different means of accessing the resources of the Church. Both canon and secular law sought to treat all rights of patronage in the same way, but in reality they seem to have been very different from each other. The patronage or advowson of a church was primarily the right to present the next incumbent (although it is true that it also implied a general obligation to protect the endowment of the church, which sometimes entailed consulting the patron on matters which might affect that endowment).21 The patronage of a religious house, however, involved a variety of possible rights, not all of which would necessarily be exercised. The question arises as to which of these many rights were especially valued by patrons, and whether there were any that were fossilised, neglected or given up. It was the members of the higher nobility who were most likely to enjoy both monastic patronage and the advowson of churches, and so it is they who are the main subjects in this study. In some contexts, the higher nobility can be thought of collectively; as, for example, when the king spoke of the wishes and interests of ‘the magnates’ or of ‘the earls and barons’ when complaining to the papacy about encroachments on the rights of lay patrons or justifying his actions in imposing restrictions on gifts to the Church. But, in order to make the study a

19

20

21

Carole Rawcliffe discusses briefly the extent and use of patronage rights by the Staffords in The Staffords, Earls of Stafford and Dukes of Buckingham, 1394–1521 (Cambridge, 1978), pp. 82–4. M. Bowker, The Secular Clergy in the Diocese of Lincoln, 1495–1520 (Cambridge, 1968), esp. 64–84; R.K. Rose, ‘Priests and Patrons in the Fourteenth-Century Diocese of Carlisle’, in The Church in Town and Countryside: Papers Read at the Seventeenth Summer Meeting and the Eighteenth Winter Meeting of the Ecclesiastical History Society ed. D. Baker (Oxford, 1979), pp.  207–18; R. Donaldson, ‘Sponsors, Patrons and Presentations to Benefices – Particularly Those in the Gift of the Priors of Durham – During the Later Middle Ages’, Archaeologia Aeliana, 4th series, 38 (1960), 169–77. J.E. Newman, ‘Greater and Lesser Landowners and Parochial Patronage: Yorkshire in the Thirteenth Century’, EHR, 92 (1977), 280–308; M. Page, ‘The Ownership of Advowsons in Thirteenth-Century Cornwall’, Devon and Cornwall Notes and Queries, 37 (1996), 336–41. The usage of these terms in thirteenth-century documents is discussed below, Chapter 1, pp. 23–5.

6   INTRODUCTION manageable one, this book selects a certain number of the magnates for detailed attention. A natural starting point in any study of the higher nobility is with the earls, because they were so clearly recognised at the time as a distinct group. ‘Earl’ was the only title of honour in thirteenth-century England (although it was possible for those who were earls in England to be dukes elsewhere, as was the earl of Richmond, who was also duke of Brittany). The title derived originally from the Anglo-Saxon ealdorman, who was the king’s representative in the shire court, and there were still in the thirteenth century vestiges of this earlier relationship with the county. No one but an earl was entitled to receive the third penny of the pleas of the county court or could be girt with the sword of the county.22 In practice, however, the thirteenth-century earl no longer presided at the county court, and his connection with his county was often only nominal. Indeed, the county from which he took his title was not always that in which he held the bulk of his estates. (The most obvious example here is the earl of Oxford, Robert de Vere, whose main estates were in Buckinghamshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex and Suffolk although he held the manor of Crowmarsh in Oxfordshire.) Most earls, however, had considerable landed interests in the county from which they derived their title. It is clear from contemporary texts that comital rank marked off earls from other members of the baronage. Of key importance in our understanding of contemporary legal thinking is a treatise once believed to have been written by the royal justice Henry of Bracton, but which is now thought to be mainly the work of William of Raleigh and to have been written for the most part by the mid-1230s.23 ‘Bracton’ singled out the earls as the king’s counsellors and associates, emphasising the importance of investiture in establishing their role: Comites videlicet qui a comitatu sive a societate nomen sumpserunt, qui etiam dici possunt consules a consulendo. Reges enim tales sibi associant ad regendum populum dei, ordinantes eos magno honore et potestate et nomine quando concingunt eos gladiis, id est ringis gladiorum. 22

23

For the origin and history of earldoms, see esp. H.A. Doubleday, ‘Earldoms and Baronies in History and in Law, and the Doctrine of Abeyance’, in G.E. Cokayne, The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom, new edn by V. Gibbs, H.A. Doubleday and D. Warrand, 13 vols (London, 1910–1959), 4:651–81; Sir F. Pollock and F. W. Maitland, The History of English Law Before the Time of Edward I, 2nd edn reissued with introduction by S.F.C. Milsom, 2 vols (Cambridge, 1968), 1:533, Sir G. Ellis, Earldoms in Fee: A Study in Peerage Law and History (London, 1963), and the much more recent study in Crouch, Image of Aristocracy, pp. 41–83, which relates the history of earldoms to the French experience of the count and considers the extent to which the holding of an earldom depended on royal conferment. On the third penny specifically, see J.H. Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville: A Study of the Anarchy (London, 1892), pp. 287–96, and Dialogus de Scaccario/The Course of the Exchequer by Richard son of Nigel, trans. by C. Johnson (London, 1950), pp. 64–5. For the authorship, see P. Brand, ‘Bratton, Henry of (d. 1268)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/3163 , accessed 9 July 2009).



INTRODUCTION   7

.  .  . earls .  .  . take the name ‘comites’ from ‘comitatus’, or from ‘societas’, a partnership, who may also be called consuls from counseling, for kings associate such persons with themselves in governing the people of God, investing them with great honour, power and name when they gird them with swords, that is, with sword belts.24

The witness lists to royal charters of the period provide further evidence of the earls’ distinct status. Earls were always listed as a group, following the names of any archbishops and bishops who were present, and, while there was some variation in the order in which earls’ names appeared in relation to each other, it is rare indeed to find another layman’s name listed before that of an earl. In particular, closeness of blood relationship with the king, wealth, age and frequency of attestation of charters were key factors affecting the order in which earls were listed in relation to each other.25 Many of the earls were related to the king and to each other, by blood and by marriage, and this too supports the notion of their distinctiveness. The ties of the holders of earldoms to the Crown were increased during Henry III’s reign, with Simon de Montfort’s marriage into the royal family, and the endowment of the king’s brother Richard with the earldom of Cornwall and of his half-brother William de Valence with the lordship of Pembroke.26 Henry’s son Edmund acquired the earldoms of Lancaster, Leicester and Derby. The wife of John de Warenne, earl of Surrey, was Alice de Lusignan, Henry III’s half-sister; and John of Brittany, earl of Richmond, married Beatrice, Henry’s daughter. Two earls, Henry de Lacy and Richard Fitzalan, were connected by marriage to the Savoyard relatives of Eleanor of Provence, Henry’s wife, and Edward I was to build up further ties based on marriage when his daughters Joan and Elizabeth were married to the earls of Gloucester and Hereford respectively. A man had to have considerable landed interest to support comital status. It is true that there was considerable variety in the amount of land held by different earls, but all of them had lands in more than one county, and many had estates spanning several regions of England and Wales. Some had lands in Ireland, too. The extent of their lands widened their influence and perspective, and indeed gave them a certain independence of the king. At the same time it gave the king a certain dependence upon their service. As the Bracton extract makes clear, the earls had a role to play as counsellors and as partners in the business of government. The degree to which they were effective in such roles would

24 25

26

Henry Bracton, On the Laws and Customs of England, ed. G.E. Woodbine, trans. S.E. Thorne, 4 vols (Cambridge, Mass., 1968–77), 2.32. Elizabeth Gemmill, ‘The King’s Companions: The Evidence of Royal Charter Witness Lists from the Reign of Edward I’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 83.3 (Autumn 2001), 129–46 (pp. 142–3). William gained only part of the Marshal earldom of Pembroke by his marriage to Joan de Munchensi, and was not formally made an earl. See H.W. Ridgeway, ‘Valence, William de, earl of Pembroke (d. 1296)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/ article/29481, accessed 9 July 2009).

8   INTRODUCTION have depended greatly on their individual ability and personal relationship with the king. But at a time when birth and status counted for so much, the dignity of comital rank made the earls suitable candidates for service as members of embassies treating with foreign princes or the papacy; and conversely as escorts to the royal presence of visiting foreign vassals and envoys. They might serve as regents during temporary royal absences and they might serve on judicial commissions dealing with special business. Their support of any royal letter, proclamation or grievance always added to its weight. Finally, an earl’s military leadership was an important aspect of his service, not only because the men he brought with him were his vassals and were bound to him with ties of loyalty and obedience, but also because an earl was often given the important task of leading a campaign while the king was elsewhere. Having said all this, it is also true that there was great variety within the comital rank. Three earls – Cornwall, Lancaster and Gloucester – were fabulously wealthy and were very closely connected with the king. Others were comparatively poor, more distant, and less active and influential in the affairs of the realm. An earl’s status depended also on age relative to others in the comital group. Richard Fitzalan, for instance, who was the first of his family to be recognised as earl of Arundel, only came into his inheritance in 1287.27 It would be very difficult to argue that the real ‘clout’ of a Robert de Vere or a Richard Fitzalan was as great as that of Roger Mortimer, the wealthy marcher lord who played such a key role in the battle of Evesham and against the Welsh and who was, temporarily, granted the lands belonging to Robert de Vere, earl of Oxford, on de Vere’s forfeiture in 1265.28 Then there was the Savoyard Otto de Grandisson, Edward I’s trusted friend, military leader and distinguished envoy, and a crusader in his own right.29 In determining who the magnates were – that is, who had real weight in political and military terms – it is better to think of barons as well as earls. The remark of the Edward II’s biographer is instructive: Sunt enim membrum regis principale, sine quo nil grande poterit rex aggredi uel consummare. Ergo qui barones paruipendunt, regem utique contempnunt et lese magestatis se reos ostendunt. For they are the king’s chief member, without which the king cannot attempt 27 28

29

T.F. Tout, ‘Fitzalan, Richard (I), first earl of Arundel (1267–1302), rev. Nigel Saul, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/9533, accessed 30 July 2012). C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp.  57 and 89–91, and see J.J. Crump, ‘Mortimer, Roger (III) de, lord of Wigmore (1231–1282)’, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/19352, accessed 13 July 2011) and D.A. Carpenter, ‘A Noble in Politics: Roger Mortimer in the Period of Baronial Reform and Rebellion, 1258–1265, in Nobles and Nobility in Medieval Europe, ed. A. Duggan (Woodbridge, 2000), pp. 183–203. For Robert de Vere, and the relative obscurity of the earls of Oxford in the thirteenth century, see J.R. Maddicott, ‘Follower, Leader, Pilgrim, Saint: Robert de Vere, Earl of Oxford, at the Shrine of Simon de Montfort, 1273’, EHR, 109 (1994), 641–53. J.R. Maddicott, ‘Grandson [Grandison], Sir Otto de (c.1238–1328)’, rev. ODNB, online edn, Oct 2005 (oxforddnb.com/view/article/37827, accessed 13 July 2011).



INTRODUCTION   9

or accomplish anything of importance. Therefore those who belittle the barons without doubt despise the king and show themselves guilty of treason.30

In this study, then, earls and barons are included, as the most important lay patrons. Particular attention has been paid to the earls, to the one countess who held estates in her own right, namely, Isabella de Forz, and to Mortimer and Grandisson. The section on royal investigations into patronage rights draws on all the larger inquisitions post mortem (IPMs) of the later thirteenth century, and the appendix of magnate presentations takes in additional members of the baronage who made a substantial number of presentations. The latter part of the thirteenth century is the heart of the book because it was such a critical period in the history of ecclesiastical patronage rights, but the scope is much broader as the nature of patronage rights makes it important to explore their origins and descent from the later eleventh century on. Patronage rights belonged to land, and the thirteenth century saw very significant change in land ownership among the higher nobility. In the first place there were the consequences of the loss of Normandy in 1204, which meant that many families who had held lands on both sides of the English Channel had to choose their allegiance. The English lands of many who sided with France passed to new owners. Some were used to endow members of the royal family. From the 1220s on, Henry III’s generosity to his family – his brothers, his brother-in-law, his wife’s uncle – led to the establishment of new magnate dynasties, endowed with lands in England and Wales. The barons’ wars of the 1260s, themselves in part a consequence of the king’s liberality and his family strategies, resulted in the disinheritance of some families. Most importantly, two earldoms, Leicester and Derby, came into the possession of the king’s younger son, Edmund. These dramatic changes were in addition to the changes caused by failure of heirs in the male line which caused several great fiefs to pass into new hands or into the control of the Crown. The century of displacement can be said to have culminated with Edward I’s acquisition, towards the end of his reign, of a number of the remaining earldoms – Albemarle and Devon, Cornwall, and Norfolk and Hertford. The changes in ownership of land suggest a number of interesting questions about the impact of such changes on the ecclesiastical patronage rights associated with them. In the first place, did the passage of rights into the hands of new owners inevitably weaken the links between patrons and ecclesiastical institutions? This is what seems to have happened to patrons of monasteries in a later period. But it may also be the case that the acquisition of new estates was an incentive for patrons to found new institutions in order to make their mark and with which they could establish their own special relationships. This is, after all, what had happened in the generations after the Norman Conquest. There is also the issue of the impact on the clergy who were incumbents of churches on forfeited estates; how secure were they in their position when their patron was disgraced? The laws of the Church which were supposed to guarantee the independence of the clergy from lay interference may not have 30

Vita Edwardi Secundi: The Life of Edward II, ed. W.R. Childs (Oxford, 2005), pp. 48–9.

10   INTRODUCTION protected them from loss of their benefices in such circumstances. Finally, the great transfers of estates prompted questions at the time about the relationship between those rights and lands that were divided up or granted out. It was the Crown which gave particular impetus to these questions, especially when kings sought to retain certain patronage rights when they made grants of land. Furthermore the Crown came increasingly to take the view that there were certain patronage rights which only the king could have, rights which were intrinsically and necessarily royal. This, too, had an impact on the quality and nature of the ecclesiastical patronage rights in the hands of the lay magnates. The king’s acquisitiveness with regard to people’s patronage rights can also be seen in the context of what Sandra Raban has called the ‘investigative culture’ of the later thirteenth century. Henry III and Edward I’s reigns saw countrywide surveys into usurpation of franchises, ministerial abuse and land ownership generally. It was an age of feverish information gathering, the purposes and outcomes of which are not always clear. The returns to the ‘Hundred Roll’ inquiries of 1279–80 included some information about ecclesiastical patronage rights,31 but much more was recorded in royal IPMs, in which the king’s escheators inquired into the value and extent of lands held by his tenants in chief. This was the time when these inquisitions – IPMs – were taking their definitive shape. The treatment of patronage rights in IPMs, of which a special study is made in this book, underwent significant change in this period, reflecting the increased determination on the part of royal government to exploit its rights of wardship patronage. The reliability of IPMs as evidence has certainly been called into question by historians (although less in respect of thirteenth-century inquisitions than later ones)32 but these, and other royal inquisitions of the period, repay close study for what they reveal about contemporary understanding of the nature and significance of ecclesiastical patronage rights and the king’s concern with them. Moreover, the valuations put on churches and other benefices in inquisitions may be compared usefully with those made in the Taxatio of Pope Nicholas IV in 1291–92.33 It is just possible that greater credence may be given to the values recorded in the secular inquisitions as a result of such comparison; or, at least, the process by which the valuations were made better understood. The relationships between kings and magnates were not of course only those based on land. The magnates were the king’s natural counsellors and leaders and supporters in war. It is a commonplace that successful medieval kings were those who maintained the goodwill of the lords and involved them in their counsels. Edward’s reign saw the beginning of a new period of conflict with France which was to last, fitfully, over the next 150 years. Of course war had consequences 31

32 33

See Sandra Raban, ‘The Church in the 1279 Hundred Rolls’, in Medieval Ecclesiastical Studies in Honour of Dorothy Owen, ed. M.J. Franklin and C. Harper-Bill (Woodbridge, 1995), pp.  185–200 (esp. p.  188) and idem, A Second Domesday? The Hundred Rolls of 1279–80 (Oxford, 2004), esp. pp. 105–7. See below, p. 114. Taxatio Ecclesiastica Angliae et Walliae Auctoritate P. Nicholai IV c. 1291, ed. T. Astle, S. Ayscough and J. Caley (RC, 1802).



INTRODUCTION   11

for patrons. The seizure by the Crown of religious houses which owed money and allegiance to mother houses in France was bound to be a source of concern to their patrons, yet these were in many cases the same magnates who were supporting the war. There must also have been a sense of divided loyalty when in 1297 the king outlawed the clergy who would not pay the tax which, as Edward argued, they should do as their contribution to the war effort. Lay opposition to papal provisions and to Cistercian monasteries’ sending money abroad may not have involved them in any sense of conflict of interest. Yet, it was in the king’s interest to mobilise remonstrations against these demands on resources, and the degree to which their own concerns as patrons were affected needs careful examination to be understood properly. It was also Edward I who enacted in 1279 the Statute of Mortmain which, while it did not stop grants to the Church, sought to put them firmly and for ever under royal control. Once again, the position of the magnates in relation to the controls must have been equivocal. On one hand, as lords at the top of the tenurial ladder, the restriction which the statute placed on grants from the lands held from them must have been welcome. Indeed, the statute was said to have been made at their request, and there is evidence that they took advantage of its provisions, as we shall see. But at the same time, they were also patrons wishing to endow ecclesiastical institutions, and their reaction to the legislation in this capacity merits close scrutiny. We are too much accustomed to regarding the Crown as the protagonist: the active role of the magnates must also be considered. The extent of endowment of the Church by the laity in this period is of course of vital importance. The great era of building new parish churches and founding new religious houses was long over. It was also after the Church had, at the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215, placed an inhibition on the foundation of new religious orders. Yet the leaders of the Church were pursuing new and ambitious policies in the thirteenth century, with the aim of guiding and enhancing the spiritual life of the laity through preaching, instruction and confession. At the vanguard of the movement were the friars. Not surprisingly – for royalty and nobility were characteristically supportive of new religious orders – they were swiftly found in the households of kings and nobles, as their confessors, confidants, and messengers.34 It must be asked how the message of the friars – with its basis in institutional and personal poverty but dependent on careful training and high intellectual standards as well – may have influenced the nobility in their exercise of patronage. The friars were part of a reforming movement which placed new emphasis on education and training of the clergy in order to achieve an effective pastoral ministry. The new spirit was embodied in particular in the reforms of the Lateran Council of 1215, but the responsibility for implementing these fell in the first instance to the bishops. Robert Grosseteste and Walter de Cantilupe stand out as the great mid-century reformers; but the Franciscan John Pecham, the

34

C.H. Lawrence, The Friars: The Impact of the Early Mendicant Movement on Western Society (London, 1994), pp. 166–80.

12   INTRODUCTION ardent if sometimes injudicious archbishop of Canterbury, and Oliver Sutton, the scrupulous and meticulous bishop of Lincoln, were outstanding in the next generation.35 The reform of the Church was intended to have its effect on the nobility, and the fact that magnates and bishops moved in the same circles may have helped to make that possible. Even if the friendship of Grosseteste and de Cantilupe with Simon de Montfort was exceptional, none the less there were opportunities for influence and direction.36 Again, all this raises the question of what part noble patrons had to play in making reform a reality for local clergy and their communities. It was, finally, at the Council of Lyons in 1274 that the Church first formally promulgated the doctrine of Purgatory. The idea that the souls of the dead were in a transitory state, and that their passage to Heaven could be expedited by the prayers of the living, gave impetus to the endowment of chantries, that is, the formal provision for Masses and prayers for the dead. The laity came, in the later Middle Ages, to choose the chantry, in its many forms, as a favourite type of foundation.37 Certainly, chantries were favoured by magnates in the later thirteenth century even though as patrons of religious houses they had access to the prayers of monks and canons in the houses founded by their ancestors. Magnates were also at the vanguard of the patronage of learning, offering support to individual scholars or endowing houses in which learning was to be pursued. Of course no study such as this would be possible without the documentary sources, and these are remarkably rich and varied for the later thirteenth century. The IPMs mentioned already are a key source for the extent of individual magnates’ patronage rights as well as being important for understanding the quality and purpose of royal information gathering and the significance to the Crown of its tenants’ patronage rights. Royal charters granting lands and rights to magnates are sometimes supplemented by the survival of secular cartularies containing magnates’ title deeds. The fact that such documents frequently record patronage rights shows the importance with which they were regarded. Monastic cartularies complement these, containing evidence of the endowments of the laity, and these are supplemented by royal confirmations of charters and deeds. Royal licences to alienate land and other property, and the inquisitions that took place before such licences were given, are informative as to endowments made in the years after the Statute of Mortmain. Bishops’ registers are the key source for the actual exercise of patronage rights in the thirteenth century. The earliest surviving bishop’s register is that of Hugh of Wells, bishop of Lincoln (1209–35), and the records of the Lincoln diocese remain excellent throughout the period we are concerned with here. There is 35

36 37

J. Gibbs and J. Lang, Bishops and Reform, 1215–1272, With Special Reference to the Lateran Council of 1215 (London, 1934), D.L. Douie, Archbishop Pecham (Oxford, 1952), esp. pp.  133–42, and W.T. Waugh, ‘Archbishop Peckham and Pluralities’, EHR, 28 (1913), 625–35. For examples of Sutton’s conscientiousness as a diocesan, see below, Chapter 2. J.R. Maddicott, Simon de Montfort (Cambridge, 1994; reprinted 2001), esp. 79–84 and 97–8. H.M. Colvin, ‘The Origin of Chantries’, Journal of Medieval History, 26 (2000), 163–73.



INTRODUCTION   13

also a full complement of registers for the archbishopric of York, although records for other dioceses are more patchy. Those for Coventry and Lichfield and for Norwich are particularly disappointing, because several of the magnates under study here, and most obviously Edmund, earl of Lancaster and Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk, had ecclesiastical interests in these dioceses for which the records are lacking: the earliest for Coventry and Lichfield is that of the episcopacy of Walter Langton (1296–1321) and for Norwich the episcopacy of John Salmon (1299–1325). The Norwich register is only a list of institutions to benefices, although it does as such yield valuable information for the closing years of the period under study. Also disappointing are the Welsh dioceses for which we have no registers at all before the fourteenth century. As a result of the incompleteness of the records, the evidence about different magnates’ use of their rights is variable, but there is nonetheless a large amount of information enabling us to discern clear patterns.38 These records show above all how lay patrons exercised their rights, and the extent to which they understood their obligations. The acceptance by patrons of the laws and standards of the Church was of no little importance in implementing the reforms of the thirteenth century, and bishops’ registers contain clear evidence of the extent to which they did so, and of how the reforms impacted on the clerks with whom the magnates were connected. In seeking dispensation from the law, however, it was the papacy which was the fount of privilege and papal letters are an important source showing the nature of the special treatment that was sought and given, and the status and circumstances of those able to approach the pope. It was sometimes the magnates, who were on friendly terms with or at least had access to, those in positions of authority in the Church, who sought special treatment for clerks who were their protégés. The later thirteenth century was a time when landlords tended to farm their estates themselves, rather than leasing them in return for a fixed sum. This resulted in the production of copious records of estate administration, and in the employment of a growing number of professional administrators. Among them the clergy – with their special literacy and accounting skills and their eligibility for remuneration by means of ecclesiastical benefices – were a significant element. The ministers’ accounts that survive for certain great estates enable us to make links between the clergy who were presented to benefices and those working as administrators, in various capacities, on magnate estates. These records also contain clues as to how information about patronage rights was conveyed to magnates, and there are entries showing expenditure on buildings and on payments to religious. Ministers’ accounts usually survive because the estates in question came into royal hands, whether in the thirteenth century or later on. The accounts of the earldom of Cornwall have been mentioned already, but there are also those of

38

See D.M. Smith, Guide to Bishops’ Registers of England and Wales: A Survey from the Middle Ages to the Abolition of Episcopacy in 1646 (London, 1981); idem, Guide to Bishops’ Registers: Supplement to the Guide to Bishops’ Registers of England and Wales (CYS, 2004).

14   INTRODUCTION the estates of Isabella de Forz, countess of Albemarle and Devon, and of Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk, which came into royal hands in 1293 and 1306 respectively. In addition, the accounts of the estates of Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, whose daughter and heiress Alice married Thomas, earl of Lancaster, and whose estates therefore descended with those of the duchy, have been preserved among the duchy records. The evidence of ministers’ accounts is supplemented by that in letters of various kinds. Of special interest are the magnates’ own letters, among the Special Collection of Ancient Correspondence in the National Archives. These contain a rich diversity of information about their patronage rights, particularly those in dispute, and about the relationship of individual magnates with the clerks with whom they were connected. In addition there are royal letters in chancery enrolments, including letters of protection for magnates’ household members or others associated with them. The witness lists to magnates’ charters and deeds are a further guide to the identity of the clergy who were in their circle. The evidence of these different sources, taken cumulatively, makes it possible to give quite a detailed account of the careers of some clergy, how wide their connections may have been, and how those connections may have been linked with the network of influence and patronage, formal and informal, of the magnates themselves. It is clear that there were powerful and independent clerks in comital administration, with interests that went well beyond their ministerial office; and at the same time there was an underclass of clerks who never seem to have succeeded in gaining the security of a benefice. And there were yet others about whom little is known other than the facts of their presentation and institution to a church. Endowment of the Church was never the end of the story. Not only did people want a spiritual return for their investment, but they sometimes wanted to reclaim what had been given in the past. The records of royal law courts show that advowson rights were often in dispute. Monastic cartularies contain evidence of confirmations of gifts which appear to have resolved disputes, as well as genuinely new endowments. Royal confirmations of magnates’ gifts supplement these, while royal licences to alienate land and other property, and the inquisitions that took place before such licences were given, are informative as to endowment patterns in the years after the Statute of Mortmain. Thus this book draws together a number of aspects of ecclesiastical property rights which were at the heart of the relationship between the laity and the Church. It sets those rights in the context of political and social relationships and the concerns of noble families to provide for their dependants. The later thirteenth century was a crucial period, as well as being an especially well-documented one, in the development of those rights.

Part I

1 Ecclesiastical Patronage Rights in the Thirteenth Century

Ecclesiastical patronage rights were property, belonging to and acquired with land. They belonged to the lord on whose estates the ecclesiastical institution – church or religious house – had been built, and from whom it had received its endowment. The rights that donors exercised in recognition of the gifts they had made descended with their estates. Broadly speaking, the patronage of a parish church was associated with the lordship of the manor in which the church was situated. The building of local churches between the tenth and twelfth centuries stemmed partly from the sense that ownership of a church was felt to confer status, although it is also true that such churches met the spiritual needs of ordinary people, enabling them to worship and to receive the sacraments of the Church within their own village communities.1 The patron of a church might be the lord of just one manor, but the more manors a lord had, the greater the number of churches he was likely to have in his gift. And, just as the establishment of a church on a local estate enhanced a local lord’s standing, so the endowment of a religious house was associated with the acquisition of a larger fief. In particular, many religious houses in England were established by the companions of William the Conqueror or their descendants, often alongside their castles, so that both became symbols of their dominion and status. But by the thirteenth century, things had moved on. Both the ownership and nature of patronage rights had undergone considerable modification and change. In the first place, canon law had cut back on the rights of lay patrons all over western Europe, so that the thirteenth-century patron’s rights were much more limited than those of his predecessors. The eleventh-century and even the twelfth-century patron had appointed clerks to churches, had dismissed them at will, had granted out churches and tithes to religious houses, and had even received spiritual income themselves.2 By the late twelfth century, following

1

2

J. Blair, ‘Introduction: From Minster to Parish Church’, in Minsters and Parish Churches: The Local Church in Transition, ed. J. Blair (Oxford, 1988), pp. 1–19 (esp. pp. 7–9) and see H. Mayr-Harting, Religion, Society and Politics in Britain, 1066–1272 (Harlow, 2011), pp. 99–100. For studies of the proprietary church in England, see J. Lingard, History and Antiquities of the Anglo-Saxon Church, 3rd edn, 2 vols (London, 1845), 1:178–96 and 398–407; F.

18   ELIZABETH

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wide-ranging Church reforms intended to establish much greater clerical independence of the laity, it was against canon law for the laity to make appointments to ecclesiastical benefices or to own or grant out spiritual property such as tithes or churches.3 They could no longer regard the church as their property; all that was left was the right to present their nominee to the bishop for admission and institution. No layman was supposed to be in receipt of spiritual income. So, when in 1294 Agnes, daughter of William de Valence, was found to be receiving income illicitly from the church of Blunham (Bedfordshire)4 the bishop of Lincoln put a stop to it right away.5 The ‘Bracton’ treatise of the 1230s summarised the position as it was then understood from the perspective of the royal courts of law: Laici tamen secundum communem usum propter eorum simplicitatem dant ecclesias, quod nihil aliud est dicere quam praesentare. Laicus igitur praesentat ad

3

4 5

Barlow, Durham Jurisdictional Peculiars (Oxford, 1950), pp. vii–xiv and The English Church, 1000–1066 (London, 1963), pp.  186–7, F.M. Stenton, Anglo-Saxon England, 3rd edn (Oxford, 1971), pp. 148–56, M. Brett, The English Church under Henry I (Oxford, 1975), pp. 229–31, and Blair, ‘Introduction: From Minster to Parish Church’, pp. 1–19. For the situation on the Continent, see Paul Thomas, Le Droit de propriété des laïques sur les églises et le patronage laïque au Moyen Age (Paris, 1906), and U. Stutz, ‘The Proprietary Church as an Element of Mediaeval Germanic Ecclesiastical Law’, in Studies in Mediaeval History, ed. G. Barraclough, 2 vols (Oxford, 1938), 2:35–70. A brief general account of the private ownership of churches and monasteries is in D. Knowles, The Monastic Order in England (Cambridge, 1950), pp. 562–72. For the development of canon law on the subject of patronage, see ‘Decretum Magistri Gratiani’, 2.C.16, q. 7 passim, and Extra, 3.tit. 38, passim, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, ed. E. Friedberg, 2 vols (Leipzig, 1879–81), 1.800–12 and 2.609–21. For eleventh-century councils in England promulgating canonist doctrine, see Concilia Magnae Britanniae et Hiberniae, ed. D. Wilkins, 4 vols (London, 1737), 1.408, 410, 412–13, 415, and 417. For a general account of the development of canonist doctrine from the earliest times, see Thomas, Droit de propriété des laïques sur les églises. See also G.W.O. Addleshaw, Rectors, Vicars and Patrons in Twelfth- and Early Thirteenth-Century Canon Law, St Anthony’s Hall Publications, 9 (York, 1956), C.R. Cheney, From Becket to Langton: English Church Government, 1170–1213 (Manchester, 1956), pp.  109–17, Brett, English Church under Henry I, pp. 141–6, B.R. Kemp, ‘Monastic Possession of Parish Churches in England in the Twelfth Century’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 31 (1980), 133–60 and, with particular regard to cognisance of advowson cases, J.W. Gray, ‘The “Ius Praesentandi” in England from the Constitutions of Clarendon to Bracton’, EHR, 67 (1952), 481–509. References to counties in this book are based on the pre-1974 names and boundaries. The Rolls and Register of Bishop Oliver Sutton, 1280–1299, ed. R.M.T. Hill, 8 vols (LRS, 39, 43, 48, 52, 60, 64, 69, and 76, 1948–1986), 5.15–16 and 18. That there were still believed to be laymen in later thirteenth-century England in receipt of income from churches is suggested by a canon of the legatine council of 1268. This ruled that patrons and presentees were not to make pacts whereby, in return for a presentation, a patron would receive a pension from the church: Councils and Synods with Other Documents Relating to the English Church, 1205–1313, 2 vols, ed. F.M. Powicke and C.R. Cheney, 2 parts (Oxford, 1964), 2.2.780.

ECCLESIASTICAL PATRONAGE RIGHTS IN THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY   

19

ecclesiam vacantem secundum quod construitur lignis et lapidibus, ut praesentatus ecclesiam regat, et episcopus eam dat, scilicet praesentatum admittat ad regimen et instituit. Laymen, however, as is the common custom, because of their ignorance, give churches, which means nothing more than to present, for a layman presents to the vacant church, as constructed of timber and stone, that his presentee rule it, and the bishop gives it, that is, admits the presentee to rule and institutes him.6

Bishops had the exclusive right to admit clerks to all the benefices in their dioceses which were endowed with spiritual goods. These were parish churches, cathedral prebends (that is, benefices of cathedral canons and other dignitaries), and chapels and chantries endowed with spiritual income from tithes, glebe lands and offerings. As to monastic appointments, bishops had the right to institute the elected head of house unless the house or its order (for example, the Cistercians) were exempt from the usual diocesan authority. The patron’s rights in elections were to give licence before and to assent afterwards. He was allowed no part in the election itself. Castle chapels, if they were endowed formally, were likewise subject to episcopal authority, and even private chapels that were not so endowed, and which were served by salaried chaplains, had to be licensed by the bishop to ensure that they were decent and to safeguard the rights of the church of the parish in which they were situated.7 There was a chaplaincy that involved both a salary and formal endowments at Edmund of Cornwall’s chapel at Oakham castle (Rutland). An archdeacon’s inquiry followed the earl’s presentation of Robert of Swayfield in 1286. This revealed that the chapel’s endowment consisted of 50s paid from the earl’s treasury, 2½ marks (33s 4d) from Oakham fair, tithe of the common pasture and of wool, lambs and milk from six cottars, the offerings at the chapel which, in the absence of the earl and countess, the chaplain was allowed to keep, and a suitable house in the town.8 The royal inquisition taken on the earl’s lands after his death took a rather different view of things, as well as producing a slightly different report about the chaplain’s benefice. It regarded what the then chaplain received rather as a charge on the earl’s revenues than a resource at his disposal, although elements of spiritual income were recorded.9 It was not listed as an advowson interest when the earl’s ecclesiastical interests were divided up for the purpose of assigning dower to his widow.10 The only exception to the bishop’s control over institution to benefices was in the king’s so-called ‘free chapels’ which enjoyed varying degrees of exemption 6 7 8 9

10

Bracton, Laws and Customs, 2.160. Reg. Sutton, 2.xiv–xv. Reg. Sutton, 2.57. TNA C 133/95, m. 13, calendared in C. Inq. PM, 3.461 (no. 604). In the IPM the chaplain was said to receive 50s from the exchequer at the castle, and 43s 7d from tithes of the parks and market and perquisites of the same market. See below, Chapter 4, pp.  102–3 on the way in which advowsons were treated for the purpose of dower assignments.

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from episcopal authority. In particular, the king claimed to collate prebends in such chapels on his own authority, rather than presenting clerks to the bishop.11 It was possible, actually, for laymen other than the king to have the right of presentation to the prebends in royal free chapels, although it was rare; one such case was when in 1290 John of Brittany presented to the church of West Thurrock (Essex) which was a prebend of the collegiate church of St Mary’s Hastings, a royal free chapel. He did so by reason of his wardship of the lands of Bartholomew Brianzon, his tenant. Here the descent of the right of advowson had remained with the manor of West Thurrock although the church had become a prebend. It was also true that some prelates had been granted the royal rights of patronage in royal free chapels. John of Brittany’s presentee was the royal clerk Walter Langton, who was admitted to the benefice by the vicar of the bishop of London, although it was by a royal order to the dean of St Mary’s that he was assigned a stall and a place in the chapter.12 The appendix lists the presentations made by a number of late thirteenthcentury magnates.13 These include presentations made by the twelve earls and the more important magnates whose ecclesiastical interests were in dioceses for which the registers for the period have come down to us: Hugh Courtenay, lord of Okehampton in Devon whose interests were in the Exeter diocese and John of Hastings, whose ecclesiastical interests were mainly in the diocese of Lincoln. Their presentations will be found in the latter part of the appendix, followed by the presentations made by some of the more prominent and longlived dowagers of the period, namely, Isabella de Forz, countess of Albemarle and in her own right countess of Devon, Alice de Lacy, mother of Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, and Margaret Ferrers, dowager countess of Derby. We will return to the clerks presented in chapters two and three, but will for now note the nature of magnate patronage that the appendix reveals. By far the majority of the presentations made by magnates were to rectories of parish churches. Most of these were on their own estates, but some were in their gift by reason of wardships during minority of the heirs. These included wardships of estates held by feudal tenants of the patron himself; but they might also be appurtenances of royal wardships granted to a magnate as a favour. There were some presentations to prebends in collegiate churches, such as those made by the earl of Warwick to the church of St Mary, Warwick. And there were some presentations to endowed castle chapels, to the headships of hospitals, and, occasionally, to vicarages, although this was rare.14 11

12

13 14

J.H. Denton, The English Royal Free Chapels 1100–1300: A Constitutional Study (Manchester, 1970). See also Denton, ‘Royal Supremacy in Ancient Demesne Churches’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 22 (1971), 289–302, and Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, 1294–1313: A Study in the Defence of Ecclesiastical Liberty (Cambridge, 1980), esp. pp. 285–93. CPR 1281–92, p. 362, and see VCH Essex, 2:594. Episcopal involvement in appointments to prebends at Hastings had been bypassed by 1291: see Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, p. 292. Appendix of Magnate Presentations, below, pp. 183, 197, 198 and 204. Among the clerical grievances of 1300–1, there was a complaint about the usurpation of

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21

Lay patronage was, in general terms, proportionate to the size of the fief to which it belonged. Magnates had the patronage of dozens of churches and of many religious houses. It was not, however, the case that for every manor he owned a magnate had the right of presenting to the local church. For one thing, manors and parishes were not always coterminous. Some parishes contained several manors, and the advowson of the church might belong to just one of the manorial lords or might be divided between several. Conversely some manors had more than one church attached to them. Furthermore many advowsons had come into the possession of cathedrals or religious houses. Such gifts had, in many cases, been made in the wake of the twelfth-century reforms which had curtailed the rights of the laity in the churches on their estates. In many cases such churches had become ‘appropriated’ to the religious institution. When a church was appropriated the tithes and other income were retained by the religious house, which effectively became the rector. Vicarages were ordained in churches that had been appropriated by monasteries, or, more rarely, when a rector could not be resident.15 The rector was usually responsible for the presentation to the vicarage in ‘his’ church, but, as mentioned already, lay patrons were sometimes involved too. The rector of Frodingham (Lincolnshire) for example had the right of presenting to the vicarage of the church with the consent of the patron of the rectory, the earl of Cornwall.16 In 1281 the ‘rector’ Michael of Northampton presented Master Henry le Meger to the vicarage. Oliver Sutton, bishop of Lincoln, admitted le Meger (although he made it clear that this was not to condone Michael of Northampton’s position, for he was holding the rectory unlawfully). He saved his right as bishop to assign a suitable house to the vicar in accordance with the earl’s consent.17 A less controversial case was when Alice de Lacy consented in 1294 to the presentation made by the rector of Bradford (Yorkshire) to the vicarage of the same church.18 These examples show that, although strictly speaking there were two benefices (the rectory and the vicarage) of which only

15

16 17 18

ecclesiastical jurisdiction. The clergy maintained that the patronage of vicarages belonged to the rectors of the churches in question and was a purely spiritual thing so belonged to the ecclesiastical court. The king replied that sometimes the patronage belonged to the rector, sometimes to others, but that cognisance of advowson cases always belonged to the royal court. Councils and Synods, 2.2.1215. Addleshaw, Rectors, Vicars and Patrons, pp. 5 and 12–17, Brett, English Church under Henry I, pp. 230–1, Kemp, ‘Monastic Possession of Parish Churches’, pp. 133–60, Mayr-Harting, Religion, Politics and Society in Britain, pp.  113–14, and U. Rasche, ‘The Early Phase of Appropriation of Parish Churches in Medieval England’, Journal of Medieval History, 26 (2000), 213–37. E.g. Rotuli Ricardi Gravesend, Diocesis Lincolniensis, ed. F.N. Davis, with additions by C.W. Foster and A. Hamilton Thompson (CYS, 31 and LRS, 20, 1925), p. 88. Reg. Sutton, 8.2. See below, Chapter 3, pp. 79–80 and 94 for Michael of Northampton. The Registers of John le Romeyn, 1286–96, and of Henry of Newark, 1296–9, ed. W. Brown (Surtees Society, 123 and 128, 1913–17), 1.137.

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one was in the patron’s gift, they were patrons of the whole church and therefore any decision about income from it concerned them. It was for the same reason that a patron might be consulted about other decisions affecting a church. For instance in 1260 Walter Bronescombe, bishop of Exeter, decided to allow certain parishioners of Lydford (Devon) to attend services at Widecombe in the Moor because they lived too far away from Lydford church. He did so with the consent of the patrons of the churches, Richard of Cornwall and Ralph FitzRichard respectively. The income of Lydford would presumably have been reduced, if only slightly, by the diversion of its parishioners to services elsewhere, so the decision did impact on the value of the benefice.19 There were no explicit references to payment of tithe in this case, but the consent of the patron might well be asked before any arrangements which did affect tithes were made. John de Warenne, patron of Sculthorpe (Norfolk), consented for example to an agreement made on 19 October 1269 between the prior and convent of Lewes and Richard FitzJohn, the rector, whereby the tithes of the demesne were farmed out to the rector and his successors.20 The tithe of the demesne of Sculthorpe had been confirmed in the priory’s possession by William de Warenne at the end of the eleventh century, although the advowson seems to have remained with the earls of Surrey.21 Even when a patron had granted out his right of advowson he still seems to have been considered to retain some residual interest in a church. In a letter of 6 August 1289 John le Romeyn, archbishop of York, asked John de Warenne whether he ‘continued to approve’ of the appropriation made of Cantley (Yorkshire) to the nuns of Wallingwells (Nottinghamshire). He said he did not want the appropriation to take effect without the earl’s approval. John de Warenne had secured the advowson of Cantley from Johanna de Vermeleys by a fine made 19

20

21

The Episcopal Register of Walter Bronescombe, 1257–80, in The Episcopal Registers of the Diocese of Exeter, ed. F.C. Hingeston-Randolph (London and Exeter, 1889), 1.103–305 (p. 204). TNA E 40/3064 and 14065 (copies in The Norfolk Portion of the Chartulary of the Priory of St Pancras of Lewes, ed. J.H. Bullock (Norfolk Record Society, 12, 1939), pp.  43–4. Disputes between rectors and the priory were of long standing: see also pp. 33–5 and 41–6. In the Taxatio of 1291 the church was valued at the considerable sum of £33 6s 8d. Lewes priory was said to have a portion but the amount was not given (www.hrionline.ac.uk/ Taxatio/db/Taxatio/printbc.jsp?benkey=NW.NF.BU.28, accessed 3 December 2009). The Chartulary of the Priory of St Pancras of Lewes (Sussex Portion), ed. L.F. Salzman (Sussex Record Society, 38 and 40, 1933–5), 1.22 and 2.xxiii and see, e.g., NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 58r. However in 1243 Eustacia de Pavelly was referred to as patron and gave her consent to the farming out of the tithes to the rector: Norfolk Portion of the Chartulary of Lewes, p. 44. Another example of a patron’s being consulted about tithes is perhaps when Godfrey Giffard wrote to Edmund of Cornwall in 1283 about tithes which Payn of Liskeard, the earl’s clerk, was claiming belonged to the church of Chalgrove (Oxfordshire), which was in the earl’s patronage. The bishop said that the tithes belonged to Hillingdon (Middlesex): Episcopal Registers: Diocese of Worcester: Register of Bishop Godfrey Giffard, September 23rd 1268 to August 15th 1301, ed. J.W. Willis Bund, 2 vols (Worcestershire History Society, 15, 1898–1902), 2.182. For Payn of Liskeard’s career, see below, Chapter 3, pp. 79–80.

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in 1262. It looks as if he had then granted the advowson to the nuns, and they were in possession of the advowson in 1272 when Archbishop Walter Giffard consented to the appropriation of the church after the death of the then rector, Master John Clarell, who was to pay them a pension in the meantime.22 So John le Romeyn seems to have taken the view that the earl had a continued interest in and responsibility towards the church, as the founder’s heir or representative. There are other instances in which the patronage of a church was referred to as a duality of rights. Although the terms ‘advowson’ and ‘right of patronage’ were often used synonymously23 they were probably thought of in some contexts as distinct. In 1268 a royal letter patent referred to the bishop of Salisbury refusing to admit to the church of Stanford Dingley (Berkshire) because of an alleged inquisition about the ‘patronage and advowson’ of the church.24 In 1279 when royal commissioners were making detailed inquiries in the counties about land ownership and tenures it was stated repeatedly in the returns for Cambridgeshire that patrons enjoyed the ‘advocatio et donatio’ (‘the advowson and gift’) of their churches.25 All the information about the advowsons of Robert de Vere in the county was recorded in this way.26 The wording of lay patrons’ charters reveals something of the makers’ construction of their rights. On 4 March 1270 William de Beauchamp granted Ralph of Lindsey the manor of ‘Compton’ with lands in ‘Ordston’ but he kept the advowson of the church of ‘Compton’ ‘for [his] presentation and gift and [that of his] heirs’.27 (‘Compton’ was perhaps Great Comberton (Worcestershire) to which the earl

22

23

24

25

26 27

Reg. Romeyn, 1.88, TNA E40/5575 (catalogued in A Descriptive Catalogue of Ancient Deeds in the Public Record Office, 6 vols (HMSO, 1890–1915), 3.196), and The Register of Walter Giffard, Lord Archbishop of York, 1266–1279 ed. W. Brown (Surtees Society, 109, 1904), pp. 36–7. The nuns’ interest in the church went back beyond this, however; an ordinance of 1262 made clear that the nuns had the advowson of this and other named churches, although they then transferred their right to the archbishop: Reg. W. Giffard, pp. 327–8. For example, when Henry de Lacy gave the advowson of his half of Whalley church to the abbot and convent of Stanlaw in 1284 he spoke of ‘advocationem sive jus patronatus’: W. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, new edn by J. Caley, H. Ellis and B. Bandinel, 6 vols in 8 (London, 1817–30), 5:644 and see below, Chapter 6, pp. 167–8 for his gift. See also Kemp, ‘Monastic Possession of Parish Churches’, pp. 135, note 4 and p. 137 for terminology of the twelfth century. CPR 1266–72, p. 262. The inquisition was said to have been made by persons who did not know that Roger de Leyburn, to whom Henry III had given the manor and advowson of Stanford Dingley which had belonged to Robert Ferrers, was the patron. See also CPR 1266–72, p. 697. Sandra Raban points out that the article inquiring about the patronage of churches occurs only in the return for the borough of Cambridge: Raban, A Second Domesday, pp. 47 and 201. Rotuli Hundredorum, 2 vols (London: Record Commission, 1812–1818), 2.422 (Great Abington and Horseheath), 424 (Castle Camps), and 569 (West Wickham). BL Add. MS 28024 (the Beauchamp Cartulary), fol. 196r ‘ad presentationem meam et donationem et heredum meorum’.

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presented in 1282.28) In a quitclaim of 5 April 1271 Roger Bigod gave up his right in the church of Cratfield (Suffolk) in favour of St Neots priory (Huntingdonshire); the deed gave expressly the advowson and the right of patronage with lands, rents, offerings, and all other appurtenances.29 Perhaps the earl intended (in the reference to lands, rents, offerings and so on) that the priory might appropriate the church, but strictly speaking he himself had no right to the fruits of the benefice. In other examples, Edmund, earl of Lancaster, gave Wormsley priory (Herefordshire) the ‘advowson and patronage’ of Dilwyn with an acre of land there in 1274;30 and in 1297 when Alice de Vere, dowager countess of Oxford, leased the manor of Beeston (Norfolk) to the prior of Beeston and the rector of Surlingham for ten years she reserved for herself the patronage of Beeston church and the right to present to it when it fell vacant.31 It seems difficult to pin down exactly what this general right of patronage may have meant for those who used the term in conjunction with the term ‘advowson’. Perhaps it implied a general responsibility for the church, bound up with a residual sense of ownership. Canon law certainly favoured the idea of lay patrons having a duty to protect the welfare of churches of their advowson and to prevent damage to their endowment. The lawyer pope Innocent IV (1243– 54) was particularly explicit on this point: Providentia patroni in duobus constitit, scilicet, vt de temporalibus sit solicitus, ne dilapidentur, in spiritualibus, ut talem ministrum praesentet, qui digne Deo valeat ministrare. Ex iure autem patronatus prouenient onera, quia tenetur ecclesiam ab impugnatione defendere, et de rebus ecclesiasticis solicitudinem genere, ne fraudentur. 32 The responsibility of the patron consists of two things, namely, that he be mindful as to the temporalities, lest they be squandered; in spiritualities, that he present such a minister who will be able to serve God fittingly. Now duties come about from the right of patronage, because he [the patron] is bound to defend the church from attack, and to nurture carefulness in respect of [its] ecclesiastical goods, lest they be embezzled.

28 29 30 31

32

Reg. Giffard, 2.144. BL Cotton MS Faustina A iv (St Neots Cartulary), fol. 141r. Copies of previous grants of the church are at fols. 79r–80r. C. Ch. R., 1257–1300, p. 250. TNA E 40/5577 (catalogued in Catalogue of Ancient Deeds, 3.196). See however Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 10:218, note (c) where it is said that the manor was demised to the prior of Beeston and the rector of Beeston. Innocent IV, In Quinque Libros Decretalium Commentaria (Venice, 1578), fol. 181r, and see also ‘Decretum Magistri Gratiani’, 2.C. 16, q. 7, c. 30 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 1.808–9. ‘Habent ius prouidendi, et consulendi, et sacerdotem inueniendi; sed non habent ius uendendi, uel donandi, uel utendi tamquam propriis.’ ‘They have the right of providing, and counselling, and of finding the priest; but they do not have the right to sell, give, or use as property.’

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Whether patrons (and the officers who asked questions of local juries) understood the duality of patronage rights in quite these terms is not clear, but the responsibility of protection was, it seems, part of the right of patronage, and by seeking the consent of patrons in matters where laymen were normally not concerned, bishops were acknowledging their responsibility. The patronage of religious houses was inherently different from the advowson of churches and it embraced a variable mix of rights, customs and ways of exercising influence. The relationship between a house and its patron would depend on its order, size, location in relation to the patron’s estates, and on custom. First of all there were traditional rights associated with elections; the patron did not have the right to nominate the new head of house but might expect formally to give licence to the community to elect and to assent to the choice they made. In practice, some patrons may have influenced the outcome; but they were not supposed to do so. Another traditional right was that of custody during vacancies, which meant that the patron had control over the lay fees of the house, including its advowsons of churches unless these were appropriated (in which case the house itself was already the rector and in receipt of its income). These rights in elections and vacancies were important because it was only the legal patron who was entitled to exercise them. If he did not, no one else could either. Indeed the rights in elections were not optional but were in the nature of an obligation – if they were not correctly exercised, the election itself might be declared invalid. A monastery might offer a variety of services to its patron – a burial place for him and his family; prayers; hospitality (on fixed occasions or as needed); grants of pensions or corrodies to his dependants. It might be a matter of keeping up close connections with him and his family. This was a characteristic of relations between Cistercian houses and their patrons, but patrons did not, however, enjoy rights in elections and vacancies in Cistercian houses.33 It is true that these kinds of service were most often associated with patronage, but they might not be exclusive to the founder and his descendants – other benefactors and persons of influence might enjoy them as well. So patronage of monasteries could involve the a number of different rights and entitlement to a variety of services, but in other cases it consisted of less welldefined links, which, although they might in themselves be important, were not always legally constituted and were not always exclusive to patronage. There was one further, very important, kind of ecclesiastical patronage exercised by magnates. This was the right of certain marcher lords to have custody of the temporal estates of Welsh bishoprics during vacancies and to collate to prebends. From the royal perspective this was galling, because it meant that the king, who exercised these rights in most English bishoprics, was not able to exploit the Welsh ones. Royal rights in bishoprics were in a sense akin to the custody of religious houses during vacancies, but the Crown claimed them by reason of kingship as well as patronage in the stricter sense.34 And they were very fruitful

33 34

Wood, English Monasteries, esp. pp. 3–4. M. Howell, Regalian Right in Medieval England (London, 1962), pp. 201–10 and passim.

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in terms of the ecclesiastical patronage which they afforded the king, in the form of benefices normally in the gift of the bishop. We need now to turn to how the magnates under study had acquired their estates – and hence their patronage rights. As seen already, some of the magnate families of the late thirteenth century had held the bulk of their estates since Domesday; some had been allowed, by royal favour, to marry into their position; and some had benefited from royal grants. For the purpose of patronage rights, it is the families who were explicitly granted their estates that are of particular interest because they enable us to look at how changes in the ownership of land affected the patronage rights associated with them. Benjamin Thompson has shown, with respect to a later period, that the transfer of patronage rights of monasteries to new owners weakened them, which was to prove fatal in the context of the Dissolution of the monasteries of the sixteenth century.35 There were huge changes in the pattern of noble landownership in the thirteenth century. The loss of Normandy in 1204 meant that, over time, lands were confiscated and conferred on new owners and links between baronial families in England and the Norman religious houses which had been endowed with English property were more arduous to maintain. In the 1260s there was further change, after some of the rebellious barons forfeited their lands and they were granted to new owners. Such redistribution of estates may well have had an impact on patronage rights. As emphasised at the beginning, however, patronage rights belonged to lands and were inherited and transferred with them, so the transfer of estates to new owners should have included those rights. But did it? The estates of the earldom of Cornwall make it possible to undertake a very detailed study of the relationship between land and ecclesiastical patronage, and to find out what happened to patronage when estates were transferred to new owners or were divided up. The earldom had been held by Reginald, Henry I’s son, until his death in 1175. But in its thirteenth-century incarnation it was far wealthier and more extensive than before. It was associated with a great swathe of estates, fees, revenues and rights which extended from the south-west to nearly every county of southern England, and to Yorkshire in the north.36 Henry III was extraordinarily generous to his younger brother. The estates were in most cases established fiefs which had belonged to people who had forfeited them – mostly in the wake of the loss of Normandy in 1204 and the civil war of the end of King John’s reign. There were also manors which had been held by the Crown since Domesday. All the lands forming the late thirteenth-century earldom of Cornwall were thus transferred from the hands of several owners into the control of a single family; and the diverse origins and distribution of the patronage rights associated with the estates reflected their earlier history. It is partly because the lands were acquired in this way that the sources relating

35 36

Thompson, ‘Monasteries and Their Patrons at Foundation and Dissolution’, pp. 103–25. For studies of the estates themselves, see L.M. Midgley, ed., Ministers’ Accounts of the Earldom of Cornwall, 1296–1297 (Camden Society, 66 and 68, 1942–5), 1.xviii–xxiv and N. Denholm-Young, Richard of Cornwall (Oxford, 1947), esp. pp. 162–70.

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to them are so copious; and the fact that they came back into royal possession in 1300 prompted further making and preservation of records. First, there are the royal charters by which Richard of Cornwall was enfeoffed of his estates by his brother, which survive in the form of royal charter enrolments and cartulary copies. In addition, we have the inquisitions post mortem (IPMs) relating to the lands of Richard of Cornwall (d. 1272) and Edmund, his son (d. 1300). Of that taken in 1272 we only have the returns relating to Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Essex and Hertfordshire.37 There was, however, as well as this inquisition an inquiry made at the end of 1275 about estates in which Beatrice of Falkenbourg, Richard’s third wife and then his widow, claimed dower against her stepson Edmund, and this provides further information.38 The inquisition taken after Edmund’s own death in 1300 provides information about almost all his demesne lands excepting the demesne lands of the honour of Eye, for which there appears to have been no return.39 This was probably because these were among the estates that had been assigned to Margaret, Edmund’s wife, when the two were separated in 1294.40 Margaret claimed dower, in the years following her husband’s death, from many feoffees – both ecclesiastical and lay – of the lands which Edmund had granted out during his lifetime. As a result, extents of lands which the earl had, at one time, held in demesne, but of which he had not died seised, were made and attached to the main IPM.41 When Edmund died in 1300 he left no children by his wife Margaret de Clare and his heir was his first cousin, Edward I. This was why the documents relating to Edmund’s estate ownership came into royal hands. They included the accounts made by estate administrators during the earls’ lives.42 The escheators responsible for compiling Edmund’s IPM may have had access to his administrative documents, for many of the alms payable from his lands were included in the returns and bear close comparison with entries in the accounts. A little later the king gained possession of his cousin’s title deeds. On 10 August 1302, Walter of Aylesbury, one of the executors of Edmund’s will, was ordered to bring all charters and deeds relating to his lands to London, and to have them in

37 38 39

40 41

42

TNA C 132/42/1 (C. Inq. PM, 1.273–5 (no. 808)). TNA C 133/15/10 (C. Inq. PM, 2.125–6 (no. 203)). TNA C 133/95–7 (C. Inq. PM, 3.456–89 (no. 604)). The inquisition is not always easy to use, because several of the membranes are stained or faded and others are missing. Although the exchequer enrolment of the inquisition, TNA E 352/8, is also in bad condition, it is helpful occasionally in supplying missing information. In addition, a schedule of the knights’ fees, advowsons of churches and patronage of monasteries belonging to the earldom of Cornwall, drawn up, apparently, for the purpose of assigning dower to Edmund’s widow, occasionally provides information which in the inquisition itself is missing or illegible: Bodl. MS Berks. Roll, II. CPR 1292–1301, pp. 63–5, and see below, pp. 170–1. The membranes in the third file of the inquisition are not all numbered consecutively. For the sake of clarity I have treated the first membrane in the file as m. 1 and have referenced the rest consecutively. Details are given in Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 1.xxxviii–xxxix.

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the exchequer by Michaelmas.43 By about 1323, if not before, they had been transcribed into a register or cartulary which forms a source of detailed information about the lands of which the thirteenth-century earldom of Cornwall was composed.44 Like all cartularies it is a one-sided source. It was compiled as a collection of the earldom’s title deeds and so it does not include many documents by which the earls had granted out their lands and rights, unless such grants were made in return for a particular service or with something held in reserve. For example, the abbess of Fontevrault (dép. Maine-et-Loire) promised in a deed of 1244, in return for Richard of Cornwall’s grant of the advowson of the church of Tintagel (Cornwall), to spend the income of the church on tunics for the nuns. This was copied into the cartulary because it was the record of their obligation; it was also copied into the abbey’s book of benefactors.45 However, Richard’s own charter, to which the undertaking referred, was not preserved in the cartulary. The major part of the royal grants in fee to Richard of Cornwall were made during the 1230s (earlier grants were given during pleasure).46 On 10 August 1231 a whole string of charters was issued. In one, Henry III gave Richard the dower lands of their mother, Isabella of Angoulême, the lands of Robert, count of Dreux, and the lands belonging to the duke of Lorraine in England.47 Isabella’s dower lands did not constitute an honour in the technical sense, but they did form a recognisable fief whose component parts had not altered much after the end of the twelfth century. It included the honour of Berkhamsted, centring on Berkhamsted castle (Hertfordshire), which had been held by Robert, count of Mortain, at Domesday. Robert’s son William forfeited his estates in 1106 and they came into the hands of the Crown. Berkhamsted was granted to Randulph, Henry I’s chancellor, and possibly later on to Reginald, Henry I’s illegitimate son, sometimes known as Reginald de Dunstanville (d. 1175).48 At the end of the twelfth century it was given in dower to Richard I’s wife, Berengaria. In addition to Berkhamsted, the dower included the county of Rutland, the overlordship of cities of Chichester and Exeter and extensive demesne lands, particularly in the south-west of England.49 Isabella’s English estates were confiscated when

43 44

45 46

47

48 49

CCR 1296–1302, p. 599. TNA E 36/57. The title deeds and register were mentioned by Bishop Stapledon in his inventory compiled in about 1323: Antient Kalendars and Inventories of the Exchequer, ed. F. Palgrave, 3 vols (RC, 1836), 1.50. TNA E 36/57, no. Lxxxxvij, fols 27v–28r. See Nicholas Vincent, ‘Richard, first earl of Cornwall and king of Germany (1209–1272)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/23501, accessed 4 Nov 2011). C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 139 (TNA E 36/57, no. Cxxxix, fols 39v–40r). An earlier charter, of 4 February 1231, had given Richard these fiefs, but only until they should be returned to the heirs of the previous owners: C. Ch. R. 1227–57, p. 129. See David Crouch, ‘Reginald, earl of Cornwall (d. 1175)’, ODNB, online edn, Oct 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/23319, accessed 10 July 2012). VCH Herts., 2:165–6, and I.J. Sanders, English Baronies (Oxford, 1960), p. 14. Isabella’s

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she and her second husband, Hugues, count of La Marche, made common cause with Louis VIII of France against the government in England of Henry III’s minority.50 The lands of Robert, count of Dreux, as they were called in Henry’s charters, implied the honour of St Valéry, with its demesne lands in the counties of Berkshire, Oxfordshire and Middlesex. These were held at Domesday and in the early twelfth century by the families of d’Ivry and de St Valéry, but were eventually united in the hands of the de St Valéry family. Robert, count of Dreux, acquired the honour when he married Annora, daughter of Thomas de St Valéry who died in 1219, but they were confiscated as lands of the Normans.51 The duke of Lorraine’s lands meant the honour of Eye, of which the demesne estates were mostly in Suffolk. The honour of Eye originated from the lands which were held by Robert Malet at Domesday. He forfeited his estates, probably in 1105, and they were granted to Stephen of Blois in about 1113. They came to the Crown when Stephen became king in 1135, and remained in royal control for most of the twelfth century. Richard I granted the honour to Henry, duke of Lorraine and Brabant, but notwithstanding this the honour was controlled by a number of people in the early thirteenth century until it was granted to Richard of Cornwall in fee.52 In another charter of 10 August 1231, Richard was given the whole county of Cornwall, with the stannary and all mines.53 The charter did not itself specify which lands were to be given, but it was by this grant that the honour of Launceston, which originated with lands in Cornwall held at Domesday by Robert, count of Mortain, was acquired. Like the lands which came to form the honour of Berkhamsted, they had been inherited by Robert’s son William, who forfeited them in 1106. Reginald, illegitimate son of Henry I, acquired the fief during the struggle between his half-sister the Empress Matilda and King Stephen but it escheated to the Crown on his death in 1175. Richard I granted it to his brother John in 1189 and it remained with the Crown after John became king. In 1215 John, much in need of allies, granted it to Reginald’s illegitimate

50 51 52 53

dower, as assigned to her on 5 May 1204, consisted of the following: the city of Exeter, Lifton, Kenton, Easton, Greatweek (Devon), Ilchester (Somerset), Wilton, Malmesbury, ‘Betestdun’ (?Biddesden or Biddestone) in service, Winterslow (Wiltshire), Chichester, Queenhithe (Middlesex), Waltham (Essex), the honour of Berkhamsted, the county of Rutland and the town of Rockingham (Northamptonshire): Rot. Cart., 128. See also CPR 1216–25, p. 444, and CPR 1225–32, p. 134. Nicholas Vincent, ‘Isabella, suo jure countess of Angoulême (c.1188–1246)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2006 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/14483, accessed 4 Nov 2011). The Book of Fees, 2 vols in 3 (HMSO, 1920–31), p. 613, VCH Oxon., 5:60–1, and Sanders, English Baronies, pp. 9–10. Book of Fees, pp. 137–8, and Sanders, English Baronies, pp. 3–4. C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 139 (TNA E 36/57, nos. Cxxx and CClxxj, fols 35r–v and 70r) Richard already held Cornwall during pleasure and had been created earl in 1227: see Denholm-Young, Richard of Cornwall, esp. pp. 9 and 13.

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son, Henry fitz Count, but he surrendered it in 1220 under pressure from Henry III’s minority government and in return for a cash compensation.54 In yet another charter of 10 August 1231 Richard of Cornwall acquired the castle and honour of Wallingford, with the manor of Watlington (Oxfordshire), and on 27 May 1232 the town of Wallingford was added.55 The honour of Wallingford, which was centred on Wallingford castle, comprised demesne estates in Berkshire and south Oxfordshire intermingling closely with lands belonging to the honour of St Valéry. The estates which had belonged to the Saxon Wigod were divided at Domesday between Miles Crispin, who held Wallingford itself, and Robert d’Oilli, constable of Oxford castle. Their estates, which became the honour of Wallingford, were reunited in the early part of the twelfth century. Brian fitz Count, who married Miles Crispin’s widow, held the honour until the mid-twelfth century, but by the early part of Henry II’s reign it had come into the possession of the Crown. Like the honour of Launceston, Wallingford was given to John by Richard I in 1189 and it remained in royal control after John became king.56 In 1234 Richard of Cornwall was given the manor of Haughley (Suffolk).57 This was the chief manor or caput of the honour of that name which had been in royal hands since 1205. The last claimant of the honour, Thomas, count of Perche, died in 1217 fighting for the cause of Louis of France. Richard acquired the manor, but not the honour, which remained in the possession of the Crown.58 In 1235 he was given the castle and honour of Knaresborough in Yorkshire. These were entailed on the heirs of his espoused wife. (This seems to have been because Richard was at the time looking at the possibility of seeking an annulment of his marriage to Isabella Marshal, following the death of their children in infancy.59) The honour of Knaresborough, which had developed from lands centring on Knaresborough held by the king at Domesday, was held by successive farmers during the twelfth century, until it was granted out to William de Stuteville in about 1175. It reverted to the Crown after the death of William’s son in 1205 and was farmed out and granted to several holders until it was given to Richard.60

54 55

56 57 58 59

60

Sanders, English Baronies, p. 60, and Simon Lloyd, ‘Henry fitz Count (b. in or before 1175, d. 1221?)’, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/47207, accessed 4 Nov 2011). C. Ch. R. 1226–57, pp. 139 and 155 (TNA E 36/57, nos. Cxxxij, 2 copies, and Cxl, fols 36r–v and 40r. The charter granting the honour of Wallingford had to be confirmed on 1 January 1285 because the parchment from which the seal hung was different from that currently in use: CPR 1281–92, p. 150 (TNA E 36/57, no. CCiv, fol. 54r). VCH Berks., 3:523–5 and Sanders, English Baronies, pp. 54 and 93. TNA E 36/57, nos. CCviij and CClxviij, fols 55r and 69r–v. The charter was not, apparently, enrolled. Sanders, English Baronies, p. 121. C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 191 (TNA E 36/57, no. CClxx, fols 69v–70r) and see Vincent, ‘Richard, first earl of Cornwall and king of Germany (1209–1272)’ and Denholm-Young, Richard of Cornwall, p. 30, note 5. Sanders, English Baronies, pp. 59–60.

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By 1235, then, Richard was in possession of most of the lands that were to make up his patrimony in England. After the Knaresborough grant, the lands Henry III gave his brother consisted, with one exception, of manors or groups of manors rather than entire honours. As yet, none of the charters by which the lands were granted to Richard had made any mention of the advowson of churches, although later confirmations did.61 However the royal grants of manors or groups of manors, which happened next, did sometimes mention advowsons specifically. On 13 February 1235, soon after the grant of Knaresborough, Henry gave Richard the royal manor of Kirton in Lindsey with the soke (that is, the area under the jurisdiction of its court). He was to hold the manor, with knights’ fees and the advowson of churches, until such time as it should be returned to the right heirs, reasonable exchange having been made. The manor was, again, entailed on the heirs of Richard’s espoused wife.62 On 10 October 1239, Henry granted him the royal manor of Lydford with the forest of Dartmoor, to hold for an annual payment of £10 at the exchequer. No mention was made of advowsons in this charter, but the king’s wish – that any advowsons in royal gift were to be transferred – was implicit in the phrase that Richard was to have the manor as fully as the king himself had done.63 All the remaining grants in fee were made by the king as a result of an agreement with Richard in 1243 subsequent to his marriage with Sanchia of Provence, the queen’s sister. On 1 December, in return for Richard’s renunciation of his rights in lands in Ireland and Gascony, he was confirmed in possession of the county of Cornwall and the honours of Wallingford and Eye, together with knights’ fees and the advowson of churches. In addition, Henry III undertook to grant Richard and Sanchia lands to the value of £500.64 The first grant in pursuit of this undertaking was made on 25 December in the same year, and consisted of the royal manors of Mere, Corsham (Wiltshire), Fordington (Dorset) and Newport (Essex), which were given with the advowsons belonging to them.65 On the same day, Richard and Sanchia were given the manors of

61 62

63 64

65

See below, pp. 34–5. C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 193 (TNA E 36/57, no. Cxxxiij, 2 copies, fols 36v–37v). For the status of Kirton, see also Domesday Book seu Liber Censualis Wilhelmi Primi Regis Angliae, vols I–II ed. A. Parley (London, 1783), vols III–IV by H. Ellis (RC, 1816), 1.338, CCR 1302–7, p. 252, and Rot. Hund., 1.249–50, 379 and 381. C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 247 and TNA E 36/57, no. Cxxxj, fol. 35v. The cartulary copy speaks of Lydford castle but the enrolled charter does not. CPR 1232–47, p. 437 (Foedera, 1.1.253, and TNA E 36/57, no. CCxij, fol. 56r–v). In the meantime Richard and Sanchia were to have an annual payment of 1,000 marks (£666 13s 4d) to decrease in proportion to the lands they were granted. See Denholm-Young, Richard of Cornwall, pp. 48–51, for the context of the agreement. TNA E 36/57, nos. Clxxxiv and CCxv, fols 49r and 57r–v, and see C 53/36, m. 4 (C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 276). Only a memorandum of the charter was preserved on the charter roll, perhaps because it was intended that a charter containing all the grants made to Richard in consequence of his marriage would be made, although no such charter seems to have

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Glatton (Huntingdonshire) and Princes Risborough (Buckinghamshire) to hold with the advowson of churches.66 Glatton had escheated to the Crown in 1239 after the death of Baldwin de Rivers (also known as de Deauville); Princes Risborough had also escheated, before 1242, after the death of William de Simili, a Norman.67 In the following year, they had two further grants: on 17 October of the royal manor of Benson (Oxfordshire), with the advowson of churches and the four and a half hundreds belonging to the manor, and on 11 November of the manor of Bradninch (Devon) with knights’ fees and advowson of churches.68 On 15 July 1245 the manor of Hailes (Gloucestershire) with the advowson of the church, was granted with the intention that Richard should found a religious house there, and that the brethren of that house should hold the manor in free alms.69 Richard, indeed, founded a Cistercian abbey at Hailes in 1246, and endowed it with the manor and advowson.70 The royal charter of 31 May 1252 whereby Richard and Sanchia were given the castle and manor of Oakham (Rutland) and the manor of Lechlade (Gloucestershire) did not mention the advowson of churches.71 Oakham and Lechlade had belonged to Isabella de Mortimer until her death in 1252. The lordship of Oakham, which was held by the king at Domesday, was granted, probably by Henry I, to the Newburgh earls of Warwick, who retained the overlordship until the mid-twelfth century. After that, their tenants, the Ferrers family, held it directly of the Crown. When Walchelin de Ferrers died in 1201, he gave Oakham to his elder son, Henry, who forfeited his English lands on the loss of Normandy in 1204. Walchelin gave his Gloucestershire manors of Longborough and Lechlade to his younger son, Hugh, who died in the same year as his brother’s forfeiture. The Gloucestershire manors passed on Hugh’s death to his sister, Isabella, wife of Roger de Mortimer, while in 1207 Oakham was granted to Isabella and Roger for Isabella’s life. Her lands reverted to the Crown on her

66 67

68

69 70 71

been issued. On 9 March 1242 it was ordered that Richard be given seisin of these four manors, so it is clear that he had them his possession earlier than the date of the charter itself would suggest: Close R. 1237–42, p. 400, and see Close R.1242–47, p. 81, and CCR 1288–96, p. 287. C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 276 (TNA E 36/57, nos. CCxxxj and CClxvij, fols 35v–36r, and 69r). Excerpta e Rotulis Finium in Turri Londinensi Asservatis, Henrico Tertio Rege, AD 1216–72, ed. C. Roberts, 2 vols (RC, 1835–6), 1:324, CCR 1279–88, p. 72, VCH Hunts, 3:178, Book of Fees, p. 1405, and VCH Bucks, 2:261–2. TNA E36/57, nos. Cxj and CCxvj, fols 55v–56r and 57v. Only a memorandum of the charter was entered on the charter roll: TNA C53/36, m. 1 (C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 280) and see above, note 65. C. Ch. R. 1226–57, pp. 280 and 288: the charter was vacated and re-entered. It was not transcribed into the cartulary, presumably because Hailes was granted out. See below, Chapter 6, pp. 160–1. C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 392 (TNA E 36/57, no. CCvj, fol. 54v). Oakham and Lechlade were in fact granted to Richard and Sanchia by letters close dated earlier in the same month: Close R. 1251–53, pp. 92 and 95–6.

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death in 1252, and the grant to Richard and Sanchia overrode the claims of Roger Mortimer, Isabella’s grandson.72 The last royal grant in fee for which there is surviving charter evidence was on 25 April 1256, when Richard and Sanchia were given the manors of Longborough (Gloucestershire) – also claimed by the hapless Roger Mortimer as his inheritance from his grandmother Isabella – and Barford St Martin (Wiltshire).73 No mention was made of the advowson of churches in the charter. The manor of Little Weldon (Northamptonshire) seems to have been granted to Richard after 1266 when it escheated to Henry on the death of Imbert Fountains, but there is no charter relating to the gift, either in the royal charter roll or in the Cornwall cartulary.74 Henry III’s endowment of his brother was a very costly, but not on the whole unsuccessful, way of keeping Richard’s support through the vicissitudes of his long reign. His generosity to his brother was not confined to grants in fee. Wardships and farm of the mint by an agreement of 1247 were further resources that came his way. It was Richard’s wealth and Henry III’s support which enabled him to be elected as king of Germany in early 1257.75 They also enabled him to augment the estates he had been given by making purchases of yet more. Richard was continually buying and selling land, as the cartulary of the earldom of Cornwall shows, but two purchases in particular were important in terms of the land he acquired, and are of special interest here because of the ecclesiastical patronage attached to them. He acquired a large part of the barony of Cardinham in Cornwall, which was held by the Cardinham family under the honour of Launceston. For reasons which are not clear, Isolda of Cardinham, who inherited the barony from her father, Andrew, in the early 1250s, granted manors to a number of new owners before 1270. The most important feoffees were Richard of Cornwall himself, Henry de Chambernoun and Oliver de Dinham.76 Richard acquired the castle of Restormel, the River Fowey, the town of Lostwithiel and the manors of Tewington, Perranarworthal and Trebarwith, all in demesne.77 Henry de Chambernoun was given the manors of Ludgvan and Tywardreath, and Oliver de Dinham acquired the manors of Cardinham and Bodardle (each of which was

72 73

74

75 76 77

VCH Rutland, 2:11, VCH Gloucs., 7:111, and Carpenter, ‘A Noble in Politics’, pp. 186–9. TNA E 36/57, nos. Cxxxvij and CCx, fols 38v–39r and 55r–v. The charter does not appear to have been enrolled, and in fact both manors had been granted by letters close of 1254: Close R. 1253–54, pp. 13 and 67. See also Carpenter, ‘A Noble in Politics’, pp. 189–91. Excerpta e Rotulis Finium, 2:439, Placita de Quo Warranto, Edward I – Edward III, in Curia Receptae Scaccarii Westm. Asservata, ed. W. Illingworth (RC, 1818), p. 571, and see The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Twenty-Sixth Year of the Reign of King Henry III, 1241–2, ed. H.L. Cannon (New Haven and London, 1918), p. 314, and CCR 1279–88, p. 72. Denholm-Young, Richard of Cornwall, pp. 58–66 and passim, and Vincent, ‘Richard, first earl of Cornwall and king of Germany (1209–1272)’. Sanders, English Baronies, p. 110, and see Rot. Hund., 1.56–7, for the lands acquired by other feoffees. TNA E 36/57, nos. l and Cxxiij, 2 copies, fols 15v–16r and 33r–v.

