THE CLERKENWELL NUNNERY
It has been generally believed that the founder of the Convent,
dedicated to the Honour of God and the Assumption of the Virgin Mary,
was one Jordan Briset about