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considered to be the caput of the two baronies forming the Cardinham inheritance) and later on that of Downinney.78 The charter or charters by which Oliver de Dinham was enfeoffed do not survive, but that enfeoffing Henry de Chambernoun shows that he was given, explicitly, the advowson of churches belonging to his manors. By contrast, the deeds in favour of Richard did not mention the advowson of churches as a specific item. The largest single purchase of lands which Richard made was of the barony of Trematon in Cornwall, which, like that of Cardinham, was held of the honour of Launceston. In an undated charter, Roger de Vautort granted Richard the castle, manor and honour of Trematon, the town of Saltash and the manor of Calstock, together with knights’ fees and advowson of churches.79 A fine of Hilary term 1270, while not mentioning Saltash, was more detailed about the terms, which included that the advowsons of the churches of Calstock and St Stephen’s, Trematon, were to be transferred to Richard.80 It may have been that, as superior lord, he was able to influence the wording of the deed to make sure that it spelled out which advowsons he was to get. Generally the advowson of churches and the patronage of monasteries were not transferred explicitly. The inclusion or exclusion of the phrase, ‘cum advocatione ecclesie’ or ‘cum advocationibus ecclesiarum’ was fairly haphazard, as becomes apparent when we try to correlate the wording of charters with the rights that we know from other evidence (particularly IPMs and bishops’ registers) were acquired as a consequence. The fact that Richard acquired most of his demesne lands and ecclesiastical interests by royal grants prompts us to observe the ambiguities of royal charters in particular. The deed of 1231, by which Richard acquired the honour of Berkhamsted, the county of Rutland and the dower lands of Isabella of Angoulême, made no mention of advowson or patronage rights (although a later charter, of 24 August 1246, which confirmed Richard in possession of the town, castle and honour of Berkhamsted with appurtenances, the county of Rutland, and all other lands and tenements which Isabella had held in dower, did indeed specify the advowson of churches as well as knights’ fees).81 And advowsons of churches were certainly acquired along with these lands.82 The phrase was not included in the grants of the honours of St Valery, Eye, Wallingford, Launceston and Knaresborough, nor that of the 78

79 80 81 82

G. Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis: Records Illustrating the Ancient Foundations in Cornwall and Devon (Exeter, 1846; Additional Supplement, 1854), p.  43, Cornwall Feet of Fines, Richard I–Edward III, 1195–1377, ed. J.H. Rowe (Devon and Cornwall Record Society, 1914), p. 120, no. 222, C. Inq. PM, 3.404 (no. 532), and 4.22–5 and 210–11 (nos. 44 and 312). Henry de Chambernoun was holding Downinney in 1275/6: Rot. Hund., 1.57. TNA E 36/57, no. xxviij, fols 7v–8r (Catalogue of Ancient Deeds, 5.54). TNA E 36/57, fine ‘A’, fol. 58r (Catalogue of Ancient Deeds, 5.54). TNA E 36/57, nos. Cxxxiij and CCxiij, fols 37v–38r and 56v–57r. The charter does not appear to have been enrolled on the charter roll. These were Hemel Hempstead (Hertfordshire), Rockingham (Northamptonshire) (though Edward I was later to challenge this), Manton and (probably) North Luffenham (Rutland), and St John the Baptist, Ilchester (Somerset): see Elizabeth Gemmill, ‘The

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barony of Oakham, yet there were many ecclesiastical interests belonging to all these lordships which were given to Richard as a result of the royal charters.83 As with the dower lands of Isabella of Angoulême, however, Richard did have a title in some of these advowsons, for when he was confirmed in his possession of the county of Cornwall, the honour of Wallingford and the honour of Eye in 1243, specific mention was made of advowsons.84 Royal charters granting honours and baronies were, then, for their beneficiaries, unreliable as evidence of title to the appurtenant patronage rights. This was also true of charters granting named manors. No mention was made of advowsons in the charters by which Richard was given Haughley, Lydford, and Longborough, yet he acquired the advowsons which belonged to these, all of which were of churches attached to those manors. There is no evidence in these cases to suggest that the advowsons came into his control at a later date after litigation.85 There is an interesting comment on the king’s intention in an assize of darrein presentment (the possessory action based on who had last presented a church, commonly used to deal with advowson disputes) in Michaelmas Term 1241. The suit was between Richard of Cornwall and the prior of Lewes. The jurors reported that the king, and before him his grandfather Henry II, had last presented to Haughley. It was judged, since the king had given Richard everything he himself had in the manor of Haughley, that the earl should recover his seisin (that is, his possession) of the advowson.86 Conversely, there were grants in Richard’s favour which purported to transfer the advowson of churches in manors to which none belonged at the time of the grant (either because the advowson of the parish church had been granted out, or because it belonged to a different manor within the parish). The manors of Mere, Corsham, Fordington and Newport were given to Richard to hold with the advowson of churches, yet the churches of Fordington and Mere were in the possession of the see of Salisbury, that of Newport belonged to the dean of St Martin-le-Grand in London, and that of Corsham belonged to the abbey of Marmoutier-les-Tours (dép. Indre-et-Loire).87 And in all these cases, the Crown (although not Henry III himself) had been responsible for granting out the church and thereby separating the advowson from the lordship of the manor. The only right of patronage belonging to the earls of Cornwall which can be traced back to this charter was of the hermitage in Blackmore forest which belonged to the manor of Fordington. The actual rights that they exercised are

83 84 85 86 87

Ecclesiastical Patronage of the English Earls during the Reign of Edward I’ (Manchester, PhD thesis, 1988), pp. 485, 487, 493, and 494. Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 471–500. See above, p. 31. Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 482, 484 and 496. Placitorum in Domo Capitulari Westmonasterii Asservatorum Abbreviatio, Richard I–Edward II (RC, 1811), p. 111. Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 482, 483 and 498.

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not clear and the advowson of the hermitage was said in the IPM of 1300 to be worth nothing.88 There was a similar lack of correlation – between the wording of royal charters and the advowsons belonging to manors granted – with the grant of the manors of Glatton and Princes Risborough. The church of Glatton was appropriated to Missenden abbey and that of Princes Risborough to Notley abbey (both Buckinghamshire). Yet, both manors were given with the advowson of churches.89 Nor were royal charters especially helpful when the church within an important manor had been granted out, but the advowson of the surrounding churches still belonged to it. The charter giving Richard the manor and soke of Kirton in Lindsey stated that they were to be held with advowson of churches. The church of Kirton had been granted to the see of Lincoln at the end of the eleventh century although the advowson of five churches in the soke was acquired as a result of this grant.90 Similarly, the manor of Benson was given to Richard with the advowson of churches in 1244. The church of Benson was in possession of Dorchester abbey (Oxfordshire), but the advowson of the church of Henley (a manor belonging to Benson and granted with it) was still attached to the manor.91 So, to sum up: there seem to have been only a few instances in which the inclusion of the phrase ‘cum advocatione ecclesie’ in a royal charter actually meant that there were advowsons appurtenant to the estate which could be and were given. The phrase only confirmed that, if there were advowsons pertaining, then they were to be transferred. Its exclusion did not, however, apparently imply the opposite, and when the king wanted to retain advowsons he made it clear. In 1229 when he had first granted his brother Richard the castle and honour of Wallingford he specifically reserved the advowson of the prebends in the castle chapel. This was a grant during pleasure; when the grant in fee was made in 1231 no such reservation was made and the prebends certainly came into the gift of the earls of Cornwall.92 The initial special treatment of Wallingford castle chapel may suggest that the king already had his eye on it, and certainly, it was later claimed as a royal free chapel.93 Advowsons were reserved in royal grants to other magnates in the period. Henry reserved the advowson of churches in the charter of 16 January 1251 in which he gave the castle and town of Hertford, with the manors of Essendon and Bayford (Hertfordshire) to William de Valence, to hold for life.94 The ecclesiastical interests belonging to the castle and manors had been the subject of recent royal attention, with presentations being made to Essendon and its chapel of 88 89 90 91 92 93 94

Bodl. MS Berks. Roll II, m. 6 and see Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 482–3. Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 474 and 485. Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, p. 486. Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 489–90. Close R. 1227–31, p. 258, CPR 1225–32, p. 313, and C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 139 (TNA E 36/57, no. Cxj, fol. 40r) and see Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 471, 489 and 492. See below, p. 128. C. Ch. R. 1227–57, p. 351, and see Close R. 1247–51, p. 403.

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Bayford in 1241 and to the church of St Andrew, Hertford, in 1245.95 Henry had also ordered a large plaster chapel to be built in Hertford castle in 1243, although this does not seem to have been endowed formally as a benefice.96 Again, when he gave his son Edmund the castle of Kenilworth in December 1266 he reserved the patronage of Kenilworth priory and of Stoneleigh abbey.97 Kenilworth priory was very closely bound up with lordship of the castle. Its founder, Geoffrey of Clinton, had given the house all the land in Kenilworth which Henry I had given to him, except for the land on which the castle was situated and what was needed for a town, stew and park.98 Kenilworth had been a ‘member’ of the royal manor of Stoneleigh at Domesday. 99 Henry I gave Stoneleigh church to Kenilworth priory,100 and his grandson Henry II gave the manor of Stoneleigh to the Cistercian monks who had moved there from Cannock Chase (Staffordshire) in the early part of his reign.101 It seems to have been the association between the manor of Stoneleigh and royal possessions in Kenilworth that would have led the patronage of Stoneleigh abbey to pass to Edmund, had the king not specially reserved it. So, here, the classic tripartite symbol of lordship – castle, town and religious house – was being broken up because the king, generous as he wished to be to his son, did not wish to part with the patronage of houses with longstanding royal connections. In another example, Henry granted John of Brittany the honour and rape of Hastings in 1268 but his charter reserved to the Lord Edward the castle and town of Hastings itself and the advowson of the prebends of the castle chapel. A valuation of what was reserved was to be made and John was to be compensated in lands, rents or advowsons.102 Again, this chapel was (as shown already) of special royal status; the collegiate church of St Mary, Hastings was later claimed as a royal free chapel.103 These were special cases. What seems clear from the analysis of the Cornwall estates is that Richard acquired the vast majority of the patronage which belonged to the lands at the time when the grants were made. There were some rights which belonged to the Crown and which the king did not transfer – he retained the patronage of the ancient royal abbey of Wilton although he gave

CPR 1232–47, pp. 244 and 467. Close R. 1242–47, p. 24. 97 C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 66–7 (TNA DL 42/1, fol. 3r–v). 98 C. Ch. R. 1300–26, p.  275. For the foundation of the house, see Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:219–23, and VCH Warwickshire, 2:86. 99 Domesday, 1.238r. 100 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:223. 101 For the foundation of the monks at Stoneleigh, see Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5, esp. pp. 443–4 and 446 and VCH Warwickshire, 2:78–9. 102 CPR 1266–72, p. 375 and see pp. 304 and 313. The grant of the honour and rape was a recompense to John in exchange for the portion of the honour of Richmond which Peter of Savoy, his predecessor as earl, had given to the king for the use of the Lord Edward. 103 Denton, The English Royal Free Chapels, pp. 114–15, and idem, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 291–3. 95 96

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Richard the town of Wilton; and there was no question of Richard’s acquiring the patronage of sees with cathedral churches in cities of which he was given the overlordship (Chichester and Exeter). He seems in addition to have obtained all the patronage rights belonging to lands which he acquired from others. With respect to these, there seems to be a better correlation between the deed and the rights actually acquired. In short, the fact that Richard was given or purchased his estates rather than inheriting them did not mean that the patronage rights were severed from them. The detailed evidence relating to the Cornwall estates enables us to take things further, indeed to quantify the ecclesiastical interests belonging to them. It is impossible to give an exact figure for the number of advowsons at any one moment, because the position was always changing: rights were being established for the first time, and others were granted out. But taking the evidence of IPMs, deeds, lawsuits and actual presentations, and including advowsons which Edmund clearly enjoyed during his lifetime and which do not seem to have been acquired later than 1272, we can say with reasonable confidence that Edmund, earl of Cornwall, inherited the advowsons of twenty-four churches associated with his manors and other demesne holdings. In addition there were the deaneries of the chapel of Wallingford castle and of the collegiate church of St Buryan (Cornwall), and the ‘hybrid’ chapel in Oakham castle. There were a further fourteen advowsons held ‘in gross’, that is, not clearly attached to particular demesne manors.104 Sometimes, the separation of the manorial lordship from the advowson had been deliberately engineered. Bernard de Mulet, for instance, had granted his manor of Horspath (Oxfordshire), which he held of the honour of St Valéry, to the Knights Templar at Sandford in 1225. But he reserved the advowson of the church explicitly to the lords of the honour of St Valéry.105 This is a rare example in which we know how and when the separation occurred. But, where the earls of Cornwall held advowsons ‘in gross’ – that is, on their own rather than as part of the lordship of a manor – they were usually of churches in manors which were held in demesne by their own subtenants. This was the case at Blisland, Paul (both Cornwall), Chalgrove, North Stoke (both Oxfordshire) and possibly Brundish (Suffolk).106 There are instances in which the advowson belonged to another manorial lordship, but there is no case at all in which another lay person held the advowson of the church when it was coterminous with one of the earls’ own manors. The position in 1272 had already changed, and it was to change further yet. Both Richard and his son Edmund were generous patrons of the Church, and they granted out a number of advowsons.107 But it was mainly in the years before they acquired their estates that advowsons had become separated from their

104 Gemmill,

‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 471–500. Sandford Cartulary, ed. A.M. Leys (Oxfordshire Record Society, 19, 1938), pp. 74–5. 106 Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 474, 476–7, 489, 492 and 495. 107 See below, Chapter 6, pp. 164–7 for Edmund’s grants of advowsons. 105 The

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demesne manors as a result of grants of churches to ecclesiastical institutions. The lands of which the thirteenth-century earldom of Cornwall was composed had been owned previously by many different lords. Each had had their own ecclesiastical connections. So, it is not surprising that many different institutions controlled churches on the Cornwall estates. This pattern contrasts markedly with the situation encountered on the estates held by a single family since Domesday. For example, the churches on the lands held by John de Warenne, earl of Surrey, were, where they were not in his gift, mostly in the possession of Lewes priory (Sussex) founded in 1078 by William de Warenne, earl of Surrey. Lewes was given numerous churches on the Warenne estates and maintained close links with the Warenne family.108 Similarly, William, earl of Albemarle had in the early 1160s confirmed the gift of many churches in his lordship of Holderness and elsewhere to the abbey of Aumâle.109 There was no such uniformity on the Cornwall estates. Many of the demesne manors had been in the hands of the Crown in the late eleventh century and during the twelfth. The churches on a number of these had been given to episcopal sees and to French and English abbeys. Other families which had owned the estates had also granted the churches on their manors to religious houses, particularly those of their own foundation. It is true that, in some cases, the thirteenth-century earls acquired the patronage of the religious houses which had been so endowed. They were patrons, for example, of the priory of Eye, founded by Robert Malet, Domesday lord of Eye. Eye priory owned the churches on the earls’ demesne manors of Thorndon and Eye.110 They had the patronage of the house of St Michael’s Mount (Cornwall), which was founded on lands given to Mont St-Michel (dép. Manche) by Robert, count of Mortain, in the late eleventh century.111 The church of St Clement, Moresk, which was first in the possession of Mont St-Michel, was later given to St Michael’s Mount.112 In other cases, they retained no connections, even indirect ones such as these, with the churches on their manors. The Crown retained the patronage of bishoprics and of abbeys which owned some of them. Then again, some had come into the possession of Norman houses, particularly in the period immediately after the Conquest.113 The house of St Valéry (dép. Somme) was given the churches of Isleworth, Heston and Twickenham (Middlesex) by Walter 108 See

esp. Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.20–3, and 2.xxiii, where the date is corrected from 1095 to 1147. A charter of William de Warenne, the founder’s son, albeit fabricated, is nevertheless of considerable interest in showing the priory’s endowments: Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.10–20, and see Early Yorkshire Charters, vols 1–3 ed. W. Farrer and vols 4–12 based on Farrer’s manuscripts and ed. C.T. Clay, 12 vols (Yorkshire Archaeological Society Record Series, Extra Series, 1914–65), 8.64–6. 109 Early Yorkshire Charters, 3.35–7. 110 Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 495–7. 111 Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 478–9. 112 Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, p. 476. 113 D.J.A. Matthew, The Norman Monasteries and Their English Possessions (Oxford, 1962), pp. 27–70.

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de St Valéry, Domesday lord of Isleworth.114 The house of Ivry (dép. Eure) was given the church of Asthall (Oxfordshire), probably by a member of the d’Ivry family.115 The earls of Cornwall did not have the patronage of either of these houses, and, even for those who did have patronage connections with houses in Normandy, its loss in 1204 must have marked the beginning of a more distant relationship. There was of course no need for patrons of churches to give them to houses over which they had definite rights – although this was a common pattern. Successive earls of Cornwall were generous to the foundation at Launceston. Reginald de Dunstanville was especially liberal, giving the house the churches of Stratton, Linkinhorne and Liskeard and a portion of the castle chapel of Launceston itself. But it was the bishops of Exeter who had the patronage, as a consequence of William Warelwast’s re-establishment of the minster as a house of Augustinian canons in 1127.116 And men gave their advowson rights as indeed they did their other possessions to houses of which others clearly had the patronage. In particular, feudal subtenants made grants in favour of houses founded by their overlords. It is also clear that in practice gifts to ecclesiastical establishments did not always last, even when their original donors intended that they should. Montacute priory (Somerset) was unable to keep possession of the church of Veryan (Cornwall), which it had been given by William, earl of Cornwall, before 1106.117 The Knights Templar at Cowley (Oxfordshire) lost the church of Beckley, which was given them by Reynold de St Valéry in the mid-twelfth century. Nor was the priory of Studley, which subsequently, in 1226, obtained this advowson from Robert, count of Dreux, ultimately able to keep it.118 The church of Brundish (Suffolk) was one of many given by Robert Malet to Eye priory when he founded the house, yet the advowson had reverted to the lordship of the honour of Eye by the later thirteenth century.119 Knaresborough church was given by Henry I to Nostell priory (Yorkshire), yet in 1277 the advowson was the subject of a plea 1.130, Facsimiles of Early Charters in Oxford Muniment Rooms, ed. H.E. Salter (Oxford, 1929), nos. 27–30 and 32, TNA C 133/96, m. 40 (C. Inq. PM, 3.473 (no. 604)), and VCH Middlesex, 3:103, 105, 122–3 and 157–8. 115 The earliest record of the advowson of Asthall is the presentation to the vicarage by the monks of Ivry in 1225/6: Rotuli Hugonis de Welles, Episcopi Lincolniensis, AD MCCIX– MCCXXXV, ed. W.P.W. Phillimore and F.N. Davis (CYS, 1, 2 and 4, 1907–9, and LRS, 3, 6 and 9, 1912–14), 2.2. They probably acquired it in the early twelfth century from the Ivry family, because Roger d’Ivry held Asthall at Domesday: Domesday, 1.158b. 116 Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, pp.  21–7; C. Henderson, Cornish Church Guide (Truro, 1925), pp.  198–9; R.N. Hadcock and D. Knowles, Medieval Religious Houses in England and Wales (London, New York and Toronto, 1953), pp.  162–3; and now VCH Cornwall, 2:201–4. 117 Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, p. 481. 118 Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 488–9. 119 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 3:405, and The Register of John de Grandisson, Bishop of Exeter (AD 1327–1369), ed. F.C. Hingeston-Randolph, 3 vols (London and Exeter, 1894–9), 1.86 (TNA E 36/57, fine ‘E’, fol. 59r). 114 Domesday,

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of darrein presentment between Edmund of Cornwall and the archbishop of York.120 Henry of Creswell gave the advowson of Pannal (Yorkshire) to Elsham priory (Lincolnshire) yet one of his descendants included the advowson in a grant of the manor of Pannal to Edmund of Cornwall in 1278.121 It is not always clear which individuals were responsible for challenging the ownership by religious of these churches and advowsons, but on the earldom of Cornwall estates, at least, it is clear that some gifts were not permanent, and that advowsons were sometimes reclaimed by the laity. The descent of the patronage of religious houses was not always straightforward. It was in some instances as overlords of the families of the founders that the thirteenth-century earls of Cornwall had such rights. Patronage of the priories of Bromholm (Norfolk), Redlingfield and Snape (both Suffolk) seems to have escheated to the lordship of the honour of Eye before Richard was given that fief. Sometimes an overlord acquired patronage rights when the founder’s family died out. The house of Augustinian canonesses at Goring (Oxfordshire) was founded in Henry I’s reign by Thomas Durival, and endowed by him with a hide of land from the honour of Wallingford.122 The Durivals were lords of the manor of Goring, which they held of the honour of Wallingford, throughout the thirteenth century,123 and it seems certain in view of this, and in view of the name, that they were the founder’s heirs. There is no evidence from thirteenthcentury bishops’ registers that they exercised patronage rights, but by the later thirteenth century the earls of Cornwall were certainly acting as patrons, in giving licence to elect.124 The status of the earls as patrons seems to however to have been thought about in the vacancy of 1297–98. When, on 13 January 1298, Bishop Sutton examined the process by which Agatha of Oxford had been elected, it was said that licence had been sought from the earl of Cornwall, and from him only because the house was situated within the honour of Wallingford. It held nothing else from him.125 Conversely, some rights in religious houses had been granted to the Crown. In Oxfordshire, Bernard de St Valéry had given Henry II the patronage of Godstow abbey,126 and the patronage of Oseney abbey, which had formerly been with the families of d’Oilli and de St Valéry, was in the hands of the Crown by 1221.127 120 Gemmill,

‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 388–9. E 36/57, nos. Cxxj and Clxiiij, fols 32v and 44v–45r. 122 Rot. Hund., 1.778 and VCH Oxon., 2:103. 123 Book of Fees, pp. 313, 446 and 455, Rot. Hund., 2.777, Inquisitions and Assessments Relating to Feudal Aids, 1284–1431, 6 vols (HMSO, 1899–1920), 4:154, and TNA C 133/97, m. 2 (C. Inq. PM, 3.480 (no. 604)). 124 See Rot. Gravesend, pp. 220 and 233. 125 Reg. Sutton, 8.197–8. The patronage of Goring passed to the Crown in 1300 with the Cornwall estates. It was not mentioned in the 1300 IPM, but the king asserted his rights soon after: CPR 1292–1301, pp. 561 and 569, CPR 1301–7, pp. 336–7, 361 and 364; but cf. CCR 1302–7, pp. 281 and 306. 126 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 4:364, and see Wood, English Monasteries, p. 13. 127 CPR 1216–25, p. 301, and The Cartulary of Oseney Abbey, ed. H.E. Salter, 6 vols (Oxford 121 TNA

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In one instance the patronage of a religious house was transferred explicitly. This was the case of the hospital of St John the Baptist at Lechlade, founded by Isabella de Mortimer in or before 1246 and endowed by her with possessions in Lechlade.128 Despite royal confirmation of many of the endowments, much of what she had given was recovered by the king after she died in 1252 because she had only had a life interest in Lechlade.129 On 31 May 1252 he granted the manor of Lechlade to Richard of Cornwall and Sanchia his wife, and on 20 November 1254 he restored to Richard the advowson of the church of Lechlade, a virgate of land, a mill, twelve acres of meadow and two burgages in Lechlade with their appurtenances which he had recovered against the master of the hospital.130 But on 11 February 1255, at Richard’s instance, he granted the brethren the site of their monastery on condition that licence to elect new masters be sought in future from Richard and Sanchia, whom the brethren were to regard forthwith as their patrons. He also returned to the brethren what he had recovered from them of the lands of the Normans, reserving to Richard and Sanchia the right of presenting to the vicarage of Lechlade.131 The evidence of the Cornwall cartulary shows that Richard was able to trump the claims of other patrons of the priory of Tywardreath (Cornwall). Tywardreath was an Augustinian house, subject to the abbey of St Serge and St Bacchus at Angers (dép. Maine-et-Loire). It had been founded by Richard, son of Turold, the Domesday holder of the manor of Tywardreath.132 Richard’s lands passed through his descendants, the Fitzwilliams, to Robert of Cardinham, who at the end of the twelfth century was holding seventy-one knights’ fees of the honour of Mortain. The fief owned by Robert of Cardinham and by his son Andrew was composed of two baronies, Cardinham and Bodardle.133 By about 1270, Andrew’s daughter and heir, Isabella, had alienated her inheritance, and in the early years of Edward I’s reign the estates were in the hands of a number of holders.134 The reasons for this are not clear, but the division of the family estates created uncertainty about who was entitled to the patronage of Tywardreath, which belonged to the Cardinham fief Historical Society, 89–91, 97–8 and 101, 1929–36), 1:xxviii. of Isabella’s charters in favour of the hospital were copied into the cartulary of the earldom of Cornwall: TNA E 36/57, nos. xiiij and lxxxxvj, fols 4v and 27v. 129 C. Ch. R. 1227–57, p. 296, and see above, pp. 32–3. 130 Close R. 1254–56, p. 5. 131 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:684. 132 The Richard who was holding the manor of Tywardreath of the count of Mortain at Domesday seems to have been the same person as the Richard, son of Turold, who held lands in Cornwall of the bishop of Exeter and of the count of Mortain: Domesday, IV.199v, 224v and 247r, and see Sanders, English Baronies, p. 110 and note 1. Richard, son of Turold, was named, with William his son and Robert, son of William, as the donor of the church of Tywardreath in a confirmation of the possessions of the house made by a mid-twelfthcentury archbishop of Canterbury: Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p. 41. 133 The Red Book of the Exchequer (Liber Rubeus de Scaccario) ed. H. Hall, 3 vols (RS, 1896), 1.89, Book of Fees, 1.393, Rot. Hund., 1.56–7, and see Sanders, English Baronies, p. 110 and notes 3 and 7. 134 See above, pp. 33–4. 128 Two

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as a whole, having been endowed with possessions in different places within it.135 Henry de Chambernoun had acquired the manor of Tywardreath itself, and indeed the charter by which Isolda had sold him this manor, and that of Ludgvan, had said expressly that the advowson of churches was included.136 Oliver de Dinham, however, had acquired the manors of Cardinham and Bodardle, each of which was the caput of one of the two baronies held by the Cardinham family; moreover the priory had been endowed with possessions within each of them.137 To Richard of Cornwall Isolda had given the castle of Restormel, the River Fowey, the manor of Trebarwith and service from the manor of Penlyne, as well as the manors of Tewington and Perranarworthal, which had formed her mother’s maritagium or marriage portion.138 It was true that the priory of Tywardreath had connections with these lands – for example, Restormel castle and the borough of Lostwithiel were in the parish of Lanlivery and the church of Lanlivery with its chapels (including that of Lostwithiel) had been given to the priory by Baldwin son of Turstin at the end of the eleventh or in the early part of the twelfth century.139 But of the three, the claim of Richard looks the most tenuous because the portions of the inheritance which the other two had acquired seem to have been more directly connected with patronage of the priory. The matter seems to have been the subject of a suit before the justices in eyre in Cornwall, resulting in quitclaims made both by Chambernoun and Dinham in favour of Richard. The quitclaims – undated in the cartulary copies, but probably made in or before 1270 – seem to have been made on the same occasion, for the witness lists are almost identical. Both included the names of the justices.140 The form and wording of the deeds is also identical, except for the fact that Oliver de Dinham reserved his right in the chantry of the church of St Mary du Val near Bayeux (dép. Calvados).141 It is possible that Robert of Cardinham’s gift to St Mary du Val, and to the monks of Tywardreath serving it, of possessions in the manor of Cardinham may have been

135 See

Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, pp. 37–41, for the gifts made to the priory by the Fitzwilliams and the Cardinhams. 136 Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p. 43; see also Rot. Hund., 1.57, and C. Inq. PM, 4.210 (no. 312). 137 Rot. Hund., 1.57, C. Inq. PM, 3.404 (no. 532) and 4.23–4 (no. 44) and Sanders, English Baronies, p. 110, note 7. The possessions of Tywardreath priory at Bodardle included the church (which was the church of Lanlivery) and mulcture of the mill, and at Cardinham the mill with mulcture and an allowance of wood: Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, esp. pp. 38–9 and 41. 138 TNA E 36/57, nos. l and Cxxiij, 2 copies, fols 15v–16r and 33r–v, and Rot. Hund., 1.57. 139 See above, note 137. The chapels were mentioned in Archbishop John Pecham’s confirmation of the gift: Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p. 43. 140 TNA E 36/57, nos. Clxij and CCxxxviij, fols 44r and 66r. Another copy of Oliver de Dinham’s quitclaim is in Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, Additional Supplement, p. 5. The terminus ante quem of the quitclaims is suggested by the fact that Roger Fountains was admitted to the priorate on the presentation of Richard of Cornwall and the abbot of Angers: Reg. Bronescombe, p. 188. 141 Wood, English Monasteries, pp. 22–3, noted this reservation.

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the original endowment of that chantry.142 His specific spiritual right – probably associated with this specific endowment – was thus separated from the overall patronage of the priory, now recognised to belong to the earldom of Cornwall. Other thirteenth-century examples show that the patronage of a religious house tended to be vested in the lordship from which it had been endowed rather than a particular part of it. Prittlewell priory (Essex) had been founded in Henry I’s reign by Robert, lord of the manor of Prittlewell, the son of Swain of Essex whose Domesday estates came to form the barony of Rayleigh.143 Robert’s gifts had included the church of Prittlewell itself and that of Wickford. It was probably he or his son, Henry of Essex, lord of Rayleigh and later of Haughley, who gave the church of Rayleigh which featured among the house’s possessions when Archbishop Thomas Becket (1162–70) undertook to protect them.144 So, Prittlewell was endowed with possessions within Prittlewell manor and elsewhere within the barony of Rayleigh. When Agnes, the daughter of Henry of Essex, married Aubrey de Vere, earl of Oxford, in 1162/63,145 the manor of Prittlewell became separated from the rest of the family estates, forming her maritagium and coming into the possession of the earls of Oxford.146 But the patronage of the priory appears to have remained with the main bulk of the family estates, judging from what happened next. Soon after his daughter’s marriage, Henry of Essex was disgraced and disinherited, and his baronies of Rayleigh and Haughley came into the possession of the Crown.147 The barony of Rayleigh was granted out to Hubert de Burgh and the advowson of Prittlewell passed with it – which surely referred to the priory.148 After 1237, however, it came back into royal control and remained there for the rest of the thirteenth century.149 And in 1241, by reason of ‘the honour of Essex’, and for the rest of the thirteenth century, the Crown exercised patronage rights at Prittlewell – including custody in vacancies, presentation to churches in the gift of the priory in vacancies, and assent to elections made by Lewes priory, to which Prittlewell was subject.150 A rather different story is that of the patronage of Rocester abbey (Stafford-

142 Oliver,

Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, pp. 38–9. Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:21–3 and Sanders, English Baronies, p. 139. 144 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:21. 145 See Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 10:205 and note (j) and 206 and notes (e) and (f). 146 Book of Fees, p. 1462, Red Book of the Exchequer, p. 737, C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 475, CPR 1281–92, p. 173 and CCR 1288–96, p. 336. 147 See the Chronicle of Robert de Torigni in Chronicles of the Reigns of Stephen, Henry II and Richard I, 4 vols (RS, 1889), 4.218. 148 C. Ch. R. 1226–57, pp. 12–13 and 82. 149 Sanders, English Baronies, p. 139. 150 CPR 1232–47, p.  251, CPR 1272–81, p.  437, CPR 1281–92, p.  391, CPR 1292–1301, p. 616, Close R. 1247–51, p. 197, Close R. 1256–9, p. 346, Close R. 1259–61, pp. 43, 45, 51–2 and 253, Close R. 1268–72, p. 367, CCR 1302–7, pp. 18 and 58, and Calendar of Chancery Warrants, 1244–1326 (HMSO, 1927), pp. 151 and 162. See also W.E.L. Smith, Episcopal Appointments and Patronage in the Reign of Edward II: A Study in the Relations of Church and State (Chicago, 1938), p. 84, note 215. 143 Dugdale,

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shire). Ranulph earl of Chester (1181–1232) gave his manor of Leek to Dieu­ lacres abbey in 1232 with all appurtenances and liberties. His gift was confirmed by Henry III on 25 November. The patronage of Rocester abbey, which had been founded by Richard Bacon, nephew of Ranulph, earl of Chester (possibly the above-mentioned earl’s grandfather) between 1141 and 1146, passed to the abbot of Dieulacres with the grant of Leek. A royal letter close of 24 May 1233 to the bishop of Coventry and Lichfield specifically said that the patronage of Rocester was known to belong to the manor of Leek and therefore to the abbot of Dieulacres. The letter, however, asked the bishop to treat John, earl of Chester (Ranulph’s successor), as patron because the abbot of Dieulacres had quitclaimed his right.151 The descent of patronage rights was thus by no means always predictable or straightforward. The survey of patronage on just one comital inheritance reveals the complexities of the relationships between land and patronage in the thirteenth century. The lordship of some manors had the advowson of churches attached; elsewhere such rights had been granted out, whether to a religious house in the patronage of the earldom, or to another ecclesiastical institution in England or Normandy. There were some advowsons held by the earls of Cornwall ‘in gross’ on the manors of their feudal subtenants. The patronage of religious houses tended to pass with the lordship of an entire estate, but might come into the hands of an overlord, or could be transferred separately to a new owner, or, if the lordship itself were divided up, would become attached to one part of the lordship. Entitlement to patronage rights was gained in the first place along with lands, whether implicitly or explicitly. All rights, however, needed to be exercised in order to be established, and it is to the exercise of rights that we now turn.

151 Dugdale,

Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:629 and 6:409–11, Close R. 1231–4, p. 220 and see p. 122 and VCH Staffs, 3:247. The case is cited in Wood, English Monasteries, p. 21.

2 The Exercise and Defence of Patronage Rights

Most of the evidence we have about magnates presenting to benefices comes from bishops’ registers. This is in itself an indication of the extent of canonical authority in relation to clerical appointments. When a bishop instituted a clerk to a church, he was upholding his own spiritual authority, and it was his duty to assure the quality of local clergy by checking on the character, education and eligibility of the man presented to him. This, after all, was a moment when he might give real meaning, within his own diocese, to the drive for pastoral reform which characterised the thirteenth-century Church. The making of canon law was one thing; putting it into effect was another. The bishop was at the sharp end of relations with lay patrons, some of whom were highly influential people, and he was also upholding the right of the patron. Canon law required that he must only admit the individual who had been presented by the true patron;1 and that he should do this was essential to the way in which advowson litigation was conducted in the secular courts. The assize of darrein presentment was based on who had last presented to a church and it was frequently the action used to determine advowson disputes.2 By exercising the right of presentation, a patron established his possession of it. At a time when being given seisin – being put in possession of property or rights – was of the utmost importance in establishing ownership, exercising the right of advowson was essential. Indeed, the view expressed in the ‘Bracton’ treatise of the 1230s was that an advowson could not be given without the donor’s having first established his seisin. This meant that he had presented successfully himself, or that his ancestors or someone in his name had done so.3 1

2 3

Canon law required not only that the clerk be personally suitable but also that he be the candidate nominated by the true patron: ‘Decretum Magistri Gratiani’, 2.C. 16, q. 7, c. 32, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 1.809 and Extra, 3.tit. 38, cap. 14 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.614. See Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, esp. pp. 72–3 on this and other possessory actions. Bracton, Laws and Customs, 2.161: ‘Oportet igitur quod ille qui advocationem dederit in seisina sit praesentandi: hoc est quod ultimo praesentaverit aliquem qui ad praesentationem suam admissus fuerit et institutus, vel saltem commissa custodia, cum per hoc recognoscatur ipsum esse patronum, vel saltem quod praesentationem suam evicerit ab aliquo de seisina antecessoris, vel quod antecessores sui praesentaverint immediate, vel aliquis nomine eorum vel nomine suo, sicut custos vel firmarius.’ ‘It is necessary therefore that he who



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Patronage rights in monasteries were much more various than those in churches. Not all of them feature in bishops’ registers, in which we find more about the patron’s rights of licence and assent in elections. These were aspects of patronage which bishops were most liable to control since they were a necessary part of the appointment process – which they themselves needed to monitor unless, that is, the house were exempt from their authority. We often have to look elsewhere for evidence about other patronage rights, such as custody of the temporalities of a house during vacancies, the right to hospitality, pensions, or corrodies, or the performance by the house of spiritual services such as prayers for the founder and his or her family.4 And it also tends to be in other sources that we read about patrons carrying out their duties as envisaged by Innocent IV.5 So the evidence from bishops’ registers of dispute over the certain formal rights of patronage in monasteries, to which we now turn, is after all only part of the story. Bishops certainly required evidence, when it came to the advowson of churches, that the true patron was making the presentation. The patron generally expressed his wishes by means of a letter which the candidate was supposed to show to the bishop.6 For instance, when Nicholas of Aylesbury was instituted for the second time to Manton (Rutland) in 1296 it was specially noted in the bishop’s register that, although a letter of presentation from the earl of Cornwall ‘did not appear’, the bishop remembered having received it.7 Such letters would have borne the patron’s seal as authentication. Furthermore, if someone other than the true patron presented for one turn, their right to do so had to be shown. John of Brittany, earl of Richmond, gave his mother-in-law, Eleanor of Provence, the right to present to a church in his gift, which she produced when

4

5 6 7

gives an advowson should be in seisin of the [right of] presenting: that is, that he shall have presented last someone who, at his presentation, was admitted and instituted, or at least the custody committed, since through this he is recognised to be the patron, or at least that he shall have won his [right of] presentation from someone by seisin of his ancestor, or that his ancestors shall have presented up until now, or someone in their names or in his name, such as a custodian or a farmer.’ See also Britton, ed. F.M. Nichols, 2 vols (Oxford, 1865), 2.267. For wider aspects of monastic patronage, see Wood, English Monasteries, Burton, Monastic and Religious Orders in Britain, pp. 215–22, and Stöber, Late Medieval Monasteries and their Patrons, esp. pp. 65–111. See above, Chapter 1, p. 24. For the procedures following on presentation, see Gray, ‘ “Ius Praesentandi” ’, pp. 490–3, and Addleshaw, Rectors, Vicars and Patrons, pp. 19–22. Reg. Sutton, 2.134. For letters of presentation, see Addleshaw, Rectors, Vicars and Patrons, pp. 19–20 and for those from a later period, K. Major, ‘Fifteeenth-Century Presentation Deeds in the Lincoln Diocesan Record Office’, in Studies in Medieval History Presented to Frederick Maurice Powicke, ed. R.W. Hunt, W.A. Pantin and R.W. Southern (Oxford, 1948), pp. 455–64. An exception that proved the rule was at Wispington (Lincolnshire) in 1264. Michael of Northampton was instituted, but it was recorded that it was not known who had presented him because he had held the church for a long time and he did not show his (letter of) presentation: Rot. Gravesend, p. 19.

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she presented to Fulbeck (Lincolnshire) in 1283. The terms of the grant were recorded in the bishop’s register: Sachent tuit que nous donouns et otroions a tres haute dame . . . Alinor . . . la primere eglise ke seyt de nostre presentaciun en nostre counte de Richemund’ vacaunt ou par mort or par resignaciun dautre persone, et li donouns nostre pleyn poer de presenter a cele eglise . . . tele persone que ele verra suffisaunt et convenable au lavand dite eglise. Know everyone that we give and allow to the very noble lady . . . Eleanor . . . the first church in our presentation in our county of Richmond [falling] vacant either by the death or by the resignation of another person, and we give her our full power to present to this church . . . such a person as she sees as sufficient and suitable for the aforesaid church.8

The letter was retained by the bishop, in a coffer, under Eleanor’s seal, together with a letter certifying the death of the previous rector of Fulbeck. Likewise when a presentation was made because of a right of wardship the fact would often be noted because the person presenting was also protecting the right of the minor of whose estates he was custodian.9 Occasionally the patron would appear in person or would send a representative to register his interest; it was, as we have seen, only when a church was vacant that a patron could establish his seisin of the advowson. Henry de Percy sent ‘a certain squire’ to claim that he, Percy, was the true patron of the church of Bolton by Bowland (Lancashire) in 1271. Two other patrons were claiming the right to present, including Adam of Preston, who turned up in person.10 Percy seems to have been a particularly determined patron; in 1296 he complained that he had not been given the promised notice of the archidiaconal inquisition regarding the vacant church of Leathley (Yorkshire). Accordingly the archbishop arranged for a second inquisition and for notice of it to be given to Henry, his presentee, and the canons of Healaugh Park and their presentee. All rectors, vicars and parish priests in the deanery of Otley were to be summoned to the inquisition. Whether patrons usually attended archidiaconal inquiries is doubtful; in this case the archbishop seems to have been trying to calm troubled waters. There was a dispute about the respective rights of Percy and the canons of Healaugh Park, each of whom had the advowson of half of the church, and Percy had had to be told to stop molesting the canons for pursuing their rights.11 Of course, the patron had to know that a church was vacant in order to present. It was important to act quickly because canon law authorised bishops to collate by lapse if the usual patron failed to present within six months or if litigation led to delay. (An exception to this was that the king, at the end of the 8 9 10 11

Reg. Sutton, 1.36–7. See Appendix of Magnate Presentations, passim, for examples. Reg. W. Giffard, p. 32. Reg. Romeyn, 1.156–7.



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thirteenth century, began to claim that time did not run against him, so that he could present to benefices even after the prescribed period was over.12) Although a patron who did not present within the time allowed did not lose the right of advowson permanently,13 he did lose the right to present for that turn. Because of what was at stake, he had to have a sure means of knowing about vacancies so that he could act within the time available. A canon of the legatine council of London of 1268, in ruling that patrons were not supposed to present to benefices unless they had good evidence (‘probabilem . . . notitiam’) of their being vacant, did recognise that they might be anxious to avoid prejudice of their right through lapse of time. It was important therefore that the bishop should not institute until it was established that the church was vacant.14 Obtaining timely and accurate information will have been a real management issue for magnates and other patrons with ecclesiastical interests spread over different parts of the country. Some patrons seem to have acted speculatively, although it was against canon law knowingly to impede the right of the true patron.15 Clerks hoping to be presented to a church had an interest in knowing about vacancies and passing the information on. Some of them may have been less concerned about who the real patron was than about the perceived opportunity for their own advancement. Some time before 1263 Master Giles of Onibury informed John Fitzalan that Clun (Shropshire) was vacant and persuaded him to present him, Giles, to the church. In fact the church of Clun and its chapels had been given to Much Wenlock by Isabel de Say at the end of the twelfth century,16 and presumably it was because of this that the vicar of the bishop of Hereford refused to admit Giles.17 12

13 14 15 16 17

Extra, 3.tit. 38, caps. 3, 22, and 27 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.610, 616 and 618. The origin of the rule of collation by lapse was in a decree of the Third Lateran Council of 1179, and canon law seems to have distinguished between advowsons belonging to lay patrons and those in the gift of ecclesiastical patrons, lay patrons being allowed four months in which to present and ecclesiastics six. The distinction was clearly spelled out by Boniface VIII: Sext., 3.tit. 19, c. 1 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.1055–6, and see also CPL 1.5. Thirteenthcentury English legal treatises, however, when referring to the rule of collation by lapse, did not mention the four-month period for laymen, so it may have been that in practice in England the distinction between lay and ecclesiastical patrons was not adhered to: Bracton, Laws and Customs, 3.214, Britton, 2.176–7, and Fleta, ed. and trans. by H.G. Richardson and G.O. Sayles, vols 2–4 (Selden Society, 72, 89, and 99, 1953–83), 4.51. See also Councils and Synods, 2.2.956–7, Gray, ‘ “Ius Praesentandi” ’, p. 486, note 2 and p. 494, and Deeley, ‘Papal Provisions and Royal Rights of Patronage’, esp. 512–14. See Extra, 3.tit. 38, caps. 12 and 27 (Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.613 and 618) and Councils and Synods, 2.1.109 for the protection of the rights of patrons in litigious churches. Councils and Synods, 2.2.759. Councils and Synods, 2.2.107 and 906. VCH Shropshire, 2:40. Original Papal Documents in England and Wales from the Accession of Pope Innocent III to the Death of Pope Benedict XI (1198–1304), ed. J.E. Sayers (Oxford, 1999), p. 306. Giles’s claim was upheld initially on his appeal to the prerogative court of Canterbury, but the prior and convent then appealed to the pope who referred the case to his judge delegate.

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Sometimes an incumbent intending to resign from his benefice would tell the patron – or others – about his plans. Andrew, provost of Werden (in Hanover) and notary of the imperial court, had been presented to Mixbury (Oxfordshire) in 1272 when Richard had been king of Germany and Andrew a clerk in his service.18 In a letter of 1282, full of misgivings about the burden of his responsibilities, he explained to Edward I that he was unable to attend as he should to his cure. He wanted the church to be given to someone else who would make up for his failings and he asked the king to intercede on his behalf with Edmund, earl of Cornwall (who now had the advowson). Andrew envisaged that Edmund would empower the Cistercian abbot of Le Gard (dép. Somme) and Master Thomas de Salen, canon of Picquigny in the diocese of Amiens, to present a suitable rector in the earl’s name on his own resignation.19 What is interesting here is the rather complicated route which Andrew was proposing be taken. He wanted the king to ask the patron to empower two foreign ecclesiastics to present on his behalf. This is the only evidence of any connection between the earl and a French abbot and canon, and neither had a pension or other financial connection with Mixbury. Quite why Andrew could not write to the earl himself is not clear, but the example does show an important point, which is that the patron who had the legal right to present was certainly not the only party who might be involved. It is unusual to find the motives of a resigning clerk spelled out so clearly, and in fact clerks cannot always have resigned voluntarily, but were sometimes made to do so to fulfil the requirements of canon law. A decree of the fourth Lateran Council in 1215 forbade anyone to hold more than one benefice with cure of souls. He should be automatically deprived of the first when he accepted the next one.20 So, when a clerk held one church in the gift of a patron who was presenting him to another one, the patron should have known that, in principle, his resignation of the first church might be in the offing. Indeed, the reforming Church relied on patrons to play their part in eradicating pluralism and its attendant evils. A canon made by the papal legate to England, Ottobon, in 1268, said that a bishop who instituted a clerk to a benefice was, if he could, to give word of this to other bishops and to patrons of other benefices which the clerk was required to resign, so that they could dispose of them.21 In practice this would have demanded a good deal of extra work and the ready co-operation of patrons; and it does suggest questions about how patrons found out about vacancies in the first place. Resignation was one reason for the occurrence of a vacancy; death was 18 19 20

21

Rot. Gravesend, p. 216. TNA SC 1/21/51 (in frontispiece and transcribed below, Appendix of Documents, item 4). Extra, 3.tit. 5, cap. 28, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 477–8. For the development of canon law on the subject of pluralism, see A.H. Thompson, ‘Pluralism in the Mediaeval Church’, Associated Architectural Societies’ Reports and Papers, 33 (1915–16), 35–73. Councils and Synods, 2.2.775–6 and see also pp. 838–40 and Thompson, ‘Pluralism in the Mediaeval Church’, pp. 45–6.



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another. Life was precarious in the thirteenth century, and unexpected death was all too frequent, but patrons must sometimes have known that an elderly parson would soon need replacing. Some patrons even looked ahead. A draft letter of Edward I to his brother Edmund, dated 6 March 1278, suggests that Edmund had been wondering whether the church of Stoke on Trent (Staffordshire) was likely soon to fall vacant: En dreit de ceo qe vos nos maundastes de la aduoeisun del eglise de Stok’ nos vos fesoms asauer qe la persone est vncore en bone vie . . .22 As regards your message to us about the advowson of the church of Stoke, we let you know that the parson is still in good health . . .

In this case it looks as though Edmund was looking forward to the vacancy to further a claim. Edward went on to remind him of the discussions in the royal council about the lands and tenements which had recently belonged to Hamo Lestrange and to say that it was not clear as yet whether the advowson was to be granted to him by Roger Lestrange. Usually, however, the information was about actual rather than prospective vacancies and it came from those in the vicinity of the church concerned and was transmitted on the authority of estate administrators. On Roger Bigod’s manor of Lopham (Norfolk) in 1270–71 a messenger of John of Hastings was paid 12d for going to the earl in London to tell him of the vacancy of Thomas de Florendinia’s churches.23 (The implication is that these were churches in the earl’s gift although we are not told which ones.) Again, in the accounts for Walton (Suffolk) for 1278–79, and 1279–80, successive payments of 18d were made for carrying letters to the earl in London because of the vacancy in the church of Waldingfield.24 The account rendered for Dunningworth (Suffolk) for 1278–79 recorded a payment of 2s to a boy carrying letters to the earl at Chepstow (Monmouthshire) on the death of the rector of nearby Tunstall.25 The account for Dunningworth for 1282–83 shows that a messenger was given 4s for going to the earl in Wales, this time because the church of Dunningworth itself was vacant.26 The same pattern is evident on the estates of Isabella de Forz, although the amounts paid are sometimes part of composite entries so we cannot tell exactly what the costs were. The constable of Cockermouth paid for a messenger telling the countess of the vacancy in the church of Boulton (Cumberland) in 1268–69;27 the countess’ receiver Simon of Preston in his account for 1268–69 paid expenses for a messenger telling her of the death of the vicar of Skipsea (Yorkshire).28 Here we are able to see how quickly the 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

TNA SC 1/13/106. For the litigation over Stoke, see below, Chapter 4, pp. 107–8. TNA SC 6/937/29. TNA SC 6/1007/8,9. TNA SC 6/995/16. TNA SC 6/995/17. TNA SC 6/824/7, mm. 1d and 4r. TNA SC 6/1078/11, m. 5d.

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countess acted on receipt of the news. The archdeacon’s inquisition reported that the incumbent, Walter, had died on 10 April, and both Isabella and Adam of Stratton, the rector of Skipsea, had presented a candidate by the end of the month.29 The reeve of Keyingham (Yorkshire) spent 3s 2d in 1279–80 sending a messenger to the countess in the Isle of Wight, telling her of the death of the parson of Keyingham, and sending a boy to York to seek the bailiff of Holderness, Robert de Hildeyard, about the same matter.30 Keyingham was in fact in the patronage of the abbot and convent of Aumâle (dép. Seine-Maritime), but, as we shall see, the countess may have exercised some influence over the choice.31 The amounts of money involved were negligible, but the entries are important because they show that these magnates wanted to know about vacancies themselves. They did not delegate the power of presenting to local officials or even to the estates steward. This is not surprising. Medieval treatises on estate management and accounting spell out the sort of decisions and appointments that could be made locally, and presentations to churches are certainly not among them.32 Sending messengers on considerable journeys with individual items of business might seem a rather ad hoc way of doing things, but it was worth it when decisions that were made centrally required local knowledge. Communication about vacancies was more difficult when a patron was abroad and so to avoid delay and expense patrons arranged for trusted individuals to be constituted as proctors to present on their behalf. For John of Brittany, a magnate who spent most of his time abroad, this must have been the usual arrangement. In 1271 his steward and proctor, the knight Peter de Trahan, presented to Wyberton (Lincolnshire) on John’s behalf, and in 1292 his bailiff, Thomas of York, presented to Leadenham (Lincolnshire).33 Thomas of York’s presentation to Leadenham, of the chaplain Master Ralph of Hagley, was not carried through. The bishop’s register recorded that the duke of Brittany afterwards changed his mind and presented a different individual, John, son of Richard of Apethorpe. This was after an agreement had been made with the rival claimants to the advowson, the abbot and convent of Tours (dép. Indre-et-Loire). Perhaps the withdrawal of Ralph’s candidature had something

29 30 31 32

33

Reg. W. Giffard, p. 53. The inquisition reported that it was not clear who had the right to present. TNA SC 6/1078/19, m. 3d. See below, Chapter 3, pp. 91–2. The later thirteenth-century treatise ‘Seneschaucy’, for example, made clear that even the steward (who was a senior estate administrator) could not on his own authority dismiss a bailiff or servant who had been given office by the lord, nor sell wardships, marriages or escheats, nor dower a woman, take homage or suit, nor sell a male serf on his own authority. It was the lord’s responsibility to review his officers’ performance: Walter of Henley and Other Treatises on Estate Management and Accounting ed. D. Oschinsky (Oxford, 1971), pp. 267 and 293. Rot. Gravesend, p. 49 and Reg. Sutton, 1.165.



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to do with his having been presented to Fulbeck (Lincolnshire) in 1283.34 We do not know how much discretion either officer had actually been given in the choice of candidate. Perhaps they were supplied in advance with a list of names. In this regard we may note Edward I’s instructions in 1296 to John de Warenne, his lieutenant in Scotland, to present to churches and benefices in Scotland on his, Edward’s, behalf. It was to be with the counsel of the king’s clerks Walter of Amersham and Hugh Cressingham, and he was allowed to present to churches worth up to 40 marks (£26 13s 4d). The candidates were to be suitable persons in the king’s service, or others so long as they were English and were dwelling in the country, which seems to imply that they were to be of local origin.35 Henry de Lacy entrusted his mother Alice with the power to present to churches in his gift when he accompanied Edward I on his trip to Gascony in 1286–89, and because of his lengthy absence (Henry stayed with Edward for the whole of his visit)36 she had to act on at least five occasions.37 On two further occasions, however, her name was not mentioned, perhaps due to incompleteness in the record keeping.38 On one of these occasions the clerk presented was Boniface, son of Thomas, marquis of Saluzzo. Boniface was one of Alice’s relations and this may suggest that the choice was hers personally.39 In another example, her presentation to North Tidworth (Wiltshire) in 1299, Alice failed to provide evidence that she was acting on behalf of her son. This thwarted the institution of the candidate, John de Cobeldich. The inquisition of the archdeacon of Salisbury did not satisfy the bishop that Alice had the power to present (although it did reveal that de Cobeldich was already in possession of the church). Because of the uncertainty nothing further was done at the time. Soon afterwards de Cobeldich resigned and the earl himself presented a new candidate.40 Proctors also had to defend the right of presentation in court if the patron’s right of advowson were challenged. In 1272 Eleanor of Provence had been entrusted by her son Edmund with the supervision of all his officers, the administration of all his lands, and the presentation to the churches of his advowson on his departure for the Holy Land. She recovered the advowson of Peckleton

34 35 36 37

38 39 40

Reg. Sutton, 1.36–7 and see above, pp. 47–8. CPR 1292–1301, p. 205. This is demonstrated by his attestation of royal charters in this period: see Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 582–3. Reg. Sutton, 1.89 and 95 and 8.9, Reg. Romeyn, 1.69, 80 and note 3, and 95. Both Henry and his mother appear to have played a part in the presentation of Robert de Saham to Campsall (Yorkshire). He was given successive periods of custody of the church prior to the eventual induction. Reg. Sutton, 8.10 and Reg. Romeyn, 1.91 and 147. See below, Chapter 3, pp. 69–70. Registrum Simonis de Gandavo, diocesis Saresbiriensis, AD 1297–1315, ed. C.T. Flower and M.C.B. Dawes (CYS, 40–1, 1934), 2.570–1 and 589.

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(Leicestershire) on his behalf against William Motun. This vindicated the earl’s right to present as guardian of the land and heir of Robert Motun.41 A presentation on its own did not constitute a title to the benefice. Before the candidate’s institution the patron was also at liberty to change his mind about the choice of candidate, and some of them did. As shown above, John of Brittany presented a second candidate to Leadenham in 1292. There are other instances in which candidates who had been chosen then gave up their rights and these too may have been because the patron changed his mind, although we are not told as much.42 In one case, the clerk himself withdrew: John de Oseville was presented by Edmund, earl of Cornwall, to Frodingham (Lincolnshire) between 1283 and 1290, but refused institution because he was archdeacon of Ely.43 Rival claimants to an advowson sometimes came to a settlement out of court. When this happened the patron who had given up his claim, whether permanently or for a single turn, might write and withdraw a presentation made previously. In 1252, for example, John de Warenne revoked the presentation he had made of his clerk Hamo to West Blatchington (Sussex) and quitclaimed all his right in the advowson. He did not say in favour of whom; but we may suppose that the beneficiary was Lewes Priory because a copy of the deed appears in the cartulary of the house.44 Again in 1267, John quitclaimed his right to the advowson of Dewsbury (Yorkshire), this time expressly granting the prior and convent of Lewes the power of presenting.45 Perhaps the earl was on a visit to the priory, which was after all in his patronage: on the very same day, in the chapter house, the prior and convent presented to the church; moreover on 2 February John wrote to the archbishop of York explaining that he had revoked his presentation after seeing his ancestors’ deeds, which were in the possession of the prior of Lewes. He attached letters of resignation from the clerk whom he had presented, William of London, believing that they would carry more weight 41 42

43

44

45

CPR 1266–72, p. 668 and Rot. Gravesend, p. 153. For example, William de Beauchamp first presented Master Robert de Cisterne to Hanslope (Buckinghamshire); Cisterne renounced his right and Peter le Blund was presented instead; Gilbert de Clare first presented John Langton to Great Marlow (Buckinghamshire); Langton renounced his right and Master Henry of Llancarvan was presented instead: Reg. Sutton, 8.146 and 161. Reg. Sutton, 8.20, and for John de Oseville, see ‘Archdeacons: Ely’, Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1066–1300: Volume 2: Monastic Cathedrals (Northern and Southern Provinces) (1971), pp. 50–2 (www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=33865, accessed 14 May 2011). TNA E 40/4182 (Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.68). The cartulary copy of the deed is followed by a similar quitclaim on the part of the earl’s grandson and successor made in 1318. The church of West Blatchington had been confirmed in the priory’s possession in the mid-twelfth century by William de Warenne: Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.21, 29–30 and see 2.xxiii. TNA E 40/14277 (Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.67). Dewsbury church had been confirmed in the priory’s possession in the mid-twelfth century: Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.22 and see pp. 28 and 41 and 2.xxiii and Early Yorkshire Charters, 8.85–7.



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if authenticated with his seal because the bishop might not be familiar with William’s own.46 Another potential obstacle between presentation and institution was if the patron died. Margaret de Lacy, dowager countess of Lincoln,47 presented Adam le Vavasur to North Coates (Lincolnshire) just before she died in March 1266. Her death occurred, however, before her letter of presentation was shown to the bishop of Lincoln, so the consent of the queen (by reason of her custody of the lands of Henry de Lacy, Margaret’s grandson, during his minority) was noted as having been given when Adam was instituted.48 In cases when the right of advowson was being exercised by reason of a wardship, however, it appears to have devolved to the executors of the person holding the wardship. For example, Eleanor of Provence presented in 1275 to Linle (Huntingdonshire) with the assent of John of Brittany and his co-executors of the will of his wife Beatrice. Henry III had given Beatrice, his daughter, wardship of the land and heir of Sir John Pyure.49 So the wardship, it seems, was being administered by Beatrice’s executors. Sometimes the new patron re-presented a clerk if his predecessor as patron had died before his presentee was instituted. Roger Bigod’s widow Alice had to write in 1306 to the chancellor about her late husband’s presentation of William of Knottingley to Kirton (Suffolk). She explicitly asked for a royal presentation, which was duly made, and when William was instituted to Kirton in early 1307 it was said to have been at the king’s presentation by reason of his custody of the lands of Roger Bigod.50 On the other hand there is evidence from some dioceses that presentations held good after the demise of the patron. Amaury de Montfort was given the church of Michaelstow (Cornwall) to hold in commendam on 46 47

48

49

50

Reg. W. Giffard, p. 20. Margaret de Lacy was the widow of John de Lacy. John acquired the earldom of Lincoln as a result of his marriage to Margaret, who was the daughter of Hawise, countess of Lincoln in her own right. See Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 7:680, and J.C. Ward, ‘Lacy, Margaret de, countess of Lincoln (d. 1266)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/ view/article/54444, accessed 15 May 2011). Rot. Gravesend, p. 21. Henry de Lacy did not receive seisin of his estates until 1272, but presented to All Saints’, Toynton (Lincolnshire) in 1266 with her consent: Rot. Gravesend, p. 22 and see J.S. Hamilton, ‘Lacy, Henry de, fifth earl of Lincoln (1249–1311)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/15851, accessed 20 July 2011). Alice de Lacy, Henry’s mother, and widow of Edmund de Lacy, his father, had custody of Edmund de Lacy’s heirs, but this seems to have excluded advowsons of churches, and in 1262, Henry III presented to a prebend in the ‘free’ chapel of St Clement in Pontefract castle by reason of this wardship: CPR 1258–66, pp. 12 and 202–3. Rot. Gravesend, p. 181. For other examples of executors exercising the right of patronage in wardships, see Rot. Gravesend, p. 42 (presentation to Helpringham (Lincolnshire) by the executors of Hugh Bigod as the guardian of the son and heir of William de Kyme) and The Register of Thomas of Corbridge, Lord Archbishop of York, 1300–1304, ed. W. Brown and A.H. Thompson (Surtees Society, 38 and 41, 1925–8), 1.29 (presentation to Gargrave by the executors of Eleanor of Provence). TNA SC 1/25/189, CPR 1301–7, p. 187, and see below, Chapter 3, p. 82.

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5 April 1274. This was on the presentation of Richard of Cornwall who had died two years previously.51 Of course a grant in commendam was not an institution; rather, it was an arrangement whereby a clerk was allowed to receive the income from a church but did not have a permanent entitlement to it. Moreover, there were complications here in that Amaury may not actually have been presented by Richard himself. The estates of the earldom of Cornwall were administered by Guy de Montfort after Richard (along with Henry III himself) had been captured at the battle of Lewes in 1264, and it may have been at this time that the presentation took place. It seems also to have been in 1264 that he obtained the rectory of St Wendron, another church in Richard’s gift.52 It was true that a change in the ownership of the advowson was not supposed to affect the position of the incumbent clerk.53 He was secure once he had been admitted and instituted. However, the case of Amaury de Montfort does point to the disruption in the normal exercise of patronage during the barons’ wars. Between the battle of Lewes and the battle of Evesham in August 1265 when de Montfort was defeated, Henry III did not have personal control over the exercise of royal ecclesiastical patronage. In March 1265, for instance, the patent roll records the revocation of Henry’s presentation of Stephen of London to the deanery of the royal chapel of Bridgenorth (Shropshire), because it had been against the wishes of the magnates of the council. Instead the benefice was given to William de Montfort.54 Henry, after the battle of Evesham had restored his control, revoked some of the grants he had made under duress: he replaced the presentation he had made of John, nephew of the prior of St Radegunds, to the church of Kingston (Kent) with a presentation of Master Alexander de la Knolle. Master Thomas of Lichfield’s presentation to Rye (Sussex) was revoked and Master John de Crofth was presented instead. The presentation of Amaury de Montfort to the treasurership of York was revoked and Edmund de Mortimer (to whom Henry had earlier promised a benefice) was presented instead. This last was a nice reversal of fortune for the sons of those who had fought at Evesham.55 In September 1265 Pope Clement IV annulled all grants, collations and institutions made to Simon de Montfort and his adherents. It is not clear that the pope’s ruling was meant to deprive clerks of benefices to which they had been instituted and Amaury was exempted from the annulment.56 And it is by no means clear that Richard of Cornwall had revoked the presentations of Amaury de Montfort to the Cornish benefices in his gift. The incumbent clerk’s security was safeguarded by the archdeacon’s inquiry when a presentation was made. This ensured that the church really was vacant before proceeding further. In 1285, for instance, the bishop of Exeter would only give the custody of Lydford (Devon) to Hugh de Shupton, to which he had 51 52 53 54 55 56

Reg. Bronescombe, pp. 155–6. For Amaury de Montfort, see below, Chapter 3, p. 71. Maddicott, Simon de Montfort, p. 324. Extra, 3.tit. 38, caps. 9 and 19 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.612 and 615 and see Gray, ‘ “Ius Praesentandi” ’, p. 488 and note 4. CPR 1258–66, p. 410. CPR 1258–66, pp. 436, 444, 451 and 470–1. For the presentation of Amaury, see p. 404. Original Papal Documents, pp. 316–17 and CPL, 1.434.



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been presented by Edmund, earl of Cornwall, rather than instituting him. One problem was that he was not old enough; but another was that it was not absolutely certain that the previous holder of the benefice had taken vows as a monk, although he had entered a monastery. The register did not record the name of the house, so perhaps this, too, was not known.57 Of course it made sense for the patron, who was often best placed to know what was going on, to explain to the bishop how a vacancy had occurred. When Peter of Wallingford was presented by Edmund, earl of Cornwall, to Rousham (Oxfordshire) in 1293 there were two ‘proofs’ that Rousham was vacant. One was the testimony of Master Richard of Sotwell. Sotwell offered to swear on pain of deprivation of his own benefice (he was rector of Frodingham, to which Edmund had presented him)58 that James of Berkhamsted, the last incumbent of Rousham, had been admitted to another benefice and had, in the earl of Cornwall’s presence, expressly resigned Rousham. The second proof was that the earl’s letters of presentation had mentioned this express resignation. On the strength of these proofs Peter of Wallingford was instituted.59 The episode suggests that magnates’ clerks knew something of each others’ business and, possibly, that some decisions about presentations and resignations were taken collaboratively, and in the patron’s presence – an aspect of the matter which does not seem to have worried Sutton. He does not seem to have been concerned about any infringement of canon law which forbade laymen to deprive clerks of their benefices. It was natural for the patron to be involved in this way. Likewise when the bishop was the first to know about a vacancy – that is, when he himself declared it vacant for canonical reasons – it made sense for him to inform the patron. The patron’s exercise of his right would then serve to ratify the bishop’s action. In February 1281 John Pecham, the archbishop of Canterbury, chastised Roger de Meuland, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, over the church of Uttoxeter (Staffordshire). During his visitation of the Coventry and Lichfield diocese he had discovered that de Meuland had divided this benefice unlawfully.60 He would, he said, have appointed to the church himself had he not wanted to defer to the rights of the patron, Edmund, earl of Lancaster. He had informed Edmund at the time of the de iure vacancy and had instructed him to present to it. He now ordered de Meuland to reunite Uttoxeter, remove the unlawful incumbents, and admit on the patron’s presentation. Nothing seems to have been done at first, although the loss of de Meuland’s register makes this 57

58 59 60

The Episcopal Register of Peter Quivil, 1280–1291 in Episcopal Registers of the Diocese of Exeter, 1.309–95 (p. 348): ‘Non constat plene de Professione illius qui prius eam tenuit, quamquam ingressus sit Religioni.’ The last incumbent may have been one Adam de Bremelle, who was given custody of Lydford in 1272 and who was rector in 1283: see Reg. Bronescombe, p. 152 and Reg. Quivil, p. 348. Reg. Sutton, 8.20. Reg. Sutton, 8.183–4. This was one of the lesser problems which Pecham discovered on his visitation: see D. A. Carpenter, ‘Meuland, Roger de (c.1215–1295)’, ODNB, online edn, May 2008 (www. oxforddnb.com/view/article/37908, accessed 15 May 2011).

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uncertain.61 But Pecham did have to write again at the end of August 1281; and then in an ultimatum in February 1282 he ordered him to sort everything out within three months or arrange for those concerned to appear before himself. By this time the earl had presented Hugh ‘de Vicania’ – perhaps Hugh de Vienne, a clerk prominent in his service – and it must have been seen as important to regularise his position.62 A similar appeal was made to the lay patron to enforce the bishop’s spiritual authority at St Mary’s, Warwick. There were strained relations between the bishop of Worcester, Godfrey Giffard, and this collegiate church, and particularly with the dean, Robert de Plessis, who may have been a younger son of John de Plessis, earl of Warwick.63 From 1282 the dean and canons had resisted the bishop’s power of visitation and correction. Moreover in 1283 Robert’s behaviour as one of the executors of John de Plessis had led to a case before papal judges-delegate. In 1284 the bishop excommunicated the dean and canons for their resistance to visitation, but then (even though the sentence had been confirmed by the dean of the arches) superseded this at the request of the earl of Warwick, William de Beauchamp. But the sentence appears to have been reimposed: in a letter to the earl of 1286 Giffard asked him as patron to present to the deanery, since Robert was in a state of excommunication. Thomas of Sodington was soon afterwards inducted into the prebend formerly held by Robert and in 1289 the custody of the deanery was committed to him on the earl’s presentation.64 In this example at least, deference to the bishop seems in the end to have trumped family loyalty. Magnates’ candidates were very rarely rejected outright on account of failure to meet canonical requirements. Canon law required that a rector of a parish church be twenty-five years old, of legitimate birth, and of suitable learning and character; he was expected to proceed to priest’s orders.65 Of all those presented to churches by the lay patrons chosen for study here, there is only one who was clearly rejected for failure to fulfil these terms. This was Robert of Chesterford, presented by Roger Bigod to Hamstead Marshall (Berkshire) in 1298. Robert was found by the inquisition to be scarcely literate and not in orders, and the patron swiftly presented an alternative.66 Although this was an exceptional case,

61 62

63 64 65 66

See Smith, Guide to Bishops’ Registers, p. 53 and note 2. Registrum Epistolarum Fratris Johannis Peckham, Archiepiscopi Cantuariensis, ed. C.T. Martin, 3 vols (RS, 1882–5), 1.175–6, The Register of John Pecham, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1279–1292, ed. F.N. Davis and others and D.L. Douie (CYS, 64–5, 1908–69), 1.168–9 and 2.132. For Hugh de Vienne, see below, Chapter 3, pp. 77–8. Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 10:548 note (b), and see Fonge, Cartulary of St Mary at Warwick, pp. 437–8. Reg. Giffard, 2.148, 151, 169, 194–5, 199, 245, 249, 260, 271, 278, 297–8 and 367, and see Fonge, Cartulary of St Mary at Warwick, pp. 437–8. Extra, 1.tit. 6, cap. 7 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.51–2 and see Thompson, ‘Pluralism in the Mediaeval Church’, p. 46. Registrum Simonis de Gandavo, Diocesis Saresbiriensis, AD 1297–1315, ed. C.T. Flower and M.C.B. Dawes, 2 vols (CYS, 40–1, 1934), 2.572–3 and 576.



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that is not to imply that magnates’ candidates were always ideal. There were a few instances in which the candidates were too young even to be ordained subdeacons. In these cases the church, as well as the candidate, would be put in the care of a responsible clerk, who might well be a ‘Master’67 and who was perhaps also expected to tutor him.68 The real issue seems to have been a lack of orders. Many magnates chose individuals who were said to be in minor orders. Sometimes their status was more specifically noted, and acolytes, subdeacons or deacons are encountered. The number of presentees who were actually priests was small as a proportion of the total presented, although a number were said to have been chaplains, which may have meant that they were in priest’s orders.69 The outcome when orders were wanting was for the bishop to give custody to the candidate pending his ordination as subdeacon or to ordain him subdeacon and institute him at the same time. After the second General Council of Lyons in 1274, however, subdeacons had to be ordained priests within a year of institution, or risk losing the benefice.70 This meant that patrons had to re-present their candidates, which effectively meant buying them more time in which to become ordained. In some cases clerks were re-presented more than once.71 In a few cases patrons put forward a different candidate. John of Hastings in 1292 presented Simon of Beauvais, whose predecessor at Wootton (Northamptonshire), Nicholas of Beauvais (doubtless a relation), had not been ordained priest within a year.72 Re-presentations are found above all in the diocese of Lincoln during the episcopate of Oliver Sutton, who was more than usually strict in the application of the law. Even here, it looks as though it took longer than a year to catch up with clerks who had failed to proceed to orders. Some bishops allowed special pleading. Nicholas Botiller, the nephew of Maud, countess of Warwick, had been presented by his aunt to Wickwar (Gloucestershire) in 1299. He had been instituted but had failed to become ordained as a priest. When he appeared before the bishop to explain why – the reasons were his brother’s death and his own illness and absence abroad – he brought a letter from Maud to back up his story. Because of his aunt’s testimony Godfrey Giffard decided to believe him and gave him a further period of grace in which to become ordained.73

67 68

69 70 71 72 73

See below, p. 60, for use of this term. For example, from the earl of Cornwall’s presentations, between October 1282 and April 1283 the church of Stithians (Cornwall) and Henry de Grandone were in the custody of Master Stephen de Gryndeham, and in 1286 Blunham (Bedfordshire) and John de St Valéry were in the care of Master Philip of Waltham: Reg. Quivil, p. 355 and LA Reg. Sutton, Roll V, m. 3 and see Reg. Sutton, 8.102. Appendix of Magnate Presentations, passim, and see J.R.H. Moorman, Church Life in England in the Thirteenth Century (Cambridge, 1955), pp. 35–6. Sext., 1.tit. 6, cap.  14 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.953–4 and see Councils and Synods, 2.2.842–3. Appendix of Magnate Presentations, pp. 199 and 200. Reg. Sutton, 2.102. Reg. Giffard, 2.511 and 529, and see Elizabeth Gemmill, ‘The Earls and Their Clergy in the

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Another tightening of the rules at the Council of Lyons was in respect of the system of grants in commendam. In practice the system provided a loophole for pluralists, and a canon of the legatine council of London of 1268 had said that grants in commendam were only to be made for just and legitimate cause, and that only one benefice with cure of souls could be held in this way.74 The 1274 Council limited grants to priests of lawful age, for a maximum of six months and for the benefit of the church.75 There do seem to have been some cases in which magnates’ candidates were given grants in commendam after this. In two cases it was because they did not fulfil the canonical requirements regarding ordination and age; in others the grant was said to be in accordance with the conciliar decree.76 Again, the influence of a patron could be instrumental in keeping a clerk in his benefice when the requirements threatened his position. In 1283, Oliver Sutton renewed the grant in commendam of Whitwell (Rutland) made to Bartholomew of Bottesford before the Council of Lyons, at the instance of the earl of Cornwall and on the strength of good reports of Bartholomew himself;77 in 1286 John le Romeyn at the instance of Edmund of Lancaster confirmed the grants of his predecessors and allowed Edmund of Everley to continue to hold a moiety of Treswell (Nottinghamshire) in commendam, in combination with Soulbury (Buckinghamshire). Both were acquired before the council.78 In fact there may have been a more general feeling among the clergy that perhaps the decrees of the Council of Lyons about age and orders had been too harsh. The matter was raised at the provincial council of Reading in 1279, where it was felt that imposing a minimum age and orders requirement actually discouraged the education of the clergy. It was suggested that they call upon the king, earls and barons and the community to intercede with the pope, suggesting that sympathy was expected from lay patrons on this matter.79 We do not know how magnates may have responded to any such request for their support, but we may note, in this connection, that a fair number of magnate presentations were of clerks with the title ‘Magister’ (‘Master’) which meant that they had at that stage benefited from a university education. We cannot know, however, whether this was their first benefice – whether, in fact, they had enjoyed ecclesiastical preferment elsewhere before going to university. Nor can we know whether those magnates’ presentees who attended university expected to apply their learning in a pastoral context.80

74 75 76 77 78 79 80

Reign of Edward I’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 88.1 (2006), 123–51 (p. 126). Councils and Synods, 2.2.778–9. Sext., 1.tit. 6, cap. 15 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.954 and Councils and Synods, 2.2.842– 3. Appendix of Magnate Presentations, pp. 191 and 196. Reg. Sutton, 2.26. Reg. Romeyn, 1.246–7. Councils and Synods, 2.2.844 and see Douie, Archbishop Pecham, p. 104. For the context of the remonstrations against the papal constitutions, and the impact of subsequent papal legislation relating to absence for the purpose of study, see R.M. Haines,



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The authority of bishops in relation to monastic appointments also involved checking the suitability of the candidate. In addition, they needed to ensure that the election itself had been conducted properly – and that the patron and mother house had, if they were meant to be involved, played their designated part. But the key difference between the right of advowson of a church and patrons’ rights in monasteries was that patrons were not supposed to play a part in the actual choice of the new head of house. They only had the right to give licence to elect and to consent to the choice made. It is true that there were one or two residual exceptions to this. In 1233 the pope, on the petition of the Augustinian prior and convent of Cartmel (Lancashire), ordered the archbishop of Canterbury to declare invalid the custom that had grown up in their church. This was that on the death of a prior they presented two persons to the patron who chose one with the approval of the bishop of the diocese.81 For many patrons, the rights of licence to elect and to give consent must have been a formality only. At Langley (Leicestershire) in the election of 1296 the nuns told the bishop that they had not sought licence to elect from the patron, Robert of Tattershall, since, as they said, this was not customary. In giving his consent, however, Robert said that the election had been made with his licence. Bishop Sutton quashed the election on grounds of incorrect procedure and appointed the prioress-elect on his own authority.82 Tattershall was, it seems, being helpfully flexible, but not all patrons were so obliging. Gilbert de Clare made a point of sticking to the letter of the law at St Neots (Huntingdonshire). St Neots was a cell to the great Norman abbey of Le Bec (dép. Eure) and the mother house had the right of presenting the new prior. In 1265 they chose Henry of St Neots; but it was only after his admission to the priorate by the bishop of Lincoln that anyone thought to seek the patron’s consent, which Gilbert then refused to give on the basis that he was not sure that the priory was vacant. We might see Gilbert as being merely awkward; conversely we might construe his stance as that of a properly responsible patron. To oblige him, the bishop wrote to him, informing him of the vacancy, the presentation by the mother house and the appointment of Henry.83 There were problems again in 1292 when Gilbert opposed the admission of John de Sècheville without his own consent; and since it was discovered in the register of Bishop Hugh of Wells (1209–35) that one of Gilbert’s predecessors had indeed exercised this right at St Neots, the prior-elect was sent to the earl to get it. Gilbert kept him waiting. He did eventually produce a letter for John to take back to the bishop, in which he said he had ‘graciously admitted’ him (the words were ‘gratanter admisimus’) at the abbot of Bec’s presentation. Admission was of

81 82 83

‘The Education of the English Clergy during the Later Middle Ages: Some Observations on the Operation of Pope Boniface VIII’s Constitution “Cum ex eo” (1298)’, Canadian Journal of History, 4 (1969), 1–22. CPL, 1.135. Reg. Sutton, 8.58. Rot. Gravesend, p. 170 and see M.M. Morgan, The English Lands of the Abbey of Bec (Oxford, 1946), p. 29.

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course the bishop’s prerogative, but Sutton appears to have let this pass. He did, however, pick up on the wording of the abbot’s letter, saying that it was not for him, the abbot, to commit the cure, as his letter put it, but only to present. He did, however, at last admit de Sècheville.84 This was certainly not an isolated case in Sutton’s register. A meticulous and conscientious bishop, foreign mother houses expecting to exercise their rights at a distance, and patrons with a stronger sense of their own lordship than of the limitations on lay authority was a combination bound to cause problems. At Minting (Lincolnshire) the arrangement seems to have been that the abbot of Fleury (dép. Loire) presented a candidate for the priorate to the patron, the earl of Lincoln, who then presented him to the bishop.85 In 1289 Theobald de Thoriaco was presented by the abbot but in letters that made no mention of the earl. Bishop Sutton sent Theobald to obtain a letter of presentation from him, but this when it was forthcoming purported to ‘admit’ Theobald. At this point Sutton appears to have wanted to admit Theobald on the basis of the abbot of Fleury’s presentation just to get things moving,86 but this was not possible since the abbot’s letters were also couched in prejudicial terms. He had claimed to ‘ordain’ Theobald to the priorate and there was a misreporting of how the vacancy had occurred. So another letter had to be sought from the abbot (although not, it would seem, from the earl). Theobald was given temporary custody of the house while things were sorted out, and in January 1291 he was finally admitted to the priorate, the bishop’s register recording all the ways in which the matter had been wrongly conducted.87 When patrons’ letters were transcribed into the bishop’s register they give an indication of how patrons of monasteries construed their rights. Nowhere is this plainer, however, than in a letter which was not copied into a bishop’s register at all but was recorded in a monastic cartulary. This was a letter patent of 30 December 1276 of Henry de Lacy. In it he rehearsed that by a grant of his ancestors the prior-elect of Nostell (Yorkshire), Richard of Warter, was not required to seek ‘grace of admission’ from himself as patron when he was outside the province of York (an interesting use of the ecclesiastical boundaries, as opposed to a description based perhaps on de Lacy’s lordship of Pontefract). Instead he could have been ‘presented’ to his, Lacy’s, steward of Pontefract. The prior-elect, notwithstanding this, had wanted to show ‘reverence’ to him, and had set out to meet the earl, although he had seemingly waited for him to arrive within the 84 85 86

87

Reg. Sutton, 8.80–2 and see Rot. Welles, 3.54 and Wood, English Monasteries, p. 59. Reg. Sutton, 1.17. Recourse was had to the rolls of Bishop Robert Grosseteste, which apparently provided a precedent for admission on the basis of presentation by the abbot of Fleury. In fact the rights of the earls of Lincoln had been mentioned on previous occasions: Rot. Grosseteste, pp. 27, 111 and 129. Reg. Sutton, 1.133–7 and 147–9. Bishop Sutton seems to have been equally concerned to safeguard his own rights at Haugham (Lincolnshire), also in the earl of Lincoln’s patronage and subject to the abbey of St Severin (dép. Charente-Maritime); see Reg. Sutton, 1.131–4 and 227–8.



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province. The earl’s letter said that he had ‘freely admitted’ him by his letter patent, acknowledging that his election had been canonical.88 Language such as this would surely never have been used in a letter to a bishop – especially not one like Sutton. The right of consent could, in extreme cases, be used to further the interests of the wrong candidate. Humphrey de Bohun granted the Augustinian canons of Stonely (Huntingdonshire) licence to elect in 1290, but, after the election was held, some kind of disagreement appears to have arisen between the candidate, Walter of Gidding, and the canons who had elected him, which prevented him from leaving the house to take things further. Walter’s proctor got a commission for the bishop of Lincoln’s official to make an inquiry into the affair and to make a decision one way or the other. Walter meanwhile gave up his case, being unable to get the patron’s consent to his election. Afterwards Simon de Wulle, ostensibly engaged in seeking the patron’s consent to Walter’s election, managed instead to obtain letters patent of consent asking the bishop to admit him, Simon, as prior. Bishop Sutton refused. Simon had not been elected by his fellow canons and he was entirely unsuitable for the position, a fact which had been quite clear during previous visitations of the house. The canons were allowed to re-elect, with due reference to the patron. Humphrey de Bohun’s consent was subsequently given to the election of John of Ripton, who, to be on the safe side, asked the bishop to write and inform the earl of his admission.89 An interesting postscript is that later on, in 1309, Simon de Wulle was appointed to the priorate of Stonely. Perhaps he had reformed his character. Or perhaps Sutton’s successor, John Dalderby, was less exacting.90 It is rather striking that so many of the problems over monastic elections are encountered in the register of Bishop Sutton. It is a reminder of how much depended on the conscientiousness of individual bishops in upholding the requirements of canon law and implementing the reforms enacted in councils of the thirteenth-century Church. It was Sutton who stopped Norman abbots when they used unsuitable language, and who took care to ensure that the rights of all concerned, including his own, were respected. Even Sutton, though, made choices about whom to challenge. Rosalind Hill suggested that he was much more suspicious about letters from heads of mother houses, lest they challenge his authority, than about those from lay patrons, and that he was careful to avoid antagonizing the powerful, such as Anthony Bek, bishop of Durham.91 It may be noted in the above examples that Sutton refrained 88

89 90 91

BL Cotton MS Vespasian E xix (the Cartulary of Nostell priory), fol. 14r (transcribed below, Appendix of Documents, item 1). The arrangement originated in a composition made on 7 December 1201 between Robert de Lacy and the prior and convent: TNA DL 42 (Duchy of Lancaster, Great Cowcher Book)/ 1, fol. 400r–v. See also Cheney, From Becket to Langton, p. 158. Reg. Sutton, 8.72–3. LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 239v. See R.M.T. Hill, ‘Bishop Sutton and the Institution of the Heads of Religious Houses in the Diocese of Lincoln’, EHR, 58 (1943), 201–9 (esp. pp. 201–6); see also Hill’s introduction

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from asking influential lay magnates to redraft their letters. Even so his meticulous attention to detail contrasts sharply with the more laissez-faire attitude of some of his episcopal colleagues. John Salmon, bishop of Norwich, for instance, appears to have condoned the action of the subprior and convent of Thetford (Norfolk) who, in 1300 (during the Anglo-French war), elected one of their own brethren, Reginald of Eye, to be prior. This was apparently with the connivance of the patron Roger Bigod and his brother John. Thus the lawful right of the abbots of Cluny to appoint to the priorate was ignored, and, worse yet, their nominee was spurned by the monks and their representatives imprisoned and maltreated. The Cluniacs appealed to the pope. Boniface VIII ordered that Salmon’s action of confirming the election be revoked and that Reginald be deprived of office. He forbade the earl and his brother from interfering further. It was not, however, until Archbishop Winchelsey’s metropolitical visitation of 1304 that the matter was sorted out and a new prior, Thomas Bigod (the name should not escape our notice), was elected.92 Giving the right of consent to elections was not quite the end of the patron’s involvement in a vacancy. In houses where the patron had the right of custody, the temporalities had to be restored to the house when the new head was admitted. There is some evidence that Isabella, countess of Albemarle and Devon, sometimes chose to string the process out. Evidence given during the visitation of Bolton priory (Yorkshire) in 1275 suggests that Isabella may have extorted money when priors were required to do fealty to her.93 In 1286 John of Pontoise, bishop of Winchester, wrote specially to her asking her to restore ‘without difficulty’ the temporalities of Christchurch Twynham (Dorset) of which she had had custody.94 It was not only during vacancies that Isabella caused trouble. She and her clerk Adam of Stratton were also implicated in the destruction of a charter belonging to the abbot of Quarr (Isle of Wight) in 1279; the dispute between them led in the end to the king taking the abbey into royal protection by 1281. This did not however prevent Isabella’s agents, during the period of royal protection, from attacking the abbot and his men and making off with their goods.95 In 1302, the bishop of Winchester allowed the priory of Breamore (Hampshire) to appropriate the rectory of Brading (Isle of Wight) after Isabella had died, to compensate for the exactions she had made.96 Another aggressive magnate was Edmund Mortimer, about whom the

92

93 94 95 96

to Reg. Sutton, 1.xxiv-xxvii and Rosalind Hill, ‘Sutton, Oliver (c.1219–1299)’, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/26801, accessed 3 Dec 2009). CPL, 1.594–5, Registrum Roberti Winchelsey, Cantuariensis Archiepiscopi, ed. R. Graham, 2 vols (CYS, 51 and 52, 1952–6), pp. 703–4, 792, and NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 14v. See also Thompson, ‘Statute of Carlisle’, p. 576 and note 165. Reg. W. Giffard, p. 303. Registrum Johannis de Pontissara, episcopi Wintoniensis, AD MCCLXXXII–MCCCIIII, ed. C. Deedes, 2 vols (CYS, 19 and 30, 1915–24), 1.323. Placitorum Abbreviatio, p. 196, CPR 1272–81, pp. 314 and 474 and CPR 1281–92, pp. 39 and 102. Reg. Pontissara, 1.123–4.



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abbot and convent of Strata Florida (Carmarthenshire) lodged a complaint to Edward I. Edmund had obtained some of the lands of Mareduc ab Robert, lord of Caedewen (Montgomeryshire). He was demanding, by reason of a grant in free alms of land in ‘Aberunhull’ in Caedewen which Mareduc had made to the abbot and convent, that the convent was bound to feed him and his household (or, in his absence, his bailiff) every Friday all through the year. To make his point, he was distraining their livestock. A commission was ordered to look into this in 1291.97 Perhaps some patrons felt that their right of custody of religious houses was akin to the right of wardship which they exercised over the lands of their feudal tenants. The similarities are shown by the rare survival, among the ministers’ accounts of the earldom of Cornwall, of two accounts of a monastic custody. This was of the Benedictine priory of Eye (Suffolk). The custody was administered by the earl’s estate officials, and some of the items of income and expenditure, such as receipts from rents, sale of produce, and perquisites of court, and expenditure on maintaining equipment and buildings, purchasing materials and supplies and paying wages, as well as the usual grange and stock accounts, were similar to those on any lay estate.98 In the account for the custody of the priory itself, however, for 1297–8 there were items showing that this was a monastic establishment, for there was income from sold tithes and portions of churches. It may seem an irregularity that the earl was apparently in receipt of spiritual income,99 although at least some of the money was paid to Nicholas Evelyn, the prior-elect. The items of expenditure included 5s 6¾d spent on nails and a stipend of 6s to one Richard Mariot for roofing the priory church. The earl’s ministers also saw to it that the cardinals’ procurations (a contribution to the expenses of the papal nuncios, Berald, cardinal bishop of Albano, and Simon, cardinal bishop of Palestrina, who had been appointed by Pope Boniface VIII in 1295 to negotiate peace between England and France) were paid.100 In addition there were payments to doorkeepers, priory servants and clerks, liveries of robes,

CPR 1281–92, p. 459. Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 2.156–7 (for the accounting period 1 August 1296 to 1 August 1297) and TNA SC 6/996/12, mm. 4–5 (for the accounting period 21 November 1297–21 April 1298). The accounts of the manors, on m. 5, are not given a separate heading, but that they covered much the same time period as the account of the priory is clear from entries for payments of expenses and stipends to servants. The accounts are discussed in VCH Suffolk, 2:73, however, as if the priory and its manors were in royal custody and as though the manor of Eye, accounted for on the first membrane of the roll, belonged to the priory whereas it was in fact one of the earl’s demesne manors. 99 See Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 56–7: although tithes that had been sold were considered by the Crown to have been temporalities, there was a clear distinction between temporalities and spiritualities. ‘Spiritualities were all that constituted the income of individual parish churches and parochial benefices; they were tithes, oblations, and income from glebe-lands.’ 100 See W.E. Lunt, Financial Relations of the Papacy with England to 1327 (Cambridge, Mass., 1939), pp. 553–7. 97 98

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and wages to the monks themselves and to Nicholas Evelyn, the prior. Evelyn was not instituted until 1301, presumably because of the Anglo-French war, Eye being subject to the abbey of Bernay (dép Eure).101 Whether such payments of wages were usual or whether this was a special arrangement during the vacancy is not clear. The earl’s ministers thus discharged the custody with awareness of their lord’s responsibilities as well as his rights as patron. There is no evidence in the accounts that he himself intervened. Some magnates did play a personal role in the financial administration of the houses of their patronage, sometimes giving assistance. Of course they were under no obligation to limit this to religious houses in which they had formal rights; a man in a position of influence might well be asked for help, although this in no way allowed him to interfere in matters that properly belonged to patrons. There is little evidence in England, as there is on the Continent, of the prevalence of advocati, ‘in principle chosen officials paid with privileges or a fief, in practice hereditary masters with numerous rights’, who emerged out of the desirability for religious houses to have a secular representative.102 If a house was in severe debt, the king might take custody of it, to see that it was administered with a view to paying it off. At this period, though not later on, the king might take custody of a house of anyone’s patronage for reasons of debt.103 It was sometimes at the patron’s instance that the king took on an impecunious house. In 1267 Spalding priory was in debt because of the damage it had suffered in the barons’ wars. Henry III on 17 September indicated his approval of the prior’s plan to go abroad to alleviate the debts (though the patent roll does not explain what the trip was actually intended to achieve), and at the instance of Henry de Lacy, the patron, took the priory into his protection for two years, and acquitted it of certain pleas.104 Sometimes the king would appoint the patron or his representative as custodian, thus obliging him to fulfil his responsibility to help maintain the good estate of the house of his patronage. Thus in 1275 Guichard de Charron was given custody during pleasure of the abbey of Jervaulx (Yorkshire) which was of the patronage of John of Brittany, earl of Richmond, and was in debt. The earl himself was abroad, and Guichard was one of the three attorneys appointed to look after his affairs while he was

101 Nicholas

Evelyn also received 10s from the rector of Bedfield and 10s from Thomas Loveday for half of the tithe of Stradbroke; these sums, recorded as receipts under ‘rent of assize and sold tithes’ were cancelled with the explanation that Nicholas Evelyn had received them. For the significance of this custody in the context of the Anglo-French war, see below, Chapter 5, p. 143 and 147. 102 Wood, English Monasteries, p.  17. For the role of advocates, see G. Constable, The Reformation of the Twelfth Century (Cambridge, 1996), pp.  249–56, Thomas, Droit de propriété des laïques sur les églises, pp.  123–4 and Wood, English Monasteries, pp.  2 and 16–21. 103 Wood, English Monasteries, esp. pp. 96–7 and 145–6 and K.L. Wood-Legh, Church Life in England under Edward III (Cambridge, 1934), p. 4. 104 CPR 1266–72, pp. 109–10.



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away.105 In this instance, the representative was already the patron’s agent. Sometimes the patron seems to have felt that if he could not take personal responsibility then he should not take on the task at all. Thus in 1276 Kirkstall abbey (Yorkshire) was committed to the custody of its patron Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, but in the following year, because of his being involved in the Welsh war, the custody was committed instead to the royal clerk, Hugh Kendal.106 A final example is the case of Brooke (Rutland). There, however, the problems seem to have been exacerbated by the patron’s involvement. Writing to the prior of Kenilworth (the mother house) Oliver Sutton said that during his recent visitation of Brooke he had found it in a state of utter poverty. The custodians sent by Edmund, earl of Cornwall,107 had not alleviated the problem but had made it worse. The canons had blamed the matter on their absent prior but Sutton preferred not to proceed against him unheard. He urged the prior of Kenilworth to do what was in his power to improve the state of the place.108 Looking at the mechanics of how patrons exercised their rights is an essential part of understanding the nature of these rights and just how important they were felt to be. It seems clear, too, that the social status of patrons played a key part in determining how they exercised their rights. First, because they had commitments beyond the immediate locality, they often had to rely on information from others and to delegate the exercise of patronage. Even so, it seems clear that they played a personal part in the exercise of their rights, wanting directly to be involved and making sure that their presentation resulted in a successful and, often, lasting institution. We do not always know very much about the lives of the clergy whom they presented, other than the bare bones of their qualifications at the moment of their presentation and institution, but it seems clear that the actual presentations were made in line with the requirements of canon law as it had by then developed. It was sometimes patrons’ influence which encouraged bishops to apply the law with discretion, but there is little evidence that they actually disregarded the authority of bishops in relation to their right of presentation. The qualifications of their candidates were, it is true, very mixed, with lack of clerical orders being a distinguishable feature, though not an insurmountable barrier to their gaining the benefice or at least custody of it. As far as monastic patronage went, however, it does look as though, on occasion, magnates went rather further than canon law allowed. Sometimes it was merely a matter of inappropriate wording; sometimes magnates wanted to be sure that their rights were being respected; a few really wanted more control over the houses of their patronage.

1272–81, pp. 75–6. 1272–81, pp. 170–1 and 208. 107 Edmund had probably acquired the patronage of Brooke with the lordship of Oakham, since it had been endowed by Hugh de Ferrars, lord of Oakham, before 1153. For an account of the house, see Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:233–5 and VCH Rutland, 1.159–61. 108 Reg. Sutton, 2.146 and for the whole sequence of events, see pp. 145–8 and 157–9. 105 CPR 106 CPR

3 Jobs for the Boys?

Exactly why lay patrons valued their patronage rights so much is revealed when we look at the clergy who held livings in their gift, and exploring the connections they had with those who had presented them. It is not possible to explain the reasons for every presentation made by a magnate to a benefice, but a number of very clear interest groups emerge. In examining the records relating to these groups, we are able to see the complexity of the relationships involved, for prominent clerks tended not to rely on just one patron for advancement. Having looked at the qualifications of clergy from the point of view of the Church, we need now to look at the considerations that prompted magnates to advance them. In the first place they had their relatives. It is well known that noble families put their members into the Church as a way of providing them with a livelihood without drawing on the resources of the family estates. In 1282 Edward I wrote to the pope about Aymer de Valence, then a younger son of William de Valence, who was making a career in the church. The king’s letter said that it was usual for magnates’ younger sons to hold a plurality of benefices. That the king should openly say so to the pope begs two questions: whether it was in fact ‘usual’ and whether the Church tolerated pluralism on the part of noble clerks.1 For some, the acquisition of benefices was certainly seen as a means of maintaining the lordly status and influence in the world that they felt was their birthright. Here, the undeniable historical fact of Bogo de Clare, younger son of Richard, earl of Gloucester, is the most obvious example. He had in 1255 a papal dispensation to hold two benefices in England with cure of souls, and the church of Callan (Kilkenny), a Clare family living, while under age (he was not yet seven). He was also made a papal chaplain.2 By 1280 he had a more comprehensive dispensation which was produced by his proctor when Bogo was presented to Whiston (Northamptonshire). This allowed him to keep four named churches with cure of souls and income amounting to 400 marks (£266 13s 4d).3 Generous though this was, it fell far short of the reality of

1 2 3

CCR 1279–88, p. 188. CPL, 1.317. The entry reads as though it were the earl himself who was the subject. Reg. Sutton, 2.2–3.The calendar speaks of the church of Callan and two other churches, but three are named.



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Bogo’s income and his accumulated benefices. By the time he died in 1294 his income is thought to have been in the region of £1,500. Michael Altschul has compiled a long list of the benefices he held, amounting to thirty-one rec­tories as well as numerous prebends and dignities.4 The exceptional nature of Bogo’s pluralism and the extravagances which it fed, evidenced by his surviving wardrobe accounts, have been discussed fully elsewhere;5 but what is especially interesting is the sheer number of the patrons who were prepared to promote him. As well as his father, his mother and his brother, his patrons included Henry III and Edward I, and several magnates (Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk, Isabella de Forz, countess of Devon and Albemarle, and Bogo’s brother-in-law Roger de Mowbray) and the prior and convent of Durham. Given that his benefices stretched from Yorkshire to Sussex and from Devon to Norfolk it is not surprising that he did not serve them in person; that his acquisition of churches was a business not a vocation is evidenced by his practice of farming out his churches; and that his friendships were with other barons, rather than with clergymen all make it unsurprising that those of the clergy who spoke of him did so disparagingly. Archbishop Pecham spoke of him as a ravisher, rather than a rector, of churches.6 Yet, it was the scale of his pluralism rather than fact of it which made him exceptional. There were many other pluralists from magnate families. Another example, less well known, was Boniface, a son of Thomas, marquis of Saluzzo. He owed his advancement in England primarily to his connection with the Lacy family, through Alice de Lacy, who was a daughter of Manfred, marquis of Saluzzo, and who had married Edmund de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, in 1247.7 Boniface had a papal dispensation in 1289 to hold two benefices with cure of souls without having to take orders or be resident and despite being under age. This was produced when he was presented by Henry de Lacy to Almondbury (Yorkshire) in 1289. Alice presented him to Penistone (Yorkshire) in 1295. He was instituted to Almondbury and given custody of Penistone.8 By 1296 he had acquired another Lacy family benefice, Campsall; as rector of Campsall and Almondbury he was given leave to stay in the papal curia for two years and to farm out his churches.9 Boniface, like Bogo de Clare, enjoyed royal

4 5

6 7 8 9

Michael Altschul, A Baronial Family in Medieval England: The Clares, 1217–1314 (Baltimore, 1965), pp. 306–8. See M.S. Giuseppi, ‘The Wardrobe and Household Accounts of Bogo de Clare, AD 1284–6’, Archaeologia, 70 (1920), 1–56, Thompson, ‘Pluralism in the Mediaeval Church’, pp. 53–7, A.B. Emden, A Biographical Register of the University of Oxford to AD 1500, 3 vols (Oxford, 1957–9), 1:423–4, Altschul, A Baronial Family, pp. 176–87 and H. Summerson, ‘Clare, Bogo de (1248–1294’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/ article/50346, accessed 20 July 2011). Reg. Epist. Peckham, 1.370–2. Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 7:681 and note (i) and Matthaei Parisiensis, Monachi Sancti Albani Chronica Majora, ed. H.R. Luard, 7 vols (RS, 1872–83), 4.628. Reg. Romeyn, 1.91, 147 and 155. Reg. Romeyn, 1.91, 147 and 155.

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favour. He was made dean of the royal chapel of Tickhill. He was in 1296 trying to occupy a number of churches in that capacity, an action viewed by the archbishop as a usurpation of his own jurisdiction. The parishioners of the churches were told not to obey him.10 Boniface VIII provided him to the prebend of Gretton (Northamptonshire) to which he was installed in 1298 and he had another papal provision to the archdeaconry of Buckingham.11 In 1300, when still only a deacon, he was given licence on the petition of Henry de Lacy to study in the schools for seven years and not to be required to proceed to further orders.12 In 1301 he had a further papal provision, to a canonry and prebend at York, and in 1304 he was allowed to visit his archdeaconry by deputy for three years.13 His brother, George, who witnessed Boniface’s oath of obedience in 1299, went down much the same route. He was given a canonry and prebend of York in 1304 with a dispensation as he was under age and in minor orders only. He was also given a dispensation to hold the precentorship of Salisbury with the canonry and prebend annexed to it, and the church of Womersley (Yorkshire).14 John Bigod, younger son of Hugh Bigod, was also a pluralist. His accumulation of benefices is less obvious because many of them were in the Norwich diocese for which the first surviving register only starts in 1299, but he was holding at least two, Cottingham (Yorkshire) and Little Frammingham (Norfolk), in 1294.15 In 1306, at the request of his brother, he had a papal dispensation to hold four churches with cure of souls – Cottingham, Terrington, Acle and Little Frammingham (Norfolk) so long as he resigned another three.16 Perhaps, in contrast to Bogo de Clare, he preferred to save his money rather than to spend it on an extravagant lifestyle, for he was able to lend his brother, the earl of Norfolk, large amounts of money. According to one chronicle account, it was in order to prevent his brother (to whom he was severely indebted) from inheriting the family estates that in 1302 Roger Bigod entailed his estates on the Crown.17 John Bigod was presented to Cottingham by Johanna de Stutevill, the patron, in 1272,18 and he was probably presented to Little Frammingham by the prior and convent of Thetford and to Terrington by the bishop of Ely as they had the patronage of these churches.19 The more we look, the more noble clerks there seem to be. Every family

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19

Reg. Romeyn, 1.333–4. Reg. Sutton, 8.220–1. Reg. Corbridge, 1.206 and see also 1.27. Reg. Corbridge, p. 10 and CPL, 1.613. CPL, 1.613. CPR 1292–1301, p. 118. CPL, 2.13. The Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough, ed. H. Rothwell, Camden Society, 3rd series, 89 (London: Royal Historical Society, 1957), p. 352. Reg. W. Giffard, pp. 58–9. For Little Frammingham, see Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:142–4 and 149–50 and for Terrington see F. Blomefield, An Essay Towards a Topographical History of the County of Norfolk, new edn, 11 vols (London, 1805–10), 9:90.



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had one. There was Master Ralph de Bohun, son of the earl of Hereford, who had a papal indult in 1256 to hold an additional benefice with cure of souls, in addition to those he had, which amounted to 60 marks (£40) in value. He was appointed a papal chaplain in the following year, and when he died he was rector of Tilbrook (Bedfordshire), Bosworth (Leicestershire), Kimbolton (Huntingdonshire), Debden (Essex), and Llanedeyrn (Glamorganshire).20 Then there was William de Percy, whose brother Henry presented him to Catton (Yorkshire) in 1268.21 William was holding Catton, Seamer, Nafferton Holm (Yorkshire), Calverton (Nottinghamshire?), Brightwell (Berkshire?), ‘Lange­ ford’, and ‘Burn’ in 1294.22 Then there was Edmund Mortimer, son of Roger Mortimer. He was promised a ‘competent’ benefice by Henry III in 1263, and in view of this Henry, after the battle of Evesham, sought to secure for him the treas­urership of York. This Henry had given earlier to Amaury de Montfort, when royal ecclesiastical patronage was, as Henry claimed, subject to the undue influence of Simon de Montfort.23 Edmund held a prebend in Hereford cathedral and was seeking, by use of physical force, to maintain possession of the church of Chipping Campden, for which he was in dispute with Adam of Avebury, when he came into his father’s inheritance in 1282 and no longer required it.24 The contrast between Edmund’s fortune and that of Amaury, also a younger son who had entered the Church, is striking. Not only did Edmund acquire the benefice that was taken away from Amaury, but he was able, after his older brother’s death, to succeed to his father’s inheritance – something Amaury was unable to do. Amaury is also in striking contrast to some of the other clerks mentioned above. It is true that he was a pluralist, holding benefices in England and France, but he was also a scholar of some note.25 So perhaps – and it is a sharp irony – Amaury, who did not come to occupy the place in the Church that he might have done, does offer a more creditable model, and thus helps to explain why the Church was complaisant – as these examples and others show – towards clerks of noble birth.26 The papal registers contain many dispensations for pluralism which specifically mention the recipients’ noble birth or their kinship to named members of the nobility.27 It was difficult – undesirable – to resist those pressures. Indeed a mandate of 25 February 1239 to the papal 20 21 22 23 24 25

26 27

CPL, 1.339 and 345 and Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1152. Reg. W. Giffard, p. 52. CPR 1292–1301, p. 123. CPR 1258–66, p. 298, 404 and 436 and Reg. W. Giffard, p. 82. See also above, Chapter 2, p. 55–6, for the context of the earlier presentation of Amaury. Reg. Giffard, 2.187–9, 3.226, Reg. Epist. Peckham, 2.747–8, and CPR 1281–92, pp. 41 and 52. See also Reg. Epist. Peckham, 2.528–30. See J. R. Maddicott, ‘Montfort, Amaury de, styled eleventh earl of Leicester (1242/3– c.1300)’, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/19045, accessed 24 Nov 2011) and Maddicott, Simon de Montfort, pp. 95–7, 253, 324, 351 and 370. For other examples of noble clerks, see Gemmill, ‘The Earls and Their Clergy’, pp. 131–3. E.g. CPL, 1.86, 147, 157, 217–18, 236, 244, 259, 268, 282, 293, 300, 315 and 361.

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legate in England instructed him, if he could not proceed without scandal against pluralist clerks whose relations were powerful, for the present to leave them alone.28 But there was also a connection between nobility of birth and education. The decree of the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215, ‘De Multa Providencia’, which forbade clerks to hold more than one benefice with cure of souls at the same time, conceded that noble and lettered clerks deserved larger benefices and suggested that there would be the chance for papal dispensations for such men under reasonable circumstances.29 Canon law proscriptions of pluralism enacted after this did not make exceptions for noble clerks,30 but there is some evidence of continued toleration. A letter of Innocent IV of 1245 to English prelates urged them to encourage the clerks of their dioceses, particularly those of noble birth, to be well behaved and to study letters; the pope said that he was willing to give dispensations to worthy clerks to hold more than one benefice.31 Perhaps the pope really did see a leadership role for noble clerks in improving the standards and learning among the clergy. Special pleading for clerks of noble birth was thought to be justified on the basis of a corresponding nobility of character. For example, on 26 January 1246 the pope authorised the clerks Thomas and Hugh, sons of William de Cantilupe, because of their nobility, learning and manners, each to hold an additional benefice with cure of souls.32 On 18 March 1251 the pope authorised the bishop of Ely to grant dispensations to two of his clerks on the basis of their nobility, morals, birth and letters so that they might each hold two benefices with cure of souls.33 When Archbishop John Pecham wrote to Martin IV in 1283 on behalf of the earl of Oxford’s sons he spoke of their high moral character, their exalted birth and the fact that they were students at the university of Paris. All sorts of good things would happen if the pope were to favour them: the English knighthood would be fortified, other noble clerks would be inspired to study and those who had given up hope of getting dispensations would be stopped from illegally occupying benefices.34 Pecham’s successor, Robert Winchelsey, writing on behalf of the illegitimate sons of the earl of Surrey in 1303, spoke of their illustrious birth and noble character.35

28 29 30

31 32 33 34 35

CPL, 1.168. Extra, 3.tit. 5, cap. 28, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.477–8. See W.T. Waugh, ‘Archbishop Peckham and Pluralities’, EHR, 28 (1913), 625–35 and Thompson, ‘Pluralism in the Mediaeval Church’, pp. 42–9 for the discrepancies between ‘De Multa Providencia’ and later legislation. Both John Pecham and Robert Winchelsey were steadfast in their pursuit of illegal pluralists: see Douie, Archbishop Pecham, pp. 98–113 and Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 277–85. Original Papal Documents, p. 134. CPL, 1.223. CPL, 1.268. Reg. Epist. Peckham, 2.591–2. Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 646–7. See Gemmill, ‘The Earls and Their Clergy’, pp. 131–2 for the outcome of these requests.



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It is true that some members of magnate families did justify the Church’s investment in their worth. Some become bishops. The de Cantilupe family produced a number of distinguished ecclesiastics, including Walter de Cantilupe, son of William de Cantilupe, steward of King John, who became bishop of Worcester in 1236.36 Matthew Paris tells us how Walter spoke up for noble pluralists at the ecclesiastical council held by the papal legate in 1237.37 Walter’s nephew, Thomas de Cantilupe, was chancellor of Oxford and was elected bishop of Hereford in 1275; he was later canonised.38 Nicholas Longspée, bishop of Salisbury (d. 1297), was the son of William Longspée, earl of Salisbury, the illegitimate son of Henry II.39 Then there was John de Grandisson, grandson of Otto de Grandisson, who became bishop of Exeter.40 The Grandissons’ success in the Church was even more conspicuous on the Continent; they were after all from Savoy.41 Gerard de Grandisson, a nephew of Otto, was consecrated as bishop of Verdun in 1276.42 Another nephew, Gerard de Vippeins, became bishop of Lausanne in 1301.43 Otto had many other clerical relatives. His nephew, another Otto, who was presented to Mancetter by Edward I in 1299, had a papal provision to a canonry in the church of York in 1301.44 In 1308 William de Estanayaco, Otto’s nephew, was allowed, at his uncle’s request, to keep the churches of Grinstead (Sussex) and Llanbadarn Fawr (Cardiganshire) (although he had resigned the latter), plus the archdeaconry of Lincoln and canonries and prebends of Wells, and churches abroad. He was not obliged to be ordained priest for five years. In 1311 he was given a papal indult at Otto’s request to visit his archdeaconry by deputy for three years.45 In 1289 another relative, Otto de Chauvent, was given an indult to hold the deanery of Seliriac (in the diocese of Geneva) and the churches of Havant (Hampshire) and Terrington (Yorkshire)

36 37 38

39 40 41 42 43

44 45

See C.H. Lawrence, ‘Cantilupe, Walter de (c.1195–1266)’, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/ view/article/4571, accessed 13 Oct 2011). Paris, Chronica, 3.418. For Thomas de Cantilupe, see N.D.S. Martin, ‘The life of St Thomas of Hereford’, in St Thomas Cantilupe, Bishop of Hereford: Essays in His Honour, ed. M. Jancey (Hereford, 1982), esp. p. 15, and R.C. Finucane, ‘Cantilupe, Thomas de [St Thomas of Hereford] (c.1220–1282)’, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/4570, accessed 20 July 2011). B. R. Kemp, ‘Longespée, Nicholas (d. 1297)’, ODNB, online edn, May 2010 (www. oxforddnb.com/view/article/95180, accessed 24 Nov 2011). See Audrey Erskine, ‘Grandison, John (1292–1369)’, ODNB (www.oxforddnb.com/view/ article/11238, accessed 13 Oct 2011). A pedigree of the Grandisson family is given in the Register of John de Grandisson, 3. Rot. Gravesend, p. 69 and note 1. For Gerard’s benefices in England, see Rot. Gravesend, p. 1, Reg. W. Giffard, pp. 160–1, and Original Papal Documents, pp. 349 and 350. Reg. Newark, p. 217 and note 4. For Gerard’s benefices in England, see CPL, 1.507. Eudes de Vippeins seems to have been another member of the family. For his career in England, see CPR 1301–1307, pp. 102, 139, 245, 392, 447–8 and 462. CPR 1292–1301, p. 440 and Reg. Corbridge, 1.9–10. CPL, 2.45 and 86.

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which he had previously held without dispensation; he was also given a licence to be non-resident for five years.46 The other significant call on magnates’ resources of benefices and favours were the clerks working on their estates. Here we have to be quite careful, because it is all too easy to regard them as an homogeneous group. In practice their status and roles varied enormously. The clerks working at local and manorial level – the scribes who wrote out the accounts, who made and kept the records of the manorial court, and who acted as counter-talliers and revenue collectors – seem to have received cash fees on the whole rather than benefices. On the Lacy estates the fee for the clerk of the account was 6s 8d per year, paid by the official whose account the clerk had written out. These clerks must often have been the local scribes who served others in the area as well. At Pontefract (Yorkshire) in 1295–96 the clerk of the town was paid 10s for having served diligently and well.47 On the other hand, a scribe would sometimes be responsible for writing out all the accounts over a wider area. Alan of Claxby received 60s in 1304–5 for his services as clerk of the account for all the earl’s reeves in the Lindsey area.48 Sometimes local scribes were also paid for taking on spiritual duties in their ‘patch’: at Scales (Yorkshire), John the chaplain was paid 100s for celebrating Mass and acting as counter-tallier and as clerk of the account in 1304–5.49 Whether this was for the benefit of the ordinary parishioners of the area, or whether it was because the earl himself was there and required it, is not clear. That he was in receipt of a fee would suggest that he was not beneficed locally. We do occasionally find that clerks working at manorial level came to the attention of the earl and his family, although it does seem rare. The officers at Clifford (Herefordshire) were allowed 54s on their account in 1304–5 at the instance of the countess of Lincoln for the wages and robe of Walter, rector of Winceby (Lincolnshire) because this sum had not been allocated to him for his previous work as clerk of the account and counter-tallier at Clifford and Glasbury (Wiltshire).50 This Walter is surely to be identified as Master Walter of Wiltshire who was presented by Henry de Lacy to Winceby in 1302,51 and so it is interesting to see him in a benefice far away from the manors in which he had earlier rendered his services. This is an exceptional case, and it is possible that it was other services given that brought Walter to Henry’s attention rather than his mundane duties as clerk of the account. The same pattern of first names and remuneration in the form of fees and robes for clerks with local scribal and revenue collecting duties, rather than benefices, seems to have been prevalent on the estates of Isabella de Forz.52 46 47 48 49 50 51 52

CPL, 1.508. TNA DL 29/1/1, m. 15r. TNA DL 29/1/2, m. 9d. TNA DL 29/1/2, m. 12d. TNA DL 29/1/2, m. 18r. LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 5v. E.g. TNA SC 6/824/7, mm. 1d and m. 4r, 824/8, m. 1d, 824/9, m. 1d, 984/4, m. 5r, 984/5, m. 3r, 984/6, m. 2r, 984/13, m. 6r, 984/14, m. 1d, 1078/7, m. 1r and 1078/8, m. 4r.



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The local ‘receipt’ was the chief manor in the bailiwick or lordship which served as a local treasury, and the officer in charge of receiving and disbursing funds was the receiver.53 Henry de Lacy had receipts at Lincoln, Bolingbroke (Lincolnshire), Clitheroe (Lancashire) Pontefract, Denbigh, Canford, Holborn in London and elsewhere.54 It was a responsible position, involving the handling of large amounts of cash, and good work would have made a real difference and would have been noticed. In June 1296 Thomas of Newton, receiver of Canford, sent £467 13s 4d to the Henry de Lacy, and was allowed 20s at the end of the accounting year as a reward, because he had worked hard to supply the earl’s provisions.55 Thomas of Newton was presented to Winterbourne Earls in 1298, Robert of Silkstone, another receiver, to Winceby in 1299 and William of Donnington, another, to Kirk Bramwith (Yorkshire) in 1306.56 The case of Robert of Silkstone shows how a receiver might progress to other roles. As well as serving as an auditor in 1304–5, he was a witness to several of Henry de Lacy’s charters and was later one of the executors of his will.57 On the estates of Roger Bigod, the three local receiverships were generally held by local men although occasionally Bigod’s household chaplains did the job: Robert the chaplain was receiver of Framlingham (Norfolk) in 1273 and Gocelin the chaplain in 1290–91. Thomas the canon was receiver at Chepstow (Monmouthshire) in 1293.58 The fact that Bigod’s estates were in dioceses for which the records do not survive so well makes it difficult to know, however, whether any of them were rewarded with benefices on the Bigod estates, and Thomas the canon was perhaps not a secular clerk in any case.59 Receiverships on the (much larger) Clare estates seem to have been smaller in number but to have been positions of greater importance than on the Lacy 53

54 55 56

57 58 59

For the duties of receivers, which varied in different magnates’ administrative systems, see J.F. Baldwin, ‘The Household Administration of Henry Lacy and Thomas of Lancaster’, EHR 43 (1927), 180–200 (esp. pp. 182–7), N. Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration in England (Oxford, 1937), pp. 40–6, L. Fox, The Administration of the Honour of Leicester in the Fourteenth Century (Leicester, 1940), pp. 36–41, and R. Somerville, History of the Duchy of Lancaster, 1: 1265–1603 (London, 1953), pp. 73–7. Baldwin, ‘Household Administration of Henry Lacy and Thomas of Lancaster’, p. 182. TNA DL 29/1/1, mm. 13r–v and passim. Reg. Gandavo, 2.586, LA Sutton Roll 6, m. 2 (but cf. Reg. Sutton, 8.227 where the presentation is said to have been made by Edmund, earl of Lancaster), LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 2v, and The Register of William Greenfield, Lord Archbishop of York, 1306–1315, ed. W. Brown and A. Hamilton Thompson, 5 vols (Surtees Society, 145, 149 and 151–3, 1931–40), 2.3. TNA DL 29/1/2, DL 42/1, fols 189r, 256r–v, 267v and 310r, and CPR 1313–17, pp. 393 and 535. Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp. 21 and 45–6. On Edmund, earl of Cornwall’s estates, local receiverships are rarely mentioned. In 1296–97, however, there was a receiver for the earl’s Cornish lands, the clerk Thomas of Oakham, who rendered account for receipts and expenses belonging to the office of his colleague, Thomas de la Hyde, steward and sheriff of Cornwall: Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 2.222–53.

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and Bigod estates, covering entire honours and lordships rather than localised groups of manors. So it is not surprising that when clerks held the position of receiver they seem to have been trusted individuals who served their lords in other capacities as well. For the lordship of Glamorgan, there was a treasurer, a position held by Master Henry of Llancarvan in 1289 and 1292–93 and after Gilbert de Clare’s death in 1295.60 Gilbert presented him to Marshfield (Monmouthshire) in 1294 and to Great Marlow (Buckinghamshire) in 1295. He resigned Alford (Somerset) and All Hallows the Greater at the Haywharf in London, a Clare family living, on his institution to Great Marlow.61 Not all Clare clerks who were receivers can be shown to hold benefices although this may well be due to lack of evidence arising from the fact that many Clare family livings were in dioceses in Wales and Ireland for which there are no registers for this period. Simon de Heyham, for instance, was evidently a trusted clerk. He served as receiver and constable of the honour of Clare in 1290–91 and went abroad with Gilbert on the king’s service in 1286. Interestingly, he was suing his master for debts and expenses not allowed to him for his work as receiver and constable in 1290–91, but was his attorney in 1293 and one of his executors after his death.62 Yet, there is no evidence of his holding a benefice in the gift of the Clares. Another case is Harvey of Boreham. He was both receiver and steward of Richard de Clare’s honour of Clare in 1259 and continued in service under Richard’s son Gilbert. He was one of those who advised Gilbert to attack London in 1267, he represented him in an action against Llewellyn in 1268 and was a member of his household in 1269. Harvey’s career was not confined to service for the earls of Gloucester; he had earlier been the steward of the abbot of Westminster and during the 1260s was prominent in royal service.63 So it is not surprising that he was favoured by Henry III (he was presented to the churches of Morden (Surrey) and Stevenage (Hertfordshire) in 1259; in addition Edward I presented him to Yelden (Bedfordshire) in 1273 and at his death he held the deanery of St Paul’s in London).64 The steward was the main executive officer within a lordship,65 and it was

60 61

62 63

64 65

Altschul, A Baronial Family, pp. 260 and 266–7 and J.C. Ward, ‘The Estates of the Clare Family, 1087–1314’ (London, PhD thesis, 1962), p. 350. Calendar of Institutions by the Chapter of Canterbury Sede Vacante ed. C.E. Woodruff (Kent Archaeological Society, Records Branch, 8, 1923), p.  80, Reg. Sutton, 8.161 and see C. Inq. PM, 5.344 (no. 538). Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp. 158–9, CPR 1281–92, p. 241, CPR 1292– 1301, pp. 19 and 292, CCR 1296–1302, p. 43 and Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 335–6 and 741. Altschul, A Baronial Family, p. 227, Ward, ‘Estates of the Clare Family’, pp. 116–17, Cartae et Alia Munimenta quae ad Dominium de Glamorgancia Pertinent, ed. G.T. Clark, 2nd edn, 6 vols (Cardiff, 1910), 2.693–4 and CPR 1266–72, p. 369. CPR 1258–66, pp. 11 and 35, CPR 1272–81, pp. 41 and 42 and Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1153. For the circumstances of the 1259 presentations see below, p. 89–90. See Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp.  66–85. The instructions given to Edmund of Cornwall’s stewards after their accounts were audited sheds light on the tasks



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because of the accountability to laymen and the ‘hands on’ nature of the work that the Church frowned on clergy who took on the role. A canon of the provincial council at Oxford in 1222 forbade beneficed clerks or those in holy orders from being stewards or bailiffs such that they had to render account to laymen, nor should they exercise secular jurisdiction involving capital punishment.66 Knightly tenants were often appointed as estate stewards but, despite the strictures of canon law, clerks are not infrequently encountered as well. And such clerks were certainly rewarded with benefices. There was also on occasion a correlation between the location of the benefice and that of their administrative role. On the Lacy estates, William de Nony was steward and constable of Pontefract in 1295–96, was an auditor on several occasions, was a witness to his charters, and was often entrusted with giving or taking seisin of property in his lord’s name. In 1300 he brought de Lacy’s will to the archbishop of York for approval.67 Clearly this was a man who linked a central with a local executive role and was personally known to the earl. William held several ecclesiastical benefices in Henry de Lacy’s gift: by 1294 he was guardian of the hospital of St Nicholas at Pontefract, which was in de Lacy’s patronage. 68 In the following year de Lacy presented him to the chapel of Clitheroe castle, and he was also presented by the prior and convent of Pontefract to Slaidburn (Yorkshire). The fact that Pontefract priory was a house in Lacy patronage perhaps helped with securing this presentation.69 In 1308 de Lacy presented him to the church of Swaton (Lincolnshire).70 A steward might not be confined to responsibility for an individual lordship; the term could imply a general executive role in administration of a lord’s estates and interests. According to the Dunstable annalist, the clerk Hugh de Vienne and the knight Thomas de Bray were stewards of Edmund, earl of Lancaster; the reference is in connection with the record of their deaths which the annalist documented immediately after his notice of the death of the earl himself, in 1296.71 Hugh was frequently named as one of Edmund of Lancaster’s attorneys

66 67

68 69

70 71

that they were expected to perform: see Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 1.54, 83,130–1 and 150 and 2.185, 201–2 and 253. Councils and Synods, 2.1.110 and Extra, 3.50, cl. 4 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.658. ‘Compoti of the Yorkshire Estates of Henry de Lacy’ ed. P.A. Lyons, Yorkshire Archaeological and Topographical Association Journal, 8 (1884), 351–8 (p. 356), TNA DL 29/1/1–2, DL 42/1, fols 44r, 170v, 172v, 398v and 408r, 42/2, fols 145v, 256v, 257r–v, 267v, 274r, 310r, 504r, C 146/4756, The Coucher Book of Selby, I, ed. J.T. Fowler (Yorkshire Archaeological and Topographical Association, Record Series, X, 1891), p. 4, Thirty-Fifth Annual Report of the Deputy Keeper of the Public Records (HMSO, 1874), p. 108a and Reg. Corbridge, 1.25. Bodl. MS Dodsworth 116, fols 24v–25r and C. Inq. PM, 5.159 (no. 279). Pontefract priory had been founded by Robert de Lacy in the late eleventh century, and Slaidburn church had been given to the priory by Hugh de la Val. See Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:118–31. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:645, Reg. Romeyn, 1.150 and LA Reg. Dalderby, fols 31r and 333r. Annales de Dunstaplia in Annales Monastici, ed. H.R. Luard, 5 vols (RS, 1864–69), 3. p. 402.

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in England during the earl’s absences abroad: with Richard Fukeram in 1275, 1278, 1279, 1281 and 1284, with Roger le Brabazon in 1289 and with Walter de Heliun in 1292.72 This was of course a position of great trust; Hugh and Richard Fukeram are found issuing deeds in Edmund’s name, which meant they had charge of his seal. On 21 February they dated both a chirographed agreement between the prior and convent of Monmouth and a mandate to the steward of Monmouth, Durand of Tidworth, ordering him to give seisin, and on 2 April following, they dated the earl’s charter in favour of the burgesses of Lancaster.73 Hugh de Vienne held at least two benefices in his lord’s patronage. Edmund presented him to Uttoxeter (Staffordshire) in 1281 and to Raunds (Northamptonshire) in 1286. 74 He also acquired property in London from Edward I, in 1281, as a reward for his services to the king and his brother.75 Clerks also worked as stewards on the estates of the earldom of Cornwall. Master Hamon Parleben was steward of Edmund of Cornwall’s lands in Devon and Cornwall for one of the accounting years between 1272 and 1292 and witnessed two of the earl’s charters, both of them given in Cornwall.76 Before 1272 he was a canon in the collegiate church of Probus, and was collated in that year to the rectory of Colan which was then in the gift of the bishop of Exeter.77 Edmund presented him to St Ladock in 1279.78 William of Monkton, Edmund’s deputy as sheriff of Cornwall in 1278, 1279 and 1285, combined these duties with the stewardship of the Cornwall estates in 1282 and 1284.79 It is not clear whether William held any benefices at the earl’s own presentation, but he was rector of a moiety of Dorstone (Herefordshire) in 1279 when Edmund had to intervene to stop the fruits of the church from being sequestrated.80 Later in 1282 William was presented to Morwenstowe (Cornwall) by Herbert de Pyne, who held ten knight’s fees of the earl in ‘Middellaunde’.81 72 73 74 75 76

77 78 79

80 81

CPR 1272–81, pp. 101, 156, 252, 296, 308 and 441, CPR 1281–92, pp. 120, 324 and 480 and CPR 1292–1301, pp. 14 and 105. TNA E 210/4545 (DL 42/1, fol. 19r) and D.L 42/1, fol. 135r–v. Reg. Epist. Peckham, 1.175–6, Reg. Pecham, 1.168–9 and 2.132 and Reg. Sutton, 2.47. See Chapter 2, pp. 57–8 for the circumstances in which the Uttoxeter presentation was made. CPR 1272–81, p. 458. TNA SC 6/827/38 (the account is undated but must have been made in or before 1292 because Roger of Drayton, who is mentioned in it, died in that year), Reg. Quivil, p. 362 and Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p. 413. VCH Cornwall, 2:247. Colan was subsequently appropriated to the bishop’s foundation at Glasney. Reg. Bronescombe, pp. 168, 173 and 177. Public Record Office Lists and Indexes, 9. List of Sheriffs for England and Wales (HMSO, 1898), p. 21, Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 1.30, Reg. Epist. Peckham, 1.379–80 and Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p. 413. William’s activities as steward were so notorious in 1282 that he was summoned to appear before Archbishop Pecham, and was threatened with excommunication. See also Reg. Bronescombe, p. 254. The Register of Thomas de Cantilupe, Bishop of Hereford (AD 1275–1282), ed. R.G. Griffiths and W.W. Capes (Cantilupe Society, 1906 and CYS, 2, 1907), p. 195. Reg. Quivil, p. 349 and C. Inq. PM, 3.476.



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This evidence from the south-west does show a correlation between local office holding and the location of the benefices acquired. It was, however, clerks at the centre of administration, members of the household, who were most likely to be rewarded with churches. Auditors, whose role was to inspect the activities of officials during the current accounting year, to audit the accounts, and to issue instructions about the future, were a key link between the centre and the locality. 82 There were a number of beneficed clerks who worked as auditors on the Lacy estates, including William de Nony and Robert of Silkstone, whom we have encountered already.83 Clerical auditors also featured on Roger Bigod’s estates; of twenty-four auditors known to be active in his administration between 1271 and 1304, at least ten were clerks.84 It is more difficult to know whether these men were rewarded with benefices, however, as so many of those in the gift of Roger Bigod were in the diocese of Norwich, for which there is no register before 1299, or in Wales. A particular pattern on Bigod’s estates, however, was the use of regular clergy in administration: of the ten, four were regular clergy, including the abbot of Tintern, a house in the earl’s patronage. It is less easy to identify the auditors in Edmund of Cornwall’s administration because it was central rather than itinerant and so the expenses of the auditors do not feature in the estate accounts. The earldom of Cornwall’s estate accounts do, however, speak of those in his central administration to whom income from the estates was sent. Money was usually delivered to the earl’s wardrobe clerks, of whom there seem to have been at least two per year. Again, there is a strong correlation between holding this office and being presented to benefices. Michael of Northampton and Payn of Liskeard were clerks of the wardrobe in 1269–70 and 1272–73.85 Payn of Liskeard was one of Richard of Cornwall’s executors and was sometimes a witness to Edmund of Cornwall’s charters.86 He had been instituted to Michaelstow in 1263 on Richard’s presentation.87 Edmund presented him to St Stephen’s by Saltash (Cornwall) in 1276.88 In 1283 he was involved in a dispute over the tithes belonging to Chalgrove suggesting that he may also have

82 83

84 85 86 87 88

See especially Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp. 131–51, for the work done by auditors. The accountant for Holborn, William of Donnington, paid the expenses of William de Nony, Roger de Cobeldich, Hugh de la Hyde, John Huberd and other members of the earl’s household in hearing the accounts of Colham, Edgeware, Holmer (Middlesex), Grantchester (Cambridgeshire) and Holborn itself. This was probably for the accounting year 1294–95 because William included the item among his expenses for 1295–96. There were two auditors for the 1295–96 accounts, William de Nony and Thomas of Fishburn. William continued as auditor of the accounts in 1304–5, when his colleague was Robert of Silkstone: TNA DL 29/1/1, m. 11d and TNA DL 29/1/1–2. Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp. 138–40. TNA SC 6/863/2, m. 2r–d. and 961/6, m. 1d. Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1152, C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 240–1 and C. Ch. R. 1300–26, p. 490. Reg. Bronescombe, p. 155. Reg. Bronescombe, p. 178.

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become rector of that church which was in Edmund of Cornwall’s patronage.89 He also held two prebends in the Exeter diocese: Roger of Bodrygan presented him to the prebend of ‘Marneys’ in the collegiate church of St Endellion in 1263 and he was a founder member of the collegiate church of Glasney, in which Walter Bronescombe collated him to a prebend in 1271.90 Michael of Northampton was an envoy of Richard, earl of Cornwall, and one of his executors after his death, and became a frequent witness to Edmund of Cornwall’s charters.91 Richard of Cornwall most likely presented him to North Luffenham (Rutland) and All Saints’ Hemswell (Lincolnshire), which were among the churches he held when he died in 1283.92 Richard also seems to have tried to present him to Wistow and Payn of Liskeard to Nailstone (Leicestershire) before he died in 1272 but this was in opposition to royal presentations to which Edmund of Cornwall later assented, so neither clerk was instituted.93 A presentation by Edmund to Frodingham (Lincolnshire) followed in 1277, and Michael held benefices in the gift of ecclesiastical patrons as well. Walter Bronescombe, bishop of Exeter, collated him to prebends in the collegiate church of Crantock (Cornwall) in 1263 and 1271. By 1264 he was rector of Wispington (Lincolnshire)94 and in 1273 the abbot and convent of Bernay (dép. Eure) presented him to Everdon (Northamptonshire). In 1276 he presented Philip of Northampton to Gayton (Northamptonshire) after resigning it himself; he had been given the advowson by Ingram de Feens.95 Roger of Drayton was a wardrobe clerk in 1278, 1285, 1287 and 1291. He acted as the earl’s attorney and frequently witnessed his charters.96 He was presented by Edmund to Manton (Rutland) in 1274. By 1282 he was dean of the collegiate chapel of St Nicholas in Wallingford (Berkshire) which Edmund had re-endowed in 1278. By 1286 he was rector of Harwell (Berkshire) a living in the gift of the earls of Cornwall.97 He was at that time given a papal indult 89 90 91

92 93 94

95 96

97

Reg. Giffard, 2.182. Reg. Bronescombe, pp. 96, 142 and 170. TNA SC 1/4/176, Reg. Epist. Peckham, 1.169, Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1152, C. Ch. R. 1257– 1300, pp. 189, 208, 240–1, 349 and 443, C. Ch. R. 1300–26, p. 490 and Reg. Grandisson, 1.87 (Oliver, Monasticon Dioecisis Exoniensis, p. 9). Reg. Sutton, 2.27 and 8.4. Both churches were in the gift of the earls of Cornwall. CPR 1266–72, pp. 654–5 and see below, Chapter 4, pp. 102–3. It was recorded in the bishop’s register on his institution in 1264 that it was not known who had presented him, because the inquisition was not found, nor did he show a letter of presentation. He had been in possession of the church for some time: Rot. Gravesend, pp. 18, 19, and 269. Reg. Bronescombe, pp. 168–9 and Rot. Gravesend, pp. 120 and 126. TNA SC 6/863/4, 1095/10–11 and also TNA SC 6/827/38 and 863/8, accounts of uncertain date in which he received payments as a wardrobe clerk; C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 208, 241, 339, 349, 384, 386 and 443, C. Ch. R. 1300–26, pp. 189 and 490–1, CPR 1272–81, p.  375, CPR 1281–92, p.  133, CCR 1288–96, p.  203, Reg. Grandisson, 1.87 (Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p.  9), Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:700 and Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p. 413. Rot. Gravesend, p. 123, Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:1330 and CPL, 1.485.



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correcting an inaccuracy in an earlier dispensation for illegitimacy, allowing him to become ordained and hold a benefice with cure of souls.98 Besides these benefices, he was collated a canon of Glasney by Bishop Peter Quivil in 1284.99 His doubtful probity is suggested by the manner of his death in 1292. He was by then the earl’s treasurer and was murdered along with his colleague the constable of Berkhamsted while they were in London making their way to parliament. The murder was carried out by three brothers from Berkhamsted in an act of revenge.100 Roger of Marlow was clerk of the earl’s wardrobe in 1291 and 1296–98.101 He too witnessed a number of Edmund’s charters.102 Edmund presented him to All Saints’, Hemswell (Lincolnshire) in 1289, and he seems to have succeeded Roger of Drayton both as rector of Harwell and dean of the chapel of St Nicholas at Wallingford.103 Roger de Bikerwick, who was a third wardrobe clerk in 1291, was the earl’s attorney in 1285 and was named on several occasions as a witness to his charters.104 He seems to have been presented by the earl to North Stoke (Oxfordshire) before 1290 as he had to be re-presented in that year.105 Master Adam Payn or Paen was one of the household receivers in Isabella de Forz’s administration between 1273 and 1280; Isabella presented him to Honiton (Devon) in 1277.106 This was just the tip of the iceberg, though; when he died, he was holding twelve churches in a number of dioceses, as well as the archdeaconry of Stafford.107 In Henry de Lacy’s administration money from his estates was sent to the household receivers and these too tended to be rewarded with benefices. Both the earl and the countess had a receiver in their respective households. Roger the chaplain was the receiver of the countess’ household in 1295–96, and in 1304–5 Nicholas of Reading was the earl’s household receiver.108 Nicholas witnessed one of the earl’s charters

CPL, 1.485. Reg. Quivil, p. 346. 100 CPR 1281–92, pp. 489, 517 and 520, Flores Historiarum, ed. H.R. Luard, 3 vols (RS, 1890), 3.84 and Annales Londonienses in Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I and Edward II, ed. W. Stubbs, 2 vols (RS, 1882–3), 1.1–251 (p. 100). 101 C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 384, TNA SC 6/811/1, m. 2d, and 1084/19, m. 1d, and Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts. Roger also received payments as a wardrobe clerk in an account of uncertain date: TNA SC 6/863/7, m. 2r. 102 C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 384, CPR 1292–1301, p. 608 and C. Ch. R. 1300–26, pp. 490–1. 103 Reg. Sutton, 8.19, Reg. Gandavo, 2.851, TNA C 133/97, mm. 4, 24 and 30 (C. Inq. PM, 3.484 and 487–8 (no. 604) and CPR 1301–7, p. 197. See Ecclesiastical Letter-Books of the Thirteenth Century, ed. R.M.T. Hill (Oxford BLitt thesis, 1936, and privately printed), pp. 185–7, for a calendar of Roger’s surviving letters. 104 CCR 1279–88, p. 357, C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 339, 384 and 386 and C. Ch. R. 1300– 26, pp. 490–1. 105 See above, Chapter 2, p. 59. 106 Reg. Bronescombe, p. 145; see Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp. 14–17. 107 Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 1149–50. 108 TNA DL 29/1/1, m. 14d, and 1/2, m. 15r. 98 99

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and was later an executor of his will.109 Henry presented him to Waddington (Lincolnshire) in 1302 and to Little Steeping (Lincolnshire) in 1307.110 In Gilbert de Clare’s household, John of Bruges was a wardrober in 1273–74 and later in Countess Joan’s administration and that of their son, the last Clare earl of Gloucester.111 Gilbert de Clare presented him to Upper Hardres (Kent) in 1293.112 In Roger Bigod’s administration, both receivers and wardrobers received money from the earl’s estates for his expenses. Several of them were chaplains and clerks. Among them was William of Knottingley. His case shows that even household clerks who must have seen their lord on a regular, even daily, basis, and whose merits were well known to them sometimes had to wait a while before being presented to a benefice. Alice of Hainault, Roger’s widow, wrote to the chancellor in 1306, just after her husband’s death, explaining that Roger had presented him to Kirton (Suffolk) but had died before the inquisition was complete. She asked for a royal presentation ‘pur Dieu et pur aumon’ (‘for God’s and for charity’s sake’); it weighed on her greatly that her husband’s clerk who had served him long, well and loyally had as yet had no advancement.113 The letter seems to have worked: William was presented to Kirton on 16 December 1306.114 Evidence about clerks in magnates’ households becomes rather more sparse once we move away from the financial officers who are mentioned in estate accounts. There is, however, evidence that some magnates, particularly the marcher lords, had chancellors,115 and again, this was a trusted position for which the clerk holding it could expect to be well rewarded. Richard of Cornwall had a chancellor after he became king of Germany. In February 1261 this was Master Arnulf of Holland to whom Henry III granted a fee of 20 marks (£13 6s 8d) a year until he was able to provide him with an ecclesiastical benefice or with wardships or escheats. Arnulf was presented to Combe (Oxfordshire) in the following month.116 There was also a correlation between serving as chancellor and being presented to a benefice in the Bigod administration. Roger Bigod’s chancellor in 1289–90 was Ranulph of Belgrave and between 1294 and

109 TNA

DL. 42/2, fol. 310r, and CPR 1313–17, pp. 393 and 535. Reg. Dalderby, fols 5v and 19r. 111 Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp.  13, note 4, and 42, Altschul, A Baronial Family, p. 234 and Ward, ‘Estates of the Clare Family’, p. 111. 112 Calendar of Institutions by the Chapter of Canterbury Sede Vacante, p. 54. 113 TNA SC 1/25/189, printed in Gemmill, ‘The Earls and Their Clergy’, pp. 150–1, and see Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp. 19–20. 114 CPR 1301–7, p. 187. 115 See T. Madox, Baronia Anglica (London, 1741), pp.  154–7, A.J. Otway-Ruthven, ‘The Constitutional Position of the Great Lordships of South Wales’, TRHS, 5th series, 8 (1958), 1–20 (pp. 7–8), Altschul, A Baronial Family, pp. 267–8 and J.R.S. Phillips, Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, 1307–1324 (Oxford, 1972), p. 247. 116 CPR 1258–66, pp. 141 and 144. 110 LA



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1301 it was the clerk William of Beccles.117 William was rector of Ditchingham (Norfolk) in 1296, a church in Roger Bigod’s patronage.118 The references to magnates’ councils at this early stage are also rare, but the existence of such councils, in which knights and important household and estate officials would have been prominent members, and whose functions would have included giving advice and information about all affairs, directing estate management and acting as a judiciary for tenants and officials, cannot be doubted.119 The most informative reference we have to the members of a magnate council in the late thirteenth century is when the one in question was acting in its capacity as a law court. In a record of the proceedings in the Glamorgan county court in 1299 (in which the usurper of the officer of coroner in the county was sentenced to imprisonment) the sheriff of Glamorgan and eleven members of the council of Ralph of Monthermer, earl of Gloucester, were listed as being present. The council consisted of seven knights and four clerks. The clerks were Master Thomas de Pulisdene, Master Henry of Llancarvan, Robert of Chenington and John of Bruges.120 Two of these, Henry of Llancarvan and John of Bruges, we have met before. Of Robert de Chenington more is known: he was a councillor in 1305 and again in 1313, was an auditor on one occasion at least, and was one of the last Clare earl of Gloucester’s executors.121 He was, by 1313, rector of Blechingley (Surrey), a church in the gift of the Clare family.122 Information about the clerical component of great households can also be derived from the protection lists issued by the king when a magnate was going abroad or on campaign. Two such lists deserve some attention here, because of the special interest of the circumstances in which they were drawn up. The first, a list of Roger Bigod’s household, was drawn up so that its members might be given royal protections.123 The document is to be dated in all likelihood to the autumn of 1297, when the rebellion on the part of certain lay magnates, led by the earl, was reaching crisis point. The members were divided up according to status and order: bannerets, maiores clerici, knights, minores clerici, squires and others. Some of the names of the ‘minor’ clerks are missing, but of the three ‘major’ ones, at least two held benefices in the earl’s gift. Master Thomas of Sodington was at that time rector of Settrington (Yorkshire) to which he had

117 TNA

SC 6/837/18 and Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, p. 20. of Chancery Warrants, 1244–1326, p.  71, and see TNA C 133/127, m. 30 (C. Inq. PM, 4.304 (no. 434)). 119 On the subject of baronial counsellors and councils, see esp. F.M. Stenton, The First Century of English Feudalism, 1066–1166 (Oxford, 1932), pp.  93–4, Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp.  25–30 and A.E. Levett, ‘Baronial Councils and Their Relation to Manorial Courts’, in Studies in Manorial History (Oxford, 1938), pp. 21–40. 120 Cartae, 3.911. 121 Ward, ‘Estates of the Clare Family’, pp. 111–12 and Altschul, A Baronial Family, p. 236. 122 CPL, 2.113 and see C. Inq. PM, 5.346 (no. 538). 123 M.C. Prestwich, Documents Illustrating the Crisis of 1297–98 in England (Camden Society, 4th series, 24, 1980), pp. 157–8. 118 Calendar

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been presented by the earl in 1294. He was succeeded there in 1299 by John Bigod, the earl’s brother, who was referred to as one of the other ‘major’ clerks.124 A useful list of Henry de Lacy’s companions dates from 1305, when he was chosen by Edward I as one of the leaders of an important diplomatic mission to Pope Clement V.125 The lists of protections for those who were to go with him were issued between 1 and 16 October and included the names of twenty-eight men.126 Of these, at least three were beneficed clerks: Nicholas of Reading, the earl’s household receiver and rector of two churches in his gift; Lawrence of Clifford, rector of Winterbourne Earls; and Thomas of Hayton, rector of Long Buckby (Northamptonshire). (The latter two had also been presented to their benefices by the earl.)127 Lists such as these do not account for all the clerical members of a great household, of course. They were only the ones going on a particular journey. Those who occupied important positions in estate administration were better left to continue their duties, and to act as their attorneys and representatives. Edmund of Lancaster, as we have already seen, repeatedly nominated Hugh de Vienne as one of his attorneys when he was about to go abroad. And when it came to legal matters, even when a magnate was in the country, his affairs were often being prosecuted in different places, so he needed representatives to act on his behalf when he himself was absent. Trusted clerks would often be appointed to act for the earls in particularly important lawsuits. In a dispute between Prince Llewellyn and Gilbert de Clare over the latter’s men of Miskin and Senghennydd, the earl’s chosen arbiters included two clerks, Master Roger of Leicester, a papal chaplain whom he had presented to Bideford (Devon) earlier in the same year, and Harvey of Boreham.128 Similarly, in 1279, William de Valence chose his clerk Geoffrey of Newbold as his arbiter in a dispute with Roger Bigod over land and rent in Chepstow.129 Geoffrey had acted on several occasions as the earl’s representative and attorney, particularly in the early 1270s.130 In 1280 he was rector of four churches including those of Sutton and Saxthorpe (both Norfolk)131 to which he was probably presented by William de Valence as these churches were in his gift,132 and on 20 January in that year he was appointed

Romeyn, 1.236 and 11.226. below, p. 96. 126 CPR 1301–7, pp. 380 and 388. 127 Reg. Gandavo, 2.575 and LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 107r. 128 Cartae, 2.693–4 and Reg. Bronescombe, p. 114. 129 CCR 1272–9, pp. 560–2. 130 CPR 1266–72, pp. 413, 485 and 627 and Close R. 1268–72, pp. 271, 400 and 428. 131 Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1149. Here he was referred to as Geoffrey ‘de Neuland’. 132 Saxthorpe was one of the manors granted to William de Valence on 21 March 1248 (C. Ch. R. 1226–57, p. 329) and the advowsons of both Saxthorpe and Sutton were mentioned in the inquisition post mortem taken after William’s son’s death in 1324: C.  Inq.  PM, 6:333 (no. 518). On 28 April 1266, Henry III granted that the presentation he had made to Sutton would not prejudice William and Joan his wife, to whose share of the Marshal inheritance the manor and advowson of Sutton belonged: CPR 1258–66, p. 588. 124 Reg. 125 See



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by the king to the deanery of the royal free chapel of St Martin-le-Grand in London, which he held until his death in 1283.133 Magnates usually named one or more of their secular clerks as the executors of their will, although we also find that this role was characteristically given to the head of a religious house in the patronage of the magnate family, so the choice may have coincided with that of their place of burial. When executors were secular clerks they tended to be beneficed. Gilbert de Clare’s executors included the abbot of Tewkesbury (Gloucestershire), one of the most important houses in his patronage, the archdeacon of Llandaff, Adam of Blechingley, Simon de Heyham and William of Hambleden.134 Simon de Heyham has been encountered before as one of the earl’s receivers and attorneys, while William of Hambleden was presented by the earl to Whiston (Northamptonshire) in 1278 and Adam of Blechingley to Blechingley (Surrey) in 1293.135 William de Valence’s executors included Anthony Bek, bishop of Durham, and Bartholomew, rector of Sutton, to which William had probably presented him.136 William de Beauchamp’s executors included the clerks Paul of Brailes, William of Clive and Roger Barbastre.137 The earl had presented Paul of Brailes, who was his wife’s chaplain and attorney in her widowhood,138 to Barrowden (Rutland) in 1280 and to Spelsbury (Oxfordshire) in 1296.139 Paul resigned Barrowden after his institution to Spelsbury, and the earl presented William of Clive to the church.140 Edmund of Cornwall’s executors included Thomas Bitton, bishop of Exeter, and the abbot of Hailes (Gloucestershire) his father’s greatest foundation.141 One of the executors’ receivers was James of Berkhamsted whom the earl had presented to Rousham (Oxfordshire) in 1292.142 John de Warenne’s executors included Brother John of Bourne and Oliver of Wissett.143 Oliver had acted as proctor for the earl’s sons John and William when they were instituted respectively to Dewsbury and Hatfield (both Yorkshire) 1272–81, p. 360 and CPR 1281–92, p. 54; see also Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1152. 1296–1302, p. 43, CPR 1292–1301, p. 292 and see also Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 335–6, 405–6, 410 and 741. 135 Rot. Gravesend, p.  135 and Registrum Johannis de Pontissara, Episcopi Wintoniensis, AD MCCLXXXII–MCCCIIII, ed. C. Deedes, 2 vols (CYS, 19 and 30, 1915–24), 1.58. See Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1149 for Adam’s other benefices. 136 Reg. Winchelsey, p. 1153 and see TNA SC 1/48/109 and above, note 132. On one occasion the executors gave power to Roger de Ingepenne and Geoffrey of Wretton to receive payment of a debt owing to the late earl. William de Valence had presented Geoffrey to Hinxhill (Kent) in 1288: TNA E 40/5930 (Catalogue of Ancient Deeds, 3.242) and Reg. Pecham, 1.76. 137 LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 104r, and The Register of the Diocese of Worcester During the Vacancy of the See, Usually Called Registrum Sede Vacante, 1301–1435, ed. J.W. Willis Bund, 1 vol. in 2 (Worcestershire History Society, 1895–7), pp. 65–6 and 72. 138 CPR 1292–1301, p. 357 and Reg. Giffard, 2.518. 139 Reg. Sutton, 2.4 and 8.193–4. 140 Reg. Sutton, 2.137–8. 141 See esp. CCR 1296–1302, p. 580, CPR 1292–1301, p. 603 and CPR 1301–7, p. 30. 142 CCR 1302–7, p. 68 and Reg. Sutton, 8.178. 143 CPR 1301–7, pp. 442 and 476. 133 CPR

134 CCR

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in 1294.144 Henry de Lacy’s executors were John of Sandal, a king’s clerk and a member of the earl’s household in 1306, and two clerks who have been met before, Robert of Silkstone and Nicholas of Reading.145 The abbot of Haughmond and the prior of Wigmore were the executors of John Fitzalan, along with his widow Isabella Mortimer.146 The Mortimers used the abbot of their house of Wigmore as an executor.147 Finally, Isabella de Forz’ executors included the priors of her houses of Breamore and Christchurch, Twynham.148 Clerks very often acted as envoys, charged with explaining confidential business. That this was so is clear from the survival of letters of credence for such envoys, which, however, rarely explain the nature of the business. When they do, they reveal the level of trust that was placed in them. For example, in 1284, William de Valence needed to refer to royal records in the custody of the treasurer in preparation for a case pending before the justices in eyre in Dorset in their Michaelmas session. He asked the treasurer, John Kirkby, to allow his clerk Henry de Eston to search and inspect the rolls, and also to allow Henry to act as his agent and receive on his behalf the fee owing to him at the exchequer, of which money he had urgent need.149 The fact that magnates’ clerks were able to access royal records is interesting in itself. It was sometimes, perhaps, because the clerk was in royal service. In 1280, Walter de Stokes, Edmund of Cornwall’s steward of Knaresborough, wrote to Michael of Northampton about the earl’s suit against the abbot of Mary’s, York. He knew that there was proof in the charters of Baldwin Fitzwalter, the chancery rolls of King John and the exchequer rolls of both King John and Henry III that would serve his lord’s interests, and he asked that transcripts of the relevant documents be sent post haste in order to avoid losses to the earl amounting to £300.150 There are a few cases in which magnates used their clerks to deputise for them in royal service. William de Beauchamp held his manor of Hartley Mauditt (Hampshire) by serjeanty of one of the chamberlainships in the king’s exchequer. Hartley Mauditt, with the serjeanty associated with it, was among the lands which William had inherited from his uncle, William Mauduit, on the latter’s death in 1268. William Mauduit had performed his duties by deputy: it was said in the IPM on his lands that he had a clerk at the exchequer continually, to whom he gave 100s a year at least.151 One of the clerks who deputised Romeyn, 1.141–2. 1313–17, pp. 393 and 535. See below, p. 96 for John of Sandal. 146 Excerpta e Rotulis Finium, 1:574. 147 CPR 1281–92, p. 130 and CPR 1301–7, p. 260. 148 Reg. Romeyn, 1.230 and note 3, and CPR 1292–1301, p. 585. 149 TNA SC 1/48/117 and 118. Only the first letter is dated (7 October 1284) but the fact that both asked for moneys to be sent with Henry de Eston makes it probable that both referred to the same fee owing to the earl. 150 TNA SC 1/22/179 and 31/18. 151 TNA C 132/35/13, m. 6 (C.  Inq.  PM, 1.212 (no. 679)). For the Mauduit office of chamberlain of the exchequer, see J.H. Round, ‘The Origin of the Exchequer’, in The 144 Reg.

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for the earl seems to have held a church in his gift: until 1274 Richard ‘the chamberlain’ was rector of South Luffenham (Rutland).152 South Luffenham was worth a lot more than 100s; in the Taxatio of 1291 it was valued at £13 6s 4d.153 By 1278 the deputy was one William of Bredicot, who was arrested in that year and imprisoned on the orders of the treasurer, Joseph de Chauncy. There had been a problem with a temporary misplacement of the exchequer countertallies that were the warrants for making payments to Robert of Hampton in respect of his time as sheriff of Cumbria,154 and William was thought by the clerks and ministers of the exchequer receipt to be the person responsible. That William de Beauchamp himself was suspended from his office as chamberlain as a result shows how serious the offence was felt to be, and how carefully the choice of deputy had to be considered. When, on 14 November, presumably after the hearing of the case, his office was restored to him, it was on condition that he placed a suitable clerk, for whose actions he would be answerable, in the exchequer. On the same day, the treasurer and barons of the exchequer were ordered to prevent exchequer officials from taking money for searching and examining fines, writs and enrolments and for renewing lost tallies. The king, said, had recently learned that chamberlains’ deputies had been levying huge fines and ‘ransoms’ by their own authority in defiance of writs. Edward had asked William de Beauchamp whether he, as chamberlain, considered such fines to be perquisites of his office and he had firmly denied it.155 Surely, though, this was small beer compared with the excesses of Adam of Stratton. Stratton was in the 1260s a deputy in the exchequer for Isabella de Forz, who held the manor of Sevenhampton by serjeanty of the chamberlainship of the exchequer. Here the analogy with Bredicot ends because Isabella actually gave Stratton the chamberlainship and the manor of Sevenhampton associated with it. Stratton, as well as being Isabella’s chief financial officer, was keeper of the king’s works. But he was also a usurer and a fraudster, brought to trial several times and finally convicted in 1292.156 Adam did not allow his business in the

Commune of London and Other Studies (Westminster, 1899), pp.  81–3 and ‘Mauditt of Hartley Mauditt’, The Ancestor, 5 (1903), 207–10, G.H. White, ‘Financial Administration under Henry I’, TRHS, 4th series, 8 (1925), 56–78, Dialogus de Scaccario, esp. pp. xxv–vi, and The Beauchamp Cartulary Charters, 1100–1268, ed. E. Mason (Pipe Roll Society, new series, 43, 1971–73), pp. lii–iv. 152 Rot. Gravesend, p. 121. 153 www.hrionline.ac.uk/Taxatio/db/Taxatio/printbc.jsp?benkey=LI.NO.RU.22 accessed 23 July 2011. 154 Robert of Hampton was appointed sheriff of Cumbria on 17 October 1274: Public Record Office Lists and Indexes, 9:26. 155 TNA SC 1/17/14, CCR 1272–9, pp. 459 and 486–7 and see CFR 1272–1307, p. 96 and CCR 1279–88, p. 12. 156 For Adam of Stratton’s career, see Red Book of the Exchequer, 3.CCCxv–xxxi, DenholmYoung, Seignorial Administration, pp.  77–84, and Robert C. Stacey, ‘Stratton, Adam of (d. 1292x4)’, ODNB; online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/26652, accessed 13 Oct 2011).

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world to hold back his advancement to church livings: Isabella presented him to Whitchurch (Oxfordshire) in 1276; his other patrons included Philip Marmion, the priory of St Andrew, Northampton, and the priory of St Oswald.157 When he died Adam of Stratton was rector of no fewer than twenty-three churches.158 There are many more examples of clerks working for the king and for a magnate. In addition to those we have encountered already there was Gilbert of Rothbury, who was in the king’s service and the household of Henry de Lacy in 1306, while John of Sandal was in the service of both the king and the earl.159 The royal clerk Master Adam de Phileby went to Rome on the business of Roger Mortimer in 1268.160 Eudes de Vippeins, nephew of Otto de Grandisson, went abroad on the affairs of Otto and the king.161 It is perhaps not surprising that clerks said to be working for both were in the service of magnates who were themselves specially close to the king. Some such clerks rose high in royal service and their passage into royal administration looks to have been a matter of career progression. Master Geoffrey de Asphale, clerk of Richard and Gilbert de Clare, became a royal clerk and keeper of Eleanor of Castile’s wardrobe. As well as holding numerous ecclesiastical benefices he acquired estates in several counties.162 Peter of Dunwich, who was in John de Warenne’s household towards the end of Henry III’s reign, as were his three brothers, later became a royal escheator.163 Geoffrey of Newbold, representative of William de Valence, became chancellor of the exchequer.164 It must have been natural for clerical administrators to pass into the service of a new master when a lord’s lands changed hands. Nicholas of Reading and Robert of Silkstone, who have been met in the service of Henry de Lacy, are later found Gravesend, pp. 38, 118, 185 and 231 and see also Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 1148–9. Winchelsey, pp. 1148–9. 159 CPL, 2.3–4, Reg. Winchelsey, pp.  1192–3 and see below, p.  96. Bogo de Clare, brother of Gilbert de Clare, and Boniface of Saluzzo, kinsman of Henry de Lacy, were also royal clerks: see Emden, Biographical Register, esp. pp. 423–4 and 1634. 160 CPR 1266–72, p. 243, and see also p. 17 where it is clear that he was a royal clerk. Perhaps the business in Rome was Edmund Mortimer’s claim to the treasurership of York. See, for Adam’s benefices, Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 1148 and 1153. 161 CPR 1301–7, p. 245. 162 TNA SC 1/7/74, CPR 1258–66, p. 515, T.F. Tout, Chapters in the Administrative History of Medieval England, 6 vols (Manchester, 1920–3), 5:236–8 and Emden, Biographical Register, 1:60–1. For his benefices, see Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 1147. He claimed in 1278 to have lost, during the civil war, papal letters allowing him to hold additional benefices: CPL, 1.456. For his estates, see C. Inq. P M, 2.384–5 (no. 635). 163 CPR 1266–72, p.  516, CPR 1281–92, p.  167 and G.P. Cuttino, ‘King’s Clerks and the Community of the Realm’, Speculum, 17 (1942), 395–409 (pp. 400–1). 164 CPR 1272–81, pp. 227, 311, and 381. On the recruitment of royal clerks, see T.F. Tout, ‘The English Civil Service in the Fourteenth Century’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 3 (1916–17), 185–214, reprinted in The Collected Papers of Thomas Frederick Tout, 3 vols (Manchester, 1932–4), 3:191–221, Cuttino, ‘King’s Clerks and the Community of the Realm’, pp. 395–409 and J.L. Grassi, ‘Royal Clerks from the Archdiocese of York in the Fourteenth Century’, Northern History, 5 (1970), 12–33. 157 Rot.

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working for Thomas, earl of Lancaster, after Henry de Lacy’s lands came into his possession in 1311.165 And it is interesting to see that the king often took responsibility for clerks who had worked for a magnate, or who had been in some way connected with them, after that magnate had died. This is especially noticeable when the magnate’s estates came into royal hands. Henry of Exeter was presented by Edmund of Cornwall to Beckley (Oxfordshire) in 1299 but resigned it in 1302. He was presented successively to Cornish benefices by Edward I – to Calstock in 1302 and to Blisland in 1304. James of Berkhamsted, who has been met already,166 was presented by the king to Beckley on Henry of Exeter’s resignation of that church in 1302. 167 Walter of Reading, who had been a trusted servant of Edmund of Lancaster,168 was presented by Edward I to North Stoke in 1303.169 All these churches belonged to the estates of the earldom of Cornwall.170 Oliver of Wissett, one of John de Warenne’s executors, was presented by Edward in 1305 to South Repps (Norfolk) which was in his gift by reason of John de Warenne’s lands.171 And, as has been seen already, William of Knottingley, Roger Bigod’s wardrober, was given a royal presentation to Kirton in 1306.172 Doubtless Edward I, having benefited from the windfall of a number of magnate estates, was willing to be generous. But royal presentations of magnates’ clerks did not only occur because the king was feeling ‘flush’. In 1259, for instance, as we have seen, when his government was under the control of the reforming barons, Henry III presented a number of clerks explicitly connected with Richard de Clare, one of the reformers, to churches. He presented Master Oliver, Richard’s nephew, to the archdeaconry of Surrey with the church of Farnham annexed to it; Master John de Sècheville to the church of Overton (Hampshire), Harvey of Boreham to Morden and Stevenage (as we have already seen), Roger of London to Kelvedon (Essex), and Bogo de Clare, Richard’s son, to St Peter in the East, Oxford.173 At the time, Master John Chishull, a royal clerk, was rector of Rotherfield (Sussex), which was in the gift of the Clares. The king ratified a life grant to Chishull of a messuage with buildings and a wood

165 For

the administrators whom Thomas of Lancaster ‘inherited’ from Henry de Lacy, see Baldwin, ‘Household Administration of Henry Lacy and Thomas of Lancaster’, pp.  180–200, Fox, Administration of the Honour of Leicester, p.  51, Somerville, Duchy of Lancaster, p. 84 and J.R. Maddicott, Thomas of Lancaster, 1307–22: A Study in the Reign of Edward II (Oxford, 1970), pp. 20–1. 166 See above, Chapter 2, p. 57. 167 LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 144r, and CPR 1301–7, pp.  27 and 306; for the presentation of Henry of Exeter see Reg. Sutton, 8.201. 168 See CPR 1272–81, pp. 441, CPR 1281–92, pp. 240 and 486 and CPL, 2.614. 169 CPR 1301–7, p. 143. 170 See above, Chapter 1, pp. 38 and 40 for Beckley, Blisland and North Stoke. 171 CPR 1301–7, p. 324. 172 CPR 1301–7, p. 487, NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 22r, and see above, p. 55. 173 CPR 1258–66, pp. 10, 11, 30 and 40. John de Sècheville was to be Richard’s executor. See Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 1151–2.

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which the former incumbent of Rotherfield had also held of the earl for life. So it seems that there was a certain exchange of favours.174 The point is that a clerk who was connected with a magnate, whether as a relative or because of service, could benefit, potentially, not only from his own lord’s formal patronage rights but from the patronage of those with whom his lord was associated. The giving and receiving of favours was at the heart of political and social relationships. We should not be surprised that royal clerks were given benefices by magnates, and that magnates’ clerks received favours from the king. It was just a question of knowing where the vacancies were, and whom to ask. Occasionally letters survive showing how these things were done. Thomas of Winchester wrote to Robert Burnell, bishop of Bath and Wells, to ask that Jordan Marsh, chaplain of Isabella de Forz, be presented to Alresford (Hampshire) which he himself was resigning; this resulted in a royal presentation of 22 April 1280.175 Of course the chancellor, who was in possession of the great seal, was the person who actually issued the royal letters patent that made presentations, so it made sense that those seeking preferment for their clerks should approach him;176 but in fact Isabella and Robert Burnell may have had some sort of ‘arrangement’. Isabella for her part presented several clerks by the name of Burnell (and variants) to churches in her gift. In one instance the intervention was clear. In 1280 Isabella had presented John Burnel, clerk, to the church of Harewood (Yorkshire). Robert Burnell had also intervened, asking that John be admitted to the cure even though he was under age, until he reached the canonical age and could be properly instituted. Archbishop Wickwane’s tactful response was to give Robert the responsibility of committing the church to him.177 Magnates likewise presented royal clerks to benefices. Edmund of Cornwall presented the royal justice Ralph of Hengham to two churches, Lanteglos-byCamelford (Cornwall) in 1275 and Middleton (Yorkshire) in 1287.178 Sometimes the choice may have been to soften the blow after successfully defending the right of advowson in the royal court. In 1293 Edmund of Lancaster presented the royal clerk Adam of Osgodby to Gargrave (Yorkshire) as executor of the will of Eleanor of Provence, custodian of the lands of Henry de Percy. This was after he had recovered the advowson from the king.179 John of Brittany’s presentation of Walter Langton to West Thurrock (Essex) in St Mary’s, Hastings, in 1290, may reflect the fact that it was a prebend in a royal free chapel.180 1258–66, p. 63. SC 1/24/197 (below, Appendix of Documents, item 2) and CPR 1272–81, p 368. The church was in the king’s gift because of the vacancy in the see of Winchester. 176 Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, esp. pp. 217–19. 177 The Register of William Wickwane, Lord Archbishop of York, 1279–1285, ed. W. Brown (Surtees Society, 114, 1907), p. 261. 178 Reg. Bronescombe, p. 149 and Reg. Romeyn, 1.167–72. 179 See below, Chapter 4, p. 108 for the suit over Gargrave. Reg. Romeyn, 1.134, 144–5 and 150, and Reg. Corbridge, 1.9–10 and note 1 and 1.29. 180 CPR 1281–92, p. 362. 174 CPR

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The king (or the chancellor) was not of course the only other source of patronage. A clerk who was prominent in the service of the king or a magnate was likely to have a multiplicity of patrons, although on balance magnates’ relatives probably had the edge in this regard. Of special interest are the connections between magnates’ clerks and the religious houses of their patronage. Lewes priory (Sussex) used its ecclesiastical interests to support clerks associated with John de Warenne. Most churches in the gift of the priory had been granted to it by his ancestors and their vassals, and the priory’s choices of clerks seem to have recognised this. The priory presented William of London to half the church of Kirkburton (Yorkshire) in 1247. William was a steward of John de Warenne in Yorkshire in the 1250s and a bailiff on his Suffolk estates in 1274/5. In early 1267 John himself presented William to Dewsbury, only to find that the advowson had been given to Lewes by his ancestors, so he and William withdrew.181 The priory then presented William of Rodmell, who was also in John de Warenne’s service: in 1277 he had a royal protection when he was with him in Wales on the king’s service.182 In 1281 the priory presented Oliver of Wissett to Harthill (Yorkshire), and in 1293 they presented one of the earl’s illegitimate sons, John, to Dewsbury.183 Castle Acre, a daughter house of Lewes in the patronage of the earls of Surrey, was also drawn into the frame: in 1302 the prior and convent presented Oliver of Wissett to Threxton (Norfolk).184 One presentation by Lewes priory was made because of an actual request on behalf of a vassal of the earl. An undertaking made by the presentee’s father and proctor, William Maufe, suggests that trouble of some sort was expected. In 1275, William promised the priory that they would suffer no damage from having presented his son to Waldron (Sussex). This presentation had been made at the petition of William’s lord, the earl of Surrey, and at William’s own. William accepted, even if his son should fail to be instituted to the church, that he would have no right to force the prior and convent to present him to another benefice or provide otherwise for him. Finally William undertook responsibility in the event that anyone should implead or trouble them over the presentation.185 The abbot and convent of Aumâle are sometimes found presenting clerks in the service of Isabella de Forz to churches on the countess’ estates in Holderness. The abbey had received many of these churches as gifts from her ancestors, the earls of Albemarle, in the twelfth century. William de la Tuyere, who was sheriff in Isabella’s lordship of Holderness, was presented by the abbey’s proctor to the vicarage of Withernsea (Yorkshire) in 1291.186 A rather different understanding Yorkshire Charters, 8.247–8, Rot. Hund., 2.210, The Register, or Rolls, of Walter Gray, Lord Archbishop of York: With Appendices of Illustrative Documents, ed. J. Raine (Surtees Society, 56, 1872), p. 100, Reg. W. Giffard, p. 20 and see above, Chapter 1, pp. 39 and 54–5. 182 CPR 1272–81, p. 222. 183 Reg. Wickwane, p. 36 and Reg. Romeyn, 1.128. 184 NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 10r. 185 Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.125. 186 TNA SC 6/1078/7 and 1078/8, Denholm-Young, Seignorial Administration, pp. 46–53 and Reg. Wickwane, p. 219. 181 Early

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of the situation was applied when Isabella’s estates came into Edward I’s possession after she died in 1293. In 1298 and again in 1301 Edward sent mandates to the abbot of Aumâle’s attorney in England to present the king’s candidates to Keyingham; it was said to be the king’s right to nominate a parson for the abbot then to present to the church.187 There seems to have been a continuum in this business of obtaining favours for clerks from houses of one’s patronage. At one end there was doubtless the occasional polite request, although the records do not enable us to gauge how occasional. Then there was the regular exercise of influence. And then there was established custom, which must have been more difficult for the house to resist. Indeed some early gifts of churches had been made on the basis that clerks connected with the patron would continue to hold the benefice; sometimes it would be inherited by the incumbent’s own offspring.188 The church of Amersham (Buckinghamshire) was given to Walden abbey by the founder, Geoffrey de Mandeville (d. 1144). It was confirmed in their possession by his sons, Geoffrey and William. William, however, came to an agreement with the monks whereby during his lifetime they would be bound to accept one of his clerks as the incumbent when the church fell vacant. A pension would be payable to the abbey from the church, and the arrangement would lapse after William’s death. In the same way, Geoffrey FitzPeter, earl of Essex (d. 1213), quitclaimed his right in the advowson of Amersham but only on condition that he and his son could nominate their clerks to the abbot for presentation.189 In 1229 the abbot and convent of St Augustine, Canterbury, had been prevailed upon by ‘some great men’ to give the church of Selling (Kent) to a certain clerk, whereas it had been given them to endow the monks’ wardrobe.190 A hostile account in the cartulary of St John’s, Pontefract (hostile because they claimed earlier to have been given the church), told of an undertaking in respect of the church of Whalley (Lancashire) when Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, was planning to give it to the monks of Stanlaw. Before he gave it, he secured an undertaking from the monks to present clerks pleasing to him and his heirs – and no one else – unless they were themselves able to appropriate the church.191 This is a rare, and doubtful, suggestion of a formal agreement, but it may reveal a practice that was widespread, even in the later thirteenth century and even though it was frowned on by the Church. Sometimes a patron shared the responsibility with the religious house for providing for a clerk. Henry de Lacy had apparently asked the prior of Bradenstoke (Wiltshire), a house of his patronage,192 to provide Gilbert de Rolling with 1292–1301, pp. 366, 372, 607 and Reg. Newark, p. 225 and note 1. ‘Monastic Possession of Parish Churches’, p. 160, Rasche, ‘Early Phase of Appropriation’, pp. 228–31. 189 BL Harl. MS 3697 (Cartulary of Walden Abbey), fols 18r–19r and 20r–21r. 190 CPL, 1.119. 191 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:127. The monks of Pontefract had a claim to the church by reason of a grant made by Hugh de Laval in the early twelfth century. 192 The patronage came into Henry de Lacy’s hands as part of the inheritance of his wife, Margaret Longspée, heiress to the lands and earldom of Salisbury: see Cokayne, Complete 187 CPR

188 Kemp,



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a yearly pension until he should present him to a benefice worth 40 marks (£26 13s 4d), and he made a contribution of 66s 8d annually from his own estates. The date of the agreement is uncertain, but officials accounting for the earl’s lands in Wiltshire made the payments in 1294–95, 1295–96 and 1304–5, showing that it must have taken the earl at least a decade to find a suitable benefice for him, if, indeed, he ever did.193 What proportion of the total pension this represented is not clear, and is interesting to note this case in the context of complaints by religious houses about the burden of providing pensions and corrodies and other demands that their patrons imposed on them.194 Elias of Ubbeston, envoy and attorney of Gilbert de Clare,195 had a pension from St Neots which was of the earl’s patronage. In the undertaking of December 1290 St Neots promised to pay him a yearly pension of 30s until he should get a benefice from them or another patron which could be farmed out for 20 marks a year (£13 6s 8d). (This might tell us what Elias was expecting to do with the benefice.) By 1295 Elias was rector of Heveningham (Suffolk) to which St Neots probably presented him as it was in their patronage. The church was not appropriated, but St Neots did have a pension which Elias undertook to pay. 196 It is interesting to see the apparent acceptance that the benefice might be farmed out. And in fact this all seems to be about the benefice – the income attached to ecclesiastical offices – and we hear nothing about the exercise of the office. (The resignation of the rector of Mixbury is an exception.) Everything we know about individual clerks seems to be about their secular careers. So what of the actual care of souls in the parish churches which were, after all, the lion’s share of the benefices in the gift of magnates? Some bishops were willing to give licence to clerks to be absent from their cure to serve their lords, sometimes requiring them to ensure that parochial duties were discharged. When, on 5 August 1290, Oliver Sutton gave permission to Ingram de Estrus, whom Edmund of Lancaster had presented to Kirkby Mallory (Leicestershire) in 1269,197 to absent himself from his church for two years from the following Michaelmas in order to attend on the earl, it was on condition that proper provision would be made for the services of the church.198 In the archdiocese of York, however, archbishops Corbridge and Greenfield seem to have been underPeerage, 11:384. Bradenstoke was founded in 1142 by Walter of Evreux, father of Patrick, earl of Salisbury. For an account of the house see Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:337–41 and for an edition of its records, The Cartulary of Bradenstoke Priory, ed. Vera C.M. London (Wiltshire Record Society, 35, 1979). 193 TNA DL 29/1/1, mm. 12d and 14r and 29/1/2, m. 18d. An allowance of £6 13s 4d was made to John de Smythmore and John Simond in their 1295–96 account for the pension paid in that and the previous accounting year. 194 Councils and Synods, 2.2.1271–3. 195 E.g. CPR 1272–81, p. 203, CPR 1281–92, p. 426 and TNA SC 1/22/159. 196 BL Cotton MS Faustina A iv, fols 6v–7r and 22v. The 20s pension was also recorded in the Taxatio: www.hrionline.ac.uk/Taxatio/db/Taxatio/printbc.jsp?benkey=NW.SF.DU.13. 197 Rot. Gravesend, p. 149. 198 Reg. Sutton, 2.27.

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standing of the need to serve secular lords. Roger de Blida was allowed to remain in the service of John de Warenne (although only for a matter of weeks), and William of Donnington, rector of Kirk Bramwith, was allowed to serve Henry de Lacy for two years.199 With regard to the attitude of bishops towards clerks in comital service, direct evidence is sparse, but such as it is, it suggests that they did not necessarily view it unfavourably.200 Even so, the pursuit of delinquent royal clerks by ardent reformers such as John Pecham and uncompromising sacerdotalists such as Robert Winchelsey, and the king’s protection of his men in the face of such attacks, are well documented.201 Pluralism and non-residence went hand in hand. The fact that clerks working for magnates did not (with some notorious exceptions) tend to be pluralists on a grand scale may have meant that they avoided censure. Michael of Northampton, as we have seen already, held several rectories in the Lincoln diocese as well as his benefices in the Exeter diocese.202 He showed a dispensation for plurality when he was instituted to Everdon (Northamptonshire) in 1273, though by whom it had been issued was not made clear in the register of Richard of Gravesend. It was noted in 1277, after Michael was given temporary custody of Frodingham (Lincolnshire) that he was beneficed elsewhere though his dispensation was uncertain.203 Oliver Sutton addressed the issue in 1281 when Michael presented (as rector) to the vicarage; Sutton admitted him but made it clear that he did not mean by doing so to recognise Michael’s position.204 In 1282 he summoned him to answer regarding his pluralism, and Edmund of Cornwall wrote to obtain a royal letter of protection on his behalf. In it he spoke of being unable to spare his services – and made clear that he was working for the king on a daily basis as well.205 We hear nothing further of the matter, and Michael does not seem to have been deprived of any of his churches in the diocese. When he died in 1283 he was rector of at least five churches.206 Papal dispensations and other favours for magnates’ administrators tended to be issued rather less frequently than for their clerical relatives, and much less liberally than they were given to the king’s clerks. There is nothing on the scale of the grants of Nicholas IV of 1289, one allowing ten clerks in the

Corbridge, 1.72 and Reg. Greenfield, 2.3, note 2. See also Reg. Corbridge, 1.78: on the request of Alice de Lacy the archbishop arranged for the clerks in her service not to be troubled by the archdeacon of York’s official. 200 See also the lists of licences for absence ‘standi in obsequiis’ in LA Reg. Bek, fols 131r–9r, and Registrum Ade de Orleton, Episcopi Herefordensis, ed. A.J. Bannister (CYS, 5, 1908), pp. 390–2. 201 See esp. Douie, Archbishop Pecham, esp. pp. 105–6, and Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 269–96. 202 See above, p. 80. 203 Rot. Gravesend, pp. 120 and 352. 204 Reg. Sutton, 8.2 and see above, Chapter 1, p. 21. 205 TNA SC 1/22/176, printed in Gemmill, ‘The Earls and Their Clergy’, pp. 149–50. 206 Michael died as rector of Wispington, Everdon, North Luffenham, All Saints’, Hemswell and Frodingham: Reg. Sutton, 1.64, 2.27 and 8.4 and 20. 199 Reg.



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king’s service to receive the fruits of their benefices for eight years without being resident and the other permitting twenty to be non-resident for ten years. In addition, ten of the queen’s clerks could be non-resident for five years.207 An exceptional example of papal generosity to a magnate was when Nicholas IV gave an indulgence to John, duke of Brittany and earl of Richmond, allowing six clerks in his service whom he should consider worthy to enjoy the fruits of their benefices, even if they were parsonages or dignities with cure of souls, without being required to reside in them. In 1292, Master John Reeve, rector of Washingborough (Lincolnshire), showed a copy of the indulgence to the bishop of Lincoln, together with a letter from the duke nominating him as one of the six. The indulgence was important, because it was given to the duke himself and he was allowed to decide who would benefit from it. This was an exceptional privilege, and was related to the specially cordial relations between the papacy and the dukes of Brittany.208 Privileges for magnates’ clergy were sometimes associated with departure on crusade. Richard of Cornwall was planning a crusade in 1238–39 when a series of favours for his clerks was given.209 Otto de Grandisson’s ability to secure favours from the papacy was due not only to his standing as a crusader, but perhaps also to his connections with the counts of Savoy and his close friendship with Edward I, on whose business he travelled to the papal curia. He was nominated, for example, as one of the king’s delegates to negotiate with the pope (in his private capacity as Benedict Gaetani) for peace between England and France in 1300.210 In 1289 at Otto’s request the rector of Aston Cantlow (Warwickshire), Ralph de Alamant, was allowed to keep this church as well as having been provided to a canonry and prebend of Geneva. He did not have to reside in Aston Cantlow or become ordained a priest for five years.211 In 1308, at Otto’s request, Adam of Osgodby was given a dispensation to retain three churches which he had obtained without dispensation before the Council of Lyons, amounting to £100 in value, and to keep the prebends he held in the churches of York and Durham as well as the fruits of these and of the church of Morton (which he had resigned). All this was on condition that he contributed one year’s income to Otto for his expedition to the Holy Land.212 In 1310 the dispensation was extended at the request of Otto, whose clerk he was now said to be. The earlier dispensation was said to have allowed him to keep churches with a value of up to £100 but since 1.503 and 507. Sutton, 3.190–1. See B.A. Pocquet du Haut-Jussé, Les Papes et les ducs de Bretagne, 2 vols (Paris, 1928), esp. 1:169–204. 209 For papal protections and other letters associated with Richard’s departure, see CPL, 1.170–1 and 184–5. For the crusade itself, see Nicholas Vincent, ‘Richard, first earl of Cornwall and king of Germany (1209–1272)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www. oxforddnb.com/view/article/23501, accessed 13 Oct 2011). 210 CPR 1292–1301, pp. 543 and 568–9. 211 CPL, 1.507. 212 CPL, 2.40. 207 CPL, 208 Reg.

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those he had were well within that limit he was allowed another as well, and, if he resigned one of those churches, he was allowed to accept another.213 Henry de Lacy was another who was able to secure favours for his clerks. In his case it was because he visited the papal curia on Edward I’s behalf. This was in 1305, after Bertrand de Got, archbishop of Bordeaux, had been elected as Pope Clement V, an appointment which did wonders for relations between the papacy and the English crown.214 Henry was able to gain a number of privileges for the clerks in his service. On 15 January 1306, Gilbert of Rothbury, canon of Auckland (Durham), a king’s clerk and a member of the earl’s household, was permitted, at the request of the king and the earl, to keep the income he had received already from eight churches and to continue in possession of three churches as well as a canonry and prebend of Auckland.215 On the same day, John of Sandal, a king’s clerk and in Henry’s service, and at the request of both of them, was allowed to keep what he had received from benefices he had held without dispensation and to keep the chancellorship of Dublin and three churches. He was not obliged to be resident in his benefices while engaged in the king’s service, nor did he have to proceed to higher orders for seven years (he was at that time a subdeacon).216 Again on that day, Henry was given an indult allowing six of the clerks in his service, to be chosen by himself, who did not yet have benefices, to hold one benefice each, and two who did have benefices to be non-resident for five years. Other clerks were allowed to succeed them in enjoying these privileges if the initial holders left the earl’s service or died; such successors would in turn lose their benefices if they left Henry’s service.217 So the holding of an ecclesiastical benefice was, in this instance, being made dependent on serving a secular lord. Of course, the clerks would not have received the benefices in the first place without doing such service, and the pope was only recognising the realities of the situation, as his predecessors had done (and his successors would do after him), just as they had understood the need for ‘noble clerks’ to hold a plurality of benefices. These were not favours that would cause ructions, and the goodwill of high-ranking laymen was worth cultivating. Henry, for his part, was making the most of his official visit as Edward I’s envoy to the papal court; such visits were not commonplace for English magnates, who did not on the whole seem to have maintained regular relations with the papacy

2.75. Charles V. Langlois, ‘Documents rélatifs à Bertrand de Got (Clément V)’, Revue historique 11 (1889), 548–54, J. Bernard, ‘Le Népotisme de Clément V et ses complaisances pour la Gascoigne’, Annales du midi, 61 (1948–9), 369–411, Y. Renouard, ‘Edouard II et Clément V d’après les Rôles Gascons’, Annales du midi, 67 (1955), 119–41, J.H. Denton, ‘Pope Clement V’s Early Career as a Royal Clerk’, EHR, 83 (1968), 303–14 (pp. 313–14), J.R. Wright, The Church and the English Crown, 1305–1334 (Toronto, 1980), esp. pp. 168–9 and S. Menache, Clement V (Cambridge, 1998), esp. pp. 6–13. 215 CPL, 2.3–4. 216 Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 1192–3 (CPL, 2.9). 217 CPL, 2.7. 213 CPL, 214 See



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on their own account in the later thirteenth century, John of Brittany being an exception in this regard. It is clear that magnates had at their disposal an array of ecclesiastical interests that created opportunities for what might be loosely called their ‘clerical affinity’. Their first responsibility was to those connected to them by kinship and marriage, who seem to have been especially successful in securing a plurality of benefices, usually with the complaisance of the Church. They needed also to provide for the clergy working for them in various capacities, but particularly those at higher levels of responsibility and those in their households. Then there was the need to grant favours to the clerical protégés of their friends and of those whose goodwill they sought to foster. Patrons relied on their own ecclesiastical interests and those of other people in a complex network of relationships, of which the sources reveal only a fragment. They in turn needed to be gracious to others in the use of their patronage. There was a mutual exchange of favours between the king, bishops, heads of religious houses and magnates. There is less evidence of earls and barons putting pressure on their own vassals or other lay patrons of lower social status – although there are one or two such cases. But what is abundantly clear is that patronage rights were a resource of the utmost importance, and this is the context for an examination, in the second half of the book, of the challenges that were posed to their possession and use of their rights.

Part II

4 Acquisitive Inquisitive Kings

In this chapter, we look at the implications for magnates of the efforts by the Crown to extend the patronage in its control. Here we start with a familiar theme: Edward I’s acquisition of magnate estates and the increase in the later thirteenth century of the amount of royal ecclesiastical patronage. The two were necessarily linked. Many years ago K.B. McFarlane exposed Edward I’s acquisitiveness of magnates’ estates, which, as he saw it, amounted to a ‘policy’ towards the earls: Edward acquired their estates by dubious legal procedures (the earldom of Derby or Ferrars), putting pressure on magnates to allow him to acquire their estates (the earldoms of Aumâle, Devon and Norfolk) and by the normal rules of inheritance (the earldom of Cornwall).1 Michael Prestwich has offered a refinement of the picture, although he has concurred in the view of Edward’s limited generosity as far as grants of land were concerned.2 Ann Deeley showed that the Crown was pushing more forcefully for its patronage rights in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, particularly in the context of a growing number of papal provisions.3 And the expansion of royal ecclesiastical patronage in Edward’s I’s reign and afterwards, as demonstrated by Philip Saunders, was in large measure due to the acquisition of magnate estates as well as to more intense exploitation of wardship patronage.4 What is called for now is a consideration of whether Henry III and Edward I systematically targeted the ecclesiastical interests of the magnates – and, if so, what effect this may have had on the relationships between land and patronage rights. In the first place the king began to consider more carefully what happened to advowsons in royal grants of land. The assumption up until the 1260s was that royal grants would be the same as anyone else’s. A statement prepared in 1258 by the king’s council for the business of Walter Merton sheds light on what royal policy in regard to advowsons was then thought to be. It was not primarily 1 2

3 4

K.B. McFarlane, ‘Had Edward I a “Policy” Towards the Earls?’, History, 50 (1965), 145–59 and reprinted in The Nobility of Later Medieval England (Oxford, 1973), pp. 248–67. E.g. M. Prestwich, ‘Royal Patronage under Edward I’, Thirteenth Century England, 1: Proceedings of the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Conference, 1985, ed. P.R. Coss and S.D. Lloyd (Woodbridge, 1986), pp. 41–52. Deeley, ‘Papal Provision and Royal Rights of Patronage’, 497–527. Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, esp. pp. 133–46 and 251–328, and ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage from Winchelsey to Stratford’, pp. 95–114.

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a statement about royal charters, but rather a clarification of the distinction there was between the right of bishops to present and their right to institute to the churches on their manors. The right of presentation was derived from their ownership of the manor and the right of institution from their episcopal office. As a preamble to this, it was explained that in England ‘certain special customs’ were observed, including the claim that whenever any manor with its appurtenances and liberties was assigned to a layman, a clerk or a woman, to persons ecclesiastical or secular, whether it was assigned for a term or was farmed out for maintenance or in dowry, or in any other way, the right of presenting to a church in such a manor by such an assignment always passed with the manor unless it were specifically reserved or excepted in the assignment.5 It is true that this was a statement of what was usually done in England rather than a gloss on royal charters specifically. Nonetheless, it seems likely that if royal charters were meant to be interpreted differently it would have been made clear. However a change in royal attitude towards advowsons can be discerned in the 1260s. On one hand, as Philip Saunders showed, advowsons were retained as a matter of course when wardships were farmed out.6 There was still room for negotiation, though: when Henry III gave his brother Richard the wardship of two parts of the lands of Henry of Hastings in 1269 the intention seems to have been that the king would retain the fees and advowsons.7 When Joan, Henry of Hastings’s widow, died in 1271, the lands she had held in dower were given to Richard, and this time the advowsons were mentioned explicitly.8 On 27 January 1271 Henry presented to Wistow (Leicestershire). He presented again to Wistow on 3 April 1272 and on the same day to Nailstone (Leicestershire). Each of these presentations was said to have been made by reason of the two parts of the Hastings lands. Richard, however, also presented his own clerks to these churches. On 14 May 1272, after Richard had died, the wardship of the Hastings lands were delivered to his executors and soon afterwards his son gave assent for himself and the other executors to the king’s presentations. In return, he was granted the knights’ fees and advowsons belonging to the two parts of the Hastings lands, including future presentations to Wistow and Nailstone.9 The matter of the Hastings lands also shows that from the 1260s the king was giving fees and advowsons special treatment when assigning dower. When he assigned lands to Joan, the wife of Henry of Hastings, for her sustenance it was said, with regard to the fees and advowsons of churches, that the king would

5 6 7 8 9

CPR 1247–58, pp. 619–20. Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, pp. 139–41. Only the royal order to deliver the lands, rather than the grant itself, appears to have been enrolled: Close R. 1268–72, p. 29 and CPR 1266–72, p. 360. CPR 1266–72, p. 546. CPR 1266–72, pp. 510, 640, 654–5 and 657 and Close R. 1268–72, p. 481. In 1277 Edmund of Cornwall was involved in litigation over another advowson on the Hastings lands, that of the vicarage of Leire (Leicestershire): Rot. Gravesend, p. 160.



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ordain as was seen fit by his council.10 By the end of Edward’s reign it was being argued that dower in advowsons was only assigned to women by special deed.11 More evidence about the royal view of advowsons in the 1260s is in a statement of 1268. On 27 September 1265 Henry gave John de Warenne houses at Cornhill in the city of London which had belonged to the royal enemy Hugh de Nevill.12 The royal letter patent granting the houses did not mention advowsons, but in 1268 John claimed that certain advowsons did belong to the houses and asked the king to specify which they were. The response was a letter close of 20 November said to have been made by the king, the Lord Edward and the rest of the council. It granted the advowsons to the earl but claimed that this was notwithstanding the custom hitherto obtaining in the realm that advowsons of churches unspecified in charters of enfeoffment ought to remain with the king.13 The advowson in question may have been that of the church of St Martin Outwich to which John’s son and grandson presented on several occasions in the early fourteenth century.14 It was, however, the ‘statute’, or rather the series of statements on current royal practices known as ‘Prerogativa Regis’, which sought to define the position. This seems to have been made in the early years of Edward I’s reign.15 The ‘statute’ addressed a variety of subjects and circumstances in which it claimed special rights for the king. It included a ‘gloss’ on the meaning of royal charters, claiming that certain things, including advowsons, were reserved if they were not explicitly included: When the lord king gives or grants any manor or land with appurtenances, unless he makes in his charter or writing express mention of the knights’ fees, advowsons of churches and dowers, when they shall fall in, belonging to the aforesaid manor or land, then nowadays, the king reserves to himself the same fees [and] advowsons, with the dowers; although among other persons it shall have been otherwise observed.

The pronouncement was possibly influenced by the policy of Philip IV of France (1268–1314), who announced that all his alienations and grants of fiefs, both past and future, did not include rights of jurisdiction, holding of fees and patronage unless the contrary were formally stipulated.16 The English crown’s 10 11 12 13 14

15

16

CPR 1258–66, p. 540. Placitorum Abbreviatio, p. 256. CPR 1258–66, p. 457 and see also p. 468 and CPR 1266–72, p. 14. CPR 1266–72, p. 303. The Register of Stephen Gravesend, in Registrum Radulphi Baldock, Gilberti Segrave, Ricardi Newport, et Stephani Gravesend, Episcoporum Londoniensium, AD MCCCIV– MCCCXXXVIII, ed. R.C. Fowler (CYS, 7, 1907), pp. 276, 285–6, 288 and 295. The Statutes of the Realm (RC, 1810), 1.2.226–7. For the dating, see F.W. Maitland, ‘The “Prerogativa Regis” ’, EHR, 6 (1891), 367–72 (reprinted in Collected Papers, ed. H.A.L. Fisher, 3 vols (Cambridge, 1911), 2:182–9) and Prerogativa Regis, Tertia Lectura Roberti Constable, ed. S.E. Thorne (New Haven, 1949), p. xviii, note 47. Thomas, Droit de propriété des laïques sur les églises, p. 157.

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statement was very significant in terms of the relationship between land and ecclesiastical patronage, at least as far as the king’s own grants were concerned. It went against what was explicit in canon and common law, that the right of patronage ought to pass with the estate to which it belonged unless it were excepted specifically when the estate was transferred. In canon law, Pope Alexander III (1159–81) had judged that the right of presentation ought to belong to the farmer of the vill or town (the word used was ‘villa’) in which the church was situated unless the advowson were specifically excepted from the farm.17 It became established in canon law that the right of patronage ought to pass with ‘the whole’ to which the advowson belonged and, indeed, it was the very attachment of patronage rights to land which made their transfer acceptable.18 On the side of English common law, the ‘Bracton’ treatise of the 1230s had said that advowsons were sometimes transferred specifically with the estate to which they belonged, and sometimes under the general terms ‘with all appurtenances without any reservation’. The advowson did have to be mentioned specifically if it was to be transferred with only part of the estate to which it belonged, and if it were not mentioned specifically then it remained with the donor.19 Britton and Fleta, both writing in the 1290s, concurred with the ‘Bracton’ treatise. Neither writer mentioned that royal grants of advowsons had to be made expressly, although this was apparently almost two decades after the compilation of ‘Prerogativa Regis’. And all three writers considered that possession of a corporeal thing in the place in which the church was situated could be regarded as evidence of seisin of the advowson when neither the patron nor his ancestor had presented to the church.20 Even though legal writers did not refer to the ‘statutory’ royal position, there is evidence that the policy was known about in the royal court. In Michaelmas Term 1276 Cecilia Mucegros was summoned in an action against the king in relation to the church of Alvescot (Oxfordshire). Cecilia’s claim to the advowson was that the king had granted the manor of Alvescot, to which the advowson belonged, to Thomas de Clare. It was argued for the king that he had a special prerogative and custom such that he retained any advowson belonging to a manor when he gave the manor unless he mentioned the advowson in his grant, and he won the case.21 In another, later, example, the beneficiary was able to refer to the terms of the grant and apparently win the point. William de Valence was granted the wardship of the heir of William de Say who died in 1295. He had to write to Edward in early 1296 to remind him of the terms of the gift, which had included, he said, fees and advowsons of churches. When the church of Cudham (Kent) fell 17

18 19 20 21

Extra, 3.tit. 38, cap.  7 in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.611 and see commentaries on this: Hostiensis, In I–VI Decretalium Libros Commentaria (Venice, 1581), fols 142v–143r and Innocent IV, In Quinque Libros Decretalium Commentaria (Venice, 1578), fol. 181r–v. Thomas, Droit de propriété des laïques sur les églises, pp. 150–9. Bracton, Laws and Customs, 2.165. Bracton, Laws and Customs, 2.161–5 and 3.211–12, 220, 228–9, 232 and 239–40, Britton, 1.267–9, 2.189–90 and note and Fleta, 3.36, 4.48–50, 55–6, 59 and 62. Placitorum Abbreviatio, p. 192.



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vacant, the earl presented but so too did the king. It looks from other evidence as though a clerk connected with de Valence was installed – in 1297 the rector of Cudham and Hinxhill was Geoffrey de Wretton.22 What was the impact of ‘Prerogativa Regis’ on magnates’ ecclesiastical interests? It seems, in fact, to have had a limited application and to have heralded no wholesale challenge to their patronage rights. With respect to the quo warranto proceedings, Philip Saunders has shown that many patrons were summoned to produce the charters by which they claimed their advowson rights, but that this generally resulted in their being vindicated.23 But what does seem clear is that the king was prepared to press his claims when it came to certain key ecclesiastical interests on the estates of his tenants in chief. His choices were made on the basis of the relationship of these interests to royal rights and property – and in the context of the political standing of the magnate concerned. One magnate especially targeted by the king was Gilbert de Clare, whose advowson of Fordingbridge was among those which Edward claimed, on the basis that advowsons could not be alienated without royal licence.24 Another challenge to Gilbert was in respect of the priory of St James in Bristol. This devolved on the issue of whether patronage ought to belong to an honour or to the caput (chief manor) of the honour when the two were in different people’s hands. St James’s had been founded by Robert, earl of Gloucester, in about 1137, as a cell to the abbey of Tewkesbury.25 It was endowed with possessions within Bristol itself and elsewhere. The founder gave every tenth stone from the construction of Bristol castle for the fabric of St Mary’s chapel within the priory.26 His son William, earl of Gloucester, gave the manor of Ashley (Gloucestershire), the profits of the Whitsun fair at Bristol, tithes from mills and rents in Monmouthshire and a burgage in the new borough of Bristol, which was situated between the priory and the castle, and which he granted should be part of the conventual parish. Finally, he gave them all the churches of his fee in Cornwall and that of ‘Escremoville’ in Normandy.27 William died in 1183, leaving three daughters: Mabel, who married Aumary, count of Evreux, Amice, who married Richard de Clare, earl of Hertford, and Isabella, who married John, count of Mortain and later king. Isabella became countess of Gloucester, but it was Amice’s son, Gilbert de Clare, who, after Isabella’s death in 1217, acquired the earldom and honour of 22 23

24 25

26 27

Gemmill, ‘The Earls and Their Clergy’, p. 134. The letter, TNA SC 1/21/43, is transcribed and translated at pp. 147–8. Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, esp. pp.  126–32. Saunders also points out that this brought business to the royal courts and promoted awareness of the need to have documentary evidence of patronage rights. Select Cases in the Court of the King’s Bench Under Edward I/Edward II, ed. G.O. Sayles, 4 vols (Selden Society, 55, 57, 58 and 74, 1936–55), 3.47–9. See Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 2:61 (from BL Cotton MS Cleopatra A vii, being an account of the foundation of Tewkesbury and its cells), 4:333–5 and VCH Gloucestershire, 2:74. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 2:61. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 2:69 and 78–9 and 4:335.

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Gloucester. The town and castle of Bristol were, however, retained by the Crown which had had an interest in Bristol from 1175 when William had surrendered to Henry II.28 The Clares received compensation for not having the barton of Bristol,29 but in 1268 and again in 1276 Gilbert de Clare revived the family’s claim to Bristol which was, after all, the caput of the honour of Gloucester. In 1276 the earl’s claim was finally overruled in the king’s full council, when it was judged, on grounds of the king’s long seisin through his ancestors, that he need not reply to Gilbert.30 On both occasions the patronage in Bristol, of the abbey of St Augustine, the priory of St James and the hospital of St Bartholomew, as well as the barton of Bristol and (in 1276) £30 rent were specifically excepted from the claim.31 Edward I did not stop, however, at making good his possession of Bristol itself. He tried in 1282 to override Gilbert’s right to the custody of St James’s priory. The first we know of this is from a letter which Gilbert wrote to the king’s clerk, John Kirkby, complaining that royal officers in Bristol had ejected his, Gilbert’s, bailiffs from custody of St James’s. The latter had taken custody on the death of the abbot of Tewkesbury, as his and his ancestors’ bailiffs had always done, because the priory was a cell to Tewkesbury and, like Tewkesbury and its other cells, was held of himself.32 The subjection to Tewkesbury, and the fact that the possessions of that house were held of himself were, therefore, key in his claim. It was true (at least according to the Tewkesbury chronicler) that close relations had been forged at the wish of the founder: ‘. . . statuitque illum membrum fieri monasterii Theokesb’ . . . subjectum in omnibus et unitum . . .’33 (‘and he ordered it [St James’s priory] to be made a member of the monastery of Tewkesbury . . . subjected and united in every way . . .’). The chronicle also relates that the founder was buried in the choir at St James’s priory. The patronage of Tewkesbury itself was not at issue; 34 nor, strictly speaking, was Gilbert claiming ‘patronage’ of St James’s. He saw it as a possession of Tewkesbury. The constable of Bristol castle took a different 28

29 30 31

32 33 34

For the vicissitudes in the fortunes of the house of Gloucester during the last years of William’s life and until the honour was acquired by the Clares in 1217, see Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 5:688–94, Altschul, A Baronial Family, pp. 25–8 and Ward, ‘Estates of the Clare Family’, pp. 70–7. E.g. TNA C132/27/5, m. 41 (C. Inq. PM, 1.156 (no. 530)) and see Altschul, A Baronial Family, pp. 25–8 and Ward, ‘Estates of the Clare Family’, pp. 76–7. Close R. 1268–72, p.  7 and Parliamentary Writs and Writs of Military Summons, ed. F. Palgrave (RC, 1827), 1.6. The hospital was said to be St Martin’s in 1276. The Clares do not seem to have had a patronage claim to St Augustine’s (founded by Robert Fitzharding) nor to St Bartholomew’s hospital (the patronage of which was claimed by the La Warres in the fourteenth century): VCH Gloucestershire, 2:75 and 118. TNA SC 1/10/17 (below, Appendix of Documents, item 3). Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 2:61. The inquisitions post mortem on the Clare lands in 1262, 1296, and 1314 all mentioned the patronage of the abbey, and the 1262 inquisition specifically mentioned the right of custody: TNA C 132/27/5, m. 42 (C. Inq. PM, 1.157 (no. 530)), SC 11/610, m. 5, Close



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view when he explained matters to Edward I. He said that the earl had sought an inquiry into the advowson of St James’s which, however, was appurtenant to the king’s castle of Bristol and was, with its demesnes, dependent on the castle.35 A hearing was, even so, arranged for Michaelmas Term 1282 and the bishop of Worcester was given custody of the priory in the interim.36 The outcome is, frustratingly, not known; there is no evidence from the late thirteenth or the early fourteenth centuries to show whether it was the earl or the king who established a right. Even the very full IPM taken after the death of the last Clare earl of Gloucester in 1314 makes no mention of any rights at St James’s priory. If the earl was successful in vindicating his right, it would have been as part of his patronage of Tewkesbury abbey, which fell to Hugh Despenser’s share of the Clare estates when they were divided up after Gilbert’s death. In suits in the king’s courts over patronage rights it was what the advowsons belonged to that was often at issue. Advowsons associated (or not) with lands granted out by royal charter were especially vulnerable.37 In 1293 Edward sought the advowson of two Staffordshire churches from his brother Edmund, namely, Stoke on Trent and Wolstanton. The royal claim to the advowson of Wolstanton was based on Henry III’s presentation of Nicholas of Aldithley and to Stoke on Trent on his presentation of Henry of Salisbury (in 1252).38 In both cases Edmund argued that the church was within and belonged to the manor of Newcastle under Lyme, which had been granted to him by Henry III with the town, castle and advowson of churches, and he called upon as evidence the chancery rolls of Henry III’s fifty-first year. In fact the royal charter of 30 June 1267 had granted ‘Newcastle’ in general terms and had mentioned neither manor, town, castle nor advowsons. However, an entry on the patent roll of 30 January 1268 recited that the king had granted Edmund the castle of Newcastle with the honour, advowsons of churches and all appurtenances, and ordered the prior and convent of Trentham that, if the priory belonged to that honour, they were to be intendant to Edmund as their lord as regards the advowson.39

35 36 37 38

39

R. 1261–64, p. 284, TNA C 133/77/3, m. 14 (C. Inq. PM, 3.236 (no. 371)), and C 134/44, m. 58 (C. Inq. PM, 5.342 (no. 538)). TNA SC 1/2/186. CCR 1279–88, p. 157 and CPR 1281–92, pp. 21–2. I am most grateful to Dr Philip Saunders who gave me references, from the Coram Rege rolls, to disputes between Edward I and the earls over the right of advowson. Placita de Quo Warranto, p. 712, TNA KB 27/136, m. 37 r–d, and 27/138, m. 42. In fact neither of these precedents seems to have been reported accurately. The most recent recorded presentation to Wolstanton was of Henry of Wengham on 1 April 1254 (CPR 1247–58, p.  366). There seems to be no record in the patent rolls of a presentation of Nicholas of Aldithley. The presentation of Henry of Salisbury to Stoke is at CPR 1247–58, p. 127 (and see also p. 560 where Henry III presented to the chapel of Whitmore, which he had recovered from the prior of Trentham as an appurtenance of the church of Stoke). John de Wycham was, however, presented on 7 November 1262 (CPR 1266–72, p. 738). C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 78 (TNA DL 42/1, fol. 1r) and CPR 1266–72, p. 186.

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Edmund’s defence seems to have prevailed, for the inquisition taken into his lands after his death recorded his seisin of both these advowsons.40 Again appurtenances were at issue in the assize of darrein presentment respecting the church of Gargrave (Yorkshire) which Edward brought in 1293 against Edmund and the other executors of their mother’s will.41 The king’s claim was based on the right to custody of the land and heir of Henry de Percy who had presented Godfrey de Hauterive in 1272.42 The executors’ defence was that the advowson belonged to the Percy lands held in wardship by Eleanor of Provence. Henry III had granted the custody to Eleanor initially on 15 October 1272; later, on 16 June 1285, she was allowed to retain two parts of the estates with knights’ fees, advowsons of churches and marriage of the heirs, but John de Vescy was to have custody of the dower lands of Henry’s mother Ellen, of his wife Eleanor, and of his great uncle’s wife Agnes, when these should fall in.43 Of course the case shows the complexities created by the survival of dowagers,44 but the legal point was whether the advowson belonged to the two parts of the custody granted to Eleanor or to the part which had been assigned to John de Vescy and which was now in the hands of the Crown. The argument for the king was that the advowson had remained ‘quoddam grossam per se’ (something in itself) after William de Percy, Henry’s father, had granted out the manor of Gargrave. It did not belong to any tenement and was not assigned to Henry’s heirs. It was now in the king’s gift because he held the dower lands which had belonged to Henry de Percy’s deceased widow, Eleanor. The royal prerogative allowed the king to present first, and the executors would have their opportunity to do so in future vacancies. The royal view of things did not, however, prevail because it was found that the advowson belonged to the manor of Catton, which was in the hands of the executors. Moreover Henry de Percy had presented to Gargrave in the lifetime of his mother and grandmother – which was evidence that the advowson had not been assigned to them in dower. Nor had it been assigned to Henry’s own widow in dower. So the executors won their case.45 Edmund’s claims were upheld in each of these cases, and it looks as though the king may have been chancing his arm in a bid to obtain control of three rather wealthy churches.46 Edward did not pursue his rights in only the most 40

41 42 43 44 45 46

TNA C 133/81, mm. 6, 37 and 49 (C. Inq. PM, 3.290, 315 and 321 (no. 423)). For Edward I’s earlier letter to his brother about the possibility of a vacancy in the church of Stoke, see above, Chapter 2, p. 51. TNA KB 27/138, m. 58r. Reg. W. Giffard, pp. 34–5 and 37. CPR 1266–72, p. 682 and CPR 1281–92, p. 175. The charter was at first cited incorrectly in the suit, as dating from 11 Edward I. See Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 10:449–56 and Early Yorkshire Charters, 11:6–7 for the descent of the Percy estates. See Reg. Romeyn, 1.134, 144–5 and 150 and Reg. Corbridge, 1.9–10 and note 1 and 1.29. Wolstanton with its chapels £26 13s 4d; Stoke on Trent with its chapels £40, Gargrave £33 6s 8d (www.hrionline.ac.uk/Taxatio/db/Taxatio/printbc.jsp?benkey=CL.ST.NE.03,



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valuable churches, however. Rockingham (Northamptonshire), for instance, was not especially rich. But it had been included in a response by jurors to the article about appropriation of advowsons, by religious and others, which had been in royal possession, in the royal inquiries of 1274/5 into usurped royal rights and misdeeds of ministers.47 The jurors said that Rockingham church had used to be in the gift of the Crown, but that they did not know whether or not the advowson had been given to Richard of Cornwall along with the manor of Rockingham.48 Perhaps it was this that prompted the king to bring a claim when Rockingham fell vacant in 1295. The argument put forward in the assize of darrein presentment in the king’s bench in Easter term 1295 was that Henry III had presented the last rector, Ivo, who seems to have been the Ivo, son of Geoffrey, presented in 1227/8.49 Edmund of Cornwall’s defence was to produce the royal charter of 24 August 1246 in which Henry III had given his father Richard the town, castle and honour of Berkhamsted with its appurtenances, the county of Rutland, and all other lands, tenements and fees that Isabella of Angoulême had held in demesne in England, with the advowson of churches and all other appurtenances. Two copies of this charter survive in the Cornwall cartulary, although it was not enrolled on the charter roll.50 To strengthen the earl’s case, Isabella had held the manor or town of Rockingham to which the advowson had belonged, and to which it still belonged, in dower, and Edmund now held the manor or town of Rockingham. That the advowson of Rockingham had indeed formed part of Isabella of Angoulême’s dower is clear from the fact that she had twice presented successfully to Rockingham, and indeed, the royal presentation of Peter of Wakering in 1221 was said to have been by reason of Isabella’s dower lands being in the king’s hand.51 The earl’s case seems very compelling; but the royal argument was that the royal charter had no bearing on the case since it had reference only to the appendages of the honour of Berkhamsted and the county of Rutland. The advowson could not be said to belong to either of these – and the attorney appears to have been claiming that advowsons could not belong to such an amorphous thing as ‘all the other dower lands’ – of which the manor or town of Rockingham formed a part. This was not a fief with which advowsons could be transferred as appurtenances.52 And the advowson should belong to Rockingham castle and the lands and demesnes which represented the head or

47 48

49 50 51 52

www.hrionline.ac.uk/Taxatio/db/Taxatio/printbc.jsp?benkey=CL.ST.NE.02 and www. hrionline.ac.uk/Taxatio/db/Taxatio/printbc.jsp?benkey=YK.YK.CR.15.) H.M. Cam, The Hundred and the Hundred Rolls (London, 1930), pp. 256–7. Rot. Hund. 2.16, and see also 2.52, where Edmund of Cornwall was said to have the advowson of Manton which Henry III had given to Richard of Cornwall when he gave him the county of Rutland. The jurors did not, however, know by what warrant the earl held the advowson, which had used to be of the king’s demesne. TNA KB 27/144, m. 35d and Rot. Welles, 2.141. TNA E 36/57, nos. Cxxxiij and CCxiij, fols 37v–38r and 56v–57r. Rot. Welles, 1.56 and 2.99, 105 and 194. In fact Isabella’s dower lands did form a recognised entity; they had, for example, been

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chief part (capud) of the manor or town, and which the king held, rather than to the lands and tenements which the earl held there as members of the manor. So there was an attempt to diminish the Cornwall holdings in Rockingham, and to make out that the king’s possessions were the essential part to which the advowson must belong. The implicit denial that the earl held a manor at all there does show how firmly rooted the idea was that advowsons were appurtenances of manors. The final point in the argument was that the church was actually a chapel to Rockingham castle. There does not seem to have been a clear basis for this; and it was a bold move to question the parochial status of the church in order to support the claim that it belonged to the castle. A search of the chancery rolls then took place. This resulted in the production of letters close of Henry III of 1 November 1216 by which Isabella had been given seisin of her dower lands, including Rockingham with its appurtenances.53 The royal attorney had recourse to the royal prerogative: there was, he said, no special mention in the 1216 order, nor in the charter which Edmund had produced, of the advowson of Rockingham, and it ought not to be separated from the Crown without such express mention. The advowson ought to belong to the honour, forest, castle and demesne of Rockingham which the king held, and not to the tenements held by the earl. As so often, the matter was settled out of court. Edmund granted the advowson to his cousin and the king remitted damages.54 It was not a quarrel; as with the other claims put forward on the king’s behalf, it was an attempt to claw back ecclesiastical interests that had once been in royal control and were particularly valuable in financial terms (Gargrave, Stoke and Wolstanton), or because of their proximity to royal castles (St James’s at Bristol). Much more significant royal acquisitions of magnates’ patronage rights were those of certain marcher lords in Welsh bishoprics sede vacante. These can be seen in the context of Edward I’s wider policy of weakening the independence of marcher lords, particularly in the matter of the marcher custom of waging private war.55 From the royal point of view, they may also be regarded as a way of bringing the Welsh church into line with the English, although this was only one aspect of the complex differences between them. (For example, in Wales, advowson cases were settled in the ecclesiastical courts rather than the secular. When Isabella Mortimer sought to pursue an advowson case against the bishop of Asaph in the secular court, she found herself chastised by the archbishop

53 54 55

held by Eleanor of Aquitaine at the end of the twelfth century: Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati, 1199–1216, ed. T.D. Hardy (RC, 1837), p. 128. i.e. Rotuli Litterarum Clausarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati, 1204–1227, ed. T.D. Hardy, 2 vols (RC, 1833–44), 1.293. See also Reg. Sutton, 2.144–5. For the legal and political powers of marcher lords, and Edward’s reduction of these, see especially J.E. Morris, The Welsh Wars of Edward I (Oxford, 1901), pp. 220–39, J.G. Edwards, ‘The Normans and the Welsh March’, Proceedings of the British Academy, 42 (1956), 155–77, Otway-Ruthven, ‘Great Lordships of South Wales’, pp. 1–20, Altschul, A Baronial Family, pp. 145–53 and Ward, ‘Estates of the Clare Family, pp. 265–76.



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of Canterbury.56) The best-known case was that of the bishopric of Llandaff. Gilbert de Clare and his predecessors as lords of Glamorgan had right of custody of the temporalities of the bishopric within their lordship when the see was vacant, together with the right to collate prebends normally in the gift of the bishop.57 Other marcher lords had the right of custody of the temporalities of the see within their lordships, but the position of the lords of Glamorgan was particularly important, because the main body of the episcopal estates was within their lordship and there was also the right of collating to prebends. This meant that the king could not exercise the rights he enjoyed in most English bishoprics during vacancies, and this became increasingly unacceptable in the thirteenth century. Henry III’s most important contribution to strengthening the royal claim was in 1250 when he secured an admission from Bishop William de Burgh to the effect that he, William, held nothing in the bishopric from anyone except of the king in chief.58 It was not, however, until 1290 that the advowson was finally annexed to the Crown. The case has been discussed fully by other scholars,59 but it is important to look at the substance of Gilbert’s arguments. On the death of William de Braose, bishop of Llandaff, in 1287, Gilbert had taken custody of the manors of Llandaff and Bishton Netherwent and had begun to collate vacant dignities and prebends. Other marcher lords, namely Humphrey de Bohun, William de Braose, lord of Gower, Edmund of Lancaster and Roger Bigod, took hold of the episcopal manors which were held of them. Edward I challenged all their rights by ordering the escheator south of Trent, to enter the estates of the see in the king’s name. Matters came to a head in the parliament of autumn 1290. All the marcher lords, except Gilbert de Clare, deferred to the king, with only Humphrey de Bohun and William de Braose even admitting that they had a serious claim. Gilbert however declared that all lands and tenements in Glamorgan were of his dominion and that the custody of the episcopal lands therein belonged to him as did the custody of all other lands in that country. His ancestors had always had such custody and had collated prebends sede vacante. Any previous royal custody or collation had been by reason of his ancestors’ minority. His father had had custody of the manors in question

56 57 58 59

Reg. Epist. Peckham, 1.250–2 and Douie, John Pecham, p.  235. For Pecham’s efforts to reform the Welsh church, see pp. 257–71. See especially the explanation of these rights given by Gilbert Marshal, earl of Pembroke, in 1241 in Cartae, 2.518–19 (Placitorum Abbreviatio, p. 109). F.G. Cowley, ‘The Church in Medieval Glamorgan’, in Glamorgan County History, 3: The Middle Ages, ed. T.B. Pugh (Cardiff, 1971), 87–166 (p. 110). See especially G. Williams, The Welsh Church from Conquest to Reformation (Cardiff, 1962), pp. 246–8 and Cowley, ‘The Church in Medieval Glamorgan’, pp. 107–14. Altschul, in A Baronial Family, pp. 273–6 and Ward, in ‘Estates of the Clare Family’, pp. 278–9, studied these rights and their loss in the context of the quality of the Clares’ lordship in Glamorgan. The case and Edward I’s suppression of other lords’ claims in vacant Welsh bishoprics are discussed in the context of the extension of regalian right in Wales: M. Howell, ‘Regalian Right in Wales and the Welsh March: The Relation of Theory to Practice’, Welsh History Review, 7 (1975), 269–88.

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in the last vacancy.60 It was a strong claim on the basis of precedent, and so it makes Gilbert’s climb-down later in the year all the more surprising. On 23 October 1290 Gilbert returned his advowson and custody of the bishopric to the king, together with the collation of prebends and dignities.61 On 2 November custody of the temporalities and the rights of collation were granted back to Gilbert and to Joan his wife, but only to hold for life,62 and on the following day a royal statement was issued saying that Gilbert had recognised the validity of the king’s right and had acknowledged the fact of his own usurpation.63 Gilbert’s recognition must be seen, surely, in the context of his situation in 1290. He had, a few months previously, married the king’s daughter Joan on unfavourable terms (including that his lands were entailed on his and Joan’s heirs, or failing that, on Joan’s heirs by a subsequent marriage) and he was embroiled in a quarrel with Humphrey de Bohun which led in 1292 to a humiliating judgement on both of them at Edward’s hand.64 Perhaps Edward even saw this as some retribution for Gilbert’s adherence to the Montfortian cause in the barons’ war. But Gilbert’s renunciation had consequences for other marcher lords too. The Llandaff case was cited as a precedent in 1293, when the right of custody of the temporalities of the see of St Asaph was in dispute after the death of Bishop Anian. John de Warenne petitioned the king in parliament, claiming the right of custody of the episcopal lands in his lordship of Bromfield. He argued that lords of Bromfield had had that custody before Edward’s conquest of Wales, and that he ought to have it because the land had been granted to him to hold with all the rights and liberties which the pre-conquest lords had had. The king and his council responded that the custody of lands and tenements of all bishoprics was a royal right, regardless of their being situated in anyone else’s lordship. If any right of custody had been usurped in the time of the Welsh princes, the lands with all their liberties had been re-annexed to the Crown in their original state after the conquest of Wales. Although the king had granted the earl the lands of Bromfield with the appurtenances, it was not to be supposed that he had given him the liberties and rights belonging to the Crown such as the custody of bishoprics and of episcopal lands and tenements, which could not be separated from the Crown. Finally, the king’s success in the Llandaff dispute was cited to support his case, and the earl’s petition was rejected.65 60

61 62 63 64

65

Rotuli Parliamentorum; ut et Petitiones, et Placita in Parliamento Tempore Edwardi R. I (RC, 1783), pp.  42–3 (A.W. Haddan and W. Stubbs, Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents Relating to Great Britain and Ireland, 3 vols (Oxford, 1869–78), 1:593–6). Littere Wallie, ed. J.G. Edwards (Board of Celtic Studies, History and Law Series, 5, Cardiff, 1940), pp. 178–9 and Rot. Parl., p. 43. C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 372 (Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, 1:592). Rot. Parl. p. 43 and CPR 1281–92, p. 393. Both earls were temporarily imprisoned and deprived of their lordships in 1292: see Rot. Parl. pp. 70–7 and references cited above, note 55. For the entailment, see esp. C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 350–1 and CFR 1272–1307, pp. 274–5. Rot. Parl. pp.  93–4 and Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, 1:598–9. The royal charter of 7 October 1282, granting the castle of Dynasbran and the lands of Bromfield and Yale to



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The king’s argument that the patronage of the bishopric did not belong to any lands but was annexed to the Crown was related, surely, to the notion that certain patronage rights belonged not to the land on which the house was situated but to the whole of the patron’s lordship. The Crown was a sort of superior lordship to which the patronage of bishoprics must always belong, originally and by right. The idea that royal rights in bishoprics were inalienable was used again in this parliament when Humphrey de Bohun petitioned for restoration of custody of the manors of the late bishop of St David’s, Thomas Bek, which were situated in his lordship of Brecknock. Earlier, in 1280, Edward had been more circumspect with regard to St David’s. He initially took the manors of Glascombe and St Harmon (Radnorshire) into royal custody but then ordered them to be delivered to Roger Mortimer pending an inquiry as to whether the custody should belong to the king or to Roger as he and his ancestors had held it in the past.66 Now, however, the king claimed to be defending the liberties of the see. It was rehearsed that, having discussed it with his council, and by testimony of trustworthy men both within and outside it, he understood that he deceased bishop had denied that he held any manors, within the liberty of Brecknock or outside it, from anyone but the king and his heirs, ‘as from the Crown’. If he were to deliver custody of the manors in that lordship to the earl, he would be lowering the church of St David’s into servitude, whereas he was bound to protect it and its liberties while it was vacant – especially as the bishop had denied holding those manors of the earl. Again, custody of bishoprics and episcopal lands was a Crown right belonging to the king by reason of his prerogative and dignity. The earl’s petition was rejected.67 It is possible that Henry de Lacy had also asserted a claim to custody of the temporalities of the see in his lordship of Denbigh, for Edward I, in an order of 8 May 1293, expressed his surprise that the justice of North Wales, Robert de Staundon, had not taken the temporalities in the earl’s land of Denbigh as well as elsewhere in his bailiwick into the king’s hand.68 In this case, however, matters do not seem to have gone any further. The establishment of royal rights in Welsh bishoprics was the only significant instance in which Edward separated patronage rights from magnates’ lands. Although Edward did target certain patronage rights of the magnates, there was no wholesale effort to resume advowsons. What is clear, however, is that there was a greater effort to exploit wardship patronage and to benefit from the ‘windfalls’ of large estates that came into royal possession. Essential in that process was full knowledge as to which patronage rights were appurtenant to those estates.

66 67 68

John de Warenne, was enrolled on the Welsh roll: Calendar of Various Chancery Rolls 1277–1326 (HMSO, 1912), p. 240. The king reserved the castle and land of Hope. CFR 1272–1307, p.  130. Roger was given the custody with the proviso that, if it were found that the custody belonged to the king, Roger should answer for the issues. Rot. Parl. pp. 97–8 and Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, 1:600–1. CFR 1272–1307, p. 322 (W. Prynne, The Third Tome of Our Exact Chronological Vindication of the Supreme Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction of Our English Kings (London, 1668; reissued 1670 and 1672), p.  571 and Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, 1:601–2). See Howell, ‘Regalian Right in Wales’, pp. 273–4.

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The later thirteenth century was a period in which the Crown showed a very great interest in finding out about the estates and associated rights of its subjects, and this was not a tendency exclusive to England; Sandra Raban speaks of the ‘investigative culture’ of the period.69 Advowson rights were certainly an object of interest in such inquiries. As seen already, the royal investigations of 1274–75 included an article about usurped advowson rights, and the inquiries of 1279–80 into land ownership and services due also included questions about ecclesiastical patronage rights, and in particular those which had been alienated or usurped.70 But a source of the first importance for understanding the nature of the Crown’s interest in ecclesiastical patronage rights are the IPMs taken on the estates of tenants in chief after they died. The information about advowsons, patronage of monasteries and chantries that were included as the property of the deceased person has not been used before in a systematic way to find out about patronage rights. This is in part because the early calendars of IPMs did not include the valuations which were made. Moreover, as a source, the reliability of inquisitions as historical evidence has been called into question by scholars, on grounds of the involvement of interested parties such as the heir’s family, overreliance on previous inquisitions and the existence of ‘stock’ replies to questions posed to the jurors, the uncertainty of the jurors’ knowledge, and over-emphasis on internal consistency. Doubts have been shed in particular on the reliability of fifteenth-century inquisitions, when the value of wardship patronage was less significant than it had been in earlier periods.71 But in fact these concerns do not apply to the information about ecclesiastical patronage rights in thirteenthcentury inquisitions, for reasons that are to be explained now. Usually, as the name would suggest, an IPM would follow the death of a tenant in chief and was initiated by issue from chancery of a writ of diem clausit extremum (‘he has closed his last day’) addressed to the escheator. In the thirteenth century there were two main escheators, one south and one north of Trent and they had

69 70 71

Raban, A Second Domesday, p. 1. Raban, A Second Domesday, esp. pp. 196, 199, 201, and 202. C.G. Crump, ‘A Note on the Criticism of Records’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 8 (1924), 140–4, C.D. Ross and T.B. Pugh, ‘Materials for the Study of Baronial Incomes in Fifteenth-Century England’, Economic History Review, 2nd series, 6 (1953–4), 186–9, R.F. Hunnisett, ‘The Reliability of Inquisitions as Historical Evidence’, in The Study of Medieval Records: Essays in Honour of Kathleen Major, ed. D.A. Bullough and R.L. Storey (Oxford, 1971), pp. 206–36, and C. Carpenter’s general introduction to Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, XXII, 1–5 Henry VI, 1422–27, ed. K. Parkin (Woodbridge, 2003), esp. pp. 16–38. Most recently, Christopher Dyer, while acknowledging the problems, points to a number of ways in which the IPM extents of the fifteenth century can be informative, if used judiciously: Christopher Dyer, ‘The Value of Fifteenth-Century Inquisitions Post Mortem for Social and Economic History’, in The Fifteenth-Century Inquisitions Post Mortem: A Companion, ed. Michael Hicks (Woodbridge, 2012), pp. 97–115, and Matthew Holford has noted the varying degrees of accuracy in the valuations and extents: Matthew Holford, ‘ “Notoriously Unreliable”: The Valuations and Extents’, in Hicks, ed., Fifteenth-Century Inquisitions Post Mortem, pp. 117–44.



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subescheators working under them in each county.72 Inquisitions were not only held after a tenant’s death, for there were other circumstances which led the king to take a man’s lands into his hands, such as an act of felony on the part of the holder, or his or her incapacity. Unusually there was a delayed IPM in 1280 on the lands of Peter of Savoy, who had died in 1268 and whose earldom of Richmond had been given in 1266 to John of Brittany, who was certainly alive then.73 The estates of the earldom were also seized in 1294 in the Anglo-French war, although an IPM was not taken.74 This was, however, a fruitful period in terms of opportunities for presentation: before the earl’s lands were restored to him for the term of the truce between the two kings, on 1 April 1298,75 Edward had presented to at least four benefices belonging to the estates.76 The writ diem clausit extremum ordered the escheator to enter the lands of the deceased man in the king’s name and to keep them safely until ordered to do otherwise. He was also to find out about the lands from sworn juries in such matters as were specified in the writ. The standard writ required him to find out how much land the tenant had held of the king and how much of others, by what service his lands were held, how much they were worth per year, who the next heir was and his age.77 There were, however, different versions of the writ, some of which were more detailed and specific than others. For example the writ

72

73

74

75

76

77

For the history of the escheator’s office see esp. Carpenter in Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem, H.M. Chew, ‘The Office of Escheator in the City of London during the Middle Ages’, EHR, 58 (1943), 319–30, E.R. Stephenson, ‘The Escheator’, in The English Government at Work, 1327–36, 2: Fiscal Administration ed. W.A. Morris and J.R. Strayer (Cambridge, Mass., 1947), pp.  109–67, and S.L. Waugh, ‘The Origins and Early Development of the Articles of the Escheator’, in Thirteenth Century England, 5: Proceedings of the Newcastle upon Tyne Conference, 1993, ed. P.R. Coss and S.D. Lloyd (Woodbridge, 1995), pp. 89–114. Nicholas Vincent, ‘Savoy, Peter of, count of Savoy and de facto earl of Richmond (1203?– 1268)’, ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/22016, accessed 14 Nov 2011). The inquisition is at TNA C133/26/6, calendared in C. Inq. PM, 2.210–23 (no. 381). The earl’s lands were in the king’s hands by 28 November 1294 (CPR 1292–1301, p. 126) but the date on which they were seized is not known. Cf. Cokayne, Complete Peerage, 10:812 and note (i). CCR 1296–1302, pp. 152 and 176. The earl’s lands were restored to him definitively on 1 May 1304: CPR 1301–7, p. 228 (Foedera, Conventiones, Litterae, ed. T. Rymer, 2 vols in 4 (RC, 1816–18), 1.2.693). CPR 1292–1301, pp. 126, 181, 221, 327, 330 and 334. The benefices were the churches of Danby Wiske (Yorkshire), Washingborough, the chapel of ‘Wykes by Boston’ (Lincolnshire) and the church of ‘Swaffham’ (Norfolk). The text of the writ is given in J. More, Registrum Omnium Brevium Tam Originalium Quam Judicialium (London, 1634), p. 291b, and in Early Registers of Writs, ed. E. de Haas and G.D.G. Hall (Selden Society, 87, 1970), p. 287, no. 764. See also Excerpta e Rotulis Finium, 1.vi–x on writs ordering inquisitions to be made and now Clare Noble, ‘Writs and the Inquisitions Post Mortem: How the Crown Managed the System’, in Hicks, ed., FifteenthCentury Inquisitions Post Mortem, pp. 183–200.

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issued on 20 January 1268 after the death of William Mauduit, earl of Warwick, spelled out the different elements which made up the value of the estates and into which inquiry should be made – demesnes, services, rents, villeinages and all issues of land, together with knights’ fees and advowson of churches. The resulting inquisition returned information about advowsons on all the demesne manors which it covered. When there was no advowson it said so.78 Of course different escheators responded differently to instructions. When Richard of Cornwall died in 1272 the writ (which the escheator south of Trent cited in his mandates to the subescheators in Oxfordshire and Berkshire and in Essex and Hertfordshire) mentioned advowsons specifically. Some of the advowsons on Richard’s demesne manors were reported in the inquisitions, but not all, and none of the advowsons he had held ‘in gross’ were mentioned. It was said that the church of Newport (Essex) was appropriated by the dean of St Martin le Grand but that the king had the advowson.79 When the writ took a shorter, less detailed form, the escheator had less of a prompt to find out about advowsons. And it was the less detailed form which had become the standard one by the early years of Edward I’s reign. This was, for instance, the form of the writ issued on the death of Roger Bigod in 1270. The resulting inquisitions did give plenty of information about the churches in the earl’s gift but none about the advowsons which had become detached from his demesne manors nor about the identity of other patrons of the churches on those manors.80 Of course the escheator had other guidance when going about his inquisition. The so-called articles of the escheator, the earliest text of which dates from 1262, included questions about ecclesiastical patronage rights.81 A further indication of the items which the escheator had to cover when dealing with an individual manor is provided by the document ‘Extenta Manerii’ which may date from the early years of Edward I’s reign.82 This text is a list of questions which the escheator or other official making a valuation of a manor had to put to the jurors. He had to inquire in detail about the lord’s buildings, lands, and sources of profit, and about his tenants and the liberties he enjoyed. The article of special relevance to the present context was the one about the churches in the lord’s gift: the escheator was to find out how many, which and where they were, and how much they were worth per year. Instructions such as these were perhaps made available to escheators and their subordinates (just as specimen accounts and other instructions were increasingly made available in this period to professional estate administrators) and were kept for reference purposes, so that the same questions were asked in respect of all estates coming into royal control on the death of a tenant in chief. 78 79

80 81 82

TNA C 132/35/13 (C. Inq. PM, 1.212–14 (no. 679)). TNA C 132/42/1 (C. Inq. PM, 1.273–5 (no. 808)). See also the inquiries made in 1275 for the purpose of assigning dower to Richard’s widow, Beatrice of Falkenbourg: TNA C 133/15/10 (C. Inq. PM, 2.125–6 (no. 203)). TNA C 132/38/17 (C. Inq. PM, 1.239–41 (no. 744)). Waugh, ‘Articles of the Escheator’, esp. p. 99. Statutes of the Realm, 1.2.242–3.



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Even so, inquisitions from Edward I’s reign resulting from the writ diem clausit extremum progressively omitted any mention of advowsons. Increasing use was made of the shorter form of the writ, and the local response seems to have been gradually to ignore advowsons although some, perhaps more diligent or experienced, escheators continued to record them.83 The increasingly selective approach is demonstrated by a comparison of the amount of information about ecclesiastical patronage in IPMs on a number of magnates’ estates taken at different times. So, for example, there was plenty of such information in the IPM into the estates of Richard de Clare, earl of Gloucester, in 1262,84 but far less in the IPM on his son Gilbert’s estates in 1295.85 (The writs ordering the 1262 and the 1295 IPMs are no longer attached to the inquisitions themselves.) As far as religious houses went only the abbey of Tewkesbury was mentioned as being of his patronage, in the extent of the manor of Tewkesbury,86 although the Clares had enjoyed rights in many other religious houses too. Likewise on the death of Gilbert’s widow Joan of Acre (who had held the estates jointly with her husband) in 1307 not a single church or monastery was mentioned.87 The writ diem clausit extremum ordering this IPM did not mention patronage as an item of inquiry.88 Comparisons between the inquisitions taken on the lands of Robert de Vere and William de Beauchamp in 1296 and 1298 respectively with those on the lands of their predecessors shows the same pattern.89 The writs were of the shorter, standard form and neither of these IPMs reported any advowson rights at all. But the inquisitions made into the lands of their predecessors in 1263/ 4 and 1268 had recorded plenty of information on the subject.90 No writ survives for the IPM on the estates of Hugh de Vere, but the writ ordering the IPM on William Mauduit’s estates was of the longer form, spelling out the different items which were to be asked about, including the advowson of churches. The writ diem clausit extremum was, however, not the only one which could elicit information about ecclesiastical patronage rights. From the closing years of Henry III’s reign the government began to make selective use of another writ in order to obtain information in IPMs. This was a specific form of the writ certiorari, namely, certiorari de feodis et advocationibus ecclesiarum, which

83

84 85 86 87 88 89 90

For example, the inquisition into the lands of Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford and Essex in 1299 reported that he had the advowsons of Shenfield (Essex) and Amersham (Buckinghamshire): TNA C 133/92/8, mm. 4 and 8 (C. Inq. PM, 3.425 (no. 552)). TNA C 132/27/5–6 (C. Inq. PM, 1.152–61 (nos. 530 and 531)). TNA C 133/77/3 (C. Inq. PM, 3.234–51 (no. 371)). There are three series of membrane numbers in the inquisition; the series are hereafter referenced as 1, 2 and 3. TNA C 133/77/3, m. 1/14 (C. Inq. PM, 3.236). TNA C 133/128–30 (C. Inq. PM 4.311–31 (no. 435)). The writ forms the first membrane of the inquisition. TNA C 133/76/7 (C. Inq. PM, 3.228–30 (no. 637)) and TNA C 133/86/1 (C. Inq. PM, 3.375–7 (no. 477)). TNA C 132/31/1 (C. Inq. PM, 1.185–7 (no. 586)) and TNA C 132/35/13 (C. Inq. PM, 1.212–14 (no. 679)).

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was typically issued after the first writ diem clausit extremum (not instead of it) and which required the escheator to extend the fees and advowsons which had belonged to a tenant in chief, because, as it said, the king wished to be made more certain about their value. The writ was particularly useful when the king needed to divide estates – and the fees and advowsons belonging to them – between co-heirs, as happened, for example, in 1270 after the death of Roger de Quincy, earl of Winchester, when the writ was issued.91 Its potential to generate information about advowsons is shown very clearly in the inquiries made on the death of Edmund, Edward’s brother, in 1296. There were several reasons why Edward I would have wanted to be clear about his brother’s fees and advowsons. First, Edmund’s heir, Thomas, was a minor so Edward could anticipate a period of wardship (albeit fairly brief) 92 of these vast estates. Some of them had been acquired through the forfeiture of the previous owners, Simon de Montfort and Robert Ferrers, which may also have been a motive for finding out more about them. And finally Edmund had left a widow, Blanche of Navarre, to whom dower needed to be assigned. Writs of 3 July 1297 told the escheators to deliver the lands of the earldom of Ferrers to Blanche, and to make an extent of the rest.93 There was no mention of the advowson of churches in the writs and only a limited amount of information about ecclesiastical patronage was returned – that he had no advowsons in Dorset and that he had the patronage of the churches of Stoke on Trent and Wolstanton with their chapels in Staffordshire. Most of the resulting inquiries did not mention advowson of churches.94 But then writs of certiorari de feodis et advocationibus ecclesiarum were sent to the escheators south and north of Trent on 18 and 20 October 1297 respectively.95 These yielded impressive results.96 In most of the resulting inquisitions and extents (which were made on a county basis), either they were listed or it was said explicitly that he had no advowsons in the county being covered.97 For 91 92 93

94

95 96 97

C. Inq. PM, 1.233 and 254–8 (nos. 732 and 776). The text of the writ is in More, Registrum Omnium Brevium, pp. 296b–297. Thomas, Edmund’s son, had seisin of his father’s lands on 8 September 1298: CCR 1296– 1302, p. 174. The writs form membranes 1a and 7a of the inquisition: TNA C 133/81 (C. Inq. PM, 3.288–321 (no. 423)). Cf. CCR 1296–1302, p. 39, where the enrolment of the writ was dated 4 July. The writs did not mention taking the lands into the king’s hand; presumably (given also the time lapse) the escheators had already entered them. TNA C 133/81, mm. 3 and 6 (C. Inq. PM, 3.288 and 290). The layout of the inquisition in the file does not make it clear which of the component inquiries were made in response to which writ, but the returns on membranes 1b–6 and 7b–11 (C. Inq. PM, 3.288–95) appear from their dates and contents to have been made in response to the writs of 3 July. TNA C 133/81, mm. 21 and 34 (C. Inq. PM, 3.306 and 311). Here the discussion is restricted to coverage of ecclesiastical interests, although, as indicated, the writ asked for information about knights’ fees too. Edmund’s advowsons were listed for Derbyshire, Staffordshire and Lancashire: TNA C 133/81, mm. 36–8 (C. Inq. PM, 3.311–15). He was said to have no advowsons in the inquisitions for Herefordshire, Wiltshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire,



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Suffolk and Lincoln, a different approach was taken. Instead of reporting on the earl’s own advowsons, those held by his feudal tenants were recorded, and in Suffolk the values of these churches were recorded too.98 Such information would of course come in very useful if a wardship of the tenant’s estates were to fall in during the king’s tenure of Edmund’s estates, and were to coincide with a vacancy in one of the churches. It would also have been helpful, surely, to know about advowsons in Edmund’s own gift, but no information was given about these in Suffolk and Lincoln. The extent of fees and advowsons in Derbyshire was different again: it covered both Edmund’s own ecclesiastical interests and those of his tenants.99 It is striking that escheators in receipt of the same instructions interpreted them so differently. Another point of interest is that the Derbyshire escheator recorded that Edmund had granted out the advowson of Hartington to the nuns minoresses outside Aldgate. This advowson and that of Duffield (which Edmund did still own at his death) were both said to belong to the honour of Tutbury and not to any demesne manor, even though Edmund had held the manors of Hartington and Duffield in demesne.100 So the escheator was thinking of advowsons as if they belonged to honours rather than individual demesne manors. The same was the case in the returns made in respect of the lands of the earldom of Derby. On 18 April 1298 the escheator south of Trent was ordered to take the honour into the king’s hand, and on 25 April extents were ordered to be made in various counties as to the lands, tenements, knights’ fees and advowsons of churches in Edmund’s possession as of the earldom of Derby. The king’s special concern with the estates of the earldom of Derby was perhaps connected with John Ferrers’ continued attempts to recover the inheritance he had lost. The resulting extents nearly all have some information about Edmund’s advowsons.101 Again, the way in which the information was set out is significant. The writs ordering these extents took a form comparable with earlier, longer forms of diem clausit

Essex, Northamptonshire and Bedfordshire, Rutland, Nottinghamshire (both north and south of Trent), Northumberland and Leicestershire: TNA C 133/81, mm. 22–6, 29–30, 33, 35, 39 and 46 (C. Inq. PM, 3.306–11, 315 and 318–20). The subject of advowsons was not covered in the returns for Norfolk and Warwickshire: TNA C 133/81, mm. 28 and 32 (C. Inq. PM, 3.309–10). The return for Leicestershire is discussed further below, p. 125. 98 TNA C 133/81, mm. 27 and 42 (C. Inq. PM, 3.308–9 and 316–18). 99 TNA C 133/81, m. 36 (C. Inq. PM, 3.311–13). 100 The manors were extended on 12 May 1298: TNA C 133/81, m. 17 and unnumbered membrane following (C. Inq. PM, 3.299–300). 101 TNA C 133/81, mm. 13–14 and 16–18 (C. Inq. PM, 3.296–304). It is possible too that the inquiries into Edmund’s possessions in the wapentake of West Derby (Lancashire), made on 28 May 1298, and in Northumberland, made on 22 May 1298, on mm. 15 and 19 (C. Inq. PM, 3.298–9 and 304–5) resulted from these writs, but neither of them gave any advowson information. Another inquiry which did not mention advowsons was that concerning the manor of Gunthorpe (Nottinghamshire), which was held in wardship, on m. 16 (C. Inq. PM, 3.299). Finally, the summary extent of all Edmund’s Ferrers lands on m. 20 (C. Inq. PM, 3.305–6) did not deal with advowsons.

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extremum, but the ecclesiastical interests were considered as ‘things in themselves’ rather than as appurtenances of manors or parcels of land. So royal officers were responding to the fact that ownership of advowsons had in practice often become separated from the ownership of the manors in which the churches were situated. It made sense to gather advowson information in one place rather than piecemeal, manor by manor. Royal inquisitions needed to be more systematic in approach at a time when the Crown was seeking to make the most of wardship patronage. Advowsons were treated in the same way in the extents resulting from the writ of 25 April 1298, and, because the extents dealt with the earl’s demesne lands as well, the separation of advowsons from the manors to which they belonged – when they did so belong – is even more striking.102 Advowsons held by reason of the honour of Tutbury tended to be grouped together, while the demesne manors were extended separately. Similar certiorari writs are also found in other important inquisitions of Edward’s reign, such as that into the vast estates of the earldom of Cornwall which Edward acquired by inheritance on his cousin’s death in 1300, and the investigation into the lands of Roger Bigod, who had entailed his lands on the king in the event of his dying childless, as he did in 1306.103 In both these cases it was important to have full information because the deaths of these earls meant a windfall of estates which were henceforth to belong to the Crown. So the IPMs on the estates of tenants in chief increasingly produced impressive lists of advowson and patronage rights. Of course the significance of rights in particular churches or religious houses depended on the value of the institution itself. A topic of great interest in relation to inquisitions are the valuations of churches they contain, which were made for that very reason. The escheators (or the jurors) sometimes struggled with the distinction between the value of the church and the value of the advowson. The inquisition into Gilbert de Clare’s estates in Surrey in early 1296, for instance, said that the advowsons of the chapel of Woldingham and of the churches of Blechingley and Chipstead were worth 20s, £20 and 25 marks (£16 13s 4d) respectively ‘when they fell in’.104 This was a reference to the right to present during vacancies but it implied that on such occasions the patron actually derived an income – which of course he should not have done. Much more usually the churches themselves were valued and their annual worth would be given. Occasionally changes in annual income would be hinted at. Churches were sometimes said to be worth a given amount ‘in normal years’. The church of Llanharry (Monmouthshire) on the Clare estates was said in 1296 to have been worth 60s ‘before the war’.105 Some102 This was especially the case in the returns for Northamptonshire, Leicestershire, Derbyshire

and Staffordshire: TNA C 133/81, mm. 13–14 and 17–18 (C. Inq. PM, 3.296–7, 300 and 302). 103 TNA C 133/95–7 (C. Inq. PM, 3.456–89 (no. 604)) and TNA C133/127 (C. Inq. PM, 4.290–310 (no. 434)). The exchequer enrolment of the Cornwall inquisition, TNA E 352/8, is occasionally useful in supplying information missing from the chancery inquisition. 104 TNA C 133/77/3, m. 1/23–4. 105 TNA C 133/77/3, m. 3/17. The inquisition is calendared in C. Inq. PM, 3.234–51 (no.



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times the report was compelling in its frankness: the chapel of Stoke St Edwald (Dorset) on the estates of George de Cantilupe was said in 1274 scarcely to suffice to feed a single chaplain.106 In 1258 the tithes and demesne lands forming the endowment of the chapel at Standen Chaworth (Wiltshire) on Patrick de Chaworth’s estates were set out, with a note that 2s yearly were payable to the prior of Ogbourne (Wiltshire) to support the chantry.107 Occasionally there is some indication in inquisitions as to how these valuations had been made. Most of the churches on John Courtenay’s estates were valued ‘by extent’ in the inquisition of 1274, but that of Hemington (Somerset) was valued at 18 marks (£12) per year ‘secundum synodalem taxationem’ (‘according to the synodal assessment’).108 The church of Sutton Courtenay (Berkshire) on the estates of Hugh Courtenay was said in 1292 to be worth 100 marks (£66 13s 4d) per year ‘in all issues and profits’.109 Amersham (Buckinghamshire), in the gift of Humphrey de Bohun, was said in 1299 to be worth 50 marks (£33 6s 8d) per year, ‘in itself by an extent according to the true value’.110 In the inquisition covering the lands of Hugh de Vere, earl of Oxford, in 1263/ 4, the churches of Castle Camps, Great Abington (Cambridgeshire) and Doddinghurst (Essex) were valued ‘by the old assessment’, while Downham (Cambridgeshire) was assessed ‘by the old estimation’.111 These may have been references to the papal taxation of 1254, the so-called Valuation of Norwich (after Walter of Suffield, bishop of Norwich, who was commissioned to make the assessment), or to an earlier papal valuation.112 For Castle Camps and Great Abington, the valuations in the IPMs were not out of line with the 1254 assessments (if we take into account the portions in these churches held by the prior of Hatfield Regis (Essex)). That for Downham coincided exactly with it, but in the case of Doddinghurst the valuation in the IPM was much higher than in the papal valuation.113 Other inquisitions reporting the values of churches in

371). Much of the detail about valuations of churches was omitted in early calendars of IPMs, but references to calendared versions are given here for the sake of completeness. 106 TNA C 133/2/7, m. 13. The inquisition is calendared in C. Inq. PM, 2.16–21 (no. 17). 107 C. Inq. PM, 1.114 (no. 417). 108 TNA C 133/6/1, mm. 7, 8, 9, 12, 14, 15, 17, 18. The inquisition is calendared in C. Inq. PM, 1.50–3 (no. 71). 109 TNA C 133/62/7, m. 20. The inquisition is calendared in C. Inq. PM, 3.23–30 (nos. 31 and 32). 110 TNA C 133/92/8, m. 8. The inquisition is calendared in C. Inq. PM, 3.424–6 (no. 552). 111 TNA C 132/31/1, mm. 6–7, 17 and 18. In the case of Castle Camps the value, 12 marks (£8) was specified as ‘the parson’s part’. The inquisition is calendared in C.  Inq.  PM, 1.185–7 (no. 586). 112 See W.E. Lunt, The Valuation of Norwich (Oxford, 1926), for a discussion of thirteenthcentury papal assessments. 113 Lunt, Valuation of Norwich, pp. 226–7 and 340. Castle Camps and Great Abington were assessed at £12 and £10 respectively in a fragment which is probably part of a papal valuation made in 1217: Lunt, Valuation of Norwich, p. 536.

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Norfolk and Suffolk sometimes referred specifically to the Norwich valuation, suggesting that escheators in East Anglia were familiar with it.114 In fact a comparison of a sample set of values in IPMs with those in contemporary papal assessments, namely, the Valuation of Norwich and the Taxatio of Nicholas IV of 1291–92, shows that they rarely coincided exactly, but that they were not out of line either.115 This is important, because it suggests that valuations in IPMs were not on the whole lifted from the most recent papal assessments. The comparison with the 1291 Taxatio is particularly interesting because this was taken by both the papacy and royal government as the basis for taxation of the English clergy for the rest of the medieval period.116 It may be suggested, if the valuations were indeed made independently, that the broad alignment of the results lends credence to both forms of evidence. Preliminary study of the values of churches in fourteenth-century inquisitions in comparison with the Taxatio of 1291 confirms this picture, and, clearly, this is a topic that would merit further research in order to understand more fully how these valuations were made and what they might tell us about patterns of agricultural prosperity in later medieval England. After all, the value of churches was based largely on tithes which were in turn based on agricultural output.117 In this connection we may note the huge variations in the values of parish churches in the gift of magnates. Some were worth just a few shillings; others £100 or more. Churches on the Yorkshire estates of Peter of Savoy, not just those of his own advowson but those of his feudal subtenants too, tended to be of high value.118 The churches on Edmund of Lancaster’s estates in Staffordshire, Derbyshire and Lancashire also tended to be of high value. Churches on the Clare family estates in Wales tended to be poor, and there were many churches of small value on the Bigod estates in East Anglia. It seems, from the evidence studied so far, that it was the region rather than the status of the patron that made the difference, but this, too, is a subject that would merit further study. We are sometimes able to compare the valuations given in successive inquisitions on the same estates. Again, the values do not seem to have been habitually lifted from earlier ones as may have happened with valuations of estates in IPMs of a later period, but were generated afresh each time. For example, comparison between the values of churches as reported in the inquisition taken into the estates of the earldom of Norfolk in 1270 and those in the inquisitions of 1307 shows that churches occurring in both were rarely valued at the same amount. Twenty churches were valued in both inquisitions and the values of only two coincide.119 114 E.g.

C. Inq. PM, 2.404 (no. 653) and 4.393–4 (no. 513). Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 535–56. 116 R. Graham, ‘The Taxation of Pope Nicholas IV’, EHR, 34 (1919), 434–54, reprinted in English Ecclesiastical Studies (1929), pp.  271–301 (p.  271) and Lunt, Financial Relations, pp. 346–55. 117 J.H. Denton, ‘The Valuation of Ecclesiastical Benefices of England and Wales in 1291–2’, Historical Research, 66 (1993), 231–50 (p. 231). 118 TNA C 133/26/6 (calendared, without the values, in C. Inq. P.M, 2.210–23 (no. 381)). 119 TNA C 132/38/17 and TNA C133/127 (calendared, without the values, in C. Inq. P.M, 115 See



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Moreover when churches were valued twice in the same inquisition, in response to different writs, they were not always valued at the same amount.120 There is an exception to this: the values of six churches on the Tattershall estates were valued in 1307–8 at the same amounts as they had been in 1304, but this is perhaps not surprising because the interval between the inquisitions was so brief.121 Escheators sometimes reported on other things as well as the value, such as whether there was likely to be a chance to present. The 1263 IPM on the lands of Baldwin de l’Isle, earl of Devon, reported that the church of Yarmouth (Isle of Wight) was said to be worth 100s in normal years, but added that it was not vacant.122 In an inquisition into the lands of Roger de Quincy, earl of Winchester, in 1270 (in response to a certiorari writ of 16 July 1270), it was said that the earl had given (‘contulit’) half the church of Croxton (Lincolnshire) to Master Adam of Norfolk, who was still alive. In a later inquiry made as a result of another certioriari writ of 2 November it was said that Roger had had the advowson of two-thirds of the church; the other third was in the gift of Richard de Buslingtorp who had given it to the chaplain William Brandon. The later inquisition recorded the name of the incumbent at Eynesbury (Huntingdonshire) who had been presented by the countess of Derby and noted that a Cambridgeshire church was vacant.123 In the inquisition into William de Say’s lands in 1272 the names of the incumbents of all three churches of which William was said to be patron were given.124 On Philip Marmion’s estates in 1292 an inquisition recorded that there were six prebends in the church of Tamworth (Staffordshire) and the names of each of the holders, including the dean, were given.125 Finally, in the inquisition into John de Lovetot’s lands in 1295 it was 1.239–4 (no. 744) and 4.290–310 (no. 434)). example, some of the churches in the gift of Edmund of Lancaster were extended not only in response to the writs of 3 July 1297 or the writs of certiorari of October 1297 but also in response to the writ regarding the Ferrers lands of 25 April 1298. It was the valuations made in response to the first two of these writs which were taken as definitive when they differed from those given in response to the last one. This is apparent from the summary of advowsons, with the valuations of the churches, reproduced in a schedule at the end of the inquisition: TNA C 133 /81, m. 49. 121 TNA C 133/109, mm. 16 and 18 and C 133/123(12), mm. 13 and 17. The churches were Roydon (10 marks per year), Stanhoe (£10 per year), Attleborough (two parts worth 40 marks per year), St Mary Congham (100s per year), Tattershall (£20 per year), and Maltby (20 marks per year). Even here three further churches in Norfolk were listed in the 1304 inquisition but not the later one, namely, Denton, Tasburgh and Topcroft. The inquisitions are calendared in C. Inq. PM, 4.103–8 and 257–666 (nos. 163 and 391). 122 TNA C 132/29/2, m. 22. The inquisition is calendared in C. Inq. PM, 1.175 (no. 564). 123 TNA C 132/38/5, m. 2 (C. Inq. PM, 1.233 (no. 732)) and TNA C 132/40/9, mm. 11, 13 and 20 (C. Inq. PM, 1.255 and 256 (no. 776)). It is not clear that the right to present to the Cambridgeshire church would have come to the king with Roger’s lands. The Cambridgeshire church may have been Trumpington, to which Henry presented in 1270 by reason of custody of the de Quincy fees and advowsons: CPR 1266–72, pp. 471 and 488. 124 C. Inq. PM, 1.281–2 (no. 813). 125 C. Inq. PM, 3.21 (no. 29). 120 For

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explained that there was a dispute between the abbot of Selby and the patron of the church over the tithes of Adlingfleet.126 The case study made of the earldom of Cornwall enables us, finally, to comment on the completeness of the information about advowsons in one (very large) inquisition of the period. The advowsons of twenty-four churches, one collegiate church and two endowed castle chapels and of one-fifth of two churches were included, as was the patronage of seven religious houses.127 This, in fact, represented by far the major part of the earl’s ecclesiastical interests at this point. Other evidence indicates that he may have had a handful more advowsons of churches and the patronage of another four, or possibly five, religious houses. Two of the religious houses were Cistercian, and it was not usual for patrons to enjoy formal rights in houses of this order.128 There were also three instances in which the earl was said to have had rights which he or his father had in fact granted out during their lifetime.129 The quality of the information in IPMs about patronage of religious houses was very variable. As with advowson rights, such information was more likely to be included when there was the prompt of a certiorari writ, but the fact of patronage was often stated without an explanation of what it meant or any information about the house itself. When more information was forthcoming, it was diverse in nature. Sometimes the number of inhabitants was given, or the annual value of the place. Sometimes the origin of the patron’s rights was explained. For example the abbey of Tintern and the priory of Chepstow (Monmouthshire) were said in Roger Bigod’s IPM of early 1307 to be of the foundation of his ancestors.130 Occasionally the possessions which the house held of the patron were enumerated, as for Bicester priory in the IPM on Henry de Lacy’s estates in 1311.131 The right most commonly mentioned when any specific right was referred to was that of custody during vacancies. The amount 3.134 (no. 207). C 133/95–7, E 352/8 (C. Inq. PM, 3.456–89 (no. 604)) and Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 470–500. 128 The churches were Hambleden (which was held as the marriage portion of Margaret, Edmund’s wife), Lydford, Perranarworthal, and, possibly, St Michael’s and St Peter’s in Wallingford (the Wallingford churches were included in the IPMs of 1272 but Edmund did not himself present to them). The religious houses were Hailes, Goring, Rewley, Studley and, possibly, Brooke: see Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 471–3, 477, 482–3 and 490–3. 129 Edmund was said in 1300 to have had the right of custody of the priory of St Michael’s Mount and the advowson of Mixbury (Oxfordshire), but he had renounced his right to the issues of the priory and had granted the advowson of Mixbury to the see of Rochester. Richard of Cornwall was said in 1272 to have had the advowson of the chapel of Cippenham (Buckinghamshire) which he had granted to the nunnery of Burnham: see Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 473, 478 and 493. 130 TNA C 133/127, m. 25 (C. Inq. PM, 4.299). 131 TNA C 134/22, m. 18 (C. Inq. PM, 5.156). The implications were similar in the inquisitions made into Edmund of Lancaster’s lands in 1297 and 1298 where the possessions of the priory of Lancaster were recorded under the marginal heading ‘Elemosina’ and those of the abbey of Merevale (Warwickshire) and the priory of St John, Chester, under the 126 C. Inq. PM, 127 TNA



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of detail given about John Tregoz’s rights at Ewyas Harold (Herefordshire) was unusual: during vacancies the lord was to have a man in the priory, and the abbot of Gloucester another. When the abbot had appointed a prior he was to be presented to the lord (that is, the patron) and the prior was then to find a monk or chaplain to celebrate divine service every day in the castle chapel at Ewyas Harold.132 In a partition of Robert of Tattershall’s estates made in 1309 or earlier the advowson of Wymondham (Norfolk) was said to include the bread and ale which the lord ought to receive on every visit.133 Spiritual services resulting from patronage rights were occasionally recorded on their own account: Roger Bigod’s patronage of Chepstow was also said to oblige the prior to provide a monk to celebrate divine service three days a week in the earl’s castle at Chepstow.134 There was considerable preoccupation, however, with the financial worth of patronage in IPMs. In 1298 Richard FitzJohn’s patronage of Shouldham priory (Norfolk) was said to be worth nothing, unless in prayers and orisons; his advowson of the hospital of Tilbury (Essex) was said to have no net worth and that of the priory of Snelshall (Buckinghamshire) to be worth nothing.135 That financial benefits were considered to be of the greatest importance is suggested in an undated extent and appraisement of Edmund of Lancaster’s fees and advowsons in Leicestershire, probably made in early 1298.136 The escheator did not make an extent of the abbeys of Leicester and Garendon although he recorded the fact of Edmund’s patronage, because, as he said, the patron got no profit from either.137 A report that a house provided no income to the patron was common in IPMs. What seems clear is that a deliberate effort was being put in at the centre to obtain the best possible information about patronage rights, even if, at a local level, the government’s requirements were not always fully understood. It is interesting too that the information about advowsons was used as well as collected. In the inquisition on the lands of Edmund Mortimer in 1305 several of the individual inquisitions reporting on advowsons are endorsed ‘advocatio’ or ‘presentatio ecclesie’, perhaps for the chancery clerks’ ease of reference.138 But of course the king did not rely solely on IPMs for information. This is clear from dower assignments and from royal presentations made during periods of wardship. For instance, on 12 November 1258 Alice de Lacy was granted certain heading ‘De advocationibus, etc, vel alterius elemosine’: TNA C 133/81, mm. 11 and 15 (C. Inq. PM, 3.295 and 299). 132 C. Inq. PM, 3.455 (no. 603). 133 C Inq. PM, 4.265 (no. 391) and see also CCR 1307–13, p. 100. 134 TNA C 133/127, m. 25 (C. Inq. PM, 4.299). 135 TNA C 133/80/6, mm. 18, 20, 24 and 33 (calendared without this detail in C. Inq. PM, 3.281–8 (no. 422)). 136 TNA C 133/81, m. 46 (C. Inq. PM, 3.318–20). The extent appears from its contents to have been made in response to the writ certiorari of 18 October 1297. 137 TNA C 133/81, m. 46 (C. Inq. PM, 3.320). 138 TNA C 133/114/8, mm. 29, 31, 32, 33, 35 and 39 (calendared, without this information, in C. Inq. PM, 4.157–66 (no. 235)).

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of the fees and advowsons which had belonged to her husband Edmund until such time as dower should be assigned to her, yet no fees or advowsons had been mentioned in the inquisition on his lands.139 And the churches mentioned in the inquisition made into the lands of John Fitzalan in 1272 were not the only ones to which the king presented during the course of his wardship of John’s lands.140 Naturally the king benefited from making presentations to churches during periods of wardship – this was why he came to retain advowsons when he granted them out. But it was vital for the heir as well. As we saw earlier, bishops’ registers frequently noted that a patron had presented by reason of wardship of estates during the minority of the heir, and by doing so preserved a record of the minor’s interest. So it is not surprising that the family or its representative would sometimes draw the overlord’s attention to the need to present. Thus, it was on the information of Henry de Percy, one of the earl of Surrey’s executors, that on 1 April 1305 Edward I presented to Gresham (Norfolk) in his gift by reason of the lands of the earldom of Surrey.141 Sometimes the case would be made for presenting a particular clerk to the vacant benefice. We saw earlier how Alice of Hainault, Roger Bigod’s widow, sought a royal presentation to Kirton for William of Knottingley.142 It was natural that Alice should write to the chancellor who played a central role in royal presentations to benefices.143 Entries in the patent rolls show that it was very often chancery officials who gave information leading to royal presentations, but royal officers administering wardships on the ground must have played their part too. Mistakes were still made. The king sometimes presented to churches of which he had assigned the advowson in dower, and then had to revoke his action.144 Keeping track of rights in monasteries must have been even more difficult, because they were so diverse and because they may have been less relevant to the holder of a wardship. Spiritual services such as prayers for the founder and his heirs were doubtless in this category. Sometimes the king would reassure religious houses, following an inquisition, that he would only exercise the rights that the usual

1258–66, pp. 4–5, where the advowsons are listed. C 132/42/5 (C. Inq. PM, 1.278–9 (no. 812)). The benefices to which Edward presented during his custody of the Fitzalan estates were the church of North Stoke (Sussex), a portion in Chichester cathedral, a portion of the church of Wrockwardine (Shropshire), the chapels of St George and St Martin in Arundel castle (Sussex), prebends in the church of Wroxeter, the church of Llanyblodwel and the chapel of Oswestry castle (all Shropshire): CPR 1272–81, pp. 11, 58, 77, 80, 82, 85, 161, 234 and 248 and CPR 1281–92, pp.  32 and 52–3. In addition Edward presented to Bedstone (Shropshire) by reason of his custody of the land and heir of Walter de Jay, who held it of Richard Fitzalan: CPR 1281–92, p. 57. 141 CPR 1301–7, p. 323 and see also pp. 442 and 476. 142 TNA SC 1/25/189 and see above, Chapter 2, p. 55 and Chapter 3, p. 82. 143 See esp. Hartridge, ‘Edward I’s Exercise of the Right of Presentation’, p. 173 and Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, pp. 217–19. 144 E.g. CPR 1258–66, p. 6 and see also pp. 4–5 and CPR 1281–92, p. 170. 139 CPR

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patron had done. For instance the patronage of Thornton (Lincolnshire) came into royal hands with the estates of Avelina de Forz. Edward I granted in 1284 that he would observe the custom of the founders and their successors: he would grant licence to elect on their petition and would take no profit. He would, however, appoint one servant to keep the gate and another the guest-house.145 Sometimes the royal inquisition represents all we know about the position at the house concerned, but in one instance, where we can compare with what was done previously, it does look as if an opportunity was being taken to shake off a burdensome patronage right. The patronage of the priory of Eye (Suffolk) came into Edward I’s hands on the death of Edmund, earl of Cornwall, and was said in the IPM to belong to the honour of Eye. No patronage rights were recorded. At the time of Edmund’s death the priory was vacant, and had been for some time. Edmund had had the custody from 8 April 1294 until 29 November 1295 when it was interrupted by the royal seizure of alien priories during the AngloFrench war. The custody was restored to him on 24 April following, after an inquisition taken by the treasurer and barons of the exchequer. Accounts of the earls’ officials’ custody of the house and its manors for August 1296 to August 1297 and 21 November 1297 to 21 April 1298 make it clear that subsequently he fully exercised the right of custody.146 The patronage of Eye was assigned to the earl’s widow as dower, so royal administration was not directly concerned with the continuing vacancy in 1300–1.147 At the next vacancy, however, in 1313, the escheator south of Trent and the bailiffs of the honour of Eye took the house into the king’s hands. The subprior and convent complained that this was unprecedented, and so an inquiry was ordered into the position in the priory during voidance. The ensuing inquisition led to a royal order of 10 August to the effect that the issues of the priory were not to be taken by custodians during voidance. Only a gatekeeper, who was to have ample sustenance from the house, should be appointed as a sign of dominion.148 This was in fact what the subprior and convent had claimed initially was usual, but it seems difficult to reconcile it with the fact of the earl’s custody earlier on. One possibility is that the earl had made a concession to the house, which he did actually do at Burnham and St Michael’s Mount.149 It may have been that such a concession was to take effect after the vacancy which began in 1296. Yet, it seems strange that the subprior and convent did not mention this, if such were the case. To summarise: the treatment of patronage rights in IPMs of the period shows a development of procedure. In early IPMs of Henry III’s reign ecclesiastical interests tended to be recorded as appurtenances of manors and information Inq. Misc., 1.284 (no. 1325) and CPR 1281–92, p.  122. The surviving IPMs after Avelina’s death in 1274 do not cover the patronage of Thornton: C. Inq. PM, 2.86–7 and 483–4 (nos. 130 and 792). 146 Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 2.156–8 and TNA SC 6/996/12, mm. 4–5. See also above, Chapter 2, pp. 65–6. 147 CCR 1296–1302, p. 439. 148 C. Inq. Misc., 2.43 (no. 178) and CCR 1313–18, p. 9. 149 See below, Chapter 6, p. 161. 145 C.

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about them was elicited through the writ diem clausit extremum, which at that time was variable in form. As the period progressed, the adoption of a certiorari writ enabled the king to obtain a much more thorough coverage of the fees and ecclesiastical interests on particular estates when he needed to do so. At a time when advowsons only partially coincided with the lordship of manors this was an appropriate recourse but it tended to further separate them from those manors in the resulting record, attributing them instead to the lordship of whole honours. The writ tended, not surprisingly, to be used when the king had acquired estates by inheritance or entailment, or when a long period of wardship was anticipated, and, sometimes, when he had to assign dower. The quality of information returned was variable as regards religious houses, but valuations of churches were made with care and were certainly not merely lifted from earlier valuations undertaken by the escheator or his predecessor in office, or from available papal valuations. The IPM evidence and royal use of wardship patronage show clearly that it was the king’s intention fully to exercise his rights – and sometimes more. When he acquired the patronage of the deanery of St Buryan in Cornwall and of Wallingford castle chapel he claimed that they were exempt from episcopal authority. 150 This was building on existing royal policy of increasing the number of such exempt royal chapels, and indeed, a clerical petition of 1295 spoke of what happened to endowed prebends in castle chapels when magnate estates came into the king’s hands. The lords, it said, had been used to present suitable clerks to the bishop as had happened at Hastings and elsewhere. Now, with regard to recently acquired escheats, the king was not content to allow bishops to admit and institute clerks to them as the original lords had done but wished, rather, to confer them on his own authority.151 So, the Crown was setting itself ever further apart from other lay patrons in terms of the quality and nature of its patronage. Other developments relevant to the king’s special status as patron were his acquisition of rights in Welsh bishoprics formerly enjoyed by marcher lords, the use of the royal prerogative whereby time did not run against the king in advowson cases, and the fact that the king could not be sued in his own court in respect of his patronage rights. Against this, were the magnates merely ‘ordinary’ lay patrons?

150 Denton, 151 See

English Royal Free Chapels, pp. 116 and 124–6 and VCH Cornwall, 2:esp. 163–6. Councils and Synods, 2.2.1144–5.

5 Speaking With One Voice

Magnates were still the most important lay patrons. Individually, they were patrons of many churches, not just one or two. They had patronage rights in religious houses, some of them of great wealth and importance. And their influence over clerical appointments extended well beyond their formally constituted rights, reflecting their standing and their connections with prelates and the Crown. We need now to look at how that influence played out when issues relating to patronage were at the forefront in politics. We know very well that the later thirteenth century was a formative period in Church–State relations, particularly in terms of papal provisions, the so-called ‘alien priories’ and the taxation of the clergy. All of those had implications for the patrons who had endowed the ecclesiastical institutions which were affected by them. The magnates were called upon to play an active part in relation to these matters and the evidence enables us to infer what their views may have been. Did the Crown manage to harness the support of the magnates in its policies towards the Church? And, if so, why was that support forthcoming? The first point to establish is whether or not the magnates were involved in the formulation of royal policies. Clearly, from 1258–65 during the baronial reform movement and civil war there had been occasions on which certain magnates had dominated royal policy and had compromised the king’s decisionmaking powers. But in terms of policies affecting lay patrons it is the reign of Edward I that is of special interest, and so it is for his reign that we need to examine whether he acted with the support of the magnates. The best evidence as to whether magnates were with the king – and so had the opportunity to counsel him – is in the witness lists to royal charters. I have demonstrated elsewhere that many of the earls were regular attestors of Edward I’s charters, especially those given at times of parliaments and councils, and that earls supported Edward’s military campaigns.1 The magnates’ presence at the king’s side was, in Edward’s reign, above all in response to royal summonses. This was not an age when constant attendance on the king was expected or desired; and the 1

Gemmill, ‘The King’s Companions’, pp. 143–4. References in this chapter to the occasions when magnates witnessed royal charters are to the enrolled charters. The witness lists to Edward I’s charters have been published in full, with a scholarly introduction, by R. Huscroft in ‘The Royal Charter Witness Lists of Edward I (1272–1307)’, List and Index Society, 279 (2000).

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magnates needed to be on their own estates, involved with their own affairs, and sometimes looking after the king’s interests elsewhere in the kingdom. Certain magnates were, however, at the king’s side more frequently and beyond the formal requirements. These were William de Valence, Edmund of Lancaster, Gilbert de Clare, Henry de Lacy, and Otto de Grandisson – mostly, that is, the king’s blood relatives and friends. It is true that Gilbert de Clare’s relations with Edward were rather more equivocal, certainly in the period after 1290; and indeed he appeared much less often as a witness after 1292.2 Although explicit evidence that the magnates counselled the king is encountered only rarely, and mainly in chronicles, we can nevertheless say that they did have the opportunity to express their opinions to the king and to present and seek redress of their grievances. So, when grievances were said to be theirs, when legislation was said to have been enacted at their prompting and with their participation – even though we know that the king stressed their backing to add weight to what he did – there is reason, in the evidence of the witness lists, to show that it may well have been true. In fact the first occasion when the magnates had the chance to air their views on issues of Church–State relations came before Edward I’s arrival back in England after his crusade of 1270–4. On 31 March 1272 Pope Gregory X gave notice of a general council of the Church, which eventually took place at Lyons in sessions during the months of May, June and July 1274.3 Summonses were issued to the clergy, and lay rulers were invited. Since the king was still away, the involvement of the magnates in government must have been instrumental, and more significant, perhaps, than it was to be on his return. Their role was to protect the king’s peace and to guard the realm until his return; indeed it was the magnates who proclaimed Edward I as king.4 Perhaps too the combination of a new king, a new pope, and the forthcoming general council made for an especially hopeful time for redressing grievances, even those of long standing. These included papal provisions (when the pope, overriding the rights of the usual patron, ‘provided’ benefices) and financial demands. Objections to these had been raised on the occasion of the first general council of the Church, held at Lyons in 1245. Arguably, the magnates had at that time played a more pro-active part in formulating the grievances for dispatch to the pope. On that earlier occasion, a list of those summoned to the council included (as well as archbishops, bishops, the abbots of major abbeys, and the kings of England and Scotland) a number of individually named English magnates, that is, the Earl Marshal, the earls of Richmond, Cornwall, Albemarle, Lincoln and Hereford and Hugh d’Aubigny.5 Moreover a letter of complaint was written on behalf of the barons, knights and the 2 3 4

5

Gemmill, ‘The King’s Companions’, p. 146. Councils and Synods, 2.2.809–10. Foedera, 1.2.497. For Edward’s decision not to hurry back, and for the business he dealt with on his journey home, see Marc Morris, A Great and Terrible King: Edward I and the Forging of Britain (London, 2008), pp. 103–10. CPL, 1.195.



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whole baronage of England, from Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk, William de Cantilupe, John FitzGeoffrey, Ralph FitzNicholas, and Philip Basset, barons, who were said to be proctors of the English baronage. The letter complained then about papal financial exactions and papal provisions, and particularly the activities of Master Martin, the papal nuncio. They referred specifically to the fact that their ancestors had endowed monasteries with lands and churches to support religious practice. Instead of those churches being given to clerks who were to serve them and protect them from the depredations of outsiders, Italians were provided by the pope and his predecessors. They did not protect the patrons, or see to the care of souls, or exercise hospitality but rather sent the income abroad. The relatives of the baronage and other deserving persons who were used to receiving benefices and who would have performed the spiritual offices attached to them were thereby prevented from doing so.6 Of particular interest is the focus on churches in the patronage of ecclesiastical patrons. We have seen already how reliant the nobility were on benefices in the gift of religious houses of their patronage. Here the needs of the relatives of barons were most stressed. What is also striking is that there is no suggestion that papal provisions were impinging on the rights of lay patrons. This is not surprising. There is very little evidence that the papacy provided benefices that were normally in the gift of lay patrons.7 Where the printed papal letters do show such interference it was usually because there was some uncertainty over the ownership of the advowson. In 1227, for example, Gregory IX had ordered the archbishop of Canterbury to assign the church of Catfield in the diocese of Norwich to Bernardinus de Setia, said to be a papal writer. The church was in the patronage of the abbot and convent of St Benet, Hulme and of G. de Munchensy, who had given it to his clerk Geoffrey. The bishop’s official had given him custody, but the bishop had refused to admit him – whereupon the abbot and convent had granted the church to Bernardinus.8 So it was not 6

7

8

The text of the barons’ proctors’ letter to the council is in Councils and Synods, 2.1.392–5 (and see also pp. 395–7). For the status of the proctors see pp. 388 and 402. For papal provisions and financial demands in this period, see esp. Smith, Episcopal Appointments, pp. 53–5, Lunt, Financial Relations, pp. 206–25 and 250–5, F.M. Powicke, Henry III and the Lord Edward: The Community of the Realm in the Thirteenth Century, 2 vols (Oxford, 1947), 1:274–89 and 356–8, and Councils and Synods, 2.1.388–90. On the subject of papal provisions in general, see G. Barraclough, Papal Provisions (Oxford, 1935), and P. Heath, Church and Realm, 1272–1461 (London, 1988), pp. 125–32. On the relationship between papal provisions and the growing amount of royal ecclesiastical patronage, see Deeley, ‘Papal Provision and Royal Rights of Patronage’, 497–527, and Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, passim, and ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage from Winchelsey to Stratford’, pp. 95–114. There had earlier been papal concessions giving special treatment of benefices in the gift of lay patrons: see CPL, 1.130, Paris, Chronica, 3.613–14, and Foedera, 1.1.256. See also Deeley, ‘Papal Provisions and Royal Rights of Patronage’, esp. 505–6, Smith, Episcopal Appointments, pp.  54 and 81–3, Powicke, Henry III and the Lord Edward, 1:279, and Saunders, ‘Royal Ecclesiastical Patronage in England’, esp. p. 371. CPL, 1.117–18.

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a papal provision, as such, but rather confirmation of the action of the ecclesiastical patron. In January 1304 there was a disagreement about a York prebend which the pope claimed had been held by Archbishop Henry Newark, who had now died, and to which the pope had provided him. It was claimed, however, that the vacant prebend had been held by Amadeus de St John and that William de Ros was patron.9 The rights of lay patrons also featured in the complaints to the second general council of the Church in 1274. For their concerns at that time we have no letter equivalent to that for the 1245 council.10 We do, however, have a rough guide as to royal and baronial grievances in the form of a list of proposals for discussion in the king’s council in March 1274. This was held in preparation for the Church council which was to take place a few weeks later. Some of the items were in the form of instructions to be given to the proctors who were to attend the council, some were mere notes of topics to be discussed, while some were in the form of a partially drafted address to the pope.11 We do not know which of the magnates was present in the royal council that discussed the proposals (in the king’s absence there were no royal charters, hence no witness lists) but the interests of the earls, barons and the community of the realm were represented at the Lyons Council by royal appointees whose expenses were paid by the king.12 The proctors were the barons John Fitzjohn and John de Vaux, together with John Wyger and Master Ralph of Marlow.13 Many issues were brought up for discussion in the king’s council, but only some mentioned specifically what the problems were. The extent of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, the possibility that a subsidy for the Holy Land might be demanded, papal reservations of benefices, prohibitions, payment of tribute – all these were objects of concern. Of these, it was papal reservation of benefices which concerned lay patrons most directly. Complaints about reservations were, as we have seen, certainly not new, but a recent papal constitution had marked an important stage in the papal claim to provide to benefices, and was referred to in the proposals. This was the constitution Licet Ecclesiarum of 1265, issued by Clement IV, which reserved to the pope the provision of all benefices which fell vacant apud sedem apostolicam, that is, when the incumbent was at, or travelling to or from, the papal court.14 In practice, as we have seen, the papacy respected the rights of lay patrons, but even so, the rehearsal in the preamble to Licet Ecclesiarum of the theory that it was the pope’s right to dispose of all ecclesiastical benefices may well have been seen as a threat. 9 10 11 12 13 14

CPL, 1.608. See Councils and Synods, 2.1.391–2: it is suggested that the versions of the letter that have come down to us were made later on. Councils and Synods, 2.2.811–14. For a discussion of these articles, see Powicke, Henry III and the Lord Edward, 2:713–15. Councils and Synods, 2.2.810. CPR 1272–81, p. 46. Sext., 3.tit. 4, c. 2, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.1021.



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As in 1245, the 1274 list of proposals for discussion made it clear that it was benefices usually in the gift of ecclesiastical patrons, to which the king and the barons were on occasion able to present, which were felt to be affected by the papal constitution. It explained that when a person died at the apostolic see or while he was journeying to or from it, the king lost out on custodies and the barons ‘similarly’ lost out in terms of parish churches. Many such churches, it said, were in the gift of ecclesiastical patrons, but the king and barons were patrons and founders of religious establishments and in many cases had the right to present to the churches normally in the gift of the institution in question. The death of a denizen could be immediately known, but the death of a foreigner was far more difficult to establish and an Italian who died abroad would be replaced by an Italian. Perusal of thirteenth-century papal registers shows that papal provisions affected both cathedral prebends and benefices in the gift of religious houses. One means of provision was that the pope would instruct a bishop or a head of house to provide a papal nominee to a benefice in the gift of the see or house. Sometimes the mandate specified a benefice normally given to a secular clerk, which seems to have meant one that was not appropriated and therefore one which the lay patrons might have had their eye on. For example in 1263 the pope ordered the prior and convent of Lewes to provide some benefice usually assigned to secular clerks to Simon of Reigate, clerk of the diocese of Winchester.15 It was possible, therefore, that the right of a patron who had custody of the temporalities of the see or of the religious house during vacancy would have been affected by papal provisions. If a benefice to which the pope claimed to provide should fall vacant during a vacancy in the see or house itself, the papal provision would override the patron’s right to present by reason of his custody of the temporalities. A telling entry from the papal registers is from 1267, when the pope asked the legate Ottobon to inform him as to which benefices Philip, count of Burgundy had held when he was archbishop elect of Lyons, at the presentation of but not belonging to laymen in England. The pope had deprived him of all his benefices, except the archbishopric, and had reserved them. It looks as though the pope intended to reserve only those presentations made by laymen by reason of custody of the temporalities of bishoprics or religious houses.16 Papal provisions were, therefore, far more likely to impact on the royal position than on that of the magnates. This was because royal rights of ecclesiastical patronage depended much more on custody of bishoprics and religious houses than magnates’ rights of patronage did, and because papal provisions tended to be of benefices in the gift of larger and more wealthy religious houses in the patronage of the Crown, rather than in the patronage of magnates. To this must be added the caveat that, in 1274, as we have seen, certain marcher lords still

15 16

CPL, 1.391. For another example where a benefice normally given to a secular clerk was specified, see CPL, 1.414. CPL, 1.437.

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had the right of custody of the temporalities of Welsh bishoprics, including the right to present to cathedral prebends, which may have been affected by papal provisions. In this connection it is noteworthy that none of the presentations to benefices examined above (in Part 1, Chapter 2) were to benefices normally in the gift of ecclesiastical patrons. We would expect this to have been noted in the bishop’s register, just as it was in the case of wardships, in order to avoid confusion as to the ownership of the advowson. They were not, however, completely unknown; there was a case between John de Warenne and the subprior and convent of Lewes, initiated by a quare impedit writ, for presentation to the church of ‘Wendern’, during the earl’s custody of the priory,17 and Henry de Lacy kept the advowson rights at Spalding (Lincolnshire) when he gave up his right of custody.18 What is much more demonstrable however is that great men expected to be able to influence the presentations made by religious houses to the benefices in their gift, particularly when it was their ancestors who had given them the church in the first place. The 1274 proposals explained why papal reservations could not and ought not to continue. The king was patron of archbishoprics and bishoprics, and many barons and earls, knights and others were patrons of abbeys, priories, dignities, offices and numerous churches. These dignities, parsonages, offices and benefices were the means by which those whom the long-established custom of primogeniture did not favour, and who had entered the Church, were provided with sustenance. This had been the usual means of supporting maidens, widows, scholars and other needy persons, of whom there were more in England than elsewhere.19Again, as in 1237 and 1245, it was being openly said that a career in the church was a natural part of family strategy. The influx of Italians suggested in the earlier article was resented not only because they were foreign, but also because they were preventing the usual patrons from providing for denizens. It may have been in response to these complaints that a canon of the 1274 council, Statutum Felicis, laid down that the pope had to provide to benefices within a month of their falling vacant, after which time the right would revert to the usual patron.20 But, as is well known, papal provisions continued to be a source of anxiety to lay patrons in England. In June 1290, after Nicholas IV had provided to the prebends of Fenton in the church of York and Nassington in the church of Lincoln, the king wrote to him. So too did the magnates. Their letter was closely modelled on the royal one – both objected to the provisions on grounds that they would diminish divine service, alter the pious wishes of the original founders, reduce alms to the poor and redound to their disinheritance. They would create an undesirable precedent so that similar alienations

17 18 19 20

TNA KB 26/160, m. 23d. See below, p. 161. Councils and Synods, 2.2.814. Sext., 3.tit. 4, c.3, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.1021.



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of Church funds would, within a short time, disfigure the English Church and render its ministers destitute from lack of stipends since the moneys had been assigned elsewhere.21 It is not known what part the magnates played in the drafting of these missives, but circumstantial evidence makes it possible that they did have a role. During the month of June (to which the letters can be dated from their position in the close roll) all the earls mentioned in the letter as its senders, that is, Edmund of Lancaster, William de Valence, Edmund of Cornwall, Gilbert de Clare, John de Warenne, Henry de Lacy and Humphrey de Bohun, witnessed royal charters.22 William de Beauchamp, Roger Bigod, John of Brittany, Robert de Vere, and Richard Fitzalan, who were not mentioned as senders, did not. Of the barons who were named in the letter, that is, John of Hastings, Richard Fitzjohn, John de St John, William de Braose, William Latimer, Roger de Montalt and Walter de Huntercombe, just two were witnesses to charters: John de St John and William Latimer. The matter may well have been discussed in the parliament of magnates which opened at Westminster on 23 April 1290.23 Nicholas IV replied to the royal letter (though not to that of the magnates) but he did not revoke the provisions he had made.24 Edward I was equally intransigent, and refused to allow the papal provisions to be executed.25 Further light can be shed on magnates’ own attitudes to papal provisions from the account of a discussion which took place in the king’s council in that same year, 1290, to which reference has been made already. Godfrey Giffard, bishop of Worcester, made it a policy during the latter part of his episcopate to try to annex churches on his episcopal manors to the collegiate church of Westbury on Trym (Gloucestershire) which was of his patronage. The prior and convent of Worcester objected on grounds that the subjection of the churches to the church of Westbury rather than to their church of Worcester would mean that they lost the right to institute and dismiss rectors of the churches sede vacante. Their jurisdictional rights would, it seems, have been prejudiced by the churches’ becoming prebendal to Westbury rather than parochial, despite their remaining in the bishop’s gift. (They cannot have been arguing that they risked losing the right of presenting, since this would have passed in any case to the king when the see was vacant.) The bishop seems to have had some influential support: according to the Worcester annalist, on 7 March 1290 he brought letters from the king and queen and ‘other magnates’, requesting that the prior and convent

21 22 23 24 25

CCR 1288–96, pp.  134–5 (and in Prynne, Exact Chronological Vindication, pp.  416–17, Foedera, 1.2.740 and Parliamentary Writs, 1.20) and see Councils and Synods, 2.2.1236. TNA C 53/76, mm. 18–17, 15–11 and m. 7 and see Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, p. 585. E.B. Fryde and F.M. Powicke, Handbook of British Chronology, 3rd edn (Cambridge, 1986), p. 548. Foedera, 1.2.740–1. CCR 1296–1302, pp. 601 and 613 (Prynne, Exact Chronological Vindication, p. 934) and Councils and Synods, 2.2.1236–7.

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of Worcester confirm the annexation of churches to Westbury prebends.26 But the annalist’s account of what happened at a meeting of the king’s council a few weeks later suggests that the monks had their advocates as well. The monks’ representatives appeared before the council on 23 May and put forward their point of view. When the king himself arrived he acquiesced in principle to Giffard’s plans, with the caveat that he did not want the church of Worcester to be damaged. He ordered his council ‘facite quod nobis videbitur expedire’ – to do as they thought would be in the king’s best interests.27 The council had in mind the fact that all the prebends in the church of Lincoln, except five, were in the hands of ‘Romans’, as, indeed, was the archdeaconry of Worcester. (The archdeaconry must have been fresh in the monks’ and royal councillors’ minds, for Francis of Naples, papal subdeacon, chaplain and notary, had been installed as archdeacon by proxy on 8 January 1289 on Nicholas IV’s provision. The pope had induced the bishop to withdraw his nomination of the royal justice, Ralph of Hengham.28) So, the councillors’ thinking went on, those which might have been in the king’s gift would devolve to the pope (that is, because they were filled by Italians who would, in all probability, die or resign their benefices apud sedem apostolicam, their benefices would be filled by the pope by virtue of the general reservation enshrined in Licet Ecclesiarum). So they did not wish churches which might come into royal patronage to be made prebendal. At this stage, Gilbert de Clare made a point in support of the status quo. He observed that the churches belonged to the bishop’s barony and that their status could not be changed any more than could that of the barony.29 This was an interesting argument, and may perhaps be seen in the context of Jeffrey Denton’s discussion of the re-drawing of the line between spiritual and temporal matters at this time, which had the purpose of protecting royal patronage rights but was to the detriment of the authority of bishops.30 It is encouraging when we are seeking to understand the magnates’ awareness of the relationship between land and patronage rights that an earl should be credited with a particular point of view. It may be relevant that Gilbert de Clare was about to come to an important agreement with the king about the terms on which he held his own estates.31 That Gilbert was indeed with the king at this time is confirmed by his regular appearance as a witness to royal charters given in

26 27 28 29 30

31

Annales Prioratus de Wigornia, AD 1–1377, in Annales Monastici, 4.500. Annales de Wigornia, p. 501. Reg. Giffard, 2.323 and 334, CPL, 1.495, and Annales de Wigornia, p. 496. Annales de Wigornia, pp. 501–2. J.H. Denton, ‘From the Foundation of Vale Royal Abbey to the Statute of Carlisle: Edward I and Ecclesiastical Patronage’, in Thirteenth Century England 4: Proceedings of the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Conference 1991, ed. P.R. Coss and S.D. Lloyd (Woodbridge, 1992), pp. 123–37 (p. 134). See above, Chapter 4, p. 112. The Worcester annalist reported in the next sentence that, having made an agreement with the earl, Edward took seisin of lands and all his possessions and that Gilbert then married Joan of Acre.



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May, including one dated 23 May when this discussion was held.32 No response to this argument was recorded by the Worcester annalist, but Giffard was, ultimately, successful in annexing certain churches to Westbury, notwithstanding the monks’ fears about the consequences.33 Later on in Edward’s reign magnates’ petitions were concerned about religious sending money abroad. Cistercians, who owed allegiance to their mother house in France and, as an exempt order, were subject to papal authority, were a particular target, especially when relations between England, France and the papacy were tense. In 1298 Edward forbade the Cistercians from attending the general chapter at Cîteaux without licence and demanded that the payment that should have gone there be diverted to him.34 A petition was presented at the parliament at Westminster in early 1305 by the earls, barons and community of the realm.35 Cistercian houses, they said, had been founded in England by the king’s progenitors and by the ancestors of the earls, barons and others ‘for the honour and service of God, sustenance of the poor, works of hospitality, and other good works’. These houses were put into servitude (‘servagio’) to Cistercian abbots to the detriment of divine service and were so impoverished that they could not live. Four thousand marks had been lost from England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland through such payments, and the Cistercians were not the only order affected; Cluniac, Premonstratensian and Carthusian houses were also sending moneys abroad. It was thought that the heads of houses had unlawful custody of the common seal, enabling them to sell their possessions and enter into obligations in their name. Judging from the royal charter witnesses a fair number of magnates came to the parliament, including Henry de Lacy, Thomas earl of Lancaster, Ralph of Monthermer, Humphrey de Bohun, Guy de Beauchamp, Aymer de Valence, John of Brittany, Hugh Despenser, John of Hastings, Robert FitzRoger and Roger Clifford.36 The royal response to the petition was twofold, and was, not surprisingly, amenable to it. First, Edward used it as his reason for withholding permission (which the abbot of Cîteaux had requested in the same parliament) from levying dues from the English Cistercians. The response to the abbot’s petition, recorded in Anglo-Norman French (and the language itself suggests that the magnates were part of the intended audience), in fact took the magnates’ argument a stage further. It pointed out that the gifts and enfeoffments made to the Cistercians could be revoked according to the law and customs of the land, since they were being used contrary to the wishes of the founders and to the form of the gifts and

32 33

34 35 36

Gemmill, ‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 584–5. For the Westbury on Trym case, see esp. Annales de Wigornia, pp.  xliv–xlvi, 495–8, 500–2, 504, 523 and 525, Reg. Giffard, 1.l–liii and 2.302, 336, 343 and 492, and VCH Gloucestershire, 2:107. Denton, ‘Foundation of Vale Royal Abbey’, p. 127. Memoranda de Parliamento, 1305: Records of the Parliament at Westminster in 1305, ed. F.W. Maitland (RS, 1893), pp. 313–14, and see Thompson, ‘Statute of Carlisle’, pp. 546–8. TNA C 53/91, mm. 12–11. Robert Brus, earl of Carrick, was also a charter witness.

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enfeoffments.37 This may have been a reference to the clause of the Statute of Westminster II of 1285 which had provided means for recovery of goods given in return for specific spiritual services when they were not performed.38 Second, although no legislation was published at this time, the later Statute of Carlisle of 1307, which forbade religious houses to send money abroad to their superiors, was proposed at the parliament of 1305 and as a result of the magnates’ petition.39 As Thompson points out, the concerns of patrons were amplified by the Crown to meet its need for control over money going abroad during the AngloFrench war.40 There were further protests voiced at the parliament of Carlisle of January 1307. The grievances presented at this parliament were as wide-ranging as those of 1274, but they survive in much more explicit form.41 The Anglo-Norman petition of the earls, barons and community of the realm prayed to the king to remedy ‘the oppressions . . . which the apostolic see is perpetrating in this realm to the abasement of God’s faith, the destruction of the estate of Holy Church in the kingdom, the disinheritance and prejudice of the king and his Crown and of other good people of the kingdom, in offence and destruction of the law of the land, to the great damage and impoverishment of the people, in subversion of the whole estate of the realm and against the wish and ordinance of the first founders.’ The first complaint was against papal provisions. The English Church, it said, had been founded by the king and his ancestors and the earls and barons and their ancestors for pious reasons (which the petition set out in full). These founders had and ought to have custody during vacancies of the possessions which had been assigned to prelates for the performance of charitable works, and ought to present to the benefices in the gift of those prelates, except dignities which were by royal grant and ordinance elective. The king and his ancestors had the major part of their counsel from the holders of such dignities. But the papacy was appropriating the lordship of these possessions as though it were patron and was giving benefices to non-resident aliens. If this were allowed to continue, within a short time all benefices in the gift of ecclesiastical patrons would be in the hands of aliens, there would be no elections of archbishops and bishops, charitable works would be diminished where aliens held office, the king and other lay patrons would lose their right of presentation in times of vacancy, counselling would end and goods would be transported out of the kingdom. The 37 38 39

40 41

Memoranda de Parliamento, 1305, pp. 312–13. See below, p. 159. Statutes of the Realm, 1.2.150–2 (and in Rot. Parl., pp.  217–18) and see Memoranda de Parliamento, 1305, p.  314. On the context and enforcement of the Statute of Carlisle, and the attitudes of patrons, see esp. the compelling account by Thompson in ‘Statute of Carlisle’, pp. 543–583, and also ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, pp. 214–17. Thompson, ‘Statute of Carlisle’, esp. pp. 553–7. Councils and Synods, 2.2.1232–6. See also Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough, esp. pp. 370–7, and H.G. Richardson and G.O. Sayles, ‘The Parliament of Carlisle, 1307 – Some New Documents’, EHR, 53 (1938), 425–37.



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petition thus made clear that papal provisions were felt to have their impact on benefices in the gift of ecclesiastical patrons. But that deleterious impact was on the life of the whole Church, on its property, on the rights of the king and lay patrons, and on the king’s fund of counsel. The rest of the grievances were mostly concerned with papal financial policies, particularly those being put into effect by Master William Testa and his colleagues.42 These were the appropriation of goods ambiguously devised in testaments and of all goods of intestates, the distraint of debtors for pledges of money to the Holy Land and for the debt itself (some of which the papal envoys would keep), the papal claim to cognisance of cases concerning ecclesiastical temporalities (which were the gifts of the king and the earls and barons and their ancestors) and to taxation of temporalities with spiritualities, the taking of annates, or first fruits (the income of a benefice from the first year of an incumbent’s tenure of the office) and demands for increased amounts in the form of Peter’s Pence. The complaint about the exaction of annates was supported by the argument that the fruits of a church were the alms of the patron of that church, even if they were tithes belonging to God. By depriving the incumbent of his sustenance, by means of which the church was served, the papacy was depriving him of his possession of the church against the wishes of the patron, and thus effectively disinheriting the patron as regards the advowson. This was against the law of the land, which did not allow disputes about tithes to be pleaded in ecclesiastical courts before the right of advowson of those tithes had been settled in the royal court.43 So the argument was that papal exactions were illegal under English common law. Thus this complaint put into explicit terms what was implicit in many of the other grievances, namely, that by impoverishing the English Church (by means of provisions and exactions) the papacy was acting contrary to the wishes of its founders and thereby encroaching on the interests of their heirs and representatives. In most instances the complaints were against papal demands from the whole Church and not just those churches and religious houses of which the petitioners were themselves the technical patrons. It may, therefore, be suggested that the ‘earls and barons and the community of the realm’ saw themselves as patrons of the English Church as a whole.44 The extent to which the document crystallised what the magnates themselves thought is, of course, difficult to know. A discourse stressing the duty of the laity collectively, as general founders of religious institutions, to protect the Church against the depredations of its spiritual, but foreign, masters, was redolent of royal arguments about the king’s status as supreme ecclesiastical patron of the English Church;45 and it is possible, indeed highly likely, that royal clerks drafted these documents. But the 42

43 44 45

For more about William Testa’s commission and the complaints about him voiced at Carlisle see W.E. Lunt, ‘William Testa and the Parliament of Carlisle’, EHR, 41 (1926), 332–57. See esp. Gray, ‘ “Ius Praesentandi”’, pp. 481–509. See Thompson, ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, p. 216. Denton, ‘Foundation of Vale Royal Abbey’, p. 137.

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language in which the petition is couched – Anglo-Norman – and the facts that many magnates were present at the time and (as shown above) were on close terms with many royal clerks – are important. These grievances of 1307 formed the basis of a series of articles with which Master William Testa was charged, and of a letter addressed to Pope Clement V (which, however, is not known to have been sent).46 Master William’s powers were restricted as a result.47 Finally, the disaffection of the magnates which was so clear in 1307 may well have prompted Edward II in 1309 to elicit another letter from the magnates to the pope on the subject of papal provision and financial exactions.48 Yet it was not only papal policies which impinged on the rights and responsibilities of patrons. In the years between 1294 and 1298 Edward I’s circumstances led him to make unusually heavy demands on the resources of the English Church and indeed those of the whole community.49 The magnates who supported Edward in his wars were also the lay patrons bound to protect the welfare of the ecclesiastical institutions and the clergy with whom they were connected. So their reactions to the events of these years are of considerable importance in our understanding of how they dealt with their conflicting responsibilities. The crisis was caused at least in part by the Anglo-French war. A significant number of English clergy was affected by the hostilities soon after they began. In the autumn of 1295, Edward I ordered the seizure of all alien priories. His immediate and ostensible reason for doing so was the fear that they could not be trusted, since they owed allegiance to houses in France, but finance doubtless played a part as well. The guardians appointed to the custody of the alien houses were not only to supervise the monks with great strictness, but also to inquire into the treasures owned by the houses and to account for their custody at the exchequer. Monks living in houses situated within thirteen miles of the sea, or by navigable rivers, were to be moved further inland. In the same way, secular parsons who were resident in England close to the sea and thus in the power of the French king or his allies were to be moved by their bishops to more secure locations, though the issues from their benefices might be delivered to them by the hands of English proctors.50 The ordinance for alien religious was made by

46

47 48 49

50

Rot. Parl., pp.  207–8 and 220–1 (Prynne, Exact Chronological Vindication, pp.  1171–5). The complaints in the magnates’ petition about the taking of goods of intestates and the taxation of temporalities were not mentioned in these, but a complaint about the number of papal legates in the kingdom was now introduced. See Lunt, ‘William Testa and the Parliament of Carlisle’, pp. 338–40. Lunt, ‘William Testa and the Parliament of Carlisle’, esp. pp. 343–4. Councils and Synods, 2.2.1236–40. For a general account of the crisis years, see M. Prestwich, Edward I (London, 1988), pp. 401–35. For Church–State relations in this period, see J.H. Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 55–176, and Thompson, ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, pp. 197–238. CFR 1272–1307, pp. 362–5, and see M.M. Morgan, ‘The Suppression of the Alien Priories’, History, 26 (1942), 204–12 (p. 205), Matthew, Norman Monasteries, pp. 81–4, Thompson, ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, pp. 224–7, and Councils and Synods, 2.2.1218, note 1.



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the king and his council, and some of the magnates were directly involved in the seizure, at the king’s command: on 8 November the king ordered a number of named marcher lords to take into the king’s hands all lands and goods of alien religious within their lordships.51 There is little evidence to suggest that any of the magnates objected in principle to what was done, but they did intervene in some cases on behalf of particular clerks and religious houses. At least two of the earls intervened on behalf of alien parsons. On 26 December Edward I allowed John de Cusance, rector of Rayleigh (Essex), and Master Peter Blanc, canon of Wells, to hold their respective benefices on the testimony of Edmund of Lancaster that they were not in the power of the king of France. Similar letters were issued on 30 December in favour of twelve clerks, including Master Peter de Sancta Maria, archdeacon of Surrey, parson of Farnham and Wonston (Surrey) and canon and prebendary of Salisbury, on the strength of the testimony of William de Valence that they were resident in England and were faithful to the king.52 There is rather more evidence about intervention on behalf of religious houses. The religious houses in need of immediate assistance from men of influence were, naturally, those who were to have their inhabitants removed. On 4 October 1295, the king ordered the sheriff of Sussex to allow the prior of Sele to remain in his priory on the assurance of William de Valence, Elias de Albini and Ralph Bluet that he would not harm the king’s or the kingdom’s interests.53 Similarly, on 13 October Edward allowed the prior of Lenton (Nottinghamshire) to remain in his house on the strength of an assurance of his loyalty from Edmund of Lancaster.54 Of course magnates were not the only people able to vouch for religious houses in this way, but their status and proximity to the king perhaps added credibility to their assurances. Lay patrons of monasteries were concerned in many cases to guarantee the loyalty of their alien houses and to seek restitution of their goods. Heads of houses were eventually allowed, on the strength of assurances of loyalty, to administer the goods of their houses, though they were required to pay an annual fine at the exchequer in return for the restitution of their freedom.55 Henry de Lacy went to some lengths to procure this privilege for the priory of Spalding (Lincolnshire). His petition to the king of November or early December 1295 was a detailed exposition of the endowments of the house and of its relationship with the abbey of Angers (dép. Maine-et-Loire). The £40 which the house paid to Angers had been seized into the hands of the king, and the three alien monks of the house of Angers who dwelt at Spalding had been removed by 51 52

53 54 55

CFR 1272–1307, p. 366. CCR 1288–96, pp. 503–4. The letter in favour of John de Cusance, and another letter of that date in favour of Raymond, parson of Norton near Fakenham (Norfolk), issued on the testimony of Guy Ferre, are printed in Prynne, Exact Chronological Vindication, p. 686. CCR 1288–96, p. 460. CCR 1288–96, p. 461. Morgan, ‘Suppression of the Alien Priories’, p.  205, Matthew, Norman Monasteries, pp. 83–4, and Councils, 2.2.1218, note 1.

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royal command. The earl drew attention to what had been done apparently in order to show the king that there was now no threat to the kingdom’s interests in the matter of indirect financial aid to the French cause, nor in the matter of loyalty. As to the latter, the earl assured the king that the prior and monks were English and had always been trustworthy. The lands and rents belonging to the priory were assigned to the performance of daily charitable works as well as to the needs of the monks themselves, so that if the endowments of the house were to remain in the custody of the king’s ministers, it would damage the alms of the earl’s ancestors as well as doing the earl himself little honour.56 Henry’s proposal was that the king should allow the priory to have its goods back, but keep the £40 normally paid to Angers, and that no alien monk be allowed to return to Spalding except by royal order. Finally, he stressed that his petition was not made with an eye to his own profit, for he had no desire to lay claim to any of the gifts made by his ancestors, particularly not to those made to Spalding.57 Henry’s arguments, in fact, resonate with those employed in objection to the Cistercians’ sending money abroad: the appeal to the inviolability of his ancestors’ alms; the suggestion that the king keep the money normally paid to the mother house; and the subjection to royal licence of the alien monks’ freedom of movement. Henry also considered that the royal occupation of Spalding’s possessions shamed him, which is revealing of the way in which he understood his obligations as patron; perhaps it was the closest he felt able to come to a criticism of the king. His petition was successful, for on 9 December Edward I ordered the keeper of alien religious in Lincolnshire to restore the goods of the house to the prior. Although he did not require a fine so called to be paid, the £40 paid customarily to the abbot of Angers was to be paid at the exchequer instead for the duration of the war with France.58 The priory was, perhaps, being treated leniently, for the fines paid by alien houses were in many cases larger sums than the moneys they sent abroad to their mother houses.59 Further, on 12 December, when the proctor of the abbot of Angers had found security at the exchequer for the sum, he and the three monks of Angers were allowed to re-enter the priory.60 It must have been simpler, though, and easier, for the king to accede to a patron’s request for lenient treatment when the patron was able to assure him that a house paid no subsidy to its French superiors and when the relationship between mother house and cell was unlikely to cause a division of loyalty. On 26 January 1296, when Edward ordered the treasurer and barons of the exchequer to restore the priory of Castle Acre (Norfolk) to the prior and convent, it was 56

57 58 59 60

Thompson points out, in ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, p.  225, that the Crown during its seizures of alien priories respected their responsibility for maintenance of divine service and charitable works. BL Add. MS 35296 (Spalding Cartulary), fol. 44r (printed in Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 3.225–6). See also Thompson, ‘Statute of Carlisle’, pp. 576–7. BL Add. MS 35296, fol. 44r–v (printed in Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 3:226). Councils and Synods, 2.2.1218, note 1. BL Add. MS 35296, fol. 43v.



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on the assurance of John de Warenne and others that they were English, that they paid no tax to the king of France or his adherents and that they were not bound by fealty to them, except in the spiritual matters of visitation and profession of monks.61 As Benjamin Thompson has pointed out, this and other patronal interventions were on the basis of claims about identity: these houses owed loyalty to England and their patrons, rather than to France and Cluny.62 It was not merely to show favour to particular patrons that the king restored liberty to alien religious and gave them back the administration of their goods. The patron, by reason of his familiarity with the affairs of the house in question, was in many ways the best person to advise the king as to its loyalty and financial obligations. He could, therefore, be of service to the king in helping him to balance the risk of disloyalty against the obvious pecuniary advantage of a fine, without having to administer the house by means of his own officials. Patrons continued to play a role in the business of the alien priories long after the initial seizure by informing the king about their relationship with the mother houses. On 4 June 1299, Edward ordered the respite of the demand made on the prior and convent of Pontefract (Yorkshire) of £180 11s 3d (due from them because they had not made fine as other alien houses had done), because Henry de Lacy had told him that the prior and monks were English and that there had been no alien monk living among them for some considerable time. The demand for payment was to be delayed until the earl returned from abroad where he was on the king’s service.63 Sometimes the rights of patrons were affected by the royal seizure more acutely. Edmund of Cornwall’s priory of Eye (Suffolk) was vacant for some considerable period during the French war, but the fact of the earl’s custody did not prevent the house from being seized in the first instance. The earl began his custody of the priory on 8 April 1294, and continued in possession of it until 29 November 1295. On that day, Richard Oysel, appointed on 24 November as keeper of alien houses in Norfolk and Suffolk,64 ejected the earl and his men from the priory and its manors. Although the earl’s bailiff was allowed to remain in the priory with the royal keeper, he received none of the profits. On 24 April 1296, however, the custody was restored to the earl, after the king had made inquiries through the treasurer and barons of the exchequer, and it was stated that he was to hold the custody by exchequer writ.65 Edward I’s treatment of the alien religious was high-handed, but his motives do seem to have been understood by the magnates. When they petitioned on 61 62

63 64 65

CCR 1288–96, p. 470. Thompson, ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, p. 226, and see also ‘Statute of Carlisle’, p. 577, and ‘The Laity, the Alien Priories, and the Redistribution of Ecclesiastical Property’, pp. 28–9, for the position of Lewes, and ‘Statute of Carlisle’, pp. 573–5, for patrons’ intervention on behalf of French abbeys with which they were connected, to ensure that they received their revenues from England. CCR 1296–1302, p. 252. CFR 1272–1307, p. 365. CCR 1288–96, p. 479.

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behalf of alien clerks and religious houses they were prepared to do so on the king’s terms, explaining to him why his fears were ungrounded in particular cases. They cannot have known in 1295 that the seizure was only the first stage in a difficult and long-drawn-out process which would result in the suppression of the alien priories in the early fifteenth century.66 Edward’s wars did not affect only the alien priories, of course. Taxation of the clergy was to him a crucial component of resourcing his war effort; indeed, as he told the clergy in 1294 when persuading them to make a contribution, it was their duty to assist when the earls, barons and knights were risking their lives as well as their goods for them and for their lands.67 But the king’s right to tax the English clergy was not a just a matter of routine reminder; the bull of Pope Boniface VIII of 1296, Clericis Laicos, called that whole obligation into question, forbidding as it did the payment of clerical subsidies to lay powers.68 This created an immediate and urgent problem when Edward I demanded a clerical subsidy. The clergy of the southern province decided, at the ecclesiastical council which met on 13 January 1297, that they could not make such a grant. As a consequence the king on 30 January outlawed the clergy and ordered the seizure of their lay fees, having already summoned a lay parliament to meet at Salisbury on 24 February.69 By the time that crucial parliament met, the effects of the king’s action had been felt by the clergy, many of whom, despite the penalty of excommunication they incurred by so doing, had made fine with the king, paying him a fifth of their income in return for royal protection and the recovery of their goods. At the Salisbury parliament, the king announced his plan for what was to happen to the goods of those clergy who did not make fine with him. If the fine was not paid by Easter, which fell on 14 April, the goods already seized would be forfeited, and the king would hold them for a year. After that the lord of the fee or the patron of the church would recover them as escheats.70 How did lay patrons react to this? They had never questioned the royal right to tax members of the clergy with whom they were linked by ties of patronage. It is true that they had occasionally engaged in special pleading on behalf of particular houses: on 18 May 1269, for example, the master and brothers of the hospital of St Cross at Reigate (Surrey) were pardoned the payment of the triennial tenth granted by the pope to the king, at the instance of the Lord Edward 66

67 68 69 70

See Matthew, Norman Monasteries and Their English Possessions, and Thompson, ‘The Laity, the Alien Priories, and the Redistribution of Ecclesiastical Property’, pp.  19–41, ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, pp. 224–33, and ‘Statute of Carlisle’, pp. 543–83. Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough, pp.  249–50. See also Thompson, ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, p. 207. The text of the bull is in Reg. Winchelsey, pp. 159–61. See Councils and Synods, 2.2.1157–9, and Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, esp. pp. 100–7. J.H. Denton, ‘The Crisis of 1297 from the Evesham Chronicle’, EHR, 93 (1978), 568–79 (p.  570), and M.N. Blount, ‘A Critical Edition of the Annals of Hailes (MS Cotton Cleopatra D iii, fols 33–59v) with an Examination of Their Sources’ (Manchester, MA thesis, 1974), p. 107.



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and John de Warenne.71 Later on, Margaret de Lacy, wife of Henry de Lacy and in her own right countess of Salisbury, appealed to the chancellor, John Langton, to seek a respite of the tenth for the nuns of Lacock (Wiltshire).72 But patrons never questioned in principle the liability of their houses and churches to contribute to the king’s needs. The Evesham chronicler tells us that the date (Easter) when clerical goods were to be finally forfeited was fixed by the barons and knights.73 This suggests that the laity did not merely acquiesce in the king’s treatment of the clergy, but that they condoned and encouraged it.74 Certainly the support of laymen was needed in order to execute the policy of seizure of lay fees of the clergy. The magnates were among those who carried out the seizure. Yet the barons and knights were also patrons of the churches and monasteries whose incumbents and inhabitants were suffering hardship at the king’s hands. This was perhaps why the king was careful to include the interests of the barons and patrons of churches and monasteries within the proposals for action he intended to take against the clergy. For example, according to the chronicler Bartholomew Cotton, at the ecclesiastical council in January, Hugh Despenser, who put forward the lay point of view, said that the clergy should help to defend the kingdom by a subsidy, otherwise the king, earls and barons would dispose of clerical goods as they wished.75 Likewise, in the Salisbury parliament (as we have seen), it was to be the lords of fees and the patrons of churches who would, ultimately, profit from the royal seizure of ecclesiastical goods.76 The king was offering a positive inducement to patrons to support his policy of coercion, and though he overrode patrons’ rights in seizing clerical goods, it was never suggested that the Crown should acquire them permanently. That the clergy had an obligation to the laity in times of financial need was no novel idea. It was intimately bound up with the development of the canonist doctrine of patronage rights, in that the founder of a church, or his heirs, were entitled to receive sustenance from that church in their dire necessity.77 There 71 72 73 74

75 76 77

Close R. 1268–72, p. 51. TNA SC 1/27/74. Denton, ‘The Crisis of 1297 from the Evesham Chronicle’, p. 570. See Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 107–8, 115, and 117–18, for the attitude of the laity towards the clergy at this time. It was also at the Salisbury parliament, however, that the king first encountered opposition from the laity. Bartholomaei de Cotton Monachi Norwicensis Historia Anglicana, ed. H.R. Luard (RS, 1859), pp. 317–18. Denton, ‘The Crisis of 1297 from the Evesham Chronicle’, p. 570, and Blount, ‘Annals of Hailes’, p. 107. ‘Decretum Magistri Gratiani’, 2.C.16, q. 7, c. 30, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 1.808: ‘Quicumque fidelium propria deuotione de facultatibus suis aliquid ecclesiae contulerint, si forte ipsi aut filii eorum redacti fuerint ad inopiam, ab eadem ecclesia suffragium uitae pro temporis usu percipiant.’ (‘Any of the faithful who, by their own devotion, give any of their resources to a church should, if by chance they or their sons are reduced to poverty, receive help from the same church for use during their lifetime.’) Extra, 3.tit. 38, cap. 25, in Corpus Iuris Canonici, 2.617: ‘Pro fundatione quoque ecclesiae honor processionis

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was, of course, a great deal of difference between the gift to an individual patron in his time of need from the fruits of an individual church or monastery and the grant of a clerical subsidy to the kingdom as a whole, but as we have seen the king and lay magnates saw themselves as patrons of the whole English Church. And, albeit in a rather different context from that of 1297, the link had been made by the papacy too. For example, on 5 July 1272, Pope Gregory X had written to all English prelates expounding the desirability of recovering the Holy Land and praising the Lord Edward and his brother Edmund who had gone on crusade there. In order to keep what had been achieved by their valorous deeds, the clergy should provide financial support to those whose ancestors had given them their property. By so doing, they would find more eager defenders of their rights.78 There is very little evidence that lay patrons exerted themselves as eager defenders of the outlawed clergy, at least in the early part of 1297, though later in the year, when they complained of their poverty and rebelled against the king, the earls and barons claimed to represent the interests of the clergy and the whole community as well as their own. It may be significant that Edward I had to write to Roger Bigod and other marcher lords as late as July 1297 to reiterate his order to seize the lay fees of religious who had not paid for royal protection.79 But there is little else to suggest that their rebellion had anything to do with their responsibilities and rights as patrons.80 One way in which patrons could protect the religious with whom they were connected was, of course, to get them to pay up. However, the evidence as to whether they did that is scant indeed. While there are certainly names of magnates’ clerks among those who submitted at an early stage to the king, there is no direct evidence that it was that connection which prompted them to do

78 79 80

fundatori servatur, et, si ad inopiam vergat, ab ecclesia illi modeste succurritur, sicut in sacris est canonibus institutum.’ (‘Also, the founder’s honourable estate is served on account of the foundation of a church, and if he should swerve into poverty he is given modest assistance from that church.’) Reg. W. Giffard, pp. 39–41. Prestwich, Documents, pp. 105–6. I am grateful to Marc Morris for this reference. See Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, esp. pp.  136–43 for a discussion of the links between clerical and lay grievances in 1297, and A. Spencer, ‘The Lay Opposition to Edward I in 1297: Its Composition and Character’, in Thirteenth Century England, 12: Proceedings of the Gregynog Conference 2007, ed. J. Burton, P. Schofield, B. Weiler (Woodbridge, 2009), pp. 91–106. For the crisis of 1297, see esp. J.G. Edwards, ‘Confirmatio Cartarum and Baronial Grievances in 1297’, EHR, 58 (1943), 147–71 and 273–300, H. Rothwell, ‘The Confirmation of the Charters, 1297’, EHR, 60 (1945), 16–35, 177–91 and 300–15, J.H. Denton, ‘A Worcester Text of the Remonstrances of 1297’, Speculum, 53 (1978), 511–21, and M. Prestwich, War, Politics and Finance under Edward I (London, 1972), esp. pp. 247–61, and Prestwich, Documents, passim. See also H. Rothwell, ‘Edward I and the Struggle for the Charters, 1297–1305’, in Studies in Medieval History Presented to F.M. Powicke, ed. R.W. Hunt, W.A. Pantin and R.W. Southern (Oxford, 1948), pp. 319–32.



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so.81 The accounts of the custody of Eye priory show how a lay patron took it upon himself to see that the religious whom he could control, and for whom he was at the time responsible, paid up. Among the expenses of the steward of the priory for 1296–97 were several he incurred in seeking the restitution of the priory lands. There were 30s expenses for the journey he made to the royal exchequer over the business of the seizure because of the fifth (the amount of the fine payable by the clergy in return for royal protection and recovery of their goods). There was a payment of £26 19s 2½d made by tally in the royal exchequer for the recovery of lands and for protection. The explanation for this was ‘since the king did not wish to do otherwise’ (‘quia rex aliter facere noluit’). Three writs had to be purchased, for protection, for the restitution of the priory to the custodians, and to the collectors of the twelfth in Suffolk (the priory was also liable for payment of the tax on lay movables granted at the Bury parliament of November 1296).82 The subprior had to be paid his expenses for going to the exchequer to pay the fine, and the earl had to be informed of all that had taken place. In all, the money paid to the king from the period of the earl’s custody came to almost a third of the total he received, if we include the losses incurred in royal seizure of grain.83 And the earl was responsible for paying it. So it was too in 1297–98. The earl’s servants saw to it that the tenth on spiritualities granted by the clergy of the southern province in November 1297 was paid from the churches of St Leonard and All Saints, Dunwich (Suffolk).84 The evidence suggests clearly that the magnates saw royal treatment of the clergy quite differently from the way in which they viewed papal provisions and financial exactions, that is, as a gross infringement on their rights and responsibilities as patrons. The conflicts between the Crown and the papacy (and the latter’s supporters in England) about control over the resources of the English Church were bound to involve the magnates. They were the founders and patrons of the English Church. Their rights and expectations as patrons were harnessed by the Crown to support the war effort in which they too were engaged.85 It is difficult, however, to be clear about how proactively the magnates were involved in actually drafting petitions purporting to represent their point of view. And it seems only to have been in the context of opportunities created by others – parliament, the royal council, the general councils of the Church – that they 81

82 83 84 85

For example, Laurence of Clifford, parson of West Thoresby (Lincolnshire) and Winterbourne Earls (Wiltshire), a clerk connected with Henry de Lacy, and Geoffrey de Wretton, parson of Cudham and Hinxhill (Kent), a clerk connected with William de Valence: CPR 1292–1301, pp. 261 and 263, CCR 1296–1302, p. 91 and Calendar of Various Chancery Rolls, 1277–1326, p. 41. See above, Chapter 3, pp. 84 and 85, note 136, for these clerks. For interpretation of the evidence for the submission of the clergy, see Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 114–15. Councils and Synods, 2.2.1150. Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 2.156–7. TNA SC 6/996/12, m. 4, and for the tenth on spiritualities, see Denton, Robert Winchelsey and the Crown, pp. 172–4. Thompson, ‘Statute of Carlisle’, esp. 575–6.

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were galvanised into presenting their collective concerns. It was only rarely that the records show that they were capable of formulating views outside these contexts. And so another way of getting at the concerns of patrons needs to be found. If magnates were so exercised about the fate of the property that they gave to the Church, we should expect this to be reflected in changing patterns of endowment during this period, and in the form of safeguards over their rights. In fact there was new legislation in the thirteenth century seeking to control endowments, and we need to examine how patrons reacted to it.

6 Looking to the Future

The Statute of Mortmain of 1279 was a response to the concern which had been growing since the early part of the thirteenth century about the passing of lands and rights into the hands of the Church. But how did lay patrons regard the new controls, and how did they react to them? ‘Mortmain’ was a pejorative term for free alms or frankalmoign tenure, for, when land was given to the Church to hold in free alms, the services and feudal incidents hitherto rendered to the lord by the donor were lost or weakened.1 The concerns about such losses and the legislation designed to control the passing of land into mortmain have been discussed fully by other scholars, particularly Sandra Raban, so that there is need here only to summarise what foreshadowed the 1279 statute.2 First, Clause 32 of the 1217 reissue of Magna Carta forbade the alienation of so much land that the remainder was insufficient for performance of the services due. Clause 36 forbade grants whereby the donor was re-enfeoffed as the ecclesiastical donee’s tenant, so that the donee became mesne between the donor and his lord.3 Then in 1258, the Petition of the Barons included a request that religious should not be allowed to enter the fees of earls, barons and others in such a way as to cause loss of customs, marriages, reliefs and escheats. Accordingly, in some texts of the Provisions of Westminster of 1259, it was laid down that religious should only enter lands with the consent of the chief lord of the fee, although it is not known whether this clause was included in the Statute of Marlborough of 1267.4 The effectiveness and

1

2

3 4

On free alms tenure, see esp. E. Kimball, ‘Tenure in Frankalmoign and Freedom from Secular Services’, EHR, 43 (1928), 341–53 and ‘The Judicial Aspects of Frankalmoign Tenure’, EHR, 47 (1932), 1–11. Sandra Raban, Mortmain Legislation and the English Church, 1279–1500 (Cambridge, 1982), esp. pp. 12–28. For other studies of mortmain tenure and legislative measures designed to control it, see also T.F.T. Plucknett, Legislation of Edward I (Oxford, 1949), pp. 94–102, J.M.W. Bean, The Decline of English Feudalism, 1215–1540 (Manchester, 1968), pp. 49–66, and P. Brand, ‘The Control of Mortmain Alienation in England, 1200–1300’, in Legal Records and the Historian, ed. J.H. Baker (London, 1978), pp.  29–40, and Thompson, ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, pp. 208–11. J.C. Holt, Magna Carta (Cambridge, 1965), p. 356. Raban, Mortmain Legislation, pp. 14–16.

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authority of the controls prior to the 1279 statute was, however, questionable.5 Nonetheless, it is clear that the earls and barons, during times of political crisis which enabled them to present their views to the Crown and to get the king to take action upon them, had made ecclesiastical acquisition of lands a subject for consideration and change. Their wishes must be regarded not only in terms of their interests as overlords but also as those of patrons who were willing to sign up to concerns about the way in which clerical wealth was being used contrary to the intentions of the original donors. The king was in a more secure position as regards alienation than the lay magnates. His special control over lands held in chief had its origin in a writ of 1228, which forbade the grant or sale of Crown land to churchmen except by royal licence, and in 1256 this restriction on the alienability of land held in chief was extended to prevent its alienation to anyone, lay or ecclesiastical.6 Although the machinery of royal government may not have been able to enforce these principles, two cases from early in Edward I’s reign show that they were taken seriously. On 19 July 1274, the king took into his hand the manor of Chedworth (Gloucestershire) which William de Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, his tenant in chief, had alienated without licence to the abbey of Evesham (Worcestershire).7 And the king’s special prerogative as regards Crown lands was used in an assize of darrein presentment in 1279 – on the very eve of the Statute of Mortmain. Walter of Wimborne, suing for the king, said that a fine made in 1257 between the earl of Gloucester’s father, Richard de Clare, and Ellis de la Falaise, whereby Ellis had acknowledged his gift to Richard of the advowson of Fordingbridge (Hampshire) and 16d rent, ought not to prejudice the king’s interests because of the king’s special prerogative, it being illegal to alienate the king’s fee without his licence.8 The terms of the Statute of Mortmain were far more robust than anything previously attempted with regard to restriction of alienation. Earlier measures had placed emphasis on licensing, but now no such arrangements were mentioned. Couched in the form of a writ addressed to the justices of the common pleas, the statute forbade any passing of lands and tenements into mortmain. If anyone were to go against this ruling, then each of the mesne lords of whom the lands were held was to have the right to enter them, and the king the final right to enter and hold the fee. If all the mesne lords should fail to enter, then the king would be at liberty to enfeoff a tenant with the lands, although the chief lords would retain their right to wardships, escheats and services.9 It is difficult to disentangle the motives for the statute from its results in 5 6 7 8 9

Raban, Mortmain Legislation, p. 16. Raban, Mortmain Legislation, pp. 16–17. CFR 1272–1307, p. 25. Select Cases in the Court of the King’s Bench, 1.47–9. The text of the statute is in Councils and Synods, 2.2.864–5. The arrangements to safeguard the rights of mesne lords were set out in painstaking detail. Each successive lord had the right to enter the fee if it were alienated in mortmain. The first should enter within the year and the rest in turn were allowed six months to enter. However, it was also said that



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practice. In the end, a licensing procedure was established and the Church continued to acquire lands, either by conforming to requirements or by evading them. As for the king, he benefited by establishing a deeper control over all land in the kingdom, and was able to exact fines for the licences to alienate or acquire lands in mortmain which were issued with increasing regularity from soon after the statute was made.10 There is evidence that the Statute of Mortmain had the support of the magnates. Its preamble said that it had been made ‘on the advice of the prelates, earls and other faithful men of our realm being of our counsel’.11 It was enacted in the parliament which met in November 1279, a parliament to which only prelates and magnates were summoned. Thus, the preamble reflected in general terms the groups who were party to its enactment. Further, the charter roll witness lists show that a number of magnates were indeed present at the royal court during the months of October and November of that year, from which we may infer that they knew of, and may even have consented to, the royal legislation.12 Later, in 1294 and 1301, in response to clerical petitions asking that the statute be revoked, the king emphasised that it had been made on the counsel of the magnates, stressing in 1301 that it was to protect their wardships and other rights.13 Finally, some magnates showed awareness of the statute’s terms. For instance, Edmund of Lancaster referred to it directly when he wrote to Robert Burnell, explaining that the abbot and convent of Stoneleigh had asked him to give them two acres of land from his enclosure at Kenilworth which adjoined their own ploughland. Edmund declared his willingness to grant their petition but appreciated that he could not do so without the king’s consent because of the Statute of Mortmain. So he asked Burnell to seek it on behalf of the abbey.14 Of course, magnates were tenants in chief and so in theory their alienations had to be licensed even before the Statute of Mortmain, so it is interesting to see this awareness of the new legislation. They also made use of the new controls that purported to bolster their rights as overlords. The statute had given them the right, as overlords, to license their tenants’ alienations. Such licences were indeed forthcoming; the difficulty with

10 11 12

13 14

the king could enter after the first year if all others failed to do so. This appears to suggest that the king could override the rights of mesne lords other than the first. For the long-term effects of the statute, see esp. Raban, Mortmain Legislation, passim. Councils and Synods, 2.2.865. TNA C 53/67, mm. 1–3. The earls of Cornwall, Gloucester, Lancaster, Lincoln, Hereford and Warwick witnessed charters in October and November. Other magnate witnesses included Otto de Grandisson, Roger Mortimer, Patrick of Chaworth, John de Vescy and Roger Clifford. Councils and Synods, 2.2.1130 and 1217. TNA SC 1/22/201. See also The Stoneleigh Leger Book, ed. R.H. Hilton (Dugdale Society, 24, 1960), pp. 42–3: Edmund’s grant of 19 July 1285, of four acres of wood in Kenilworth, which is followed by a royal licence dated 25 February 1286, may well be the gift referred to in his letter, which is dated at ‘Newby’ (Newby in Westmorland) on 18 April, though the year is not given.

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interpreting them as general willingness to support alienations is that we tend to know more about the cases where alienations were allowed rather than about those proposed which could not be carried through. Licences as such survive only rarely. This is not in itself surprising, because relatively few of the magnates’ letters patent, in which form they were probably couched, have come down to us. The instances which do survive are enlightening, however, in terms of what they held back and, sometimes, what they added to the gift being made. William de Beauchamp, for instance, gave licence to Amicia de Harley, lady of Bathampton (Wiltshire), to assign a messuage, a carucate of land and rent of 30 marks (£20) with appurtenances to a chantry in Bathampton parish church for the souls of Amicia, her ancestors and successors, and for those of the earl and his successors. It was made clear, however, that the earl and his heirs would retain their right to the services due from the manor, to be rendered from that portion of it remaining to Amicia after the grant.15 On 28 April 1299, Edmund of Cornwall gave licence to Joanna, widow of John de Grey, to grant her manor of Shabbington (Buckinghamshire), which she held immediately of him, to the Hospitallers to hold in free alms. The earl allowed the grant, and augmented it with a gift of the view of frankpledge in the manor. The king inspected and confirmed Edmund’s grant, having himself ordered an inquiry to be made before issuing a licence to Joanna on his own account on 18 April.16 Sometimes, though, it was preferable to secure services from the beneficiary. Edmund of Cornwall was able to exact written promises of feudal incidents from religious houses, both before and after the Statute of Mortmain. On 30 May 1276 the abbot of Dorchester (Oxfordshire) undertook to pay a reasonable relief to the earl for four virgates of land which the house held of him in Warborough, according to the custom of the manor, and what was usually rendered from the land, whenever an abbot of the house died or was removed. He also undertook to pay heriot and tallage and to perform suit of court and do other services due. In the same way, on 6 February 1290, the prior of Thremhall (Essex) agreed to pay the earl 10s annual rent due from land and rent which the earl’s tenant, Walter of Stortford, had given the house in Birchanger. He also promised the payment of heriot and relief on the death of a prior of Thremhall, to perform suit at the earl’s view of frankpledge at Newport and to do all necessary services.17 So he was able, because of his overlordship, to forge new links between himself and the houses of Dorchester and Thremhall. Licences to alienate were sometimes given to the recipients rather than to the donors. Edmund, earl of Lancaster, had given one to the abbey of Stoneleigh (Warwickshire) in 1278, before the new legislation because he knew of their debility and poverty (‘statum debilem nouimus et exilem’). They were allowed 15 16 17

BL Add. MS 28024, fol. 78r–v. C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p.  476, and see Public Record Office Lists and Indexes, 17: List of Inquisitions Ad Quod Damnum, Part I (HMSO, 1904), p. 46, and CPR 1292–1301, p. 408. TNA E 36/57, nos. Cxiv and Clxxxvj, fols 31r and 49r–v. The undertakings are transcribed and discussed by H.E. Salter in ‘Reliefs “Per Cartam” ’, EHR, 45 (1930), 281–5.



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to enclose 120 acres of waste in Westwood Heath and Dallies in Stoneleigh and three acres of meadow under Helenshull next to Dallies wood and to hold them without interference from himself or his tenants, together with all the closes which the monks and their men had enclosed before 1 November 1277 at Helenshull and elsewhere within Stoneleigh.18 On 21 August 1284 Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford, gave the abbey of Walden (Essex), which was of his patronage, a general power to acquire to hold in demesne (‘perquirendi possidendi’) the lands, rent and tenements belonging to abbey tenants in Walden and elsewhere, without interference from himself, his heirs or his bailiffs.19 He was giving them a sort of general licence. It may even be seen as parallel with the way in which it became customary for the king to issue general, rather than specific, licences to religious houses, whereby their acquisitions were limited to a certain value rather than to a named piece of property.20 However, Bohun was only allowing them a facility with property which was of their own fee, and, like Edmund of Lancaster’s grant to Stoneleigh, no fresh alienation was authorised. Sometimes it is clear that magnates commissioned inquiries about the value of land to be alienated or the effects of a proposed gift. We might even regard these as equivalents of royal inquisitions ad quod damnum which, after 1284 at the latest, were the essential preliminary to royal licences to alienate. As their name suggests, inquisitions ad quod damnum were meant to establish whether the king and others might lose out if a proposed alienation were allowed. They inquired into the value of the lands or tenements to be alienated, the identity of the overlord and the services due. After 1292, they also asked whether the land remaining to the donor after the gift was made would suffice to support the customary services.21 Edmund, earl of Cornwall, was careful to find out what would happen before he allowed the Dominicans to make changes in his borough of Ilchester (Somerset). He wrote to the burgesses in 1285 ordering them to allow the friars to move a lane between their close and land they had recently acquired from John Whitbred, and to enclose their land, provided that the proposals would cause no loss to himself or to the burgesses and no damage to the town itself. The burgesses viewed the place, and could not see that any harm would come of it all, so they allowed the enclosure to go forward. The earl issued letters patent on 7 May, giving his permission ‘in so far as it was possible for him to do’ and on the next day his letters were confirmed by the king.22 Sometimes an assessment of the value of land granted would be made, and kept with the deed by which it had been alienated. William de Beauchamp’s deed confirming to the monks of Préaux (dép. Eure) the town of Warmington (Warwickshire) which, except for the berewick, Henry de Newburgh, earl of Warwick (d. 1119), had already granted to them, is followed in the Beauchamp cartulary by an extent 18 19 20 21 22

Stoneleigh Leger Book, p. 42. BL Harl. MS 3697, fol. 23r. Raban, Mortmain Legislation, esp. pp. 41–71. Raban, Mortmain Legislation, pp. 39–40. C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 285.

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of Warmington, including details about the services and dues of tenants. The town was valued at a total of £5.23 Sometimes when new ecclesiastical institutions were set up details of the licensing process were recorded in bishops’ registers. It was the responsibility of bishops to ensure the stability of new foundations, which after 1279 included pre-empting overlords’ interference on grounds of the new mortmain legislation. Oliver Sutton, bishop of Lincoln, ensured in 1296 by means of archidiaconal inquiry that all the arrangements necessary for the sound establishment of a chantry in Wymondham church (Leicestershire) had been made before he instituted John of Ilston to serve it on 7 May. The knight William Hamelyn had built a chapel attached to the church and had assigned lands and rents for the establishment of a chantry. His charter of endowment was transcribed in full in the bishop’s register, as were the consent of the king, in the form of a licence to alienate into mortmain, and the consent of Edmund of Lancaster, who was lord of the fee and patron of the church of Wymondham, in the form of a confirmatory letter. The consent of the rector of Wymondham was also noted as having been given, though no letter of his was transcribed in the bishop’s register.24 In another example, in 1303, Sutton’s successor, John Dalderby, allowed sacraments to be held at a new chapel in Sutton in Holland (Lincolnshire). He noted that the consent of the king, that of Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, lord of the manor of Sutton, that of the prior and convent of Castle Acre (Norfolk) (who had appropriated the parish church), and that of the vicar of the parish church had all been given, and that the place was not subject to secular services.25 There were other ways of signifying consent than by licences as such. Magnates sometimes petitioned the king to allow alienations of their fee, so implying their consent. Edmund of Lancaster wrote to the king on behalf of the abbey of Croxden (Staffordshire) on 27 November 1283. He said that the abbot and convent held a tenement from him in Ashbourne (Derbyshire) for which they rendered him 4s annually, and that they wanted to resume two holdings in the tenement into demesne, mainly because their own tenants were unable to pay the rent.26 The royal order resulting from this, dated 20 January 1284, and addressed to Edmund’s bailiffs at Ashbourne, makes it clear that Richard de Prez, who had recently died, and Thomas of Tideswell, the tenants, had given their holdings to the abbot and convent. The king ordered the earl’s bailiffs to allow the abbot and convent to continue in what was their own fee.27 Margaret de Lacy, countess of Lincoln, based her petition to John Langton, the chancellor, on behalf of the abbess and convent of Lacock (Wiltshire) on the fact that the house was of her patronage and that it was too poorly endowed. She asked for his help in enabling them to acquire a messuage and two carucates of land in Westlecott held by Isabel Pypard. She sent her clerk, Walter of 23 24 25 26 27

BL Add. MS 28024, fols 80v–81r. Reg. Sutton, 8.60–6. LA Dalderby Memoranda, fol. 52r and see also fols 140v–141r and below, p. 156. TNA SC 1/22/197. CCR 1279–88, p. 286.



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Wallop, with her letter so that he could explain the matter and the other needs of the house and could bring back Langton’s reply.28 The results of Margaret’s petition are not documented, but the fact that she had been a good friend to the house was recognised after her death, when Simon of Ghent, bishop of Salisbury, allowed the nuns to appropriate the church of Lacock, recognising their loss in the death of Margaret and other nobles who had helped them.29 Of course, magnates would also petition for licences to alienate their own demesne. Henry de Lacy’s letter of 22 July 1284 to the chancellor, Robert Burnell, shows how procedure was developing in relation to alienations. De Lacy had already assigned rent in his manors of Kingston and Canford (both Dorset) to the priors of Bradenstoke (Wiltshire) and Christchurch (Hampshire), to finance a chantry, but he knew that the king needed to know of whom the rent was held and how much it was worth per year. He asked for a writ addressed to the sheriff of Dorset to be sent to himself via his messenger.30 Inquisitions ad quod damnum were taken, and licences to alienate land and rent worth 5 marks (£3 6s 8d) from Canford for one chaplain celebrating there, and to alienate 10 marks’ (£6 13s 4d) land and rent from Kingston for two chaplains there, were issued on 18 October, along with another licence for the establishment of a chantry of seven chaplains at Denbigh.31 It had been usual, since the Conquest, for lords to confirm the grants made by their vassals, especially those in favour of religious houses in the lord’s own patronage. A good example of this is the endowment of the priory of Eye (Suffolk). Robert Malet’s foundation charter listed all the gifts he himself had made, and then moved on to those made by his barons and knights with his consent. He listed the names of the donors and the gifts they had made, and encouraged further generosity to the house he had founded by granting and ordering the men, knights and sokemen of his jurisdiction to endow the monastery with their goods according to their means.32 Also worth noting is Gilbert of Tonbridge’s exhortation to his vassals to endow the monastery he had founded at Clare (Suffolk) in 1090, as well as his confirmation of the actual gifts they made.33 The introduction of mortmain controls meant that such confirmations became more important to obtain, and so they made it more likely that overlords would claim an involvement in their vassals’ endowments. Henry de Lacy in 1292 consented as overlord to the establishment of a 28 29

30 31

32 33

TNA SC 1/27/75. Reg. Gandavo, 1.193. Another noble lady who helped Lacock was Maud de Clare, dowager countess of Gloucester (d.1289), who wrote to Robert Burnell on behalf of the abbey: TNA SC 1/22/163. See also above, p.  145, for another example of Margaret de Lacy’s assistance. TNA SC 1/23/162. CPR 1281–92, p.  136. The inquisitions have not survived, but were referred to in the licences. Inquisitions ad quod damnum were taken as early as 1281 for alienations into mortmain; see Brand, ‘Control of Mortmain Alienation’, p. 37 and note 3. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 3.404–5. Ward, ‘Fashions in Monastic Endowment’, pp. 435–6.

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chantry. Roger of Saxton had set aside seventy acres of land and 10s rent in Saxton (Yorkshire) for the sustenance of a chaplain in St Mary’s chapel there. Wanting, as he said, to keep the disposal of the tenements to himself and his heirs and to be able to confer them on new chaplains, Henry granted the tenements to Richard of Halton, of whose worthiness he had been satisfied by his mother, Alice de Lacy. (Halton seems to have been a protégé of hers: she had presented him to Almondbury (Yorkshire) in 1287 and had consented to his institution to the vicarage at Bradford (Yorkshire) in 1294.34 In 1302, Master Richard of Halton, as rector of Barwick in Elmet (Yorkshire) was given permission to study for two years by Archbishop Corbridge, at Alice’s request.)35 Alice seems to have had some other involvement in the establishment of the chantry. The writing by which her son conferred the tenements on Richard of Halton, dated 7 June 1292, was divided into three parts sealed in turn by Richard of Halton, Alice and Henry de Lacy.36 (The part Roger of Saxton himself played in establishing this chantry is not entirely clear. It seems as if the earl had taken up Roger’s gift as though it were his own. The royal licence to alienate into mortmain, issued on 6 February 1292 after an inquisition ad quod damnum, was for an alienation by the earl himself and it made no mention of Roger.37) De Lacy was involved in another collaborative arrangement at Sutton in Holland (Lincolnshire). Here we have evidence from the bishop’s register showing how important it was not to prejudice the rights of the parish church when new chapels were built. John Dalderby carefully specified which sacraments might be celebrated in the new chapel (which he allowed certain parishioners to attend because they lived a long way away from the main church) but reserved for the mother church its rights and imposed on the parishioners who were to frequent the new chapel their obligations of attendance at the mother church and the dues which were to be paid to it.38 This evidence would suggest that it was local people who had built the chapel, but the royal licence to alienate, issued on 28 October 1302 after an inquisition ad quod damnum, indicated that de Lacy was to alienate half an acre of land in Sutton to the prior and convent of Castle Acre to build a chapel to the church there.39 The de Lacys in fact established a number of chantries. In 1284, as already seen, Henry had licences to establish a chantry for seven chaplains at Denbigh, another at Canford for two chaplains, and another at Kingston.40 In 1286 he granted the canons of Christchurch lands belonging to his bondmen in Kingston and ‘Holte’ in return for the canons finding two chaplains for the chantry there.41 He and his wife Margaret established another chantry at Bindon in 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

Reg. Romeyn, 1.69 and 137. Reg. Corbridge, 1.78. TNA DL 42/1, fol. 397r. CPR 1292–1301, p. 474, and see Public Record Office Lists and Indexes, 17:22. LA Dalderby Memoranda, fol. 52r, and see fols 140v–141r. CPR 1301–7, p. 66 and see Public Record Office Lists and Indexes, 17:59. CPR 1281–92, p. 136. C. Ch. R. 1300–26, p. 227.



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Dorset, where they built a chapel.42 Henry’s mother Alice had a licence in 1303 to alienate in mortmain a messuage and 80 acres of land in Barwick in Elmet (Yorkshire) to a chaplain celebrating divine service daily in the church there for the souls of herself and of Adam of Potterton and their ancestors.43 Adam of Potterton was a clerk in service of the de Lacys; it is intriguing to find him associated with his lady in this foundation.44 Another founder of chantries was Edmund of Cornwall, and there are two in particular where the terms of the foundation reveal his concern to ensure that the spiritual services he wanted were provided. They also show a characteristically medieval sense of place, based on his knowledge of events in his favourite saint’s life. The first gift was in Abingdon, on the site of the birthplace of St Edmund of Abingdon. Edmund of Cornwall had, indeed, specially purchased the site where the saint was believed to have been born; it was close to the river and to St Helen’s church.45 In a deed of 25 June 1288 the abbot of Abingdon consented to the foundation of a chapel on land belonging to the house and within the parish of Abingdon, of which it was both patron and impropriator. (The earl, he was careful to explain as he entered into the obligation, had always been a gracious and benign protector of the house.) The abbot and convent undertook to provide two priests to celebrate daily to the praise of God, to the honour of St Edmund and for the souls of the earl and his ancestors without further need for alms or payment from the earl or his heirs unless they chose to give them. They promised to maintain the chapel and chantry in their present state or better, and acknowledged that ecclesiastical censure and royal power might be brought to bear to compel them to do so. Finally, they renounced any possibility of redress in the ecclesiastical or civil court should their endowment be taken away (that is, if they failed in their undertaking) and to observe any means of enforcement imposed on them by the king or the Church.46 Edmund’s other chantry in honour of St Edmund was at Salisbury. In 1290, he gave the dean and chapter a garden, a small croft and a mill in Mere (one of his demesne manors) for which the tenants had been used to render 23s per year. The lands were next to the manse of the rector of Mere, who was the dean of Salisbury. His endowment was in return for the dean and chapter celebrating his anniversary after his death ‘as solemnly as they celebrate for any bishop, only excepting the distribution to the poor’. During his life, anniversaries were to be celebrated on the date of his father’s death for his father and mother, and after he died for all of them on his own anniversary. (Nothing was said of his wife. This is not surprising in view of what was to happen to their marriage, and it does suggest that the wording of deeds could be very particular to the donor’s 42 43 44 45 46

CPL, 2.17 CPR 1301–7, pp. 101 and 144. See below, Appendix of Documents, item 1. See the editor’s biography of the saint in Matthew Paris, The Life of St Edmund, ed. C.H. Lawrence (Stroud, 1996), p. 4. TNA E 36/57, two copies, nos. xxix and CCxix, fols 8r–v and 61r–v.

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circumstances.) The dean and chapter were to distribute 23s among the resident canons and vicars present at the anniversary celebrations. Finally, the dean and chapter were to arrange for their own story of St Edmund’s life to be sung on his feast days, which may represent the earl’s support for the writing of such a Life. If these plans were not carried out then the earl and his heirs were to have the right to re-enter the tenements which he had given.47 Many other magnates established chantries and chapels at this time. Some, like John of Brittany’s chantry for six chaplains at Richmond, Edmund of Lancaster’s at Tutbury, and Roger Bigod’s at Chepstow, were associated with their castles.48 Isabella de Forz paid stipends amounting to 66s 8d per year from her lordships of Cockermouth and Holderness to chaplains celebrating Masses for the soul of her husband the earl of Albemarle.49 Some chantries, like Roger de Clifford’s in Hereford and William de Beauchamp’s at Worcester, were in cathedrals.50 Some, like William de Valence’s chapel and chaplain at Tenby, were in a hospital he had founded.51 Some were associated with parish churches in the patronage of the donor: in 1285 Edmund of Lancaster had licence to alienate in mortmain to Ralph de Lavinton, parson of the church of Duffield, one acre of land there towards the construction of a chapel of St Thomas the Martyr in that church.52 The choice of Thomas Becket by the king’s brother shows how respectable this once subversive saint had become, and of course Edmund’s eldest son was also called Thomas. Some were on demesne manors, like Edmund of Cornwall’s foundation at Mere and the oratory he founded at Hambleden. 53 Some were collaborative ventures with local people, like the Saxton chantry just mentioned and like the Richmond foundation at Swaffham. In 1304 a licence was given to two chaplains – John of Swaffham and Simon his brother – enabling them to acquire various pieces of land in Swaffham in mortmain, to be given for a chantry in John of Brittany’s chapel there. The chantry was for the souls of John and Beatrice, his wife, and their successors. The long list of donors was headed by John of Brittany himself who had died in that year.54 This is an interesting case, for it appears to suggest collaboration between a magnate and ordinary local people. In another example, in 1309 Agnes de

47 48 49

50 51 52 53 54

TNA E 36/57, no. xliij, fols 12v–13v. CPR 1272–81, pp. 81 and 270, CPR 1281–92, p. 385 and Calendar of Chancery Warrants, 1244–1326, p. 346. TNA SC 6/824/13, m. 2r, 824/14, m. 2r, 1078/11, mm. 1d and 5d, 1078/13, m. 1r, 1078/14, m.  3d, 1078/15, m. 2d, 1078/16, m. 1r, 1078/17, m. 2r, 1078/18, m. 1r, 1078/19, m. 2r, 1078/20, m. 2d, 1079/1, m. 2d, 1079/4, m. 1d, 1079/5, m. 3d, 1079/7, m. 2d, 1079/11, m. 1r, 1079/14, m. 3d. CPL, 1.620, and BL Add. MS 28024, fol. 142r. The chantry at Worcester was established by the prior and convent in return for William’s quitclaim of land in Worcester. CPL, 1.503–4. CPR 1281–92, p. 151. This had to be shut temporarily on account of the rumours of miracles there: Reg. Sutton, 5.143–4, 176 and 212, CPL, 1.570, and CPR 1292–1301, p. 311. CPR 1301–7, p. 306.



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Monceaux had a licence for alienation in mortmain of property in Crewkerne (Somerset) to a chaplain celebrating divine service daily for Isabella de Forz and for the souls of her own ancestors in a chapel to be founded in honour of the Virgin Mary in the cemetery of Crewkerne church.55 Perhaps it was out of gratitude that Agnes included Isabella in the spiritual benefits; in 1282 Isabella had granted her, for her life, the manor of Craft and Crewkerne, with the advowson of Crewkerne, and of the portions and chapels belonging to the church, at a rent of £80 payable for Isabella’s life.56 One reason for the establishment of chantries was the increased emphasis on the doctrine of Purgatory, first officially promulgated at the Second General Council of Lyons in 1274. Another possible motive, for some, was that monks were finding it difficult, with an increasing population, to keep up with all their obligations to pray for people’s souls.57 Perhaps, too, there was a fear of relying too much on gifts made in the past and a sense that individuals and their families had an ongoing responsibility for giving anew. The devotion to individual saints and the attachment to particular places and fellow founders all played their part, as the examples above show. They also show that gifts were being made in return for specific services, a feature that Benjamin Thompson has shown was characteristic of later medieval foundations.58 That chantries were becoming fashionable is also evidenced by the way in which they were protected by royal legislation. For example, the second Statute of Westminster of 1285 instituted safeguards for specific spiritual services. Clause 41 ordained that if heads of religious houses should alienate tenements or houses given to them by the king or his progenitors, then the king had the right to take what had been alienated and hold it at his will. The purchaser would be unable to recover either the property or the money he had paid for it. A writ was made available to earls, barons and others, enabling patrons to recover property; it ordered a head of house to restore property given to the house by the founder or his ancestors. It ought to revert to him as the alienation was contrary to the form of the gift. Furthermore, if the services for which a gift had been made, such as the maintenance of a chantry, lighting in a church or chapel, feeding of the poor, and so on, were not performed over a period of two years, the donor or his heir would be able to use the action of novel disseisin as laid down in the fourth clause of the Statute of Gloucester of 1278 to recover what had been given.59 55 56 57 58

59

CPR 1307–13, p. 183. CPR 1292–1301, p. 53. Jacques Le Goff, The Birth of Purgatory, trans. Arthur Goldhammer (London, 1984), esp. pp. 284–6, and Colvin, ‘Origin of Chantries’, esp. pp. 168–9. Thompson, ‘From “Alms” to “Spiritual Services” ’, pp. 227–62; ‘Habendum et Tenendum’, esp. pp.  212–14 and 234–5, and ‘Monasteries and Their Patrons at Foundation and Dissolution’, pp. 103–25. Statutes of the Realm, 1.2.91–2, and for the clause in the Statute of Gloucester, 1:2:48. See also Wood, English Monasteries, pp. 36–7, where attention is drawn to the fact that there were already procedures available to religious houses themselves to recover what had been alienated in the past, and Thompson, ‘Statute of Carlisle’, pp. 548–9. Thompson

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The clergy objected to this last ruling in the series of criticisms they made of the second Statute of Westminster soon after its publication.60 They maintained that the performance of services due should be enforced by the prelates and that gifts which had been made ought to stand.61 The clergy were not questioning the principle that the services in return for which gifts had been made ought to be given. They were arguing that it was a matter for spiritual, not temporal, jurisdiction. Their stance thus belongs to the continuing conflict over the relative competence of the ecclesiastical and secular courts, which was a recurrent feature of the clerical gravamina of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.62 Chantry foundations were also mentioned specifically when the clergy remonstrated against the Statute of Mortmain. In 1285, they asked that endowments be allowed for hospitals, chantries, building new religious houses and for the necessities and provisions (commodibus) of parish churches.63 Again, in 1295 when asking for mitigation of the terms of the statute the clergy asked that, at the least, they be allowed to acquire chantries and other augmentations of divine service.64 Chantry foundations were certainly favoured by the magnates, but traditional foundations continued as well, albeit less prolifically than before. The most important new foundations were by the earls of Cornwall, who had recently acquired their estates. Richard of Cornwall founded the Cistercian abbey of Hailes in 1246,65 and a Benedictine nunnery at Burnham (Buckinghamshire) in 1268.66 His son Edmund re-endowed the secular college of St Nicholas in Wallingford castle in 1278;67 he founded a house of Cistercians at Rewley in Oxford in 128168 and a college of Bonshommes (an order which followed a rule similar to that of the Augustinian canons) at Ashridge in 1283.69 Richard’s foundation of Hailes was in fulfilment of a vow made when in danger at sea, and Edmund’s foundation at Ashridge was in order to house a portion of the Holy Blood which

60 61 62

63 64 65 66 67 68 69

summarises: ‘The spiritual nature of the services which the Church’s property supported did not exempt its holders from the temporal considerations of the tenurial structure.’ The clerical complaints and royal responses are in Councils and Synods, 2.2.964–7. See also 2.2.1146. Councils and Synods, 2.2.964. For discussion of clerical grievances, see W.R. Jones, ‘Bishops, Politics and the Two Laws: The Gravamina of the English Clergy, 1237–1399’, Speculum, 41 (1966), 209–45 and J.H. Denton, ‘The Making of the “Articuli Cleri” of 1316’, EHR, 101 (1986), 564–95. Councils and Synods, 2.2.958, and see also 2.2.961 and 963. Councils and Synods, 2.2.1142. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:686–9, and VCH Gloucs., 2:96–9. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:545–6, and VCH Bucks, 1:382–4. C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p.  209, Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:1330–1, VCH Berks, 2:104, and see Denton, English Royal Free Chapels, pp. 124–6. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:697–701 and VCH Oxon., 2:81–2. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:515–17, C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 324–5, 383–6 and 405–6, and H.J. Todd, A History of the College of Bonshommes at Ashridge (London, 1823), pp. 1–11.



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he had brought from Germany. Rewley was founded to support Cistercians studying at Oxford. It is striking that Edmund deliberately renounced any patronage rights either at Rewley or Ashridge. At Rewley, he granted that none of his bailiffs should enter the lands and tenements with which he had endowed it, nor damage them in any way.70 It was not usual for patrons of Cistercian houses to have custody during vacancies or indeed to exercise many other rights which other orders found acceptable, but Edmund seems to have been granting them freedom on even more liberal terms than their order’s custom required. And when he founded Ashridge, he said explicitly that he would have no right to enter the possessions of the house during vacancies, nor would their estate be altered in any way at such times. When the brethren had chosen a new rector they would be able to present him to the bishop to be confirmed even if he had not been presented to the patron first.71 Finally, when, in or before 1291, he added lands in Berkhamsted, Hemel Hempstead and Bovingdon to his gifts, he said that he would have no right of entry into the lands and tenements nor to the advowson during vacancies.72 This policy in respect of new foundations was mirrored by renouncing his rights in elections and of custody at Burnham.73 At St Michael’s Mount he retained nominal custody but promised that profits during future vacancies would be delivered to the new head of house.74 Other magnates gave up their traditional rights. Edmund of Lancaster in 1268 decided in view of the fact that the prior or keeper of the Benedictine cell of Llangua (Monmouthshire) could be removed at the will of the abbot of Lire (dép. Eure) that his predecessors’ exactions in time of vacancy could no longer be considered reasonable, and so he gave up his right of custody.75 Henry de Lacy gave up his right of custody at Spalding, but, importantly, he retained the right to put in a custodian to look after its affairs and the right to present to churches, chapels and hospitals falling vacant during the vacancy in the house itself.76 This renunciation of certain traditional rights was happening at the same time that new opportunities for patronage were emerging. One was the growth of the universities, and a number of magnates were interested in supporting study at Oxford. In some cases they were particularly concerned to support poor scholars: 70 71 72 73 74 75

76

Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:700. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:516, and Todd, History of Ashridge, p. 6. C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 386. CPR 1292–1301, pp. 582–3. Oliver, Monasticon Dioecesis Exoniensis, p. 33. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:1015–16; see also Wood, English Monasteries, esp. pp. 53–4 and 81 for the rights of patrons in true cells when the position of the prior was like that of an obedientiary under the abbot of the mother house. TNA DL 36/2/132, 42/2, fol. 27v, and BL Add. MS 35296, fols 73v, 108r–v and 143v–144r. See also Wood, English Monasteries, pp.  82–7, for further examples of the renunciation of rights of custody and the purchase of exemptions from custody rights, particularly in houses of royal patronage.

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Devorguilla de Balliol, widow of John de Balliol, continued his support of a house of poor scholars at Oxford and in 1282 granted them a charter setting out the rules to govern their study and religious observance, including Masses and prayers for the soul of her husband and specific provisions for the poorer scholars among them.77 Isabella de Forz’s account for Naseby for 1268–69 recorded a payment of £6 13s 4d as her alms to the scholars of Oxford established by Walter of Merton. The countess was bound by her charter to make this annual payment ‘donec eisdem in alio competenter beneficio providerit’ – ‘until she should provide suitably for them with another benefice’.78 Henry de Lacy supported individual scholars with allowances of money from his estates, and he and his mother Alice both presented scholar clerks to benefices and supported requests for leave to enable them to study.79 Henry’s accounts for Bicester for 1295–96 show payments of 73s 4d and 33s 4d being paid to two scholars, William of Fockerby and William of Litton, respectively. Another scholar, Robert of Twynham, had had a sum of 16s 8d, but the payments were ordered to stop ‘quia male recessit de scolis’ (‘he had left the schools in disgrace’).80 Clearly, the earl’s sponsorship of learning was linked to performance. The support for scholars was not confined to one accounting year only; in 1304–5 a scholar of Oxford, Thomas of Litton, was getting 33s 4d from Bicester; and at Holborn in London one John Mey, whose place of study was not given – he was simply said to be a poor scholar – was given 41s 11d for his sustenance and clothing.81 Two of these scholar clerks, William of Fockerby and Thomas of Litton, were presented to benefices by de Lacy.82 Towards the end of his life the earl planned to give the advowson of five churches to thirteen scholars at Oxford for whom he had built a house. He was given licence to alienate these on 22 July 1306, though it is not certain whether he did so.83 Magnates were also inspired by the last and greatest experiment of the medieval reforming church, the new mendicant orders. A number of magnates chose friars as members of their households, and specifically as their confessors and messengers.84 Simon de Montfort’s friendship with the scholar Adam Marsh is well known, but he was not the only Franciscan with whom he had connections.85 In Simon’s case, the spiritual and intellectual inspiration of the friars seems clear; with other magnates the evidence of actual influence is less 77 78 79 80 81 82 83

84 85

Oxford Deeds of Balliol College, ed. H.E. Salter (Oxford Historical Society, 1913), pp. 277–9, and VCH Oxon., 3:82. TNA SC 6/949/3, m. 2r. Gemmill, ‘The Earls and Their Clergy’, p. 128. TNA DL 29/1/1, m. 16r. TNA DL 29/1/2, m. 15d. Reg. Sutton, 1.211 and Reg Gandavo, 2.717. CPR 1301–7, p. 455, and see also CPR 1307–13, p. 11. The advowson of a moiety (fraction) of one of the churches, Long Buckby, was said to be in the earl’s possession when he died in 1311: TNA C 134/22, m. 16 (C. Inq. PM, 5.155 (no. 279)). CPL, 1.305 and 321. Maddicott, Simon de Montfort, esp. pp. 80–2 and 91–3.



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explicit but nonetheless suggests that friars of various orders were trusted and esteemed. Richard of Cornwall’s chaplain and envoy was Brother William, a Trinitarian, who in 1260 was authorised to receive back a loan of 5,000 marks which Richard had lent to Henry III.86 Richard’s son Edmund had the Franciscan, John Russel, as his household member and envoy in 1293.87 In 1307 Henry de Lacy was given permission by the pope to be accompanied by his confessor Michael de Mercona, a Franciscan.88 Edmund of Lancaster and Blanche, his second wife (who seems to have been the initiator of the plan), in 1294 endowed a house of Franciscan nuns or Poor Clares outside Aldgate.89 According to Leland, Edmund was also the founder of a house of Franciscans at Preston (Lancashire).90 And finally, Isabella de Forz’s almsgiving from Naseby (Northamptonshire) in 1268–69 contained a flurry of gifts to friars of different orders in Stamford (Lincolnshire): 40s to the Dominicans to commemorate the anniversary of her son Thomas, 20s to the Franciscans and 6s 8d to the Carmelites.91 Of course the personal preferences of patrons made a difference, as seems to have been the case with the earl of Lincoln’s sponsorship of learning. Another factor was whether the patron was a member of a new dynasty, as Richard, earl of Cornwall, and Edmund his son were. But not all royal cadet families wanted to found new religious houses. William de Valence and Edmund, earl of Lancaster, were less munificent in their gifts to the Church. But at least there is evidence of Edmund’s concern to do his duty to houses of which he had acquired the patronage. (And in fact, even a century earlier, Gervase of Chichester had thought that it was better for aristocrats to look after houses already in existence rather than vaingloriously to found new ones.92) Edmund explicitly confirmed the almsgiving of his (disgraced) predecessors. According to a letter to his bailiffs of Tutbury of 12 June 1270 he had ordered an inquiry, as a result of which he instructed them to continue making the offering of 4s 4d per year at the high altar of the priory which had been given from the time of its foundation until the capture of Robert Ferrers at Chesterfield.93 This is a dramatic reference to the very moment at which the alms of a patron had stopped as a result of his political circumstances. Edmund ratified the gift (true, a small one – a half virgate of land and a meadow) made by Simon de Montfort to the hospital for the poor, sick

86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93

CPR 1258–66, p. 74. Bodl. MS Digby, no. 154, fol. 38r (calendared in Hill, Ecclesiastical Letter-Books, p. 187). CPL, 2.7. Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:1553–4. VCH Lancs., 2:162, and John Leland’s Itinerary: Travels in Tudor England, ed. J. Chandler (Stroud, 1993), p. 271. TNA SC 6/949/3, m. 2r. There was also a payment of 13s 4d to an (unidentified) house of nuns there. Mayr-Harting, Religion, Politics and Society in Britain, pp. 128–9. The Cartulary of Tutbury Priory, ed. A. Saltman (Collections for a History of Staffordshire, 4th series, 4; Historical Manuscripts Commission, Joint Publications, 2, 1962), pp. 145–6.

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and infirm at Hungerford – in May 1281.94 And he was clear that his acquired patronage of the house of Garendon (Leicestershire) had brought an obligation to help them. He spelled this out in a letter to John Comyn, begging him to prevent his bailiff and men from maltreating the abbot and convent: ‘. . . le abbe e le covent de Gerondone . . . sunt de nostre avoueysun, par quey nus lour sumes plus especiaument tenuz de eyder en dreit e en resun . . .’ ‘the abbot and convent of Garendon . . . are of our advowson so we are more especially bound in right and reason to help them . . .’95 In 1286 in a final concord recorded in the king’s bench Edmund recognised the right of the brethren of the hospital of Burton Lazars (Leicestershire) to the advowson of Spondon (Staffordshire). The church had been given to the hospital by William Ferrers, earl of Derby (d. 1190).96 The final concord reserved to Tutbury chapel two parts of the garb tithes of the demesne of Spondon, which it had been used to receive, and Edmund was given spiritual benefits in the hospital.97 Magnates were certainly continuing to give their advowsons to religious institutions. They might be given on their own, or with a token parcel of land, or as appurtenances of manors. When they were given along with manors, the deeds do seem to have taken care to mention them specifically. Thus, the advowsons of the churches which belonged to manors given by Edmund of Cornwall to Ashridge college (Buckinghamshire), that is, Hemel Hempstead (Hertfordshire), Chesterton and Ambrosden (Oxfordshire) were all mentioned specifically in his charters.98 When he gave Hailes abbey his manor of Lechlade (Gloucestershire) in 1300, his charter mentioned specifically the gift of the hospital and of the vicarage.99 Edmund, although he was the most prolific of the magnates in his gifts to the Church, was certainly not alone in mentioning advowsons specifically. Other examples are Roger Bigod’s grant of the manor of Acle (Norfolk) to Tintern abbey (Monmouthshire) in 1302, and Henry de Lacy’s grant of the reversion of the manor of East Bradenham to the abbey of Bury St Edmunds in 1309.100 Of course, there may still have been instances in

CPR 1272–81, p. 436. BL Lansdowne MS 415 (Garendon cartulary), fol. 36r. 96 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:633–4. 97 TNA DL 42/2, fol. 142r. 98 The advowson of Hemel Hempstead was at first specifically reserved when he granted the manor in his foundation charter, but he gave it along with other lands there in a charter made in or before 1291. See C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp.  324–5 (vacated) and 385–6, Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6:515–17, and Todd, History of Ashridge, pp. 4–7. The later of the charters was probably made after the inquisition ad quod damnum about the alienation of these lands and the advowson was held on 7 July 1290: TNA C 143/14/24, m. 2. For Chesterton and Ambrosden, see C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 405–6. Again, the charter was probably made after the relevant inquisition ad quod damnum. Only a fragment of the inquisition survives, but the writ ordering it to be taken was issued on 28 April 1289: TNA C 143/14/24, m. 3. 99 C. Ch. R. 1300–26, p. 2. 100 C. Ch. R. 1300–26, pp. 31 and 128. 94 95



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which advowsons were appurtenant but were not mentioned specifically. But, in the case of the earl of Cornwall whose estates and endowments are exceptionally well documented, there is no instance in which an advowson was transferred silently: all those which he granted out with manors were expressly mentioned in his charters.101 Such precision may indicate that the magnates and those who drafted their charters were adopting new standards in line with royal practices. Advowsons were sometimes given along with land in a different place. On 27 May 1280, Edmund of Cornwall gave the Trinitarian friars of Knaresborough (Yorkshire) lands in Pannal with the advowson of the church of Fewston, while in an undated deed, confirmed (as was this one) on 24 November in the same year, he gave them lands in Hampsthwaite and Scotton Thorpe and the advowson of Pannal in exchange for the manor of Roecliffe.102 Sometimes a very small piece of land would be given along with an advowson. Thus in 1274 Edmund of Lancaster gave the prior and convent of Wormsley (Herefordshire) the ‘advowson and patronage’ of the church of Dilwyn together with an acre of land in the manor of Dilwyn;103 Similarly, Edmund of Cornwall’s endowment of Rewley abbey (Oxfordshire) which he founded in 1281 included an acre of his demesne in ‘Bel by Roslyn’ (Cornwall), with the advowson of the church of Wendron and all its other appurtenances in the hundred of Kerrier.104 In 1285 Hugh Courtenay had licence for the alienation in mortmain of one acre of land in Iwerne Courtney (Dorset) and the advowson of the church there to the prior and convent of Christ Church, Twynham.105 In 1302 Henry Percy had licence to assign in mortmain to the abbot and convent of Meaux (Yorkshire) half an acre of land in Nafferton and the advowson of the church there, in exchange for the manor of Pocklington.106 Roger Bigod gave Tintern abbey half an acre of marsh in Halvergate (Norfolk), the site of the church there, and the advowson.107 This giving of token pieces of land along with an advowson may have been in order to help the recipient establish his seisin, before he could take actual possession of the advowson itself at the next vacancy. The ‘Bracton’ treatise took the view that, although seisin of the advowson could only be established by actually presenting, if an advowson were given along with a tenement in the manor in which the church was situated then some sort of ownership was created:

101 Gemmill,

‘Ecclesiastical Patronage’, pp. 474–7, 483–5, 488–9, and 491–2.

102 C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 240–1. The deed in which the friars granted Roecliffe to Edmund

is in TNA E 36/57, no. Clxxxxvij, fol. 52r. The exchange was to be null if Robert de Brus and Christina, his wife, should recover their right in the manor of Roecliffe. Roecliffe was in the parish of Aldborough, whose church had been given to the see of York by Henry I: Early Yorkshire Charters, 1.333–5. 103 C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 250. 104 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:699–700. 105 CPR 1281–92, p. 162. 106 CPR1301–7, p. 100. 107 C. Ch. R. 1300–26, p. 99.

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. . . facta traditione rei corporalis, videlicet tenementi, statim incipit donatarius possidere tenementum illud, et quasi possidere ius praesentandi . . . .  .  .  livery of the corporeal thing, that is, the tenement having been made, the donee begins at once to possess that tenement and to quasi-possess the right to present . . .108

There is one rather nice example of royal officials giving seisin following the settlement of an advowson case in the royal court. A fine was made between Edmund of Cornwall and Thomas Ingoldsthorpe, bishop of Rochester, in 1287, whereby the bishop exchanged the advowson of St Buryan’s (Cornwall) for those of Henley and Mixbury (Oxfordshire), that of Brundish (Suffolk) and a rood of meadow in Henley. A writ was sent to the sheriff of Oxford, who delegated Robert de Rykeward, the hundred bailiff, to give seisin of the advowson of Mixbury. Robert summoned fourteen men to witness a ceremony in which he handed over the ring (handle) of the church door. This was the only way in which it was possible to give seisin of the advowson of Mixbury, because the rood of meadow which the earl had granted to the see of Rochester as the church glebe lay in Henley – that is, outside Mixbury.109 One view was that it was not possible to establish seisin of an advowson until a vacancy occurred. This was one of the arguments put forward for the Crown in the suit over the advowson of Fordingbridge in 1279.110 The chronicler of St John, Pontefract, in his exposition of the rival claims of his house and that of Stanlaw to the church of Whalley, made the point that the monks of Stanlaw only had a charter and no seisin because they had not presented; Pontefract, on the other hand, had both charter and seisin because they had.111 The ‘Bracton’ treatise and later thirteenth-century legal writings went so far as to say that advowsons could not be granted in gross.112 Even so, advowsons were still being given on their own,113 and donors often expected that the insti-

108 Bracton,

Laws and Customs, 2.162. Roffense, ed. J. Thorpe (London, 1769), p. 201. 110 Select Cases in the Court of the King’s Bench, 1.49. 111 Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:127. 112 Bracton, Laws and Customs, 2.161, Britton, 1.267–8, and Fleta, 3.36. 113 For example, Edmund of Cornwall gave Hailes abbey the advowsons of Hemel Hempstead (Hertfordshire), Northleigh (Oxfordshire), and Paul (Cornwall); Edmund of Lancaster gave the abbey of Grace Dieu (Monmouthshire) the advowson of Skenfrith (Monmouthshire); and Gilbert de Clare gave the abbey of St Augustine’s, Bristol, the advowson of Marshfield (Huntingdonshire) and quitclaimed his right in its chapels in return for the advowson of Great Gransden: C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p.  208 and Rot. Gravesend, pp. 187–8, C. Ch. R. 1300–26, p. 490, CPR 1281–92, p. 451 and CPR 1292– 1301, p. 140. No charters survive for John de Warenne’s gift of the advowson of Cantley (Yorkshire) to the nuns of Wallingwells (Nottinghamshire), nor of his gift of Didlington (Norfolk) to the nuns of Marham, nor of Edmund of Lancaster’s gift of the advowson of Embleton (Northumberland) to the scholars of Merton at Oxford; these, too, may well have been given ‘in gross’: Reg. Romeyn, 1.88, CPR 1301–7, p. 97, and CPL 2.350. For 109 Registrum



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tution would appropriate the church concerned. Magnates were influential in securing consent for appropriations – by the late thirteenth century bishops had firmly established their right to consent to appropriations of parish churches and to ordain vicarages in them.114 Indeed, seeking permission to appropriate can be compared in a way to securing royal licences to alienate into mortmain. Edmund of Cornwall gave the advowson of Hemel Hempstead with its chapels and that of Northleigh (Oxfordshire) to Hailes abbey (Gloucestershire) in or before 1278115 and in 1279 Richard Gravesend, bishop of Lincoln, allowed the abbey to appropriate the churches at the earl’s request. Edmund had asked for the appropriation in order to provide for ten more monks at Hailes. Gravesend considered that neither church on its own would suffice to support the proposed increase in numbers, and so he allowed the appropriations, augmenting the vicar’s portion already ordained at Hemel Hempstead and himself ordaining one for Northleigh.116 Appropriations were only allowed for good reason, and the case of the appropriation of Whalley (Lancashire) by the Cistercian monks of Stanlaw shows that the influence of the patron could be instrumental. Henry de Lacy gave Stanlaw that part of the advowson of Whalley still in his possession on 1 January 1284.117 Subsequently, a petition was made to the pope for the appropriation of the church. The monks kept in their Coucher Book a list of the arguments presented to Pope Nicholas IV in support of the petition which the earl made on their behalf.118 It asked for two things: for the appropriation of Whalley and to be allowed to move the house of Stanlaw to Whalley. The earl had given Stanlaw that part of the advowson of Whalley still in his possession on 1 January 1284.119 Cantley see also above, Chapter 1, p. 22–3. Some gifts may have been confirmations of gifts made in the past, like Roger Bigod’s quitclaim of Cratfield (Norfolk) in favour of St Neots (Huntingdonshire) in 1271. His deed confirmed the other gifts made to the priory by Matilda de Senlis, William de Albini and Walter Fitzrobert in the early twelfth century: BL Cotton MS Faustina A iv, fol. 141r. 114 See esp. Cheney, From Becket to Langton, pp.  119–36, and Kemp, ‘Monastic Possession of Parish Churches’. The Third Lateran Council canon 9 had indicated that churches and tithes could not be received from lay hands without consent of bishops and this was confirmed in the Fourth Lateran Council. A canon of the legatine council of London of 1268 ruled that appropriations should only occur where there was genuine poverty or for some other legitimate reason, and there had to be sufficient vicarages: Councils and Synods, 2.2.770–1. 115 His charters were confirmed on 10 August 1278: C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 208. 116 Rot. Gravesend, pp. 187–8. 117 The Coucher Book of Whalley Abbey ed. W.A. Hutton, 4 vols (Chetham Society, 10–11, 16 and 20, 1847–9), 1.189–91 (the deed is in Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:644–5). This does not in fact seem to have been the end of the matter: in 1298 by a fine in the royal court Henry quitclaimed his right in return for being received into all benefits and orisons: Final Concords for Lancashire, Part 1, 1189–1307, ed. William Farrer (1899), p. 185. 118 Coucher Book of Whalley, 1.191–3. 119 Coucher Book of Whalley, 1.189–91 (the deed is in Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum,

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All sorts of reasons were listed in support of the appropriation: the dangers of the site at Stanlaw; the fact of the earl’s gift which had been made with a view to appropriation and to the move to Whalley; the royal consent to the gift; the fact that the bishop of Coventry and Lichfield had approved their appropriation of part of the church already; the fact that the new site would be more conducive to hospitality and alms-giving and that the number of monks could be increased by twenty, enabling daily Masses to be said for the earl and the pope (a striking inclusion of the pontiff himself); and finally, the fact that the old place would not be neglected, for three or four monks could stay there as long as was practicable to maintain hospitality and divine works. The good which would come of the proposed move and appropriation was summarised at the end of the petition and it was followed by a copy of the deed by which Henry de Lacy had given the advowson. Nicholas IV allowed the monks to move to Whalley and to appropriate the church after the death of the then rector.120 Later, when the monks had a change of heart, Henry in January 1306 (while at the papal court) obtained a papal injunction to force the monks to stay in Whalley; if they did not then the advowson would revert to him.121 An approach to the pope did not mean that the rights of the bishop of the diocese were ignored. When in 1295 Edmund of Lancaster granted the advowson of Hartington (Derbyshire) to the Franciscan nuns outside Aldgate, his charter included a specific statement that if the pope or the diocesan bishop should give permission for appropriation, then he and his heirs would not interfere.122 Edmund petitioned the pope to allow the nuns to appropriate one of his churches, and permission was given for the appropriation of a benefice up to the value of 40 marks (£26 13s 4d). The bishop of Coventry and Lichfield and his officials did in fact oppose the appropriation of Hartington on the grounds that it was worth more than this. The abbess and convent petitioned Boniface VIII, and it was discovered that, according to the 1291 Taxatio, Hartington was not in excess of the limit (the church was valued there at £26 13s 4d)123 so the pope allowed the appropriation to take place.124 It seems clear that the magnates were willing to continue to give advow-

5:644–5). 1.499 (the deed is given in full in Coucher Book of Whalley, 1.182–4, and Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 5:644). 121 CPL, 2.7. 122 TNA LR 14/1173. ‘.  .  . si per graciam sedis apostolice seu episcopi diocesani dictam ecclesiam in proprios usus poterunt obtinere liceat eis dictam ecclesiam cum suis pertinenciis ingredi et in proprios usus sibi et successoribus suis ad sustentationem suam imperpetuum retinere absque impedimento nostri vel heredum nostrorum.’ ‘. . . if by the grace of the apostolic see or of the diocesan bishop they are able to appropriate the said church, it will be permitted to them to enter the said church with its appurtenances and to retain it appropriated for ever, to themselves and their successors, for their sustenance, without impediment of us or of our heirs.’ 123 www.hrionline.ac.uk/Taxatio/db/Taxatio/printbc.jsp?benkey=CL.DE.AS.13. 124 CPL, 1.575. 120 CPL,



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sons to ecclesiastical institutions, with an awareness of the potential of those advowsons. At the same time, some were seeking to reclaim rights of advowson granted out in the past. This is especially noticeable on the estates of magnates whose ancestors had granted out many such rights to religious houses in their patronage. In fact, the result was often a vindication of the rights of the house concerned. John de Warenne tried to present to West Blatchington (Sussex) in 1252, but then revoked his presentation and quitclaimed his right in the advowson.125 Similarly, in 1267 he quitclaimed his right to the advowson of Dewsbury (Yorkshire).126 Both churches had been confirmed in Lewes priory’s possession by William de Warenne, the founder’s grandson, in the mid-twelfth century, and the house had deeds in its possession to demonstrate this, so it was not a question of a spurious claim to prompt the creation of a title.127 In the same way, Humphrey de Bohun challenged the right of Walden abbey (Essex) to the advowson of Pleshey. Pleshey seems to have been given to Walden at the abbey’s foundation between 1136 and 1144.128 In the end Humphrey was forced to admit that the abbey’s candidates had been instituted to Pleshey, and he granted them the advowson.129 Conversely he managed to regain the advowson of Amersham which had earlier been given to Walden.130 Gilbert de Clare was unsuccessful in his bid to recover the advowson of Undy (Monmouthshire) from the priory of Goldcliff, to which it had been granted by Howell of Caerleon. Gilbert did not help himself by impleading the prior as his tenant in his court of Caerleon under his own writ of quare impedit. This of course challenged the royal cognisance of all advowson cases which extended into the marcher lordships, and may well have been what prompted Edward I to espouse the prior’s cause when he appealed to him. The plea came before the king’s bench in 1290, but it dragged on for years inconclusively, Gilbert failing to appear and continuing to distrain and oppress the prior. The family did not regain the advowson. In the inquisition taken on the Clare estates in 1314 the prior of Goldcliff was said to ‘occupy’ the church of Undy.131 It is also evident that magnates were seeking to maintain their stock of advowsons, making sure in their grants to other laymen that they retained them. In about 1262 Roger Bertram, lord of Mitford, sold his towns of Mason, Callerton and Little Eland (Northumberland) to William de Valence, but he retained the advowson of churches and his tenants’ suit to the mill of Great Eland. When of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.68. of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.67, and Reg. W. Giffard, p. 20. 127 Early Yorkshire Charters, 8.85–7 (and in Chartulary of Lewes (Sussex Portion), 1.22 and 28). 128 The deed is in Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 4:133 and note (u). The church of ‘Estra’ referred to Pleshey: see P.H. Reaney, ed., The Place Names of Essex (English Place Names Society, 12, 1935), p. 488, note 2. 129 BL Harl. MS 3697 (Cartulary of Walden Abbey), fol. 23r. 130 CPL, 1.199. 131 C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, p. 360, Morgan, English Lands of the Abbey of Bec, pp. 29–30, Altschul, A Baronial Family, p. 276, and TNA C 134/43, m. 41 (C. Inq. PM, 5.336 (no. 538)). 125 Chartulary 126 Chartulary

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he sold William the manor of Great Eland itself, in or before 1269, he reserved the advowson of the church which he had granted, homage of certain tenants which he had also granted out, and several manors.132 John of Hastings made a life grant to John Paynel of the manor of Ashley (Norfolk), but retained the advowson of the church.133 Deeds in the Cornwall cartulary show similar patterns. Edmund of Cornwall’s life grant to Ralph of Chesterton’s widow of the manor of Holton (Oxfordshire) specifically reserved the advowson of the church, and he reserved it again later on, when he granted Holton for life to Bartholomew of Kent.134 In 1290, he may well have retained the advowson of Perranarworthal when he gave the manor of Perranarworthal with land in ‘Redwyl’ to John Fitzwilliam and Beatrice his wife, to hold from Oliver de Dinham, in exchange for their manor of Penlyne.135 Edmund also had a policy of reserving advowsons and other rights when he farmed out manors. The account of the honour of Wallingford in 1285–86 shows that the manors of Chesterton, Hambleden (Buckinghamshire), and Remenham (Berkshire) were all farmed out in that year, but the advowsons of churches, together with wardships, marriages, escheats and entry fines were retained.136 On the honour of St Valery, Harwell (Berkshire) was being farmed out with similar exceptions in 1290–91, and Hambleden was farmed out again in 1297–98 with the same exceptions.137 Finally, when in 1288 Edmund granted the wardship of the lands of William Fitzwilliam, his tenant of the manor of Lechlade and ‘Wike’ (Gloucestershire), to the clerk Walter de Chilteham he reserved the knights’ fees, advowsons of churches and escheats.138 Much more significant, however, was the largest single grant Edmund made during his lifetime, namely, the settlement on his wife Margaret when the two 132 TNA

E 40/4770, and duplicate, 4771 (C. Ch. R. 1257–1300, pp. 119–20). 1292–1301, p. 312. 134 TNA E 36/57, no. Cxvj, fol. 31v, Midgley, Ministers’ Accounts, 1.143, and TNA C 133/97, esp. mm. 1 and 3 (C. Inq. PM, 3.479 and 483 (no. 604)). The grant to Christina had been in exchange for her dower lands in Chesterton, where Edmund seems to have been trying to build up his demesne interest. He had bought the manor from Ralph of Chesterton before Ralph’s death in 1273, and purchased the advowson in 1274 from William de l’Isle (who had himself recovered it from John le Bret, Ralph of Chesterton’s son-in-law) for 80 marks (£53 6s 8d): Rot. Hund., 2.826, The Feet of Fines for Oxfordshire, 1195–1291, ed. H.E. Salter (Oxford Record Society Publications, 41, 1930), p. 204, Rot. Gravesend, pp. 225–6, and see VCH Oxon., 6:95. 135 TNA E 36/57, fols 25r–26r. There are two very similar deeds in the cartulary evidencing this transaction, both undated. One specifically excepted the advowson although the other did not. The agreement must have been made in or about 1290. On 10 September in that year, Edmund granted the service due from Perranarworthal and ‘Redwyl’ to Oliver de Dinham in exchange for that from Penlyne: TNA E36/57, fols 66v–67r. 136 TNA SC 6/1095/12. It is not clear why Edmund was in possession of Remenham; it was held in the thirteenth century by the de Montfort family from the earls of Warwick: VCH Berks, 3:160. 137 TNA SC 6/1095/13 and 14. 138 TNA E 36/57, fol. 30v. 133 CPR



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were separated. They had had no children, and the failure of this marriage had huge consequences for the balance of royal and magnate power in the period. Edmund had no siblings, and so his heir when he died in 1300 was his first cousin, Edward I. The quarrel between Edmund and Margaret, of unknown origin, was a scandal, and John Pecham had been trying to mediate between them as early as 1289. He even threatened to excommunicate Edmund if he did not return to Margaret.139 On 13 February 1294, however, the two were formally separated and Edmund settled a portion of his estates, worth £800, on Margaret for her lifetime.140 He assigned to her all his lands in Norfolk and Suffolk, the manor and soke of Kirton in Lindsey (Lincolnshire), £40 per year from the farms of Malmesbury and Winterslow (Wiltshire) and £8 13s 7d from Queenhithe in London. But he kept for himself the knights’ fees, the advowson of priories and churches and the escheats belonging to these lands and tenements. The patronage rights were considerable. They included the patronage of the priories of Bromholm, Eye, Snape and Redlingfield (Suffolk), the presentation on every fifth vacancy to Alderton and Dallinghoo (Suffolk), and the advowsons of Hemswell, Pilham, Springthorpe, Heapham and Frodingham (Lincolnshire).141 The ecclesiastical interests were treated quite differently, however, when Margaret was granted her dower after Edmund’s death in 1300. The very same manors and rents were assigned to her, but this time with the ecclesiastical interests – except for the patronage of Bromholm.142 William de Beauchamp also retained advowsons when he granted out lands, as evidenced by deeds in the Beauchamp cartulary. We saw earlier how he retained the advowson of ‘Compton’ when he granted the manor to Ralph of Lindsey in 1270.143 When, in or before 1270, he leased the manors of Greetham and Cottesmore (Rutland) to Humphrey of Barford for a three-year term with all appurtenances, he reserved the advowson of Cottesmore.144 (The advowson of Greetham could not have been transferred in any case, because the church had been appropriated by the priory of St Sepulchre at Warwick.145) In a fine of 12 November 1278 by which a plea of warranty of charter was settled, William and his wife Matilda granted Richard de Amundeville and his wife Matilda a life interest in the manors of Berkswell, Lighthorne and Brailes (Warwickshire) with their appurtenances, except for the advowson of the churches of

Epist. Peckham, 3.995–6 and see 3.982, Reg. Pecham, 2.246, Reg. Sutton, 3.33–7 and Nicholas Vincent, ‘Edmund of Almain, second earl of Cornwall (1249–1399), ODNB, online edn, Jan 2008 (www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/8505, accessed 16 Nov 2011). 140 CPR 1292–1301, pp.  63–5. The earl’s side of the agreement is only calendared, but Margaret’s side, written in Anglo-Norman, is given in full. 141 These are the rights included in the IPM taken on Edmund’s death in 1300: TNA C 133/95–7 (C. Inq. PM, 3.456–89 (no. 604)). 142 CCR 1296–1302, pp. 426 and 438–9. 143 See above, Chapter 1, pp. 23–4, for this grant. 144 CPR 1266–72, p. 441. 145 VCH Rutland, 2:138. 139 Reg.

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Berkswell and Lighthorne and £16 rent in Brailes.146 Again, the advowson of Brailes could not have been retained, the church having been appropriated to Kenilworth priory to which it had been given by Roger de Beaumont, earl of Warwick (c.1123–53).147 When William demised £36 5d, all pleas and perquisites of court, fines of lands, merchets and all other incidents from the manor of Kibworth Beauchamp (Leicestershire) and its tenants to William of Hanslope, son of Simon of Toulouse, for ten years, he retained the advowson.148 Finally, when (at an uncertain date) he demised his land in Letcombe Basset (Berkshire) to William Comyn he retained the advowson of the church.149 William’s are not the only deeds in the Beauchamp cartulary showing a concern to retain advowsons of churches. In 1289 Ela, dowager countess of Warwick, quitclaimed her dower manors of Tanworth and Claverdon (both Warwickshire) to William, but retained for her lifetime the advowson of the church of Tanworth together with the annual rent of 6d due from the abbot of Reading, and his fealty.150 On the de Lacy estates both Henry and his mother Alice were concerned to safeguard their advowson rights. In 1295 Henry de Lacy granted William of Stopham, his retainer, all his possessions in Waddington (Lincolnshire) except the advowson of the church, until such time as he should enfeoff him with thirty librates of land in a suitable location in Wales.151 In 1297 Alice his mother leased the manor of Beeston (Norfolk) to Thomas, prior of Beeston and Robert of Bramford, rector of Surlingham, for ten years, but reserved the patronage of the church.152 And finally, magnates were prepared to go to court to uphold and enhance their patronage rights. Here Isabella de Forz should have the last word. She spent very large sums of money on advowson litigation. In the constable of Cockermouth’s accounts for 1265–66, 1266–67 and 1267–68, expenses amounting to £14 11½d were incurred over the advowson of Brigham (Cumberland), and a further sum of 66s 8d was paid to Beatrice de Louther for giving up her right in it.153 Brigham was the subject of dispute between two rival presentees, Antony Bek and Master Roger de Seton. The matter was settled by January 1278 in favour of Bek, who had been presented by Isabella, ostensibly by their friends’ arbitration.154 In 1267–68 the sum of £11 12s 9d was spent on William Becok’ and others occupying the church of Caldbeck (Cumberland) for forty-eight weeks, holding it against the bishop of Carlisle. In the following year the constable spent 13s 4d 146 BL

Add. MS 28024, fol. 84r–v. 1300–26, pp. 276–7, and VCH Warks., 5:25. 148 BL Add. MS 28024, fols 32v–33v. 149 BL Add. MS 28024, fol. 137r. 150 BL Add. MS 28024, fol. 102r–v. Ela was the widow of Thomas de Newburgh, earl of Warwick (1229–42): see Cokayne, Complete Peerage, XII (ii). 365, and Beauchamp Cartulary Charters, p. xxxviij. 151 TNA DL 42/1/2, fol. 504r. 152 TNA E 40/5577 (Catalogue of Ancient Deeds, 3.196) and see above, Chapter 1, p. 24. 153 TNA SC 6/824/6, m. 1r and 824/7, m. 1d. 154 CPR 1272–81, p. 254. 147 C. Ch. R.



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taking to Carlisle letters (presumably the writ ne admittas) stopping the bishop from admitting anyone to the church, and on expenses of twelve men witnessing this act.155 In 1268–69 the constable of Skipton incurred expenses of 16s 9d going to London for the suit over Caldbeck.156 And in spite of all this effort the archbishop of York on 12 June 1268 collated to Caldbeck because it had, on account of the controversy, been vacant for more than six months.157 When the case came on in the king’s bench in Michaelmas Term Isabella’s claim to the advowson as her dower looks somewhat cavalier; her argument was that her husband had presented his clerk Alan and that the bishop had only had collated as diocesan, not as true patron. The jury upheld the bishop’s right and Isabella was fined for making a false claim – except that she was let off at the instance of the queen.158 Finally, in 1277–78 Isabella’s receiver of Cockermouth and her reeve of Holderness paid out £12 8s 8d and £4 10s 5d respectively as expenses incurred by her officials over the church of Dean (Yorkshire), suggesting yet another expensive lawsuit for the ill-fated countess.159

155 TNA

SC 6/824/7, m. 1d. SC 6/1087/6, m. 3d. 157 Reg. W. Giffard, pp. 91–2. 158 Placitorum Abbreviatio, p. 169. 159 TNA SC 6/824/10, m. 1r, and 1077/27, m. 2r. 156 TNA

Conclusion We cannot, then, look at endowment of the Church without also considering what was being taken back and which rights were being defended and nurtured. This, after all, was what patronage was all about. What emerges too is that patronage was a dynamic thing, always needing to be exercised in order to be a reality, and always benefiting from refreshment in the form of new endowments. Studies of ecclesiastical patronage have tended hitherto to focus on particular families or regions, or to address long time periods. The present study is different because it has focused on a larger, but still discrete, social group, and has examined patronage rights in the special and very important political circumstances of the later thirteenth century. This has made it possible to combine the evidence from a variety of sources to give depth and context to our understanding of the nature of patronage and how it operated. This brief conclusion draws together the main points and suggests where further study would be fruitful. Until the middle years of the century, advowson rights, unless they were actually granted out (nearly always to an ecclesiastical institution), usually descended with land. They were not normally severed from estates as a consequence of estate transfer. The same is broadly true of patronage rights in religious houses, although with respect to these there was a tendency for upward mobility, with rights sometimes being acquired by overlords, especially when estates were divided up. But from the later years of Henry III’s reign, the necessary attachment of patronage to land was being questioned as never before. Specifically, the Crown had a policy of retaining rights when it made grants of wardship, and Edward I asserted that patronage rights had to be mentioned specifically in royal charters if they were to be transferred as appurtenances. Members of the nobility were becoming more circumspect in granting out advowsons, and study of other laymen’s charters of the period might show whether this was a more general trend. Advowsons were also being treated sep­arately in IPMs, rather than as natural adjuncts of tenants’ demesne manors. The patronage rights of marcher lords in Welsh bishoprics were brought into the control of the Crown. In practice, the consequences of the royal change of policy were uneven. For some magnates, it made little difference. There was no general resumption of patronage rights into the hands of the Crown, and the challenges to patronage rights on the basis of the interpretation of past royal charters were made very selectively. The most significant change was in respect of the rights of marcher lords to the custody of Welsh bishoprics. Once the bishoprics were brought into royal control, it was clear that the ecclesiastical patronage rights of the magnates were, qualitatively, no different from those of any other laymen. And the gulf between magnate and royal patronage rights was widened by the



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increasingly strident claims made by the Crown in respect of the exempt royal free chapels. It is hard to write any study of the magnates without seeing them in relation to the Crown and comparing their position with that of the king. Indeed, much of what we know about the medieval nobility comes from their appearance in the royal records. Comparison of the authority, power and influence of individual magnates with those of the Crown will always tend to put them in the shade – except at particular times of rebellion and dissent such as the years from 1258 to 1265 and, perhaps, 1297. Even so, when it comes to ecclesiastical patronage, it is quite clear that the rights and influence of the nobility were both distinct from, and important by comparison with, the rights of the Crown. Quantitatively, the magnates were the most important lay patrons. This was essentially because the number of institutions in their patronage was related to the overall size of their estates. Although some advowsons of churches – and, on some magnate estates, many of them – had been granted out to ecclesiastical institutions in the past, they still had many of the churches on their demesne manors in their gift, as well as opportunities for wardship patronage on the estates of their tenants. Further study of the value of benefices in lay gift, based on IPMs, would be a way of understanding IPMs better as well as, possibly, informing us about patterns of agricultural prosperity. Because so much of their patronage was made up of benefices normally in their gift they were well placed to know which churches were involved and it was very rare that they omitted to make a presentation in timely fashion. By contrast, as perusal of the patent rolls shows, the Crown was heavily reliant on wardship patronage and on custodies of bishoprics and religious houses. This is why the king relied so much on information from IPMs, and from royal clerks and others about the opportunity to present. Magnates, however, had their estate administrators on the ground, close to the benefices to which they needed to present, as their source of information. Studying the nobility inevitably sets us thinking about whether to regard the decisions they made as really their own, how much they knew of what was done in their name, and how much they relied on the advice of others. It is, for example, possible to regard changing patterns in the endowment of the Church in the thirteenth century as a product of a collective attitude towards foundations. Certainly, there were common patterns. Chantries were emerging ever more clearly as a preferred kind of gift, and a number of magnates favoured the friars with their generosity. We also begin to see an increasing interest in the sponsorship of learning, particularly in the form of support for institutions and individuals at Oxford. Beyond such patterns, of course, individual preferences played their part. We cannot generalise and say that all new families were generous to the Church because they wanted to make their mark and felt that they could afford it. The endowments made by the thirteenth-century earls of Cornwall were on a magnificent scale; next to them the grants made by the earl of Lancaster look downright mean. Yet, Edmund ‘Crouchback’ did his duty by the houses of which he had acquired the patronage – even when they had been founded by the ancestors of royal enemies. Likewise, some magnates – Isabella

176   CONCLUSION de Forz, for example – had rather hostile and aggressive relations with the houses which had been in the patronage of their family for generations. All the same, Isabella’s estate accounts show her casting her bread upon the waters in her almsgiving to friars, scholars and others. This was, however, a period which required patrons to consider their endowments very seriously. From 1279, if not before, secular law required them to seek licences before making gifts to the Church. They also needed to exert their influence to make sure that the benefit of gifts that had been made were fully realised – that is, specifically, that gifts of advowsons could, with the permission of the bishop, be turned into appropriations. And, in the context of papal provisions and financial exactions, they needed to think carefully about whether to go on making gifts at all. In practice, of course, they did. But what is particularly noticeable is that they did not confine their gifts to institutions with which they had formal patronage relationships. In particular, chantry foundations were not necessarily associated with religious houses of their own patronage, nor, necessarily, with churches of their own advowson. In this and in their patronage of the friars they were seeking spiritual services elsewhere. Nor were the spiritual needs of magnates met, apparently, in the parish churches which formed the bread-and-butter of their ecclesiastical interests. It is true that some chantries were associated with these churches, but on the whole it should not surprise us that magnates do not seem to have paid much attention to the endowment of the churches on their estates. Their size and wealth were not so much related to the status of their patron, but rather to the pattern of settlement of local agricultural communities. The network of parish churches met the needs of local people – and unless the lord was local, he was unlikely to worship in it.1 For a great magnate, ordinary parish churches were generally a resource which met his need to provide for his family members and administrators. They were not the place where he practised his own religion. For that, he had his castle chapel, sometimes endowed, in which to hear Mass; he had his portable altar; he might have a friar in his household to hear his confession; and he could take spiritual comfort in contemplating the auspicious buildings and rich treasures and property given to the religious houses where his family were buried and where he would one day lie. Nor did noble clerks, when they entered the Church, expect to abandon their class and status. They quite clearly intended to hold multiple benefices. Apart from the impact on the care of souls that this will have made, it ate into magnates’ stock of patronage and used up many of the favours they were able to call in. This in turn will have left fewer resources for meeting the needs of other clerks who had claims on their lords’ generosity. The other needy clerks were their estate administrators, and study of surviving ministers’ accounts shows that there were dozens of clerks working away, only a few of whom could expect to

1

As Crouch points out, however, manorial chapels enabled lords to worship away from the local community: English Aristocracy, pp. 229–30.



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be rewarded with a church. There were not enough benefices to go round in thirteenth-century England.2 Magnates, however, when meeting the needs of their dependants, were not solely reliant on their own resources of patronage. The circles in which they moved gave them access to a whole network of patrons, including the king, bishops and religious houses (and not just houses in their own patronage). They, in turn, granted favours to royal clerks and those of the affinity of other magnates. The ability of magnates to access the papacy seems to have been rather more uncertain. Entries in the papal registers about magnates generally relate to their private affairs – dispensations for marriage within the prohibited degree; the licensing of portable altars or granting of permission to have private confessors; allowing ladies to stay overnight in monasteries; occasional dispensations for individual clerks. Only rarely did they have personal and individual access to the papal curia. Arguably, with the decline of the crusade and the more insular interests of many English magnates following the loss of Normandy at the beginning of the century, the international influence of individual magnates was also on the wane. In this context it is important that the king engaged the lay patrons, represented by the magnates, in his policies towards the Church and in his remonstrations to the papacy. He did so because he believed that that their word carried weight. More than ever before, patronage rights were mediated by the king, and his own rights of patronage were increasingly distinctive in character and extent. But this did not mean that the magnates were just ordinary lay patrons. To be a magnate’s clerk meant access not only to fees and benefices but to protection and to a network which was the magnate’s full sphere of influence. A magnate’s patronage did not only include his formal rights of patronage as defined by the law but implied all the influence he could bring to bear on his class and affinity. And in thirteenth-century England, influence and the giving and receiving of favours mattered just as much as the exercise of rights.

2

See S. Townley, ‘Unbeneficed Clergy in the Thirteenth Century: Two English Dioceses’, in Studies in Clergy and Ministry in Medieval England, ed. D.M. Smith (York, 1991), pp. 38–64.

Appendix of Documents

Editorial note Punctuation and use of capital letters has been standardised. Contractions and suspensions have been extended silently unless the scribal intention is unclear, in which case the extension has been placed in square brackets. The use of the letters c, t, i, j, u and v, sometimes used interchangeably in the documents, has been standardised according to pronunciation and the spelling of modern English words derived from the Latin or French words in which they occur. 1. BL Cotton MS Vespasian E xix (Cartulary of Nostell priory), fol. 14r Copy of letter patent of Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, receiving Richard of Warter, prior-elect of Nostell (Yorkshire), 30 December 1276. Littera domini Henrici de Lascy comitis de receptione electi. Henricus de Lascy comes Lync’ et constabularius Cestr’ omnibus presentes litteras visuris vel audituris salutem in Domino. Noveritis quod cum frater Ricardus de Wartria canonice electus esset in priorem domus Sancti Oswaldi de Nostle et ipse, pro conservatione libertatis prioris dicte domus eligendi et presentandi per antecessores nostros sibi concesse nos extra provenciam1 Ebor[acensem] tanquam verum patronum suum admissionis gracia querere non deberet sed potius nobis extra predictum provinciam existentibus seneschallo nostro Pontis Fracti presentari, nobis tamen in omnibus reverenciam volens exhibere, versus nos appropinquans presenciam nostram apud Kynstan’2 infra predictam provinciam exspectavit, ubi electione nobis exhibita et libertate sua cognita, quia eidem in nullo prejudicare voluimus, ipsum fratrem Ricardum electum canonice per dilectum clericum nostrum Adam de Potterton’ litteram nostram patentem deferentem prout decuit gratanter admisimus. In cuius rei testimonium has litteras nostras dicte domui de Sancto Oswaldo fieri fecimus patentes. Dat’ apud Pontem Fractum xxxmo die Decembris anno regni3 Edwardi quinto. Letters of Lord Henry de Lacy, earl, concerning receipt of the [prior‑]elect. Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln and constable of Chester, [sends] greetings in the Lord to all who shall see or hear the present letters. You should know that when brother Richard of Wartria had been elected canonically as prior of the house of St Oswald’s Nostell, he did not have to seek us outside the province of York, but

1 2 3

sic. Kingston (Dorset). regis omitted?



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rather, in order to safeguard the liberty of the prior of the said house in electing and presenting as granted by our ancestors, might be presented to our steward of Pontefract while we were outside the said province. He, however, wanting to show reverence to us in all things and, making his way towards us at Kingston, awaited our arrival within the said province, where, the election having been shown to us and his liberty understood, because we naturally did not wish to do prejudice to him in any way, we graciously admitted the same brother Richard, as canonically elected, by our beloved clerk Adam of Potterton, carrying our letter patent. Dated at Pontefract (Yorkshire), 30 December 1276.

2. TNA SC 1/24/197 Letter of Thomas of Winchester to Robert Burnell, bishop of Bath and Wells, asking for a presentation to Alresford (Hampshire) for a clerk of Isabella de Forz, countess of Albemarle [before 22 April 1280].4 Reverendo patri in Christo domino R. Dei gracia Batoniensi et Wellensi episcopo, suus humilis et devotus Th[omas] de Winton’ clericus salutem, reverenciam pariter et honorem. Reverende paternitati vestre humiliter et devote supplico, quatinus domino Jordano capellano comitisse Albemarlie, latori presencium, cum pietatis affectu favorabiles et benigni quo ad suam promotionem existere dignemini. Placeret autem mihi si domino regi et vobis placeret ut ad ecclesiam meam de Alresford, secundum Deum, promoveretur, [?quod]5 tenore presentium felici paternitati vestre significo. Dat’ apud Alresford. [Seal missing.] To the reverend father in Christ, Lord R., by the grace of God bishop of Bath and Wells, his humble and devoted clerk Thomas of Winton [sends] greetings, with equal reverence and honour. I humbly and devotedly beg your reverend fatherhood that, inclined by piety, you will deign to be favourable and benign to Sir Jordan, chaplain of the countess of Albemarle, bearer of these presents, as regards his promotion. Indeed, I hereby inform your auspicious fatherhood that it would please me, if it were pleasing to you and the lord king, that he be promoted, God willing, to my church of Alresford. Given at Alresford.

3. TNA SC 1/10/17 Letter of Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester, to John Kirkby, about the custody of the priory of St James’s, Bristol [before 19 May 1282].6 A sun cher et bien voillant sire Johan de Kirkeby saluz et bone amur. Sachez sire ke nostre abbe de Teukebury7 est a Deu comande, e si tost ke noz baillifs saveyent

4 5 6

7

Jordan Marsh was presented to Alresford on 22 April 1280: CPR 1272–81, p. 368. The contraction seems obscure in the manuscript. The constable of Bristol was ordered on 19 May 1282 to deliver the custody of the priory to Godfrey Giffard, bishop of Worcester, while the plea was pending between the king and Gilbert de Clare: CCR 1279–88, p. 157, and see also CPR 1281–92, pp. 21–2. Tewkesbury (Gloucestershire).

180   

APPENDIX OF DOCUMENTS

il8 entrerent en nostre noun en la priorte de Sente Jake de Bristewe ke est celle de la mesun de Teukebur’ et tenue de nus,9 si com noz baillifs ont tut jorz fet et les baillifs de noz ancestres quant tel caas avint, atenir la priorte avantdite en nostre garde et tut les autres maners de la mesun jesque atant ke il y eust autre abbe, porceo ke la mesun de Teuk’ ne tient de nul homme forke de nus ne nule celle ke il eient.10 E la vindrent les bailiffs et les genz nostre seignur le rey de Bristewe et boterent hors noz genz la quel chose est a nostre desheretesun. Dunc nus vus prions ke vus por lamur de nus ceste chose voillez mostrer a nostre seignur le rey11 et mettre a ceo de la vostre part le bien ke vus poez issi ke la chose nus seit adresce et ke nus ne seons desheritez.12 Si riens vus plese ver nus si le nus voillez mainder. Saluz; le Deu vus gard. To his dear and benevolent Sir John de Kirkby, greetings and good fellowship. Know, sir, that our abbot of Tewkesbury is commended to God and that as soon as our bailiffs knew [of this] they entered in our name into the priory of St James of Bristol which is [a] cell of the house of Tewkesbury and is held of us. This is just as our bailiffs and our ancestors’ bailiffs have always done on such occasions, to hold the aforesaid priory and all the other manors of the house in our custody until there should be another abbot, since the house of Tewkesbury does not hold of anyone but of us, nor does any cell that they have. And lo! Our lord the king’s bailiffs and people of Bristol came and threw our men out, something which is to our disinheritance. So we entreat you, that you will for love of us make this thing known to our lord the king and do your best in this regard, so that the matter shall be put right and we shall not be disinherited. Do send word if there is anything we can do to please you. Farewell; God keep you.

4. TNA SC 1/21/51 Letter of Andrew, provost of Werden (Hanover) and notary of the imperial court to Edward I, regarding the church of Mixbury (Oxfordshire), 11 July 1282. Magnifico principi et predilectissimo domino suo in Christo, domino Eduardo Dei gracia regi Anglorum, domino Hyb[ernorum] et duci Aquit[annorum],13 suus Andreas prepositus Werdensis, imperialis aule notarius humilis, non modicum quod est in omnibus et per omnia quicquid potest cum fervido desiderio serviendi. Zelo Dei qui tribuit intellectum hominibus cuiusque spiritus ubi wlt spirat pariter et inspirat, dum oneris gravitatem intueor humeris meis impositam quam bonorum temporalium labilis corruptela multiplicat, nunc formido fortune prosperatricis insidias, nunc ex eius meticulosa suspicione conterreor et acerrime judicantis horrorem in tube novissime sonitu gemebundus expecto, propter quod fascicules deprimentes abicere cupians et ecclesie mee de Myxeberi calicem a me ipso trans-

8 9 10 11 12 13

sic. de nus is interlined. sic. ‘ne nule . . . eient’ is interlined. ‘a nostre . . . rey’ is interlined. ‘et ke . . . desheritez’ is interlined. That these (by this time unconventional in England) styles of address were intended is clear from the explicit use of the style ‘regi Anglorum’.



APPENDIX OF DOCUMENTS  

181

ferri in alium fortiorem qui in ecclesia ipsa preteriti mei neglectus incuriam sue sollertie circumspectione resarciat, malefacta reformet et dirigat indirecta, serenitati regie supplico quatinus licet plenissimo cum affectu quatinus erga spectabilem virum dominum Eadmundum Cornubie comitem consobrinum vestrum divine contemplationis instinctu mei precaminis ad id vigiles curas vestras et operas applicare dignemini cum effectum quod per litteras suas patentes viris prudentibus abbas de Gardo14 Cysterciensis ordinis et magistro Thome de Salen canonico de Pinconio, Ambianensis dyocesis15 det plenariam potestatem ecclesiam ipsam ad liberam resignationem meam hac vice persone ydonee suo nomine conferendi. Confido enim in Domino quod per viam istam eidem ecclesie concedente Altissimo congruo providebitur de pastore. Datum anno Domini Mo CCo octuagesimo secundo sabbato ante divisionem Apostolorum. To the Lord Edward, magnificent prince and his most well-beloved lord in Christ, by the grace of God king of the English, lord of the Irish and duke of the men of Aquitaine, Andrew, provost of Werden, humble notary of the imperial court, [sends] his full capacity and fervent desire to serve, in whatever ways he can, in all and through all. Through God’s zeal, which gives understanding to men and whose spirit both breathes and inspires wherever it wills, while I sense the weight of the burden laid on my arms as the fleeting seduction of worldly goods multiplies, now I fear the ambush of fortune’s prosperity and am frightened by dreadful anxiety over it; above all I dread the awful judgement at the sound of the last trumpet. Because of this, I wish to cast off burdensome loads, and the chalice of my church of Mixbury to be passed from me to someone else, a stronger person, who would, with his careful prudence, put right the carelessness of my past neglect in the same church, reform wrongdoings, and direct the undirected. So I earnestly beg your royal serenity that you will deign to apply your vigilant attention and efforts to this, and that, instigated by my pious scruples, you will entreat the illustrious man Lord Edward, earl of Cornwall, your kinsman, to give full power by his letters patent to the discreet men the abbot of Le Gard of the Cistercian order and Master Thomas de Salen, canon of Picquigny in the diocese of Amiens, to confer in his name a suitable person on this occasion, at my free resignation. For I trust in God that, by this means, God willing, the same church will be provided with a suitable pastor. Dated 11 July, AD 1282.

14 15

Le Gard (dép. Somme). Picquigny (dép. Somme), in the diocese of Amiens.

ac.   ch.   clk   dcn  

Benefice Yardley Hastings (Northants.)

Date

1251/2

Source

acolyte chaplain clerk deacon

Rot. Grosseteste, pp. 248–9

William de Valence, lord of Pembroke

Key *  date other than of admission and institution [ ]  information derived from other source

Nominee William of Saxthorpe, ch.

Last incumbent

d. died pr.   priest res. resigned subd.   = subdeacon

Patron and brother Geoffrey de Lusignan recovered advowson from prior of Hospitallers. King had given them custody of manor of Yardley Hastings which was part of the inheritance of Henry of Hastings.

Comments

v.  = vicarage

This list includes evidence of successful presentations to ecclesiastical benefices made by English earls and selected barons and one countess in the later thirteenth century. One generation from each family is included, plus presentations made by two dowagers. Nearly all the evidence is from bishops’ registers and sede vacante records. Evidently unsuccessful presentations, when the candidate was neither instituted nor given custody, are excluded. The date refers to the admission and institution, or orders for such admission and institution, except where otherwise indicated. All benefices were rectories in parish churches unless otherwise indicated. Information about custody prior to institution has been included when available in the source, with the date of the grant when it was given for a period of years. The clerical orders shown next to presentees’ names are those at the time of presentation and not those to which some were ordained. The title ‘Sir’ has been excluded as it did not refer to specific orders. Information about pensions payable from benefices has not been included.

Appendix of Magnate Presentations

24 Sept 1288 18 Aug 1289

14 June 1293

Reg. Pecham, 1.76 Reg. Swinfield, p. 527

Reg. Swinfield, p. 529

Hatfield (Yorks.) Swafield (Norfolk) Edingthorpe (Norfolk) Aylmerton moiety (Norfolk)

Date 18 Aug 1270

14 Aug 1294

27 Jan 1301

27 Feb 1303 28 June 1304

Source Rot. Gravesend, p. 42

Reg. Romeyn, 1.128, note 1 and 141–2 NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 6r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 11r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 13r Franco de Tieis, ac. John son of Gilbert of Thetford, ac.

William de Warenne, subd. William de Leyhton, pr.

Nominee­­ William of Northborough, subd.

13 April 1286

Reg. Giffard, 2.277

Benefice Helpringham (Lincs.)

8 Dec 1276*

CPR 1272–81, p. 184

Johnde Warenne, earl of Surrey

16 Feb 1269

Nominee

Benefice Towcester (Northants.) Master Benet, clk of legate Inkberrow (Worcs.) Peter of Castle Goodrich vicarage Clent (Worcs.) Master Hugh Hamelyn, clk Inkberrow (Worcs.) Vincent of Northampton, vicarage dcn Hinxhill (Kent) Geoffrey of Wretton, ch. Whitchurch Reginald of Sutton, dcn (Herefords.) Ganarew (Herefords.) Thomas of Inkberrow

Date

27 Dec 1267*

Source

Cartulary of Bradenstoke, p. 151 Reg. Giffard, 2.4

Last incumbent Richard of Manton (d.)

Last incumbent

Comments Patron presented as co-executor of will of Hugh Bigod, earl of Norfolk, who had had custody of the lands of William of Kyme. Advowson recovered against abbot of Bourne (Lincs.) to whom a pension was reserved. Custody before institution due to lack of orders.

Date refers to royal acceptance of presentation made by reason of custody of lands of Roger de Somery. Induction before institution due to lack of orders.

Date refers to patron’s letters patent disclaiming right in the advowson.

Comments

10 July 1278* 23 May 1280

13 Dec 1280 18 Sept 1283 23 Dec 1284

1290

1290

12 Nov 1292

Reg. Giffard, 2.98 Reg. Sutton, 2. 2–3

Reg. Sutton, 2.7 Reg. Quivil, p. 347 Reg. Sutton, 2.42

Reg. Giffard, 2.345

Reg. Giffard, 2.385

Reg. Giffard, 2.428

John of Dorstone, pr.

Last incumbent

Comments

See above.

Patron presented as custodian of the heir of Doynton.1 See above.

Ordained subd.

Custody only. Custody before institution sede vacante as nominee needed to show dispensation.

Patron recovered advowson from Agnes of Byfield.

Previous incumbent’s name omitted in MS.

Patron presented apparently as custodian of the lands of Richard de Greynville who had presented at the previous vacancy. Custody only, until 2 May 1269. Patron presented as custodian of the lands of Richard de Greynville.

In early 1296 the heir of Henry de Berkeley held two fees in Doynton and Draycot (Wilts.): TNA C 133/77/3, m. 3/19 (C. Inq. PM, 3.249 (no. 371)).

1 June 1278

Rot. Gravesend, p. 135

1 

19 June 1269

Rot. Gravesend, p. 243

North Cerney (Gloucs.) Hambleden (Bucks.)

Reg. Giffard, 2.11 and 14 20 Jan 1269

Nominee Master Roger of Leicester, papal ch.

John de Belevile/ Belishale, clk Laurence of Hambleden, … … Italicus, canon clk of Beata Maria Rotunda (d.) Whiston (Northants.) William of Hambleden, Robert of Paxton (d.) subd. North Cerney(Gloucs.) Roger of Heydon, clk Whiston (Northants.) Bogo de Clare William of Hambleden (res.) Whiston (Northants.) Richard of Filby, ch. Bogo [de Clare] (res.) Langtree (Devon) Elias de Forde, subd. Whiston (Northants.) Master Thomas de Richard of Filby (d.) Cardelio, clk in minor orders Doynton chapel Nicholas of Leicester (Gloucs.) Doynton chapel John Toky (Gloucs.) Doynton chapel (Gloucs.) Richard de Branch, ch.

Kilkhampton (Devon)

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 147 18 Jan 1269

Benefice Bideford (Devon)

Date

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 114 26 Dec 1268*

Source

Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester and Hertford

31 July 1295

17 Dec 1295

Reg. Sutton, 8.161

Reg. Sutton, 8.86

Source LA Reg. Sutton, fol. 326v and Reg. Sutton, 8.156

Date 19 Dec 1293

Robert de Vere, earl of Oxford

27 Sept 1295

Canterbury Institutions Sede Vacante, p. 37 Reg. Pontissara, 1.69

Blechingley (Surrey) Adam of Blechingley Marshfield with chapels Master Henry of (Monmouths.) Llancarvan, clk

11 Nov 1293 17 Apr 23 July 29 July 1294* 15 Sept 1294*

Nominee

Benefice Aston Sandford (Bucks.)

Comments

Comments Custody before institution; ordained subd.

Master Walter of Bath Patron first presented John Langton who renounced (d.) his right. Simon of Elsworth Custody before institution; ordained subd. (res.)

Appropriated to abbot First and last dates refer to mandates of inquiry with and convent of St. power to proceed to institution; second date to Augustine, Bristol sequestration of the fruits of the church, which had fallen into decay. Date refers to mandate of inquiry.

Last incumbent

Nominee Last incumbent Robert of Stepney, clk in Master Stephen of minor orders Haslingfield (res.)

Coychurch Thomas de Colmedene, (Glamorgan) clk Fordingbridge William de Weterhile (Hants.) Great Marlow (Bucks.) Master Henry of Llancarvan, subd. Thurning (Hunts.) Ralph of Culverden, clk in minor orders

John de Bruges, clk

Benefice Upper Hardres (Kent)

Date

27 Oct 1293

Source

Canterbury Institutions Sede Vacante, p. 54 Reg. Pontissara, 1.58 Canterbury Institutions Sede Vacante, p. 80

Date

25 Apr 1269

28 Apr 1271*

20 Jan 1273

23 Dec 1273

1273–4

30 Jan 1274

27 Feb 1274

11 Feb 1281* 30 Aug 1281* 5 Feb 1282* 25 Aug 1282

5 March 1286

13 Nov 1287

Source

Rot. Gravesend, p. 149

Rot. Gravesend, p. 153

Rot. Gravesend, p. 120

Rot. Gravesend, p. 56

Rot. Gravesend, p. 121

Rot. Gravesend, p. 154

Rot. Gravesend, p. 154

Reg. Epist. Peckham, 1.175– 6 and Reg. Pecham, 1.168–9 and 2.132 Reg. Sutton, 2.24

Reg. Sutton, 2.47

Reg. Sutton, 8.38

Edmund, earl of Lancaster Nominee

Last incumbent

William of Alconbury, subd. Ralph, ch.

Vincent de Petra Castri, subd. William (d.)

Peter de Riston (d.)

Edmondthorpe (Leics.) William of Alconbury, dcn

Raunds (Northants.)

Hugh de Vienne, subd.

Henry of Roughton, ch.

Teigh(Rutland)

Uttoxeter (Staffs.)

Vincent de Petra Castri, subd. Hugh de Vienne

Stapleford (Leics.)

Dates refer to archbishop of Canterbury’s orders to the diocesan to reunite the church and to institute the patron’s candidate. Joan de Folville presented Richard of Bowden by reason of the lands of William de Folville, but revoked her presentation realising her error.

Simon de Aneto had presented Peter de Aneto but both renounced their claims. Date refers to royal writ notifying the bishop of the outcome of between Eleanor of Provence (having power to present to benefices in her son’s gift) and William Motun. Patron had custody of lands of Robert Motun. Eleanor of Provence presented on behalf of her son who was abroad. Patron had custody of manor of ‘Lewdeheved’. Patron presented as custodian of lands of Thomas de Grelley. Patron presented as custodian of manor of ‘Lewdeheved’. Patron presented as custodian of lands of Robert Ferrers, against whom the advowson was recovered. Advowson recovered against Robert Ferrers.

Comments

Master John Twyford (d.) William of Alconbury Representation, as incumbent was not ordained pr. (lack of orders) within a year of the church being committed to him.

Master Thomas of Louth (d.)

Roger (d.)

Great Casterton Vincent de Petra (Rutland) Castri (res.) Edmondthorpe (Leics.) William Ouwaiyne, subd. Robert of Hanbury (res.)

Bloxholme (Lincs.)

Great Casterton (Rutland)

Kirkby Mallory (Leics.) Ingram [de Estrus], subd. Henry of Knighton (d.) Peckleton (Leics.) John de Wotton, subd. Richard (d.)

Benefice

22 Dec1287

30 Jan 1289

24 Sept 1289

Reg. Sutton, 8.38

Reg. Sutton, 2.71–2

Reg. Sutton, 2.78

20 Apr 1291

3 Dec 1291 9 Apr 1292

23 Aug 1292 2 Dec 1292

19 Sept 1293

29 July 1300

Reg. Sutton, 8.48

Reg. Sutton, 2.96 LRO Reg. Sutton, fol. 282v and Reg. Sutton, 8.50 Reg. Sutton, 8.51 Reg. Romeyn, 1.349

Reg. Sutton, 8.54

Reg. Romeyn, 1.134, 144–5 and 150 and Reg. Corbridge, 1.9–10 and note 1 and 29

LRO Sutton, Roll IV, m. 21 Jan 1290 3 and Reg. Sutton, 8.43

Date

Source Master Hugh Hamelyn, subd. William of Alconbury, dcn

Nominee

Gargrave (Yorks.)

Seal (Derbys.)

Durand of Florence, clk in minor orders Adam of Osgodby, clk

John de Montibus (res.)

Edmondthorpe (Leics.) John Brabazun, subd. John of Calais (res.) Whittington (Yorks.) Master John Lovel, subd.

William of Clifford (other benefice)

Nicholas (res.)

Last incumbent Custody before institution.

Comments

Patron presented as co-executor of Eleanor of Provence, as custodian of the lands of Henry de Percy. Advowson recovered from king. Custody from 24 Nov 1293, because of lack of orders. Inst as subd.

Alan of Coupland assented to the presentation, asserting that he was patron. Delay as archdeacon of Richmond had failed to admit nominee. Ordained subd.

Church vacant by lapse of two years of indulgence for plurality granted to last incumbent, then bishop-elect and then bishop of Emly. Higham Ferrers Lawrence de St Maur, clk Robert of Hanney (d.) Ordained subd. after making proof of age. (Northants.) in minor orders Edmondthorpe (Leics.) John of Calais, clk in William of Alconbury Custody before institution; ordained subd. minor orders (other benefice – Irchester) Stapleford (Leics.) Richard of Richard of Representation, as incumbent was not ordained pr. Loughborough, dcn Loughborough (lack within a year of the church being committed to of orders) him. Raunds (Northants.) Walter of Reading, subd. Hugh de Vienne (res.) Custody before institution. Seal (Derbys.) John de Montibus, subd. Master Ralph de Burgh (d.)

Irchester (Northants.)

Wymondham (Leics.)

Benefice

Hanslope (Bucks.)

7 June 1270*

24 Sept 1271

13 Mar 1274

9 Aug 1276*

26 July 1280

28 Feb 1282

1285

30 May 1286 14 Feb 1289*

12 Mar 1290

6 Oct 1291

1294

Rot. Gravesend, p. 245

Rot. Gravesend, p. 118

Rot. Gravesend, p. 121

Reg. Giffard, 2.89

Reg. Sutton, 2.4

Reg. Giffard, 2.144

Reg. Giffard, 2.271

Reg. Giffard, 2.287 Reg. Giffard, 2.367

Reg. Giffard, 2.368

Reg. Sutton, 2.96

Reg. Giffard, 2.439

Great Comberton (Worcs.) Warwick: St Mary’s. Prebend Warwick: St Nicholas Warwick: St Mary’s. Deanery Church Lench (Worcs.) South Luffenham (Rutland) Hindlip (Worcs.)

South Luffenham (Rutland) Worcester castle St Peter’s chapel Barrowden (Rutland)

Cottesmore (Rutland)

Benefice Hampton Lovett (Worcs.)

Source Date Reg. Giffard, 2.32 and 35 18 Jan 1270

William de Beauchamp, earl of Warwick Last incumbent

Roger le Bor

William of Arkesden (d.)

Richard of Salwarpe, pr.

Ranulph son of Ranulph the clerk, subd. John de Neville Richard (d.)

Robert, ch. Thomas of Sodington

Nicholas, ch.

Nicholas de Hach’, subd.

Paul of Brailes, ch.

Master Peter of Northampton (d.) Richard de Tarent, subd. Richard ‘the chamberlain’ (d.) Richard of Powick

James de Beauchamp, subd. Gilbert Marsh, subd.

Nominee William de Hame, clk

Custody only.

Date refers to presentation.

Comments Patron disputed bishop’s right to collate to church after he had done so. Nominee presented at bishop’s instance. Advowson recovered by patron as custodian of land of Henry Lovet from Robert de Scotevill and Joan his wife. Commendation only.

11 June 1294 26 Aug 1294 11 Oct 1296

7 Dec 1296

1 Feb 1297

Reg. Giffard, 2.445 Reg. Sutton, 5.24 Reg. Sutton, 8.193

Reg. Giffard, 2.483

Reg. Sutton, 2.137–8

17 Feb 1298

Peter le Blund, subd.

William of Clive, pr.

William of Apperley

Thomas of Beoley, pr. Simon of Elsworth Paul of Brailes, ch.

Nominee

Norton (Northants.)

Benefice

Letcombe Basset (Berks.)

Richard of Rothwell, subd.

Nominee

Robert Sapy, ch.

Warwick: St Nicholas’. Henry of Sutton, clk Portion.

Hanslope (Bucks.)

Warwick: St Mary’s. Deanery Barrowden (Rutland)

Warwick: St James’ Hanslope (Bucks.) Spelsbury (Oxon.)

Benefice

Comments

Richard of Hengham (d.)

Last incumbent

Hugh Tankard

Litigation with Reginald de Grey; both claimed advowson by reason of the lands of William le Marescall. Earl had certain of William’s lands and Grey had manor of Norton. Agreement was made whereby both would present on this occasion, and after discussion presentee was presented by earl. Writ dated 20 Sept 1270; church granted in commendam only.

Comments

Nominee recorded as being inducted to portion on 2 Dec 1297, but not instituted due to lack of orders. Ordained subd. Litigation; bishop collated patron’s candidate by lapse.

Paul of Brailes (other benefice – Spelsbury) Simon of Elsworth (d.) Master Robert de Systerne, first presented, resigned.

Master Peter of Taunton (d.)

Last incumbent

2  Entry appears among institutions for fourteenth year (1293–94) but is dated seventeenth year (1296–97).

Date

26 Sept 1270*

Source

Rot. Gravesend, pp. 116 and 298

John of Brittany, earl of Richmond

Reg. Gandavo, 2.557–9

LA Reg. Sutton, fol. 324r 24 Mar 12972 and Reg. Sutton, 8.146 Reg. Giffard, 2.182 and 23 Sept 1297 487

Date

Source

Benefice

Wyberton (Lincs.)

20 Apr 1281

10 May 1281

9 June 1290*

20 Jan 1291

22 Feb 1292

21 Apr 1292

9 Nov 1293

Reg. Sutton, 1.12

Reg. Sutton, 1.12

CPR 1281–92, p. 362

Reg. Sutton, 1.147

Reg. Sutton, 1.164

Reg. Sutton, 1.165

Reg. Sutton, 1.180

Nominee

Peter de Bisenturia, ch.

Master Henry Gomar, subd. William Gerardi, dcn

Wyberton (Lincs.)

Washingborough (Lincs.) Leadenham (Lincs.)

Fulbeck (Lincs.)

Last incumbent

Comments

Master Bartholomew (d.)

Peter Marsh (sic) (d.)

Ralph of Hagley (res.)

Thomas of York, patron’s bailiff, presented Master Ralph of Hagley, but after agreement with rival claimants, abbot and convent of Tours (dép Indreet-Loire), patron made a new choice.

Patron presented by reason of custody of land of Bartholomew de Brianzon. Presentee admitted before this date by bishop’s vicar. Date refers to royal mandate to assign stall and place in chapter at St Mary’s, Hastings.

Henry de Badelghem Presented by proxy, Sir Peter de Trahan, knight, (res.) patron’s steward. Gerard de Grauncon (cons. bishop of Verdun) Master Henry Grovier The first presentee, Odo de Phara, died. (sic) (res.) William Geraud (d.)

Philisecus de Jotro, subd. Peter de Bisenturia (d.)

John son of Richard of Apethorpe, subd.

Matthew of Wetherden, ch. Master John Reeve, dcn

Washingborough Peter, ‘Monk of the (Lincs.) Marsh’, ch. West Thurrock (Essex) Walter Langton Prebend in St Mary’s, Hastings

Washingborough (Lincs.)

Wyberton (Lincs.)

Rot. Gravesend, p. 69 and 19 May 1276 note 1

Date

13 Nov 1271

Source

Rot. Gravesend, p. 49

8 Dec 1294

22 July 1297 11 June 1298

Reg. Romeyn, 1.236

Reg. Swinfield, p. 530 Reg. Gandavo, 2.572–3 and 576 Reg. Romeyn, 2.226 Reg. Gandavo, 2.576 and 604 NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 2v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 3v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 7r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 9r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 9v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 10r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 10v and 12r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 4v Kelsale (Suffolk)

21 Dec 1303

24 June 1303

25 July 1302

Master Stephen Bigod, subd.

Long Stratton St John of Spanby, ac. Peter’s (Suffolk) Gillingham All Saints’ Bartholomew Cok of (Suffolk) Bungay, ac. Hollesley (Suffolk) Master John Golafre, pr.

10 May 1302

8 Dec 1301

16 June 1302

John of Heyford, clk

John Bigod, clk Ralph of Ryburgh, ch.

Caistor St Edmunds James Dobel of Bungay, (Norfolk) ac. Gillingham All Saints’ John of Royston, ac. (Suffolk) Winston (Suffolk) John of Honing, pr.

Lancaut (Gloucs.) Hamstead Marshall (Berks.) Settrington (Yorks.) Hamstead Marshall (Berks.) Earl Soham (Suffolk)

Alexander of Rudham, subd. Master Thomas of Sodington, dcn Robert of Usk Richard of Rudham, clk

Nominee Bogo de Clare

20 Nov 1300

5 June 1300

25 May 1299* 13 Mar 1300

Levisham (Yorks.)

13 July 1289

Reg. Romeyn, 1.168 Settrington (Yorks.)

Benefice Settrington (Yorks.)

Source Date Reg. Wickwane, 1.114–15 19 Feb 1283

Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk

Richard of Rudham (res.)

Last incumbent

Church granted in commendam before institution, according to (canon of) Council of Lyons.

Patron’s first presentee, Robert of Chesterford, was rejected on account of illiteracy and lack of orders. Custody only.

Comments Nominee ordered to become ordained pr. within a year.

Ditchingham (Norfolk) Master John Martel, pr. Iken (Suffolk) Bixley (Norfolk) Stonham (Suffolk) Hollesley (Suffolk) Dunningworth (Suffolk) Dunningworth (Suffolk) Forncett (Norfolk) Eyke (Suffolk) Rockland All Saints’ (Norfolk)

23 June 1304

9 July 1304

19 July 1304

8 Dec 1304

11 Dec 1304

27 Dec 1304

6 Feb 1306

8 Feb 1306

Robert de Benacre, ac.

Hugh Bolle, ch.

Hamo Erl of Mendlesham, pr. Robert Buttourt, pr.

Robert of Cotton, pr.

Thomas Randouf, pr.

Master John of Bridgham, pr. Simon of Heyford, pr.

Laurence of Offton, pr.

Simon of Heyford, pr.

John Bigod (res.)

Last incumbent

Presented in the time of Ralph Walpole, bishop of Norwich 1289–99.

Comments

Source

Date

Benefice

Nominee

Last incumbent

Comments

3  It is not clear whether this refers to Aldborough or Alburgh. Roger Bigod had the advowson of both churches when he died: TNA C 133/127, m. 30 (C. Inq. PM. 4.304 (no. 434)).

26 July 1305

21 July 1305

Earl Soham (Suffolk)

13 June 1304

Thomas of Mutford, ac.

Winston (Suffolk)

Nominee

14 Mar 1304

Benefice ‘Aldeburgh’3 (Norfolk) John of Honing, pr.

Date

10 Mar 1304

Source

NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 5r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 5r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 13r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 13r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 13v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 13v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 14v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 14v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 13r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 17r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 17r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 19r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 19r

Suffield (Norfolk) Starston (Norfolk)

27 Apr 1306

27 Apr 1306

Date

18 Sept 1266

20 Sept 1270 19 Jan 1271

1 Feb 1274

6 May 1281

23 May 1282 23 Oct 1282

7 Feb 1284

3 June 1284

Source

Rot. Gravesend, p. 22

Reg. W. Giffard, p. 31 Rot. Gravesend, p. 152

Rot. Gravesend, p. 121

Reg. Sutton, 1.12

Reg. Sutton, 1.25 Reg. Sutton, 1.32–3

Reg. Sutton, 2.36

Reg. Sutton, 1.52

Long Buckby (Northants.) Waddington (Lincs.)

Wadenhoe (Northants.) North Thoresby (Lincs.) Winceby (Lincs.) Winceby (Lincs.)

Toynton All Saints’ (Lincs.) Castleford (Yorks.) Whitwick (Leics.)

Benefice

Westwick (Norfolk)

4 Mar 1306

Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln

Earsham (Norfolk)

2 Mar 1306

Benefice Theberton (Suffolk)

Date

1 Mar 1306

Source

NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 19v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 19v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 19v NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 20r NRO DN REG 1/1, fol. 20r

Nominee

Gerard de Vippeins, clk in minor orders

John of Bircholt, subd. Philip of Northampton, ch. Robert of Wellow, ch

Robert of Cadbury, pr

Eudes de Bettesford, ch.

Thomas Bek John of London, subd.

Thomas de Stokys

Nominee

Robert of Beverley, dcn

Richard de Donyngtone, ac. Walter de Bonyngtone, ac. Bartholomew de Enepol, ac. Robert Miles, subd.

Patron presented as custodian of lands of Thomas Maunsel of Whitwick and Swannington.

Patron presented with consent of Eleanor of Provence, custodian of his estates.

Comments

Comments

Anthony Bek (other Church granted in commendam before institution. benefice: bishopric of Ordained subd. Durham)

Thomas of Kent (d.)

John of Bircholt (d.)

Alexander of Bradenham (d.)

Richard (d.)

Robert Maunsel (d.)

Anthony (d.)

Last incumbent

Last incumbent

24 May 1290*

21 Mar 1293

Reg. Romeyn, 1.80 and note 3

Reg. Romeyn, 1.123

Thorner (Yorks.)

Campsall (Yorks.)

Almondbury (Yorks.)

12 Nov 1289*

Reg. Romeyn, 1.91

William of Wansford, pr.

Robert de Saham, ch.

Master Robert de Lacy, John of St Mary (d.) ch. Boniface, son of Thomas, marquis of Saluzzo, clk

West Halton (Lincs.)

28 Mar 1287

Reg. Sutton, 1.95

Little Steeping (Lincs.) William of Chester, ch.

12 July 1287

2 Mar 1287

Reg. Sutton, 8.9

Last incumbent

Reg. Sutton, 8.10

17 Nov 1286

Reg. Sutton 1.89

Kirkby Laythorpe moiety (Lincs.)

Nominee Gerard de Vippeins, Gerard de Vippeins subd. (lack of orders) Valentine of Tangley, clk John of Kirkby (d.) in minor orders

Reg. Romeyn, 1.69 and 95 21 June 1287*

23 July 1286*

Reg. Sutton, 1.86

Benefice Waddington (Lincs.)

Master John of Howden (d.) Willingham (Lincs.) Master Henry de la Wyle, Richard Makerel (d.) clk in minor orders Little Steeping (Lincs.) Henry of Chester, ch. William of Chester (res.) Almondbury (Yorks.) Richard of Halton

Date

9 June 1286

Source

Reg. Sutton, 1.83

Comments

Date refers to mandate to induct if inquisition should find in nominee’s favour, although he was under age. Papal dispensation of 25 April 1289 shown; see also CPL, 1.569. Date refers to second of two mandates to induct, the earlier dated 3 Oct 1289. Custody before institution.

Represented as not ordained pr. within a year of institution. Patron presented as custodian of lands of Sir Thomas of Frampton, knight. Church granted in commendam until presentee should be of age and ordained subd. Presented by Alice de Lacy acting on patron’s behalf while he was abroad. Presented by Alice de Lacy acting on patron’s behalf while he was abroad. Ordained subd. Presented by Alice de Lacy acting on patron’s behalf while he was abroad. Presented by Alice de Lacy (acting on patron’s behalf while he was abroad). Date refers to mandate to induct Richard, who had already been admitted and given custody. An undated letter (appearing among the entries for early1290) shows that custody was granted until 11 November following.

Little Steeping (Lincs.) John of Ireland, subd. Ackworth (Yorks.) William of Warminster, clk North Coates (Lincs.) William of Kirkby, ac

8 June 1298*

22 Dec 1298

22 Mar 1299

24 Jan 1301

13 Apr 1301 7 Apr 1302

Reg. Gandavo, 2.575

Reg. Gandavo, 2.586

Reg. Gandavo, 2.589

Reg. Sutton, 8.227 and LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 2v LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 3r Reg. Corbridge, 1.68 and note 1 LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 5v

Waddington (Lincs.)

LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 5v 5 May 1302

4  Name of the previous incumbent omitted in MS.

Winceby (Lincs.)

Kirkby Laythorpe moiety (Lincs.)

LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 5v 17 Apr 1302

9 Apr 1302

Winterbourne Earls (Wilts.) Winterbourne Earls (Wilts.) North Tidworth (Wilts.) Winceby (Lincs.)

22 Sept 1296

Nominee

Last incumbent

Master Walter of Wiltshire, subd. Nicholas of Reading, subd.

Robert of Silkstone, clk

Simon of Walcot

Thomas of Newton

Laurence of Clifford, pr.

Adam of Potterton (d.) Robert of Silkstone (res.) Master Gerard de Vippeins (other benefice: consecrated bishop of Lausanne)

Henry [of Chester] (d.)

John de Cobeldich (res.) … …(d)4

Master Robert de la Hugh of Penn (d.) Vanne, ch. William of Fockerby, clk Valentine of Tangley in minor orders (other benefice)

Reg. Sutton, 1.211

Benefice Swaton (Lincs.)

Date

17 June 1295

Source

Reg. Sutton, 1.199

Custody before institution due to lack of orders.

Custody before institution due to lack of orders.

Patron presented as custodian of the lands of Thomas son of Alan of Moulton. John of Grace Dieu, who, as farmer of the manor of Kirkby Laythorpe lately belonging to Thomas of Moulton, had presented another clerk, revoked his presentation. Ordained subd. Church granted in commendam for half a year.

Comments

28 June 1306

29 June 1306

20 Feb 1307

22 Feb 1307 6 Oct 1307

Reg. Gandavo, 2.674

Reg. Gandavo, 2.682–3

LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 19r LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 113r Reg. Greenfield, 2.49 LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 31r and 333r

21 Dec 1310*

Reg. Greenfield, 4.111

Benefice

Nominee

Last incumbent

John of Wroxhall, ac.

Master Henry de la Wyle (res.)

Master William de Eure, Eudes [de Bettesford] ac. (d.) Thomas of Hayton, ac. Robert [of Wellow] (d.) Richard of Owmby, ac. Master Henry (d.)

Patron presented as custodian of the lands of Thomas son of William of Owmby.

Comments

Kirk Bramwith (Yorks.) William of Donnington, ac. Coulston (Wilts.) Nicholas of Sheppey, clk Thomas of Blyborough (legitimated ac.) (res.) Blandford Forum John Corneys, ac. Advowson recovered from John Berkwick, dean (Dorset) of Wimborne, who had presented William of Wimborne Holte. Little Steeping (Lincs.) Nicholas of Reading, ch. John of Ireland (d.) Wadenhoe Thomas of Doncaster, ac. Master William de (Northants.) Eure Castleford (Yorks.) Richard Trenche, pr. Swaton (Lincs.) William de Nony, ch. Robert de la Vanne The church was granted in commendam before (d.) institution, according to (the canon of) the Council of Lyons.5 Wadenhoe Peter of Kirkby, ch. Thomas of Doncaster (Northants.) (res.) Winterbourne Earls Thomas of Litton, ac. (Wilts.) Radcliffe on Trent Henry de Pluckele, clk Custody only. (Yorks.)

Wadenhoe (Northants.) Long Buckby (Northants.) Cold Hanworth (Lincs.) Willingham (Lincs.)

5  Commendation dated incorrectly 17 kalends March AD 1308. There are no 17 kalends March; the intention was probably to signify 17 kalends April, i.e., 16 March 1308.

20 Dec 1309

8 Nov 1309

LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 116v Reg. Gandavo, 2.717

28 Mar 1308 1 Sept 1308

18 Nov 1305

24 May 1304

4 May 1304

Date

16 Feb 1304

Source

LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 107r LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 107r LA Reg. Dalderby, fol. 87r LA Reg. Dalderby, fol.88v Reg. Greenfield, 2.3

27 Nov 1275*

6 July 1277

26 July 1278

Rot. Gravesend, p. 135

22 May 1277*

Rot. Gravesend, pp. 347 and 352 Rot. Gravesend, p. 160

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 178 6 May 1276

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 149 6 May 1276

Rot. Gravesend, p. 128

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 167 21 Oct 1275*

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 170 20 July 1275

Lydford (Devon) Chesterton (Oxon.) Armthorpe (Yorks.) Manton (Rutland) North Stoke (Oxon.)

27 Nov 1272* 4 June 1274 26 Mar 1274* 18 Sept 1274 6 Feb 1275

John Forbur, clk

Nominee John de Seleston

Last incumbent Nicholas of Marlborough (res.)

Manton (Rutland)

John of Holland, subd.

Master Salvagius of Florence (res.)

Adam de Bremelle, ch. William de Deen, subd. Robert de Anna (d.) Alexander de l’Isle, clk Roger of Drayton, subd. John de Seleston (d.) Master John of St Omer, Robert of Asthall (d.) subd. Creed (Cornwall) Master Robert de Stokes, subd. St Buryan’s (Cornwall) John Kirkby Deanery Manton (Rutland) Master Salvagius of Florence, subd. Lanteglos-by Camelford Ralph of Hengham (Cornwall) St Stephens by Saltash Payn of Liskeard, dcn (Cornwall) Frodingham (Lincs.) Michael of Northampton, subd. Leire (Leics.) John de Bateford, subd. William (d.) (vicarage)

Lydford (Devon)

24 Sept 1272*

Reg. Bronescombe, pp. 151–2 Reg. Bronescombe, p. 152 Rot. Gravesend, p. 225 Reg. W. Giffard, p. 254 Rot. Gravesend, p. 123 Rot. Gravesend, p. 226

Benefice Manton (Rutland)

Date 13 Aug 1272*

Source Rot. Gravesend, p. 119

Edmund, earl of Cornwall

Patron presented as custodian of lands of Henry of Hastings. Advowson recovered from John son of William of Leire.

Custody only.

Custody before institution.

Grant in commendam only.

(Custody only) until 1 April following.

Custody only. Advowson recovered from William de l’Isle. Date refers to mandate of inquiry on presentation.

Induction only.

Comments Grant in commendam only.

15 Nov 1280

23 July 1281

20 Dec 1281

21 Feb 1282

3 April 1283

22 April 1283

17 June 1283

Reg. Giffard, 2.125

Reg. Sutton, 2.14

Reg. Quivil, p. 354

Reg. Quivil, p. 349

Reg. Quivil p. 355

Reg. Sutton, 2.27

Reg. Sutton, 8.4

Henry de Grandone

Master Wandricus Parleben William of Crediton, clk

Roger of Norton, dcn

Walter de Cantilupe, ch.

Henry of ?Winston, ch.

North Luffenham Master Walter of (Rutland) Cornwall, subd. Hemswell [All Saints]6 John of Helpston, subd. (Lincs.)

Michaelstow (Cornwall) Stithians (Cornwall)

St Ladock (Cornwall)

Nominee

Last incumbent

Comments

Patron presented as custodian of the lands of Henry of Hastings.

Patron presented by reason of custody of the lands of Agnes de la Myrie. Custody only.

Michael of Northampton (d.) Michael of Northampton (d.)

Custody of church and of presentee committed to Master Stephen de Gryndeham on 6 Oct 1282, because presentee lacked orders. Ordained subd.

Custody before institution. Ordained subd.

Roger of Norton (res.) Represented. Church vacant by candidate’s own resignation. Patron presented as custodian of the lands of Henry of Hastings.

Master John of Holland (res.)

Reginald of Appleford, Ralph (d.) pr. Master Nicholas of Marlborough Master Hamon Parleben, subd. Master William le Brun, subd. Roger of Norton, dcn William (d.)

6  That this was a presentation to All Saints’, Hemswell, is shown by later presentations in 1289 and 1292.

6 June 1280

Reg. Sutton, 2.4 Lechlade (Gloucs.) (vicarage) Yardley Hastings (Northants.)

3 June 1280

Reg. Sutton, 2.4

Michaelstow (Cornwall) Yardley Hastings (Northants.) Manton (Rutland)

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 156 25 Dec 1279

Blunham (Beds.) St Ladock (Cornwall)

9 June 1279*

Rot. Gravesend, p. 212

Benefice Saunderton (Bucks.)

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 173 24 Sept 1279

Date

2 Nov 1278

Source

Rot. Gravesend, p. 257

23 Dec 1284

17 Jan 1285*

17 Feb 1285

20 Sept 1286

21 Dec 1286*

5 Sept 1289

Reg. Sutton, 8.6

Reg. Quivil, p. 348

Reg. Sutton, 2.43–4

Reg. Sutton, 2.57

LA Sutton Roll 5, m. 3 and Reg. Sutton, 8.102

Reg. Sutton, 8.19

LA Reg. Sutton, fol. 335r 28 July 1290 and Reg. Sutton, 8.172 Reg. Sutton, 8.20 18 Oct 1290

Date

23 Jan 1284

Source

Reg. Sutton, 8.5

Benefice

Frodingham (Lincs.)

Hemswell All Saints’(Lincs.) North Stoke (Oxon.)

Oakham (Rutland) castle chapel Blunham (Beds.)

North Luffenham (Rutland)

Lydford (Devon)

Springthorpe (Lincs.)

Pilham (Lincs.)

Nominee

Last incumbent

Comments

Roger de Bikerwick, subd. Master Richard of Sotwell, pr.

Roger of Marlow, ch.

John of St Valéry, clk

Michael of Northampton (d.)

Roger de Bikerwick

John [of Helpston] (d.)

Nicholas of Marlborough

Represented, because not ordained pr. within a year of the church being committed to him. John de Oseville was presented first, but refused to be instituted because he had the archdeaconry of Ely. This accounts for the delay between the death of Michael of Northampton (see above for North Luffenham and Hemswell All Saints’) and the institution of the next incumbent.

Church was vacant because the term of the grant in commendam to the previous incumbent had expired. Custody of the church and the candidate was committed to Master Philip of Waltham until the candidate should come of age and be ordained subd.

Nicholas of Kingsbury, Master John de Kernik’ ch. (res.) Thomas of Whissendine, John (d.) Ordained subd. clk in minor orders Hugh de Shupton Custody only, because he was under age, and because it was not certain that the previous incumbent had taken vows although he had entered a monastery. Master John of Master Walter of Ordained subd. Molesworth, clk in Cornwall (other minor orders benefice: Ambrosden (Oxon.)) Robert of Swayfield, ch. William Dixi (d.)

North Stoke (Oxon.)

Rousham (Oxon.)

23 July 1291

6 Dec 1291

30 May 1292

20 Sept 1292

20 Dec 1292

23 May 1293

24 Nov 1293

29 June 1294

5 May 1295

Reg. Romeyn, 1.167–72

Reg. Sutton, 8.176

Reg. Sutton, 8.22

LA Reg. Sutton, f339r and Reg. Sutton, 8.178

Reg. Sutton, 2.102

LA Reg. Sutton, fol. 340r and Reg. Sutton, 8.179–80 Reg. Sutton, 8.183–4

Reg. Sutton, 8.185

Reg. Sutton, 8.25

Benefice

Heapham (Lincs.)

North Stoke (Oxon.)

Manton (Rutland)

Rousham (Oxon.)

Hemswell All Saints’ (Lincs.)

North Stoke (Oxon.)

Middleton (Yorks.)

Beckley (Oxon.)

Date

18 March 1291

Source

Reg. Sutton, 8.173

Nominee

Last incumbent

Roger of Marlow (other benefice: Harwell) William of Bruern (other benefice: Hemswell All Saints’) Henry of Winton (d.)

Roger de Bikerwick

Master Richard of Sotwell (other benefice: Frodingham)

Peter of Wallingford, James of Berkhamsted subd. (other benefice) Master John of Everdon, Master John of dcn Everdon Master William Adam (d.) Chambers, subd.

Nicholas of Aylesbury, clk in minor orders Master John of Everdon, Roger de Bikerwick clk in minor orders (res.)

James of Berkhamsted, clk in minor orders

Roger de Bikerwick, subd. William Heath, ch.

Ralph of Hengham, dcn

Master Philip of Hedsor

Comments

Represented, because not ordained pr. within a year of institution.

Custody before institution. Ordained subd.

Custody before institution. Ordained subd.

Custody before institution. Ordained subd.

Patron presented as custodian of the lands of John Wake. Custody before institution, from c. 1288. Represented, because not ordained pr. within a year of institution.

Ordained subd.

12 Jan 1296

19 May 1296

7 Dec 1296

17 Oct 1297

27 Jan 1299

Reg. Sutton, 2.134

Reg. Sutton, 8.116

Reg. Sutton, 2.137

Reg. Sutton, 8.29

Reg. Sutton, 8.201

Benefice

Beckley (Oxon.)

Frodingham (Lincs.)

Manton (Rutland)

Shelton (Beds.)

Manton (Rutland)

Hambleden (Bucks.)

Date 26 Dec 1277

1290*

21 Oct 1291

Source Rot. Gravesend, p. 78

Reg. Giffard, 2.369

LA Reg. Sutton, fol. 317v and Reg. Sutton, 8.127

Amersham (Bucks.)

Benefice South Thoresby (Lincs.) ‘Bardsley next Bebury’

Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford and Essex

Date

17 Dec 1295

Source

Reg. Sutton, 8.162

Nominee

Last incumbent

Comments

Nominee Last incumbent Comments Geoffrey de Mandeville, James of Havering (d.) dcn Andrew son of William Chapel. Induction only because nominee lacked of Stonely, clk orders. Master William of Master William of Nominee had papal dispensation. March, subd. Bridlington (d.)

Richard of Waltham, clk Laurence of Burgh (d.) Patron and wife recovered advowson from Gilbert in minor orders de Clare who had presented Robert of St Fagans, clk in minor orders. Custody before institution. Ordained subd. Nicholas of Aylesbury, Nicholas of Aylesbury Represented, because not ordained pr. within a year dcn of the church being committed to him. Richard Malory, clk in Thomas English (d.) Patron presented as custodian of the lands of minor orders Richard of Croxton. Sir John Wake, knight, presented for the same reason, but revoked his presentation and his presentee, John of Arden, renounced his right. Ordained subd. Geoffrey of Laund, ch. Nicholas of Aylesbury (res.) Richard of Cornwall, Master Richard of subd. Sotwell (res.) Henry of Exeter, subd. Master Philip of Hedsor (d.)

29 April 1279

Reg. Cantilupe, p. 206

29 June 1301*

Reg. Langton, p. 53

Date

20 Dec 1292

Source

Reg. Sutton, 2.102

John of Hastings

Date 31 May 1301

Source Reg. Langton, p. 40

Nominee

Benefice Wootton (Northants.)

Last incumbent

Last incumbent

Simon of Beauvais, clk in Nicholas of Beauvais minor orders (not ordained pr. within a year of institution)

Nominee

Comments

After a composition made in the king’s court between the patron and the abbot and convent of Tiron (dép. Eure-et-Loire) nominee was admitted and instituted. Although the entry does not show the name of the patron on this occasion, it is clear from the royal writ of 1293 and from his successor’s presentation that the earl had made good his right: Reg. Swinfield, pp. 300 and 542.

Ordained subd.

Date refers to mandate of inquiry on presentation.

Comments

Last incumbent Comments Belingarius de Custody before institution because nominee lacked Quiliano orders. Nicholas of Troughford Custody only.

Andrew of Saleby, clk in Geoffrey [de minor orders Mandeville] (d.) Hugh de Chalbenore, subd.

Richard de la More, clk

Benefice Nominee Wroxeter (Shropshire) Roland de Viquiria, ac. portion Wroxeter (Shropshire) Master Walter of Clun portion of one-third

26 Feb 1295

Richard Fitzalan, earl of Arundel

Benefice Shire Newton (Monmouths.) South Thoresby (Lincs.) Kington (Herefords.)

Date

1 July 1294*

Source

Canterbury Institutions Sede Vacante, p. 116 Reg. Sutton, 1.197

13 Dec 1293 27 Oct 1299

Reg. Sutton, 8.54 Reg. Sutton, 8.71

23 Dec 1290

23 Dec 1290

Reg. Sutton, 8.126

Reg. Sutton, 8.126

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 182 8 July 1280

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 124 5 Feb 1280

Reg. Bronescombe, p. 124 21 April 1277

Source Date Reg. Bronescombe, p. 123 23 April 1260

Hugh de Courtenay

Date

2 Aug 1292

Source

Reg. Sutton, 8.51

Benefice

Benefice Chulmleigh (Devon) prebendal church Chulmleigh (Devon) prebendal church Chulmleigh (Devon) prebendal church Sticklepath (Devon) chantry chapel Waddesdon (Bucks.) portion in church Waddesdon (Bucks.)

Wistow (Leics.) Aston Flamville (Leics.)

Nailstone (Leics.)

Nominee

Last incumbent Hugh of Kendal (res.)

Robert de la Hope

William de Stanford

Last incumbent

Robert de Esse of Okehampton, pr. Ralph FitzBernard, clk in Richard of Stamford minor orders (d.) William of Street, dcn William of Street

Adam de Segrave, clk

Robert de la Hope, pr.

Nominee John de Broclande, clk

Gilbert de Reggate, ch. Master Salvagius (d.) William of Stratford, ch. Geoffrey of Mountsorrel (d.)

Walter of Maidstone

Comments

Representation; candidate had resigned because he had not been ordained priest within a year of institution.

Ordained subd.

Comments Admitted to prebend.

Nominee was asked about his other benefices. He had been collated to a mediety of Kirkby Stephen which was litigious and he had temporary possession of Newchurch (Kent) which he promised to give up: see also Reg. Romeyn, 1.34–6.

Benefice

21 May 1286

7 Sept 1286 1287 2 June 1291

Reg. Sutton, 2.29

Reg. Pontissara, 1.26

Reg. Romeyn, 1.112

Harewood (Yorks.)

19 Nov 1280

Reg. Wickwane, p. 29

Yarmouth. (Isle of Wight) Harewood (Yorks.)

Naseby (Northants.)

Whitchurch Honiton (Devon) Harewood (Yorks.)

Skipsea (Yorks.) vicarage

Rot. Gravesend, p.231 26 Sept 1276 Reg. Bronescombe, p. 145 16 Feb 1277 Reg. Wickwane, p. 261 19 Aug 1280

Date

23 April 1269

Source

Reg. W. Giffard, p. 53

Isabella de Forz, countess of Albemarle Nominee

William, son of William Burnel, subd.

William (or John?) Burnelle, clk Master William of Cherrington ch. Peter de Kelme, subd.

Adam of Stratton, subd. Adam Paen, subd. John Burnel, clk

Robert, ch.

Last incumbent

Eustace de Henton (res.)

Thomas Makerel (d.)

Oliver (Sutton), bishop of Lincoln

Thomas Esperon, d.

Walter (d. since 10 April)

Comments

An apparent representation, as the candidate was not given a letter of induction because he was elsewhere (‘alias’) inducted and had not been ordained priest within a year.

See also Reg. Wickwane, p. 259, and TNA JUST 1/1055, m. 85r. Lapse of six months from time of commendation to Jordan of Wolverhampton.

Date refers to presentation. Presentation also made by Adam of Stratton, the rector, of William de Farendon’. Record that nothing was known about the presentee because it was not known who was parson (rector) there. Vicarage said to be litigious and that there had been a number of presentations by different patrons.

1261–2

7 Apr [1266]

21 Jan. 1268

22 May [?1269]

22 May 1269*

31 July 1270*

9 March 1275 17 Nov [1276]

Rot. Gravesend, p. 168

Rot. Gravesend, p. 107

Rot. Gravesend, p. 109

Rot. Gravesend, p. 112

Rot. Gravesend, p. 173

Rot. Gravesend, p. 115

Rot. Gravesend, p. 126 Rot. Gravesend, p. 129

Higham Ferrers (Northants.) Keystone (Hunts.) Higham Ferrers (Northants.)

Higham Ferrers (Northants.) Keystone (Hunts.)

Hospital of St James, Higham Ferrers (Northants.) keepership Irchester (Northants.)

Benefice Hospital of St James, Higham Ferrers (Northants.) mastership and keepership Keyston (Hunts.)

Date

13 Nov 1271*

Source

Reg. Gravesend, p. 119

Last incumbent

Nominee

Last incumbent

Master William de Clifford, subd. Roger de Sancto Master Hubert (d.) Philiberto Robert of Higham, subd. Roger de Sancto Philiberto (res.) Roger de Sancto Philiberto Robert of Higham, dcn Lychebarewe (res.) Master Robert de Robert de Sancto Hanney, pr. Philiberto (d.)

Roger de Sancto Simon de Tonk’ (d.) Philiberto, subd. John de Chelueston, ch. Adam (d.)

Nominee Adam of Warwick, ch.

Clipstone (Northants.) Richard of Halton 2 parts

Benefice

Alice de Lacy, dowager countess of Lincoln

Date 12 Mar 1259*

Source Rot. Gravesend, p. 99

Margaret Ferrers, countess of Derby

Commendation to presentee as rector of Radcliffe on Soar.

Comments

No inquisition because all was plain. Commendation during pleasure. Commendation only. Presentee said to be rector of ‘Karnebouz’ Commendation only. Presentee had resigned Brington (Northants.)

Right to patronage had been recognised previously in king’s court Commendation only.

Comments Date refers to presentation.

Date

7 Jan 1288*

20 Nov 1288

1 Sept 1291

1 March 1292

24 June 1293*

22 Jan 1294

30 Oct 1295*

26 July 1297

8 Dec 1301

Source

Reg. Romeyn, 1.78

Reg. Romeyn, 1.81

Reg. Romeyn, 1.86 and note 1

Reg. Sutton, 2.98

Reg. Romeyn, 1.12 5–6

Reg. Romeyn, 1.137

Reg. Romeyn, 1.155

Reg. Sutton, 2.141

Reg. Corbridge, 1.65

Benefice

Nominee

Master Ralph de Halton, clk

Robert de Nevile, subd.

Robert de Neyvile, clk

Boniface of Saluzzo, clk

Richard of Halton, pr.

Crofton (Yorks.)

Robert of Ripon, pr.

Clipstone (Northants.) Berengar de Quiliano, 2 parts ch.

Bradford (Yorks.) vicarage Penistone (Yorks.)

Clipstone (Northants.) Richard of Halton, clk in 2 parts minor orders Mirfield (Yorks.) John de Heton, ac.

Darton (Yorks.)

Hemsworth (Yorks.)

Hemsworth (Yorks.)

Last incumbent

Richard of Halton (inst. to church in diocese of York)

Robert de Cave (res.)

Comments

Patron presented as custodian of land and heir of Thomas de Burgh. Date refers to letter of archbishop to his escheator, regarding the sale of the fruits of the church. Matter to be settled before institution. Presentation made by Robert, the rector, with consent of Alice, with onus of personal residence. Patron presented by reason of wardship of lands and heir of Thomas de Burgh. Date refers to mandate to induct in name of custody of sequestration until next ordinations, when he should be ordained as subd.

Date refers to previous incumbent’s resignation. Inducted with custody of sequestration until next ordination when he should be ordained subd. Patron presented by reason of wardship of lands of Adam, heir of Adam de Wanervyle. Inducted and given custody of sequestrations, during pleasure, as clk, on 28 April 1289. When instituted he was a subd. Ordained subd. after proof of age.

Bibliography

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Index Abingdon (Berkshire), 157; abbot and convent of, 157; St Helen’s church at, 157; see also Edmund of Abingdon, St Ackworth (Yorkshire), 195 Acle (Norfolk), 70, 164 Adlingfleet (Yorkshire), 124 ad quod damnum, inquisitions, 153, 155, 156, 164n. Agnes, relative of Henry de Percy, 108 Alamant, Ralph de, 95 Albano, cardinal bishop of, 65 Albemarle, earldom of, 9 Albemarle (Aumâle), earls of, 91, 105; see also Forz, Isabella de; Forz, William de; William, earl of Albemarle Albini, Elias de, 141 Albini, William de, 166n. Alconbury, William of, 186, 187 Aldborough (Yorkshire), 165n. ‘Aldeburgh’ (Aldborough or Alburgh) (Norfolk), 192 Alderton (Suffolk), 171 Aldithley, Nicholas of, 107 Alexander III, Pope, 104 Alford (Somerset), 76 Alice of Hainault, wife of Roger Bigod, 55, 126 aliens: priories, 4, 127, 129, 140–4; religious, 140–1, 144 All Hallows the Greater at the Haywharf (London), 76 Almondbury (Yorkshire), 69, 156, 194 Alresford (Hampshire), 90, 179 Alvescot (Oxfordshire), 104 Ambrosden (Oxfordshire), 164, 199 Amersham (Buckinghamshire), 92, 117n., 121, 169, 201 Amersham, Walter of, 53 Amundeville, Richard de, and Matilda his wife, 171 Andrew, son of William of Stonely, 201 Aneto, Peter de, 186 Aneto, Simon de, 186 Angers (dép. Maine-et-Loire), abbey of St Serge and St Bacchus, 42, 43n., 141, 142 Anian II, bishop of St Asaph, 110, 112 Anna, Robert de, 197 Apperley, William of, 189 Appleford, Reginald of, 198

appropriation, 21, 22, 23, 25, 92, 109, 116, 133, 154, 155, 167, 168, 171, 172, 176, 185 Arden, John of, 201 Arkesden, William of, 188 Armthorpe (Yorkshire), 197 ‘articles of the escheator’, 116 Arundel (Sussex), chapels of St George and St Martin in castle, 126n. Ashbourne (Derbyshire), 154 Ashley (Gloucestershire), 105 Ashley (Norfolk), 170 Ashridge (Buckinghamshire), college of Bonshommes, 160, 161, 164 Asphale, Master Geoffrey de, 88 Asthall (Oxfordshire), 40 Asthall, Robert of, 197 Aston Cantlow (Warwickshire), 95 Aston Flamville (Leicestershire), 203 Aston Sandford (Buckinghamshire), 185 Attleborough (Norfolk), 123n. attorneys, 84–5 D’Aubigny, Hugh, 130 Auckland (Durham), 96 auditors, 79 Aumâle (dép. Seine-Maritime), abbey, 39, 52, 91, 92 Aumâle, earldom of, see Albemarle Aumary, count of Evreux, 105; Mabel, wife of, 105 Avebury, Adam of, 71 Aylesbury, Nicholas of, 47, 200, 201 Aylesbury, Walter of, 27 Aylmerton (Norfolk), 183 Badelghem, Henry de, 190 Balliol college (Oxford), 162 Balliol, Devorguilla de, wife of John Balliol, 162 ‘Bardsley next Bebury’, 201 Barford St Martin (Wiltshire), 33 Barford, Humphrey of, 171 Barrowden (Rutland), 85, 188, 189 Barwick in Elmet (Yorkshire), 156, 157 Basset, Philip, 131 Bateford, John de, 197 Bath, Master Walter of, 185 Bathampton (Wiltshire), 152 Bayeux (dép. Calvados), church of St Mary du Val near, 43

224   INDEX Bayford (Hertfordshire), 36, 37 Beata Maria Rotunda, canon of, 184 Beatrice, daughter of Henry III, wife of John, duke of Brittany, 7, 55, 158 Beatrice of Falkenbourg, third wife of Richard, earl of Cornwall, 27, 116n. Beauchamp cartulary, 153, 171, 172 Beauchamp, Guy de, earl of Warwick, 137 Beauchamp, James de, 188 Beauchamp, William de, earl of Warwick (d. 1296), 20, 23, 54n., 58, 85, 86, 87, 117, 135, 150, 151n., 152, 153, 158, 171, 188–9 Beaumont, Roger de, earl of Warwick, 172 Beauvais, Nicholas of, 59, 202 Beauvais, Simon of, 59, 202 Beccles, William of, 83 Beckley (Oxfordshire), 89, 200, 201 Becok’, William, 172 Bedfield (Suffolk), rector, 66n. Bedstone (Shropshire), 126n. Beeston, prior of, 24, 172 Beeston (Norfolk), 24, 172 Bek, Anthony, bishop of Durham, 63, 85, 172, 193 Bek, Thomas, bishop of St David’s, 113, 193 ‘Bel by Roslyn’ (Cornwall), 165 Belgrave, Ranulph of, 82 Belevile alias Belishale, John de, 184 Benacre, Robert de, 192 Benet, Master, 183 Benson (Oxfordshire), 32, 36 Berald, cardinal bishop of Albano, 65 Berengaria, wife of Richard I, 28 Berkeley family, 3n. Berkeley, Henry de: heir of, 184 Berkhamsted, James of, 57, 85, 89, 200 Berkhamsted (Hertfordshire), 81, 161; castle and honour of, 28, 29, 34, 109; constable of, 81 Berkswell (Warwickshire), 171, 172 Berkwick, John, dean of Wimborne, 196 Bernay (dép. Eure), abbey, 66, 80 Bertram, Roger, lord of Mitford, 169 ‘Betestdun’ (?Biddesden or Biddestone) (Wiltshire), 29n. Bettesford, Eudes de, 193, 196 Beverley, Robert of, 193 Bicester (Oxfordshire), 162; priory, 124 Bideford (Devon), 84, 184 Bigod, Hugh, 55n., 70, 183 Bigod, Roger, earl of Norfolk (d. 1270), 116, 131; as Earl Marshal, 130 Bigod, Roger, earl of Norfolk and Hertford (d. 1306), 13, 14, 24, 51, 55, 58, 64, 69, 70, 75, 79, 82, 83, 84, 89, 111, 120, 124, 125, 126, 135, 146, 158, 164, 165, 166n., 191–3; wife of: see

Alice of Hainault Bigod estates, 75, 76, 79, 122 Bigod, John, brother of Roger, 64, 70, 84, 191, 192 Bigod, Master Stephen, 191 Bigod, Thomas, 64 Bikerwick, Roger de, 81, 199, 200 Bindon (Dorset), 156–7 Birchanger (Essex), 152 Bircholt, John of, 193 Bishton Netherwent (Monmouthshire), 111 Bisenturia, Peter de, 190 Bitton, Thomas, bishop of Exeter, 85 Bixley (Norfolk) Blanc, Master Peter, 141 Blanche of Navarre, wife of Edmund, earl of Lancaster, 118 Blandford Forum (Dorset), 196 Blechingley (Surrey), 83, 85, 120, 185 Blechingley, Adam of, 85, 185 Blackmore forest, hermitage in, 35 Blida, Roger de, 94 Blisland (Cornwall), 38, 89 Bloxholme (Lincolnshire), 186 Bluet, Ralph, 141 Blund, Peter le, 54n., 189 Blunham (Bedfordshire), 18, 59n., 198, 199 Blyborough, Thomas of, 196 Bodardle (Cornwall), 33, 43 Bodardle, barony of, 42 Bodrygan, Roger of, 80 Beoley, Thomas of, 189 Bohun, Humphrey de (d. 1275), 71, 130; Master Ralph, son of, 71 Bohun, Humphrey de, earl of Hereford and Essex (d. 1298), 7, 63, 111, 112, 113, 117n., 121, 135, 137, 151n., 153, 169, 201–2 Bolingbroke (Lincolnshire), 75 Bolle, Hugh, 192 Bolton (Yorkshire), priory, 64 Bolton by Bowland (Lancashire), 48 Boniface VIII, Pope, 49n., 64, 65, 70,144, 168; as Benedict Gaetani, 95 Bonyngtone, Walter de, 193 Bor, Roger le, 188 Boreham, Harvey of, 76, 84, 89 Bosworth (Leicestershire), 71 Bottesford, Bartholomew of, 60 Botiller, Nicholas, 59 Boulton (Cumberland), 51 Bourne (Leicestershire), abbot of, 183 Bourne, Brother John of, 85 Bovingdon (Hertfordshire), 161 Bowden, Richard of, 186 Brabazun, John, 187

Brabazon, Roger le, 78 Bracton, Henry of, treatise ascribed to, 6, 7, 18, 46, 104, 165, 166 Bradenham, Alexander of, 193 Bradenstoke (Wiltshire), priory, 92, 155 Bradford (Yorkshire), 21, 156, 206 Brading (Isle of Wight), 64 Bradninch (Devon), 32 Brailes (Warwickshire), 171, 172 Brailes, Paul of, 85, 188, 189 Bramford, Robert of, 172 Branch, Richard de, 184 Brandon, William, 123 Braose, William de, bishop of Llandaff, 111 Braose, William de, lord of Gower, 111, 135 Bray, Thomas de, 77 Breamore (Hampshire), priory, 64, 86 Brecknock, lordship of, 113 Bredicot, William of, 87 Bremelle, Adam de, 57n., 197 Bret, John le, 170n. Brianzon, Bartholomew, 20, 190 Bridgenorth (Shropshire), royal chapel, 56 Bridgham, Master John of, 192 Bridlington (Yorkshire), priory, 2n. Bridlington, Master William of, 201 Brightwell (Berkshire), 71 Brington (Northamptonshire), 205 Bristol, 105, 106; abbey of St Augustine at, 106, 166n., 185; constable of, 106–7; hospital of St Bartholomew (alias St Martin) at, 106; priory of St James at, 105, 106, 107, 110, 179, 180, St Mary’s chapel, 105 Brigham (Cumberland), 172 Brittany, dukes of, 95; see also John, duke of Brittany Britton, 104 Broclande, John de, 203 Bromfield (Denbighshire), lordship of, 112 Bromholm (Norfolk), priory, 41, 171 Bronescombe, Walter, bishop of Exeter, 22, 80 Brooke (Rutland), priory, 67, 124n. Bruern, William of, 200 Brun, Master William le, 198 Brus, Robert, earl of Carrick, 137n. Bruges, John of, 82, 83, 185 Brundish (Suffolk), 38, 40, 166 Buckingham, archdeaconry, 70 Burgh, Hubert de, 44 Burgh, Laurence of, 201 Burgh, Ralph de, 187 Burgh, Thomas de, 206 Burgh, William de, bishop of Llandaff, 111 ‘Burn’, 71 Burnel, John, 90, 204

INDEX   225 Burnel, William, son of William, 204 Burnell, Robert, bishop of Bath and Wells, chancellor, 90, 151, 155, 179 Burnelle, William (alias John), 204 Burnham (Buckinghamshire), nunnery, 124n., 127, 160, 161 Burton Lazars (Leicestershire), hospital, 164 Bury St Edmunds (Suffolk): abbey, 164; parliament at (1296), 147 Buttourt, Robert, 192 Byfield, Agnes of, 184 Cadbury, Robert of, 193 Caedewen (Montgomeryshire): ‘Aberunhull’ in, 65; see also Mareduc ab Robert Caerleon, Howell of, 169 Caistor St Edmunds (Norfolk), 191 Calais, John of, 187 Caldbeck (Cumberland), 172, 173 Callan (Kilkenny), 68 Callerton (Northumberland), 169 Calstock (Cornwall), 34, 89 Calverton (Nottinghamshire?), 71 Cambridge, borough, 23n. Campsall (Yorkshire), 53n., 69, 194 Canford (Dorset), 75, 155,156 Cannock Chase (Staffordshire), 37 Canterbury, abbey of St Augustine, 92 Canterbury, prerogative court of, 49n. Cantilupe family, 73 Cantilupe, George de (d. 1273), 121 Cantilupe, Hugh de, 72 Cantilupe, St Thomas de, bishop of Hereford (d. 1282), 73 Cantilupe, Thomas de, son of William, 72 Cantilupe, Walter de, bishop of Worcester (d. 1266), 11, 12, 73 Cantilupe, Walter de, chaplain at Lechlade, 198 Cantilupe, William de, steward of King John (d. 1239), 73 Cantilupe, William de (d. 1251), 72, 131 Cantley (Yorkshire), 22, 166n. Cardelio, Master Thomas de, 184 Cardinham (Cornwall), 33, 43 Cardinham, Andrew of, 33, 34 Cardinham, barony of, 33, 34, 43 Cardinham family, 33, 43 Cardinham, Isolda of, 33 Cardinham, Robert of, 34, 43 Carlisle, 173; parliament at (1307), 138 Carlisle, Statute of (1307), 138 Carthusians, 137 Cartmel (Lancashire), prior and convent, 61 Catfield (Norfolk), 131

226   INDEX Catton (Yorkshire), 71, 108 Castle Acre (Norfolk), priory, 91, 142, 154, 156 Castle Camps (Cambridgeshire), 23n., 121 Castleford (Yorkshire), 193, 196 Castle Goodrich, Peter of, 183 certiorari de feodis et advocationibus ecclesiarum, writ, 117, 118, 120, 123, 124, 128 Chalbenore, Hugh de, 202 Chalgrove (Oxfordshire), 22n., 38, 79 chamberlain of the exchequer, 86–8 Chambernoun, Henry de, 33, 34, 43 Chambers, Master William, 200 chancellors, 82–3 chantries, 12, 19, 43, 121, 152, 154, 155–60, 175, 176 Charron, Guichard de, 66 Charters, royal, witnesses to, 7, 129–30, 132, 135, 136–7, 151 Chauncy, Joseph de, 87 Chaury, Robert de, bishop of Carlisle, 172 Chauvent, Otto de, 73 Chaworth, Patrick de, 121, 151n. Chedworth (Gloucestershire), 150 Chenington, Robert of, 83 Chepstow (Monmouthshire), 51, 84; castle, 125; chantry in castle, 158; priory, 124, 125; receiver of, 75 Chester, constable of, see Lacy, Henry de Chester, earls of, 3; see also John, Ranulph Chester, priory of St John, 124n. Chester, Henry of, 194, 195 Chester, William of, 194 Chesterford, Robert of, 191 Chesterfield (Derbyshire), 163 Chesterton (Oxfordshire), 164, 170, 197 Chesterton, Ralph of, 170 Chichester, 28, 38 Chichester, portion in cathedral, 126n. Chichester, Gervase of, 163 Chilteham, Walter de, 170 Chipping Campden (Gloucestershire), 71 Chipstead (Surrey), 120 Chishull, Master John, 89 Christchurch (Hampshire), prior and canons of, 155, 156 Christchurch Twynham (Dorset): priory, 64; prior of, 86 Chulmleigh (Devon), 203 Church Lench (Worcestershire), 188 Cippenham (Buckinghamshire), 124n. Cistercians, 11, 19, 25, 124, 137, 142, 161; see also Hailes, abbey; Stoneleigh, abbey; Cannock Chase; Le Gard; Rewley; Stanlaw Cisterne, Systerne, Master Robert de, 54n., 189 Cîteaux, abbey, 137

Clare (Suffolk), priory, 155 Clare, Bogo de, 68, 69, 70, 88n., 89, 184, 191 Clare: estates, 75, 106n. 107, 111n., 120, 122, 169; family, 2n., 3n., 76, 83, 89, 106 and n., 117 Clare, Gilbert de, earl of Gloucester and Hertford (d. 1230), 105 Clare, Gilbert de, earl of Gloucester and Hertford (d. 1295), 7, 54n., 61, 76, 82, 84, 85, 88, 93, 105, 106, 111, 117, 120, 130, 135, 136, 166n., 169, 179, 184–5, 201 Clare, Gilbert de, earl of Gloucester and Hertford (d. 1314), 82, 83, 107 Clare, honour of, 76 Clare, Margaret de, wife of Edmund, earl of Cornwall, 19, 27, 124n., 170, 171 Clare, Maud de, 155n. Clare, Richard de, earl of Hertford (d.1217), 105 Clare, Richard de, earl of Gloucester and Hertford (d. 1262), 76, 88, 89, 105, 117, 150; Oliver, nephew of, 89 Clare, Thomas de, 104 Clarell, Master John, 23 Claverdon (Warwickshire), 172 Claxby, Alan of, 74 Clement IV, Pope, 56, 132, 133 Clement V, Pope, 84, 96, 140 Clent (Worcestershire), 183 Clericis Laicos, bull (1296), 144 clerks: noble, 68–74, 96, 176; royal, 88–90, 94–5, 139–40, 175, 177; wardrobe, 79-82 Clifford (Herefordshire), 74 Clifford, Lawrence of, 84, 147, 195 Clifford, Roger, 137, 151n., 158 Clifford, William of, 187 Clifford, Master William de, 205 Clinton, Geoffrey of, 37 Clipstone (Northamptonshire), 205, 206 Clitheroe (Lancashire), 75, castle chapel, 77 Clive, William of, 85, 189 Clun (Shropshire), 49 Clun, Master Walter of, 202 Cluniacs, 137 Cluny, abbey, 64, 143 Cobeldich, John de, 53, 195 Cobeldich, Roger de, 79n. Cockermouth (Cumberland), lordship of, 158, constable of, 51, 172; receiver of, 173 Cok, Bartholomew, of Bungay, 191 Colan (Cornwall), 78 Cold Hanworth (Lincolnshire), 196 Colham (Middlesex), 79n. Colmedene, Thomas de, 185 Combe (Oxfordshire), 82 ‘Compton’ (Great Comberton?) (Worcestershire), 23, 171; see also Great Comberton

Comyn, John, 164 Comyn, William, 172 Congham (Norfolk), church of St Mary, 123n. Corbridge, Thomas of, archbishop of York, 77, 93, 156 Cornwall, county of, 29, 31, 35 Cornwall, earldom of, 9, 13, 26, 27n., 28, 29n., 33, 42n., 44, 65, 101, 124 ; estates belonging to, 37, 38, 39, 41, 56, 75n., 78, 79, 89, 110, 120; cartulary of, 28, 31n., 32n., 33, 42, 43, 109, 170 Cornwall, earls of, 35, 36, 38, 40, 41, 45, 80 and n., 160, 175, see also Edmund of Almaine; Reginald; Richard; William Cornwall, sheriff of, see Hyde, Thomas de la; Monkton, William of Cornwall, Richard of, subdeacon, 201 Cornwall, Master Walter of, 198, 199 corrodies, 25, 47, 93 Corsham (Wiltshire), 31, 35 Cottesmore (Rutland), 171, 188 Cottingham (Yorkshire), 70 Cotton, Bartholomew, 145 Cotton, Robert of, 192 Coulston (Wiltshire), 196 councils, magnate, 83 Coupland, Alan of, 187 Courtenay family, earls of Devon, 4 Courtenay, Hugh de, lord of Okehampton, 20, 121, 165, 203 Courtenay, John de, 121 Coventry (Warwickshire), 3 Coventry and Lichfield, diocese of, 13, 57 Coventry and Lichfield, bishop of, 168; see also Langton, Walter; Meuland, Roger de Cowley (Oxfordshire), Knights Templar at, 40 Coychurch (Glamorganshire), 185 Craft (Somerset), 159 Crantock (Cornwall), 80 Cratfield (Norfolk), 24, 166n. Crediton, William of, 198 Creed (Cornwall), 197 Cressingham, Hugh, 53 Creswell, Henry of, 41 Crewkerne (Somerset), 159 Crispin, Miles, 30 Crofth, Master John de, 56 Crofton (Yorkshire) Croxden (Staffordshire), abbey, 154 Croxton (Lincolnshire), 123 Croxton, Richard of, 201 Crowmarsh (Oxfordshire), 6 crusade, 95, 130, 146, 177 Cudham (Kent), 104, 105, 147n. Culverden, Ralph of, 185 Cusance, John de, 141

INDEX   227 custody, right of, 25, 64–6, 124-5, 127, 134, 143, 147, 161 D’Ivry family, 29, 40 D’Ivry, Roger, 40n. Dalderby, John, bishop of Lincoln, 63, 154, 156 Dallinghoo (Suffolk), 171 Danby Wiske (Yorkshire), 115n. darrein presentment, assize of, 35, 40–1, 46, 107, 108, 109, 173 Dartmoor, forest of, 31 Darton (Yorkshire), 206 ‘De Multa Providencia’, canon of Fourth Lateran Council (1215), 72 Dean (Yorkshire), 173 Debden (Essex), 71 debt, see indebtedness of religious houses Deen, William de, 197 Denbigh, 75; lordship of, 113, chantry at, 155, 156 Denton (Norfolk), 123n. Derby (alias Ferrers), earldom of, 7, 9, 101, 118, 119, 123n. Derby, countess of, 123; see also Ferrers, Margaret Despenser, Hugh, 107, 137, 145 Devon, earldom of, 9, 101 Devon, earls of, see Courtenay; L’Isle, Baldwin de Dewsbury (Yorkshire), 54, 85, 91, 169 diem clausit extremum, writ, 114–16, 117, 118, 119, 120, 128 Didlington (Yorkshire), 166n. Dieulacres (Staffordshire), abbey, 45 Dilwyn (Herefordshire), 24, 165 Dinham, Oliver de, 33, 34, 43, 170 Ditchingham (Norfolk), 83, 192 Dixi, William, 199 Dobel, James, of Bungay, 191 Doddinghurst (Essex), 121 Doncaster, Thomas of, 196 Donnington, William of, 75, 79n., 94, 196 Donyngtone, Richard de, 193 Dorchester (Oxfordshire), abbey, 36, 152 Dorstone (Herefordshire), 78 Dorstone, John of, 184 dower rights, 27, 102–3, 108, 109–10, 126, 171 Downham (Cambridgeshire), 121 Downinney (Cornwall), 34 Doynton (Gloucestershire), 184 Draycot (Wiltshire), 184 Drayton, Roger of, 78n., 80, 81, 197 Dreux, Robert, count of, 28, 29, 40 Dublin, chancellorship in cathedral of, 96 Duffield (Derbyshire), 119, 158, see also Thomas the Martyr, St

228   INDEX Dunningworth (Suffolk), 51, 192 Dunwich (Suffolk), church of All Saints at, 147 Dunstable annalist, 77 Dunwich, Peter of, 88 Durham, prebend of, 95 Durham, prior and convent, 69 Durival family, 41 Durival, Thomas, 41 Dynasbran (Denbighshire), 112n. Earl Soham (Suffolk), 191, 192 Earsham (Norfolk), 193 East Bradenham (Norfolk), 164 Easton (Devon), 29n. Edgeware (Middlesex), 79n. Edingthorpe (Norfolk), 183 Edmondthorpe (Leicestershire), 186, 187, 205 Edmund of Almaine, earl of Cornwall, 8, 19, 21, 22n., 27, 38, 41, 47, 50, 54, 57, 59n., 60, 67, 76n., 75n., 76n., 78, 79, 80, 81, 85, 86, 89, 90, 94, 102n., 109, 110, 124n., 127, 130, 135, 143, 151n., 152, 153, 157, 158, 160, 161, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 170, 171, 181, 197–201; wife of: see Clare, Margaret de Edmund, earl of Lancaster, Leicester and Derby, son of Henry III (Edmund ‘Crouchback’), 7, 9, 13, 24, 37, 51, 53, 57, 60, 75n., 77, 78, 84, 89, 90, 93, 107, 108, 111, 118, 119, 122, 123n., 124n., 125, 130, 135, 141, 146, 151, 152, 153, 154, 158, 161, 163, 164, 165, 166n., 168, 175, 186–7; son of: see Thomas, earl of Lancaster; wife of: see Blanche of Navarre; Forz, Avelina de Edmund of Abingdon, St, 157 education of the clergy, 11, 46, 58–9, 60, 72 Edward I, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 27, 34n., 37, 42, 50, 51, 53, 65, 68, 69, 73, 76, 78, 84, 89, 92, 95, 96, 96, 101, 103, 104, 106, 107, 108n., 110, 111, 113, 116, 117, 118, 126, 127, 129, 130, 135, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 146, 150, 169, 171, 174, 180, 181; daughters of: Elizabeth, 7, see also Joan of Acre; Eleanor of Castile, wife of, 88 Edward II, 8, 140 Ela, countess of Warwick, 172 Eleanor of Aquitaine, 109n. Eleanor of Castile, wife of Edward I, 88 Eleanor of Provence, wife of Henry III, 7, 47, 48, 53, 55, 90, 108, 173, 186, 187, 193 elections, rights in, 19, 25, 41, 42, 47, 61–4, 161 Elsham (Lincolnshire), priory, 41 Elsworth, Simon of, 185, 189 Ely, bishop of, 70; see also Northwold, Hugh of Ely, archdeacon of, see Oseville, John de Emly, bishop of, 187 Embleton (Northumberland), 166n.

Enepol, Bartholomew de, 193 English, Thomas, 201 envoys, 86 Erl, Hamo, of Mendlesham, 192 ‘Escremoville’, Normandy, 105 Esse, Robert de, of Okehampton, 203 Essendon (Hertfordshire) Essex, Henry of, 44; Agnes, daughter of, 44 Essex, ‘honour of’, 44 Estanayaco, William de, 73 Eston, Henry de, 86 Estrus, Ingram de, 93, 186 Eure, Master William de, 196 Evelyn, Nicholas, prior of Eye, 65, 66 Everdon (Northamptonshire), 80, 94 Everdon, Master John of, 200 Everley, Edmund of, 60 Evesham (Worcestershire), abbey, 150; battle of, 8, 56, 71; chronicler of, 145 Evreux, count of, 105 Evreux, Walter of, 92n. Ewyas Harold (Herefordshire), 125 executors, 85–6 Exeter, 28, 29n., 38 Exeter, bishop of, 40, 42n., 78; see also Bitton, Thomas; Bronescombe, Walter; Grandisson, John; Quivil, Peter; Warelwast, William Exeter, diocese of, 20, 80, 94 Exeter, Henry of, 89, 201 ‘Extenta Manerii’, 116 Eye, Reginald of, 64 Eye (Suffolk), 39, 65n. Eye, honour of, 27, 29, 31, 34, 35, 40, 41, 127 Eye, priory, 39, 40, 65, 66, 127, 143, 147, 155, 171 Eyke (Suffolk), 192 Eynesbury (Huntingdonshire), 123 Falaise, Ellis de la, 150 Farnham (Surrey), 89, 141 Feens, Ingram de, 80 Fenton, prebend, 134 Ferrars, Hugh de, 67n. Ferre, Guy, 141 Ferrers family, 32 Ferrers, John, 119 Ferrers, Margaret, dowager countess of Derby, 20, 205 Ferrers, Robert, 23n., 118, 163, 186 Ferrers, Walchelin de, 32; Hugh, son of, 32 Ferrers, William, earl of Derby (d. 1190), 164 Fewston (Yorkshire), 165 Filby, Richard of, 184 Fishburn, Thomas of, 79n. Fitz Count, Brian 30

Fitz Count, Henry, 30 Fitzalan, John, 49, 86, 126; estates of, 126n. Fitzalan, Richard, earl of Arundel, 7, 8, 126n., 135, 202 Fitzalan, Thomas, of Moulton, 195 FitzBernard, Ralph, 203 FitzGeoffrey, John, 131 Fitzharding, Robert, 106n. Fitzjohn, John, 132 Fitzjohn, Richard, magnate, 125, 132, 135 FitzJohn, Richard, rector of Sculthorpe, 22 FitzNicholas, Ralph, 131 FitzPeter, Geoffrey, earl of Essex (d. 1213), 92 FitzRichard, Ralph, 22 Fitzrobert, Walter, 166n. FitzRoger, Robert, 137 Fitzwalter, Baldwin, 86 Fitzwilliam family, 42, 43n. Fitzwilliam, John, and Beatrice, wife of, 170 Fitzwilliam, William,170 Fleta, 104 Fleury (dép. Loire), abbot of, 62 Florence, Durand of, 187 Florence, Master Salvagius de, 197 Florendinia, Thomas de, 51 Fockerby, William of, 162, 195 Folville, Joan de, 186 Folville, William de, 186 Fontevrault (dép. Maine-et-Loire), abbey, 28 Forbur, John, 197 Fordingbridge (Hampshire), 105, 150, 166, 185 Fordington (Dorset), 31, 35 Forde, Elias de, 184 Forncett (Norfolk), 192 Forz, Avelina de, 127 Forz, Isabella de, countess of Albemarle and Devon, 9, 14, 20, 51, 69, 74, 81, 86, 87, 90, 91, 158, 159, 162, 163, 172, 175–6, 179, 204; Thomas, son of, 163 Forz, William de, earl of Albemarle (d. 1260), 130, 158 Fountains, Imbert, 33 Fountains, Roger, 43n. Fowey (River) (Cornwall), 33, 43 Framlingham (Norfolk), 75 Frampton, Thomas of, 194 friars, 162–3, 175, 176 Frodingham (Lincolnshire), 21, 54, 57, 80, 94, 171, 197, 199, 200, 201 Fukeram, Richard, 78 Fulbeck (Lincolnshire), 48, 53, 190 Ganarew (Herefordshire), 183 Garendon (Leicestershire), 125, 164

INDEX   229 Gargrave (Yorkshire), 55, 90, 108, 110, 187 Gayton (Northamptonshire), 80 Geneva, prebend of, 95 Geoffrey, clerk, 131 Gerardi, alias Geraud, William, 190 Ghent, Simon of, bishop of Salisbury, 155 Gidding, Walter of, 63 Giffard, Godfrey, bishop of Worcester, 22n., 58, 59, 107, 135, 136, 137, 179n. Giffard, Walter, archbishop of York, 23, 41, 54, 173 Gillingham (Suffolk), All Saints’, 191 Glamorgan, 76, 83, 111 Glascombe (Radnorshire), 113 Glasney (Cornwall), 78n., 80, 81 Glatton (Huntingdonshire), 32, 36 Gloucester, abbey, 125 Gloucester, earls of, see Clare; Robert; William Gloucester, honour of, 106n. Gloucester, Statute of, 1278, 159 Golafre, Master John, 191 Goldcliff (Monmouthshire), priory, 169 Gomar, alias Grovier, Master Henry, 190 Goring (Oxfordshire), 41, priory, 41, 124n. Godstow (Oxfordshire), abbey, 41 Grace Dieu (Monmouthshire), abbey, 166n. Grace Dieu, John of, 195 Got, Bertrand de, archbishop of Bordeaux, 96; see also Clement V Grandisson family, 73 Grandisson, Gerard de, bishop of Verdun, 73, 190 Grandisson, John de, bishop of Exeter, 73 Grandisson, Otto de, 8, 9, 88, 95, 130, 151n. Grandone, Henry de, 59n., 198 Grantchester (Cambridgeshire), 79n. gravamina of the clergy, 160 Gravesend, Richard of, bishop of Lincoln, 55, 61, 94, 167 Great Abington (Cambridgeshire), 23n., 121 Great Casterton (Rutland), 186 Great Comberton (Worcestershire), 188; see also ‘Compton’ Great Eland (Northumberland), 169, 170 Great Gransden (Huntingdonshire),166n. Great Marlow (Buckinghamshire) (also Marlow), 54n., 76, 185 Greatweek (Devon), 29n. Greenfield, William, archbishop of York, 93 Greetham (Rutland), 171 Gregory IX, Pope, 131 Gregory X, Pope, 130, 146 Grelley, Thomas de, 186 Gresham (Norfolk), 126 Gretton (Northamptonshire), 70 Grey, Joanna de, widow of John de Grey, 152

230   INDEX Grey, Reginald de, 189 Grey family (of Ruthin), 4 Greynville, Richard de, 184 Grinstead (Sussex), 73 Grosseteste, Robert, bishop of Lincoln, 11, 12, 62n. Gryndeham, Master Stephen de, 59n., 198 Gunthorpe (Nottinghamshire), 119n. Hach’, Nicholas de, 188 Hagley, Master Ralph of, 52, 190 Hailes (Gloucestershire), 32 Hailes, abbey, 32, 85, 124n., 160, 164, 166n., 167 Halton, Master Ralph de, 206 Halton, Richard of, 156, 194, 205, 206 Halvergate (Norfolk), 165 Hambledon (Buckinghamshire), 124n., 158, 170, 184, 201 Hambledon, Laurence of, 184 Hambledon, William of, 85, 184 Hame, William de, 188 Hamelyn, Master Hugh, 183, 187 Hamelyn, William, 154 Hampton, Robert of, sheriff of Cumbria, 87 Hampsthwaite (Yorkshire), 165 Hampton Lovett (Worcestershire), 188 Hamstead Marshall (Berkshire), 58 Hanbury, Robert of, 186 Hanney, Robert of, 187, 205 Hanslope (Buckinghamshire), 54n., 188,189 Hanslope, William of, son of Simon of Toulouse, 172 Harewood (Yorkshire), 90, 204 Harley, Amicia de, 152 Harthill (Yorkshire), 91 Hartington (Derbyshire), 119, 168 Hartley Mauditt (Hampshire), 86 Harwell (Berkshire), 80, 81, 170, 200 Haslingfield, Master Stephen of, 185 Hastings, honour and rape of, 37 Hastings, Henry of, 102, 182, 197, 198; Joan, wife of, 102 Hastings, John of, 20, 51, 59, 135, 137, 170, 202–3 Hastings, chapel of St Mary at, 20 and n., 37, 90, 128, 190 Hatfield (Yorkshire), 85, 183 Hatfield Regis (Essex), 121 Haugham (Lincolnshire), priory, 62n. Haughley (Suffolk), 30, 35, 44 Haughley, barony of, 44 Haughmond (Shropshire), abbot of, 86 Hauterive, Godfrey de, 108 Havant (Hampshire), 73

Havering, James of, 201 Hayton, Thomas of, 84, 196 Healaugh Park (Yorkshire), canons of Heapham (Lincolnshire), 171, 200 Heath, William, 200 Hedsor, Master Philip of, 200, 201 Heliun, Walter de, 78 Helpringham (Lincolnshire), 55n., 183 Helpston, John of, 198, 199 Hemel Hempstead (Hertfordshire), 34n., 161, 164, 166n., 167 Hemington (Somerset), 121 Hemswell (Lincolnshire), church of All Saints, 80, 81, 94n., 171, 198,199, 200 Hemsworth (Yorkshire), 206 Hengham, Ralph of, 90, 136, 189, 197, 200 Hengham, Richard of, 189 Henley (Oxfordshire), 36, 166 Henry I, 28; chancellor of, 28; son of, see Reginald Henry III, 7, 9, 10, 23n., 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, 33, 35, 45, 55, 56, 66, 69, 71, 76, 82, 84n., 86, 88, 89, 101, 102, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 117, 127, 130, 163, 174 Henry, duke of Lorraine and Brabant, 28, 29 Hereford, bishop of, see Cantilupe, St Thomas; vicar of, 49 Hereford cathedral, chantry in, 158 Hereford, earl of, see Bohun Hertford, castle and town, 36 Hertford, chapel in castle, 37 Hertford, church of St Andrew at, 37 Hertford, earldom of, 9; see also Clare Heston (Middlesex), 39 Heton, John de, 206 Heveningham (Suffolk), 93 Heydon, Roger of, 184 Heyford, John of, 191 Heyham, Simon de, 76, 85 Higham, Robert of, 205 Higham Ferrers (Northamptonshire), hospital, 187, 205 Hildeyard, Robert de, 52 Holborn (London), 75, 79n., 162 Holderness (Yorkshire), lordship of, 39, 52, 91, 158; bailiff of, see Hildeyard, Robert de; Robert, reeve of, 173 Holland, Master John of, 197, 198 Hollesley (Suffolk), 191, 192 Holmer (Middlesex), 79n. Honiton (Devon), 81, 204 Hope, Robert de la, 203 Horseheath (Cambridgeshire), 23n. Howard family, 3n. Howden, Master John of, 194

Hillingdon (Middlesex), 22n. Hindlip (Worcestershire), 188 Hinxhill (Kent), 85n., 105, 147n., 183 Holland, Master Arnulf of, 82 ‘Holte’ (Dorset), 156 Holton (Oxfordshire), 170 Holy Blood, 160–1 Honing, John of, 192 Hope (Denbighshire), 112n. Horseheath (Cambridgeshire), 23n. Hospitallers, 182 households of magnates, 14, 83, 162–3, 176; receivers of, 81–2 Huberd, John, 79n. Hundred Rolls, 10, 23 Hungerford (Berkshire), hospital, 163–4 Huntercombe, Walter de, 135 Hyde, Hugh de la, 79n. Hyde, Thomas de la, 75n. Iken (Suffolk), 192 Ilchester (Somerset), 29n., 153; church of St John the Baptist at, 34n.; Dominicans at, 153 Ilston, John of, 154 in commendam, grants of churches, 55, 56, 60 indebtedness of religious houses, 66–7 Ingoldsthorpe, Thomas, bishop of Rochester, 166 Ingepenne, Roger de, 85n. Inkberrow (Worcestershire), 183 Inkberrow, Thomas of, 183 Innocent IV, Pope, 24, 47, 72 inquisitions ad quod damnum, 14, 153, 155, 156, 164n. inquisitions post mortem (IPMs), 27, 114–28, 174, 175 and passim Irchester (Northamptonshire), 187, 205 Ireland, John of, 195, 196 Isabella of Angoulême, second wife of King John, 28, 34, 35, 109 Isabella of Gloucester, first wife of King John 105 Isle of Wight, 52 Isleworth (Middlesex), 39, 40 Ivo, son of Geoffrey, rector of Rockingham, 109 Ivry (dép. Eure), abbey, 40 Iwerne Courtney (Dorset), 165 Jay, Walter de, 126n. Jervaulx (Yorkshire), abbey, 66 Joan of Acre, daughter of Edward I, wife of Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester, 7, 82, 112, 117, 136n. John, king of England, count of Mortain, 26, 29, 30, 73, 86, 105 John, duke of Brittany, earl of Richmond, 6, 7, 20, 37, 47, 52, 54, 55, 66, 90, 95, 97, 115, 135, 137,

INDEX   231 158, 189–90; see also Beatrice John, earl of Chester, 45 John son of Gilbert of Thetford, 183 John son of Richard of Apethorpe, 52, 190 Jotro, Philisecus, de, 190 Kelsale (Suffolk), 191 Kelvedon (Essex), 89 Kendal, Hugh, 67, 203 Kenilworth (Warwickshire), 37, 151 Kenilworth, priory, 37, 67, 172 Kent, Bartholomew of, 170 Kent, Thomas of, 193 Kenton (Devon), 29n. Kernik’, Master John de, 199 Kerrier (Cornwall), hundred, 165 Keyingham (Yorkshire), 52, 92 Keyston (Huntingdonshire), 205 Kibworth Beauchamp (Leicestershire), 172 Kilkhampton (Devon), 184 Kimbolton (Huntingdonshire), 71 Kingsbury, Nicholas of, 199 Kingston (Kent), 56 Kingston (Dorset), 155, 156, 178, 179 Kington (Herefordshire), 202 Kirk Bramwith (Yorkshire), 75, 94, 196 Kirkburton (Yorkshire), 91 Kirkby, John, treasurer, 86, 106, 179, 180, 197 Kirkby, John, 194 Kirkby, Peter of, 196 Kirkby, William of, 195 Kirkby Laythorpe (Lincolnshire), 194, 195 Kirkby Mallory (Leicestershire), 93, 186 Kirkby Stephen (Westmorland), 203 Kirkstall (Yorkshire), abbey, 67 Kirton (Suffolk), 55, 82, 89, 126 Kirton in Lindsey (Lincolnshire), 31, 36, 171 Knaresborough (Yorkshire), castle and honour of, 30, 31, 34 Knaresborough, church, 40 Knaresborough, steward of, see Stokes, Walter de Knaresborough, Trinitarian Friars of, 165 Knighton, Henry of, 186 Knolle, Master Alexander de la, 56 Knottingley, William of, 55, 82, 89, 126 Kyme, William de, 55n., 183 l’Isle, Alexander de, 197 l’Isle, William de, 197 L’Isle, Baldwin de, earl of Devon (alias Baldwin de Revières), 123 La Warre family, 106n. Lacy: estates, 74, 75, 77, 79, 172; family, 69, 77, 156, 157

232   INDEX Lacy, Alice de, dowager countess of Lincoln, 20, 21, 53, 55n., 69, 74, 94n., 125, 156, 157, 172, 194, 205–6 Lacy, Edmund de, earl of Lincoln, 55n., 69, 130 Lacy, Henry de, earl of Lincoln and Salisbury and constable of Chester (d. 1311), 7, 14, 20, 23n., 53, 178, 55, 62, 66, 67, 69, 70, 74, 75, 77, 81, 84, 86, 88, 89, 92, 94, 96, 113, 124, 130, 134, 135, 137, 141, 143, 147n., 151n., 154, 155, 156, 157, 161, 162, 163, 164, 167, 168, 172, 178, 193–6; Alice, daughter of, 14; wife of: see Lacy, Margaret de, countess of Salisbury Lacy, John de, earl of Lincoln (d. 1240), 55n. Lacy, Margaret de, dowager countess of Lincoln (d. 1266), 55 and n. Lacy, Margaret de, countess of Salisbury and wife of Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, 145, 154, 155 and n., 156 Lacy, Robert de, 63n., 77n. Lacy, Master Robert de, 194 La Marche, Hugues, count of, 29 Lancaster, burgesses of, 78 Lancaster, priory, 124n. Lancaut (Gloucestershire), 191 ‘Langeford’, 71 Langley (Leicestershire), priory, 61 Langton, John, 54n., 185 Langton, John, chancellor, 145, 154, 155 Langton, Walter, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, 13, 20, 90, 190 Langtree (Devon), 184 Lanlivery (Cornwall), 43 Lanteglos-by-Camelford (Cornwall), 90, 197 Lateran Council, Third (1179), 49n., 167n. Lateran Council, Fourth (1215), 11, 50, 72, 167n. Latimer, William, 135 Launceston (Cornwall), castle and honour of, 29, 30, 33, 34; castle chapel, 40; priory of, 40 , 190 Laund, Geoffrey of, 201 Laval, Hugh de, 77n., 92n. Lavinton, Ralph de, 158 Le Bec (dép. Eure), abbey, 61 Leadenham (Lincolnshire), 52, 54, 190 Leathley (Yorkshire), 48 Lechlade (Gloucestershire), 32, 42, 170, 198; hospital of St John the Baptist at, 42 Leek (Staffordshire), 45 Le Gard (dép. Somme), abbot of, 50 Leicester, abbey, 125 Leicester, earldom of, 9; see also Edmund; Thomas Leicester, Master Roger of, 84, 184 Leicester, Nicholas of, 184 Leire (Leicestershire), 102n., 197 Leire, John son of William of, 197 Leland, John, 163

Lenton (Nottinghamshire), prior of, 141 Lestrange, Hamo, 51 Lestrange, Roger, 51 Letcombe Basset (Berkshire), 172, 189 Levisham (Yorkshire), 191 ‘Lewdeheved’, 186 Lewes, battle of, 56 Lewes (Sussex), priory, 22 and n., 35, 39, 44, 54, 91, 133, 134, 169 Leyburn, Roger de, 23n. Leyhton, William de, 183 licences to alienate, 14, 150–9, 165, 167, 176 Licet Ecclesiarum, constitution, 1265, 132, 136 Lichfield, Master Thomas of, 56 Lifton (Devon), 29n. Lighthorne (Warwickshire), 171, 172 Lincoln, archdeaconry of, 73; see also Estanayaco, William de Lincoln, bishop of: official of, 63; see also Gravesend, Richard of; Grosseteste, Robert; Sutton, Oliver; Wells, Hugh of Lincoln, countess of, see Lacy, Alice de; Lacy, Margaret de Lincoln, diocese of, 12, 20, 59, 94 Lincoln, see of, 36; prebends in, 136; see also Nassington Lindsey, Ralph of, 23, 171 Linkinhorne (Cornwall), 40 Linle (Huntingdonshire), 55 Liskeard (Cornwall), 40 Liskeard, Payn of, 22n., 79, 80, 197 Little Eland (Northumberland), 169 Little Frammingham (Norfolk), 70 Little Steeping (Lincolnshire), 82, 194, 195, 196 Little Weldon (Northamptonshire), 33 Litton, Thomas of, 162, 196 Litton, William of, 162 Llanbadarn Fawr (Cardiganshire), 73 Llancarvan, Master Henry of, 54n., 76, 83, 185 Llandaff, 111 Llandaff, archdeacon of, 85 Llandaff, bishop of, see Braose, William de; Burgh, William de Llandaff, see of, 111–12 Llanedeyrn (Glamorganshire), 71 Llangua (Monmouthshire), cell, 161 Llanharry (Monmouthshire), 120 Llanyblodwel (Shropshire), 126n. Llewellyn ap Gruffudd, prince of Wales, 76 London, 27; church of St Martin le Grand in, 35, 85, 116; church of St Martin Outwich in, 103; Cornhill in city of, 103; Franciscan nuns (Minoresses or Poor Clares) outside Aldgate in, 119, 163, 168, legatine council at (1268), 18n., 167n.

London, John of, 193 London, Roger of, 89 London, Stephen of, 56 London, William of, 54, 91 London, vicar of the bishop of, 20 Long Buckby (Northamptonshire), 84, 162n., 193, 196 Long Stratton, St Peter’s (Suffolk), 191 Longborough (Gloucestershire), 32, 33, 35 Lopham (Norfolk), 51 Lostwithiel (Cornwall), 33, 43 Loughborough, Richard of, 187 Louis VIII, king of France, 29, 30 Louther, Beatrice de, 172 Loveday, Thomas, 66n. Lovel, Master John, 187 Lovet, Henry, 188 Lovetot, John de, 123 Ludgvan (Cornwall), 33, 43 Lusignan, Alice de, wife of John de Warenne, earl of Surrey, 7 Lusignan, Geoffrey de, 182 Lychebarewe, 205 Lydford (Devon), 31 and n., 35; church, 22, 56, 57n., 124n., 197, 199 Lyons, Council of (1245), 130, 132 Lyons, Council of (1274), 12, 59, 60, 95, 130, 132, 159, 191, 196 Lyons, archbishop-elect of (Philip, count of Burgundy), 133 Magna Carta, 1217 reissue, 149 Maidstone, Walter of, 203 Makerel, Richard, 194 Malet, Robert, 29, 39, 40, 155 Malmesbury (Wiltshire), 29n., 171 Malory, Richard, 201 Maltby (Lincolnshire), 123n. Mancetter (Warwickshire), 73 Mandeville, Geoffrey de (d. 1144), founder of Amersham church, 92; Geoffrey and William, sons of, 92 Mandeville, Geoffrey de, deacon, 201, 202 Manton (Rutland), 34n., 47, 80, 109n., 197, 198, 200, 201 Manton, Richard of, 183 March, Master William of, 201 marcher lords, rights in Welsh bishoprics, 25, 110–13, 128, 133–4 Mareduc ab Robert, lord of Caedewen, 65 Marescall, Richard le, 189 Marham (Norfolk), nuns of, 166 maritagium (marriage portion), 43, 44 Mariot, Richard, 65

INDEX   233 Marlborough, Statute of (1267), 149 Marlborough, Master Nicholas of, 197, 198, 199 Marlow (Buckinghamshire) (also Great Marlow), 54n., 76, 185 Marlow, Master Ralph of, 132 Marlow, Roger of, 81, 199, 200 Marmion, Philip, 88, 123 Marmoutier-les-Tours (dép. Indre-et-Loire), abbey, 35 ‘Marneys’, 80; see also St Endellion Marsh, Adam,162 Marsh, Gilbert, 188 Marsh, Jordan, 90, 179 Marsh, Peter, alias ‘Monk of the Marsh’, 190 Marshal earldom and estates, 7, 84n. Marshal, Gilbert, earl of Pembroke (d. 1241), 111n. Marshal, Isabella, first wife of Richard, earl of Cornwall, 30 Marshfield (Monmouthshire), 76, 166n., 185, Martin IV, Pope, 72 Martel, Master John, 192 Martin, Master, 131 Mason (Northumberland), 169 Maud, countess of Warwick, 59 Mauduit, William, earl of Warwick, 116, 117 Maufe, William, 91 Maunsel, Robert, 193 Maunsel, Thomas, of Whitwick and Swannington, 193 Meaux (Yorkshire), abbey, 165 Meger, Master Henry le, 21 Mercona, Michael de, 163 Mere (Wiltshire), 31, 35, 157,158 Merevale (Warwickshire), abbey, 124n. Merton College (Oxford), 162, 166n. Merton, Walter, chancellor and bishop of Rochester, 101, 162 Meuland, Roger de, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, 57 Mey, John, 162 Michaelstow (Cornwall), 55, 79, 198 ‘Middellaunde’ (Cornwall), 78 Middleham (Yorkshire), 90 Middleton (Yorkshire), 200 Miles, Robert, 193 Minting (Lincolnshire), 62 Mirfield (Yorkshire), 206 Miskin, 84 Missenden (Buckinghamshire), abbey, 36 Mixbury (Oxfordshire), 50, 124n., 166, 181; Andrew, rector of, frontis., 50, 93, 180–1 Molesworth, Master John of, 199 Monceaux, Agnes de, 158–9 Monkton, William of, 78

234   INDEX Monmouth, priory, 78 Mont St-Michel (dép. Manche), 39 Montacute (Somerset), priory, 40 Montague family, 3n. Montalt, Roger de, 135 Montfort, Amaury de, 55, 56, 71 Montfort, Guy de, 56 Montfort, Simon de, earl of Leicester, 7, 12, 56, 71, 118, 162, 163 Montfort, William de, 56 Monthermer, Ralph of, earl of Gloucester and Hertford, 83, 137 Montibus, John de, 187 Morden (Surrey), 76 More, Richard de la, 202 Moresk (Cornwall), church of St Clement at, 39 Mortain: counts of, see Robert, William; honour of, 42 Mortimer, Edmund, 56, 64, 71, 88n., 125 Mortimer family, 86 Mortimer, Isabella, wife of John Fitzalan, 86, 110 Mortimer, Roger (d. 1282), 8, 9, 33, 71, 88, 113, 151n. Mortimer, Roger, 32; Isabella, wife of, 32, 42 Mortmain, Statute of, 1279, 11, 12, 14, 149, 150, 151, 152, 154, 160 Morton (Lincolnshire), 95 Morwenstowe (Cornwall), 78 Motun, Robert, 54, 186 Motun, William, 54, 186 Mountsorrel, Geoffrey of, 203 Mowbray, Roger de, 69 Mucegros, Cecilia de, 104 Much Wenlock (Shropshire), abbey, 49 Mulet, Bernard de, 38 Munchensi, Joan de, wife of William de Valence, 7n., 84n. Munchensy, G. de, 131 Mutford, Thomas of, 192 Myrie, Agnes de la, 198 Nafferton (Yorkshire), 165 Nafferton Holm (Yorkshire), 71 Nailstone (Leicestershire), 80, 102, 203 Naples, Francis of, 136 Naseby (Northamptonshire), 163 Nassington (Northamptonshire), prebend, 134 ne admittas, writ, 173 Nevill, Hugh de, 103 Neville, John de, 188 Neyvile, Nevile, Robert de, 206 Newark, Henry, archbishop of York,132 Newbold, Geoffrey of, 84, 88 ‘Newby’ (Westmorland), 151n.

Newburgh, Henry de, earl of Warwick (d. 1119), 153 Newburgh, Thomas de, earl of Warwick (d. 1242), 172n. Newcastle under Lyme (Staffordshire), 107 Newchurch (Kent), 203 Newport (Essex), 31, 35, 103, 116, 152 Newton, Thomas of, 75, 195 Nicholas IV, Pope, 10, 94, 95, 122, 134, 135, 136, 167, 168; see also Taxatio non-residence, 93–6 Nony, William de, 77, 79, 196 Norfolk, earldom of, 9, 101 Norfolk, Master Adam of, 123 Normandy, loss of (1204), 9, 26, 32, 40, 177 Normans, lands of the, 29, 32, 42 North Cerney (Gloucestershire), 184 North Coates (Lincolnshire), 55, 195 North Luffenham, 34n., 80, 94, 198, 199 North Stoke (Oxfordshire), 38, 81, 89, 126n., 197 , 199, 200 North Stoke (Sussex), 126n. North Thoresby (Lincolnshire), 193 North Tidworth (Wiltshire), 53, 195 Northampton, Michael of, 21, 47n., 79, 80, 86, 94, 197, 198, 199 Northampton, Master Peter of, 188 Northampton, Philip of, 80 Northampton, priory of St Andrew at, 88 Northampton, Vincent of, 183 Northborough, William of, 183 Northleigh (Oxfordshire), 166n., 167 Northwold, Hugh of, bishop of Ely, 72 Norton (Northamptonshire), 189 Norton, Roger of, 198 Norton near Fakenham (Norfolk), Raymond, parson of 141 Norwich, diocese, 13, 70, 79, 131 Norwich, Valuation of, 121, 122 Nostell (Yorkshire), priory, 2n., 40, 62–3, 178; prior-elect of, see Warter, Richard of Notley (Buckinghamshire) abbey, 36 novel disseisin, action of, 159 d’Oilli family, 41 d’Oilli, Robert, constable of Oxford castle, 30 Oakham (Rutland), castle and manor of, 32, chapel, 19, 38, 199 Oakham, barony of, 35, 67n. Oakham, Thomas of, 75n. Offton, Laurence of, 192 Ogbourne (Wiltshire), priory, 121 Okehampton (Devon), 20 Onibury, Master Giles of, 49

‘Ordston’, 23 Oseney (Oxfordshire), abbey, 41 Oseville, John de, 54, 199 Osgodby, Adam of, 90, 95, 187 Oswestry (Shropshire), castle chapel, 126n. Otley, deanery, 48 Ottobon, papal legate, 50, 133 Ouwaiyne, William, 186 Overton (Hampshire), 89 Owmby, Richard of, 196 Oxford, Agatha of, 41 Oxford: church of St Peter in the East at, 89; Cistercians at, see Rewley; constable of castle of, see d’Oilli, Robert; provincial council at (1222), 77; scholars of, 161, 162, 175, see also Balliol, Merton; sheriff of, 166; university of, chancellor of, 73 Oxford, countess of, see Vere, Alice de Oxford, earls of, see Vere, Hugh de and Robert de Oxfordshire and Berkshire, subescheator of, 116 Oysel, Richard, 143 Palestrina, Simon, cardinal bishop of, 65 Pannal (Yorkshire), 41, 165 papal dispensations, 94–6 Paris, Matthew, 73 Paris, university, 72 Parleben, Master Hamon, 78, 198 Parleben, Master Wandricus, 198 Patrick, earl of Salisbury, 93 Paul (Cornwall), 38, 166n. Pavelly, Eustacia de, 22n. Paxton, Robert of, 184 Payn (Paen), Master Adam, 81, 204 Paynel, John, 170 Pecham, John, archbishop of Canterbury, 11, 43n., 57, 58, 69, 72, 78n., 94, 111, 171, 186 Peckleton (Leicestershire), 53, 186 Pembroke, earldom of, 7n., see also Marshal, Gilbert Pembroke, lordship of, 7, see also Valence, William de Penistone (Yorkshire), 69, 206 Penlyne (Cornwall), 170 Penn, Hugh of, 195 pensions, 23, 25, 47, 50, 92–3, 183 Perche, Thomas, count of, 30 Percy, Henry de, 20, 48, 71, 108; lands of, 90, 108, 126, 165, 187; Ellen, mother of, 108; Eleanor, wife of, 108; William, father of, 108; William, brother of, 71 Perranarworthal (Cornwall), 33, 43, 124n., 170 Peter’s Pence, 139 Petition of the Barons (1258), 149

INDEX   235 Petra Castri, Vincent de, 186 Phara, Odo de, 190 Phileby, Master Adam de, 88 Philip IV, king of France, 103 Philip, count of Burgundy, archbishop-elect of Lyons, 133 Pilham (Lincolnshire), 171, 199 Pleshey alias ‘Estra’ (Essex), 169 Plessis, John de, earl of Warwick, 58 Plessis, Robert de, 58 Pluckele, Henry de, 196 Pluralism, 50, 68–72, 94–6 Pocklington (Yorkshire), 165 Pontefract (Yorkshire), 74, 75, chapel of St Clement in castle of, 55n.; hospital of St Nicholas at, 77; lordship of, 40, 62; priory of St John at, 77, 92, 143, 166; steward of, 62, 179; see also Nony, William de Pontoise, John of, bishop of Winchester, 64 Potterton, Adam of, 157, 178, 179, 195 Powick, Richard of, 188 Préaux (dép. Eure), 153 Premonstratensians, 137 ‘Prerogativa Regis’, ‘statute’, 103–5 Preston (Lancashire), friary, 163 Preston, Adam of, 48 Preston, Simon of, 51 Prez, Richard de, 154 Princes Risborough (Buckinghamshire), 32, 36 Prittlewell (Essex), 44, priory, 44 Probus (Cornwall), 78 Provisions, papal, 3, 11, 101, 129, 130–6, 176 Pulisdene, Master Thomas de, 83 Purgatory, 12, 159 Pyne, Herbert de, 78 Pypard, Isabel, 154 Pyure, Sir John: heir of, 55 quare impedit, writ, 134, 169 Quarr (Isle of Wight), abbot of, 64 Queenhithe (Middlesex), 29n., 171 Quiliano, Belingarius (alias Berengar) de, 202, 206 Quincy, Roger de, earl of Winchester (d. 1270), 118, 123 Quivil, Peter, bishop of Exeter, 56 quo warranto proceedings, 105 Radcliffe on Soar (Leicestershire), 205 Radcliffe on Trent (Yorkshire), 196 Raleigh, William of, 6 Randouf, Thomas, 192 Ranulph, earl of Chester, 44, 45 Ranulph, son of Ranulph the clerk, 188

236   INDEX Raunds (Northamptonshire), 78, 186, 187 Rayleigh (Essex), 44, 141; barony of, 44 Reading, abbot of, 172 Reading, provincial council at, 1279, 60 Reading, Nicholas of, 81, 84, 86, 88, 195, 196 Reading, Walter of, 89, 187 receivers, 75–6; see also households of magnates, receivers of Redlingfield (Suffolk), priory, 41, 171 ‘Redwyl’ (Cornwall), 170 Reeve, Master John, 95, 190 Regalian right, 25–6, 111–13 Reggate, Gilbert de, 203 Reigate (Surrey), hospital of St Cross at, 144 Reigate, Simon of, 133 Reginald (‘de Dunstanville’), earl of Cornwall (son of Henry I), 26, 28, 29, 40 relics, see Holy Blood Remenham (Berkshire), 170 Restormel (Cornwall), castle, 33, 43 Rewley (Oxfordshire), abbey, 124n., 160, 161, 165 Richard I, 29, 30 Richard, earl of Cornwall and king of Germany (brother of Henry III), 7, 22, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 41, 42, 43, 50, 56, 79, 80, 82, 95, 102, 109, 116, 124n., 160, 163; wife of: see Beatrice of Falkenbourg, Marshal, Isabella; Sanchia of Provence Richard ‘the chamberlain’, 87, 188 Richmond (Yorkshire), 158, 48 Richmond, archdeacon of, 187 Richmond, earldom of, 115 Richmond, earls of: see John, duke of Brittany; Savoy, Peter of Richmond, honour of, 37n. Ripon, Robert of, 206 Ripton, John of, 63 Riston, Peter de, 186 Rivers, Baldwin de (de Deauville), 32 Robert, count of Mortain, 28, 29,39, 42; William, son of, 28, 29 Rocester (Staffordshire), abbey, 44, 45 Rochester, bishop of, see Ingoldsthorpe, Thomas; Merton, Walter de Rochester, see of, 124n., 166 Robert, earl of Gloucester (d. 1147), 105 Robert, son of Swain of Essex, 44 Robert, son of William, 42n. Rockingham (Northamptonshire), 29n., 34n., 109, 110 Rockland (Norfolk), All Saints’, 192 Rodmell, William of, 91 Roecliffe (Yorkshire), 165 Rolling, Gilbert de, 92

Romeyn, John le, archbishop of York, 22, 23, 60 Ros, William de, 132 Rotherfield (Sussex), 89–90 Rothbury, Gilbert of, 88, 96 Rothwell, Richard of, 189 Roughton, Henry of, 186 Rousham (Oxfordshire), 57, 85, 200 royal free chapels, 19–20, 128, 174–5; see also Bridgenorth; Hastings, St Buryan’s, St Martinle-Grand (under London), Tickhill, Wallingford Roydon (Essex), 123n. Royston, John of, 191 Rudham, Alexander of, 191 Rudham, Richard of, 58, 191 Russel, John, 163 Rutland, county of, 28, 34, 109 Ryburgh, Ralph of, 191 Rykeward, Robert de, 166 Rye (Sussex), 56 Saham, Robert de, 53n., 194 St Asaph, bishop of, see Anian II St Asaph, see of, 112 St Benet, Hulme (Norfolk), abbey, 131 St Buryan (Cornwall), collegiate church, 38, 128, 166, 197 St David’s, bishop of, see Bek, Thomas St David’s, see of, 113 St Endellion (Cornwall), 80 St Fagans, Robert of, 201 St Harmon (Radnorshire), 113 St John, Amadeus de, 132 St John, John de St Ladock (Cornwall), 78, 198 St Leonard (Suffolk), 147 St Mary, John of, 194 St Maur, Lawrence de, 187 St Michael’s Mount (Cornwall), priory of, 39, 124n., 127, 161 St Neots (Huntingdonshire), priory, 24, 61, 93, 167n. St Omer, Master John of, 197 St Oswald’s, priory, 88 St Pauls, London, 76 St Radegunds (Kent), prior of: John, nephew of, 56 St Severin (dép. Charente-Maritime), abbey, 62n. St Valéry (dép. Somme), abbey, 39 St Valéry, honour of, 29, 30, 34, 38, 170 St Valéry, Annora, daughter of Thomas de St Valéry, 29 St Valéry, Bernard de, 41 St Valéry, John de, 59n., 199 St Valéry, Reynold, de, 40

St Valéry, Walter de, 39–40 St Valéry, de, family, 29, 41, 00 St Wendron (Cornwall), 56, 165 Saleby, Andrew of, 202 Salen, Master Thomas de, canon of Picquigny, 50, 181 Salwarpe, Richard of, 188 Salisbury, archdeacon of, 53 Salisbury, bishop of, see Ghent, Simon of; Longspée, Nicholas; Wyle, Walter de la Salisbury, canon of, see Sancta Maria, Master Peter de Salisbury, chantry of St Edmund at, 157 Salisbury, dean of, 157 Salisbury, earls of, Patrick, see Lacy; Longspée; Patrick Salisbury, Henry of, 107 Salisbury, parliament at (1297), 144, 145 Salisbury, precentorship of, 70 Salisbury, see of, 35 Salmon, John, bishop of Norwich, 13, 64 Saltash (Cornwall), 34; church of St Stephen by, 79, 197 Saluzzo, Boniface of, son of Thomas, marquis of Saluzzo, 53, 69, 70, 88n., 194, 206; George, brother of, 70 Sanchia of Provence, second wife of Richard, earl of Cornwall, 31, 32, 33, 42 Sancta Maria, Master Peter de, 141 Sancto Philiberto, Robert de, 205 Sancto Philiberto, Roger de, 205 Sandal, John of, 86, 88, 96 Sandford (Oxfordshire), Knights Templar at, 38 Sapy, Robert, 189 Saunderton (Buckinghamshire), 198 Savoy, counts of, 95 Savoy, Peter of, earl of Richmond, 37n., 115, 122, 130 Saxthorpe (Norfolk), 84 Saxthorpe, William of, 182 Saxton (Yorkshire), St Mary’s chapel at, 156 Saxton, Roger of, 156 Say, Isabel de, 49 Say, William de, 104 Say, William de (d. 1272), 123 Scales (Yorkshire), 74 Scotevill, Robert de, and Joan his wife, 188 Scotland, king of, 130 Scotton Thorpe (Yorkshire), 165 Scrope family (of Bolton), 3n. Sculthorpe (Norfolk), 22 Seal (Derbyshire), 187 Seamer (Yorkshire), 71 Sècheville, John de, prior of St Neots, 61, 62 Sècheville, Master John de, rector of Overton, 89

INDEX   237 Segrave, Adam de, 203 seisin, of advowson, 165–6 Selby (Yorkshire), abbey, 124 Sele (Sussex), prior, 141 Seleston, John de, 197 Seliriac (diocese of Geneva), 73 Selling (Kent) Seneschaucy, 52n. Senghennydd, 84 Senlis, Matilda d, 166n. Setia, Bernardinus de, 131 Seton, Master Roger de, 172 Settrington (Yorkshire), 83, 191 Sevenhampton (Wiltshire), 87 Shabbington (Buckinghamshire), 152 Shelton (Bedfordshire), 201 Shenfield (Essex), 117n. Sheppey, Nicholas of, 196 Shire Newton (Monmouthshire), 202 Shouldham (Norfolk), priory, 125 Shupton, Hugh de, 56, 199 Silkstone, Robert of, 75, 79, 86, 88, 195 Simili, William de, 32 Simond, John, 93n. Skenfrith (Monmouthshire), 166n. Skipsea (Yorkshire), 51, 52, 204; rector of, see Stratton, Adam of Skipton (Yorkshire), 173 Slaidburn (Yorkshire), 77 Smythmore, John de, 93n. Snape (Suffolk), priory, 41, 171 Snelshall (Buckinghamshire), priory, 125 Sodington, Thomas of, 58, 188 Sodington, Master Thomas of, 83, 191 Somery, Roger de, 183 Sotwell, Master Richard of, 57, 199, 200, 201 Soulbury (Berkshire), 60 South Luffenham (Rutland), 87, 188, 189 South Repps (Norfolk), 89 South Thoresby (Lincolnshire), 201, 202 Spalding (Lincolnshire), priory, 66, 134, 141, 142,161 Spanby, John of, 191 Spelsbury (Oxfordshire), 85, 189 Spondon (Staffordshire), 164 Springthorpe (Lincolnshire), 171, 199 Stafford, archdeaconry of, 81 Stamford (Lincolnshire), friars of, 163 Stamford, Richard of, 203 Standen Chaworth (Wiltshire) Stanford, William de, 203 Stanford Dingley (Berkshire), 23 Stanhoe (Norfolk), 123n. Stanlaw (Lancashire), abbey, 23, 92, 166, 167, 168

238   INDEX Stanley family (of Lathom), 4 Stapledon, Walter de, bishop of Exeter, 28n. Stapleford (Leicestershire), 186, 187 Starston (Norfolk), 193 Statutum Felicis, canon (1274), 134 Staundon, Robert de, 113 Stephen of Blois (later Stephen, king of England), 29 Stepney, Robert of, 185 Stevenage (Hertfordshire), 76 stewards, 76–78 Sticklepath (Devon), 203 Stithians (Cornwall), 59n., 198 Stoke on Trent (Staffordshire), 51, 107, 108n., 118 Stoke St Edwald (Dorset), 121 Stokes, Robert de, 197 Stokes, Walter de, 86 Stokys, Thomas de, 193 Stoneleigh (Warwickshire), 37,153; abbey, 37, 151, 152, 153; Dallies, Helenshull and Westwood Heath in, 153 Stonely (Huntingdonshire), priory, 63 Stonely, Andrew, son of William of, 201 Stonham (Suffolk), 192 Stopham, William of, 172 Stortford, Walter of, 152 Stradbroke (Suffolk), 66n. Strata Florida (Carmarthenshire), abbey, 65 Stratford, William of, 203 Stratton (Cornwall), 40 Stratton, Adam of, 52, 64, 87, 88, 204 Street, William of, 203 Studley (Oxfordshire), priory, 40, 124n. Stutevill, Johanna de, 70 Stuteville, William de, 30 Suffield (Norfolk), 193 Suffield, Walter of, bishop of Norwich, 121 Surlingham (Norfolk), 24, 172 Surrey, archdeaconry of, 89 Sussex, sheriff of, 141 Sutton, Oliver, bishop of Lincoln, 12, 18, 21, 41, 57, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 67, 93, 94, 95, 154, 204 Sutton, Henry of, 189 Sutton, Reginald of, 183 Sutton (Norfolk), 84; Bartholomew, rector of, 85 Sutton Courtenay (Berkshire), 121 Sutton in Holland (Lincolnshire), 154, 156 Swafield (Norfolk), 183 Swaffham (Norfolk), 115n., 158 Swaffham, John and Simon of, 158 Swaton (Lincolnshire), 77, 195,196 Swayfield, Robert of, 19, 199

Tamworth (Staffordshire), 123 Tangley, Valentine of, 194, 195 Tankard, Hugh, 189 Tanworth (Warwickshire), 172 Tarent, Richard de, 188 Tasburgh (Norfolk), 123n. Tattershall (Lincolnshire), 123n. Tattershall, Robert of (d. 1298), 20, 61 Tattershall, Robert of (d. 1306), 125 Tattershall estates, 123 Taunton, Master Peter of, 189 Taxatio (1291–2), 10, 22n., 87, 93n., 122, 168 taxation of the clergy, 121–2, 129, 139–40, 144–7 Teigh (Rutland), 186 Tenby, hospital at, 158 Terrington (Norfolk), 70, 73 Testa, Master William, 139, 140 Tewington (Cornwall), 33, 43 Tewkesbury (Gloucestershire), abbey, 85, 105, 106, 107, 117, 179, 180; chronicler of, 106 Thetford (Norfolk), priory, 64, 70 Theberton (Suffolk), 193 Thomas the Martyr, St (Thomas Becket), 158 Thomas, earl of Lancaster, 14, 118 and n., 158 Thoriaco, Theobald de, 62 Thorndon (Suffolk), 39 Thorner (Yorkshire), 194 Thornton (Lincolnshire), abbey, 127 Thremhall (Essex), priory, 152 Threxton (Norfolk), 91 Thurning (Bedfordshire), 185 Tickhill (Yorkshire), royal chapel, 70 Tideswell, Thomas of, 154 Tidworth, Durand of, 78 Tieis, Franco de, 183 Tilbrook (Bedfordshire), 71 Tilbury (Essex), hospital, 125 Tintagel (Cornwall), 28 Tintern (Monmouthshire), abbey, 79, 124, 164,165 Tiron (dép. Eure-et-Loire), abbey, 202 Toky, John, 184 Tonbridge, Gilbert of, 155 Tonk’, Simon de, 205 Topcroft (Norfolk), 123n. Tours (dép. Indre-et-Loire), abbey, 52, 190 Towcester (Northamptonshire), 183 Toynton, church of All Saints at, 55n., 193 Trahan, Peter de, 52, 190 Trebarwith (Cornwall), 33, 43 Tregoz, John, 125 Trematon (Cornwall), castle, manor and honour of, 34 Trematon, St Stephen’s church at, 34 Trenche, Richard, 196

Trentham (Staffordshire), priory, 107 Treswell (Nottinghamshire), 60 Troughford, Nicholas of, 202 Trumpington (Cambridgeshire), 123n. Tunstall (Suffolk), 51 Turold, Richard, son of, 42; William, his son, 42n. Turstin, Baldwin, son of, 43 Tutbury (Derbyshire),119, 120, 163, chapel at, 164; chantry in castle of, 158 Tuyere, William de la, 91 Twickenham (Middlesex), 39 Twyford, Master John, 186 Twynham, Robert of, 162 Tywardreath (Cornwall), 33, 42, 43; priory, 42, 43 Ubbeston, Elias of, 93 Undy (Monmouthshire), 169 Upper Hardres (Kent), 82, 185 Usk, Robert of, 191 Uttoxeter (Staffordshire), 57, 78, 186 Valence, Aymer de, earl of Pembroke, 68, 137 Valence, William de, lord of Pembroke, 7, 18, 36, 68, 84, 85, 86, 88, 130, 135, 141, 147n., 158, 163, 169,182–3; Agnes, daughter of, 18; Munchensi, Joan de, wife of, 7n., 84n. ‘Valuation of Norwich’, 121, 122 valuations in IPMs, of churches, 120–3; of religious houses, 125 Vanne, Master Robert de la, 195, 196 Vautort, Roger de, 34 Vaux, John de, 132 Vavasur, Adam le, 55 Vere, Alice de, dowager countess of Oxford, 24 Vere, Aubrey de, earl of Oxford, 44 Vere, Hugh de, earl of Oxford, 117, 121 Vere, Robert de, earl of Oxford, 6, 8, 23, 72, 117, 135, 185 Vermeleys, Johanna de, 22 Veryan (Cornwall), 40 Vescy, John de, 108, 151n. vicarages, 20, 21, 42 Vienne, Hugh de (alias ‘de Vicania’), 58, 77, 78, 84, 186, 187 Vippeins, Eudes de, 73n. Vippeins (Wypens), Gerard de, bishop of Lausanne, 73, 193, 194, 195 Viquiria, Roland de, 202 Waddesdon (Buckinghamshire), 203 Waddington (Lincolnshire), 82, 172, 193, 194, 195 Wadenhoe (Northamptonshire), 193, 196 Wake, John, 200, 201

INDEX   239 Wakering, Peter of, 109 Walcot, Simon of, 195 Walden (Essex), abbey, 92, 153, 169 Waldingfield (Suffolk), 51 Waldron (Sussex), 91 Wallingford (Berkshire), 30; castle and honour of, 30, 31, 34, 35, 36, 41, 170; church of St Michael in, 124n.; church of St Peter in, 124n.; St Nicholas’ chapel in castle, 38, 80, 81, 128, 160 Wallingford, Peter of, 57, 200 Wallingwells (Nottinghamshire), nuns of, 22, 166n. Wallop, Walter of, 154–5 Walpole, Ralph, bishop of Norwich, 192 Waltham (Essex), 29n. Waltham, Master Philip of, 59n., 199 Waltham, Richard of, 201 Walton (Suffolk), 51 Wanervyle, Adam: Adam, heir of, 206 Wansford, William of, 194 Warborough (Oxfordshire), 152 wardship patronage, 10, 48, 54, 55, 102, 104-5, 108, 120, 125-8, 175 Warelwast, William, bishop of Exeter, 40 Warenne, John de, earl of Surrey, 7, 22, 39, 53, 54, 85, 88, 89, 91, 94, 103, 112, 134, 135, 143, 145, 166n., 169, 183; John and William, sons of, 85; wife of: see Lusignan, Alice de Warenne, William de, 169, 183 Warmington (Warwickshire), 153, 154 Warminster, William of, 195 Warter, Richard of, prior-elect of Nostell, 62, 178 Warwick, church of St James at, 189; church of St Nicholas at, 188, 189; collegiate church of St Mary at, 2n., 20, 58, 188, 189; priory of St Sepulchre at, 171 Warwick, Adam of, 205 Warwick, countess of, 59, 172 Warwick, earls of, 32, 170n.; see also Beauchamp, William de; Beaumont, Roger de; Mauduit, William Washingborough (Lincolnshire), 95, 115n., 190 Watlington (Oxfordshire), 30 Wellow, Robert of, 193, 196 Wells, Hugh of, bishop of Lincoln 12, 61 Wells, canon of, see Blanc, Master Peter Wells, prebends of, 73 ‘Wendern’, 134 Wengham, Henry of, 107n. Werden (Hanover), Andrew, provost of, see Mixbury West Blatchington (Sussex), 54, 169 West Derby, wapentake of (Lancashire), 119n. West Halton (Lincolnshire), 194

240   INDEX West Thoresby (Lincolnshire), 147n. West Thurrock (Essex), 20, 90, 190 West Wickham (Cambridgeshire), 23n. Westbury on Trym (Gloucestershire), 135, 136, 137 Westlecott (Wiltshire), 154 Westminster, abbot of, 76 Westminster, parliaments at (1279), 151; (1290), 135; (1305), 138 Westminster, Provisions of (1259), 149 Westminster, Statute of, II (1285), 138, 159, 160 Westwick (Norfolk), 193 Wetherden, Matthew of, 190 Whalley (Lancashire), 23n., 92, 166, 167, 168 Whissendine, Thomas of, 199 Whiston (Northamptonshire), 68, 85, 184 Whitbred, John, 153 Whitchurch (Herefordshire), 183 Whitchurch (Oxfordshire), 88 Whitmore (Staffordshire), 107n. Whitwell (Rutland), 60 Whitwick (Leicestershire), 193 Wickford (Essex), 44 Wickwane, William, archbishop of York, 90 Wickwar (Gloucestershire), 59 Widecombe in the Moor (Devon), 22 Wigmore (Shropshire), abbey, 86 Wigod, the Saxon, 30 ‘Wike’ (Gloucestershire), 170 William the Conqueror, 17 William, earl of Albemarle (d. 1179), 39 William, earl of Cornwall (d. 1140), 40 William, earl of Gloucester (d. 1183), 105, 106 William, Brother, Trinitarian, 163 Willingham (Lincolnshire), 194, 196 Wilton (Wiltshire), 29n., 38; abbey, 37 Wiltshire, Master Walter of, 74, 195 Wimborne, Walter of, 150 Wimborne Holte, William of, 196 Winceby (Lincolnshire), 74, 75, 193, 195 Winchelsey, Robert, archbishop of Canterbury, 64, 72, 94 Winchester, bishop of, see Pontoise, John of Winchester, diocese of, 133 Winchester, earl of, see Quincy, Roger de Winchester, see of, 90n. Winchester, Thomas of, 90, 179 Winston (Suffolk), 191, 192

Winston, Henry of, 198, 200 Winterbourne Earls (Wiltshire), 75, 84, 147n., 195, 196 Winterslow (Wiltshire), 29n., 171 Wispington (Lincolnshire), 47n., 80, 94n. Wissett, Oliver of, 85, 89, 91 Wistow (Leicestershire), 80, 102, 203 Withernsea (Yorkshire), 91 Woldingham (Surrey), 120 Wolstanton (Staffordshire), 107, 108n., 110, 118 Womersley (Yorkshire), 70 Wonston (Surrey), 141 Wootton (Northamptonshire),59, 202 Worcester annalist, 135, 136, 137 Worcester, archdeaconry of , 136 Worcester, bishop of, see Giffard, Godfrey Worcester: castle, St Peter’s chapel, 188; cathedral, chantry in, 158; prior and convent of, 135, 136 Wormsley (Herefordshire), priory, 24, 165 Wotton, John de, 186 Wretton, Geoffrey of, 85n., 105, 147n., 183 Wrockwardine (Shropshire), 126n. Wroxeter (Shropshire), 126n., 202 Wroxhall, John of, 196 Wulle, Simon de, 63 Wyberton (Lincolnshire), 52, 190 Wycham, John de, 107n. Wyger, John, 132 ‘Wykes by Boston’ (Lincolnshire), 115n. Wyle, Master Henry de la, 194, 196 Wyle, Walter de la, bishop of Salisbury, 23 Wymondham (Norfolk), 125 Wymondham (Leicestershire), 154, 187 Wypens, Gerard de, see Vippeins, Gerard de Yale (Denbighshire), 112n. Yardley Hastings (Northamptonshire), 182, 198 Yarmouth (Isle of Wight), 123 Yelden (Bedfordshire), 76 York, abbot of St Mary’s at, 86 York, archbishop of, see Giffard, Walter; Corbridge, Thomas of York, archdiocese of, 12, 20, 62, 93, 165n., 178 York, prebend of, 132; see also Fenton York, Thomas of, 52, 190 York, treasurership of, see Montfort, Amaury de; Mortimer, Edmund

Other volumes in Studies in the History of Medieval Religion I: Dedications of Monastic Houses in England and Wales 1066–1216 Alison Binns II: The Early Charters of the Augustinian Canons of Waltham Abbey, Essex, 1062–1230 Edited by Rosalind Ransford III: Religious Belief and Ecclesiastical Careers in Late Medieval England Edited by Christopher Harper-Bill IV: The Rule of the Templars: The French text of the Rule of the Order of the Knights Templar Translated and introduced by J. M. Upton-Ward V: The Collegiate Church of Wimborne Minster Patricia H. Coulstock VI: William Waynflete: Bishop and Educationalist Virginia Davis VII: Medieval Ecclesiastical Studies in honour of Dorothy M. Owen Edited by M. J. Franklin and Christopher Harper-Bill VIII: A Brotherhood of Canons Serving God English Secular Cathedrals in the Later Middle Ages David Lepine IX: Westminster Abbey and its People c.1050–c.1216 Emma Mason X: Gilds in the Medieval Countryside Social and Religious Change in Cambridgeshire c.1350–1558 Virginia R. Bainbridge XI: Monastic Revival and Regional Identity in Early Normandy Cassandra Potts XII: The Convent and the Community in Late Medieval England: Female Monasteries in the Diocese of Norwich 1350–1540 Marilyn Oliva XIII: Pilgrimage to Rome in the Middle Ages: Continuity and Change Debra J. Birch

XIV: St Cuthbert and the Normans: the Church of Durham 1071–1153 William M. Aird XV: The Last Generation of English Catholic Clergy: Parish Priests in the Diocese of Coventry and Lichfield in the Early Sixteenth Century Tim Cooper XVI: The Premonstratensian Order in Late Medieval England Joseph A. Gribbin XVII: Inward Purity and Outward Splendour: Death and Remembrance in the Deanery of Dunwich, Suffolk, 1370–1547 Judith Middleton-Stewart XVIII: The Religious Orders in Pre-Reformation England Edited by James G. Clark XIX: The Catalan Rule of the Templars: A Critical Edition and English Translation from Barcelona, Archito de la Corona de Aragón, ‘Cartes Reales’, MS 3344 Edited and translated by Judi Upton-Ward XX: Leper Knights: The Order of St Lazarus of Jerusalem in England, c. 1150–1544 David Marcombe XXI: The Secular Jurisdiction of Monasteries in Anglo-Norman and Angevin England Kevin L. Shirley XXII: The Dependent Priories of Medieval English Monasteries Martin Heale XXIII: The Cartulary of St Mary’s Collegiate Church, Warwick Edited by Charles Fonge XXIV: Leadership in Medieval English Nunneries Valerie G. Spear XXV: The Art and Architecture of English Benedictine Monasteries, 1300–1540: A Patronage History Julian M. Luxford XXVI: Norwich Cathedral Close: The Evolution of the English Cathedral Landscape Roberta Gilchrist

XXVII: The Foundations of Medieval English Ecclesiastical History Edited by Philippa Hoskin, Christopher Brooks and Barrie Dobson XXVIII: Thomas Becket and his Biographers Michael Staunton XXIX: Late Medieval Monasteries and their Patrons: England and Wales, c.1300–1540 Karen Stöber XXX: The Culture of Medieval English Monasticism Edited by James G. Clark XXXI: A History of the Abbey of Bury St Edmunds, 1182–1256: Samson of Tottington to Edmund of Walpole Antonia Gransden XXXII: Monastic Hospitality: The Benedictines in England, c.1070–c.1250 Julie Kerr XXXIII: Religious Life in Normandy, 1050–1300: Space, Gender and Social Pressure Leonie V. Hicks XXXIV: The Medieval Chantry Chapel: An Archaeology Simon Roffey XXXV: Monasteries and Society in the British Isles in the Later Middle Ages Edited by Janet Burton and Karen Stöber XXXVI: Jocelin of Wells: Bishop, Builder, Courtier Edited by Robert Dunning XXXVII: War and the Making of Medieval Monastic Culture Katherine Allen Smith XXXVIII: Cathedrals, Communities and Conflict in the Anglo-Norman World Edited by Paul Dalton, Charles Insley and Louise J. Wilkinson XXXIX: English Nuns and the Law in the Middle Ages: Cloistered Nuns and Their Lawyers, 1293-1540 Elizabeth Makowski

DR ELIZABETH GEMMILL is University Lecturer in Local History and Fellow of Kellogg College, University of Oxford.

Series: Studies in the History of Medieval Religion

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THE NOBILITY AND ECCLESIASTICAL PATRONAGE IN THIRTEENTH-CENTURY ENGLAND

ELIZABETH GEMMILL

Cover image: Cloister Hailes Abbey

NOBILITY AND ECCLESIASTICAL PATRONAGE

This book provides the first full-length, integrated study of the ecclesiastical patronage rights of the nobility in medieval England. It examines the nature and extent of these rights, how they were used, why and for whom they were valuable, what challenges lay patrons faced, and how they looked to the future in making gifts to the Church. It takes as its focus the thirteenth century, a critical period for the survival and development of these rights, being a time of ambitious Church reform, of great change in patterns of land ownership in the ranks of the higher nobility, and of bold assertion by the English Crown of its claims to control Church property. The thirteenth century also saw a proliferation of record keeping on the part of kings, bishops and nobility, and the author uses new evidence from a range of documentary sources to explore the nature of the relationships between the English nobility, the Church and its clergy, a relationship in which patronage was the essential feature.

THE

‘While there has been work on the nobility as patrons of monasteries, this is the first real study of them as patrons of parish churches, and is thus the first study to tackle the subject as a whole. Illustrated with a wealth of detail, it will become an indispensable work of reference for those interested in lay patronage and the Church more generally in the middle ages.’ PROFESSOR DAVID CARPENTER, DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY, KING'S COLLEGE LONDON

ELIZABETH GEMMILL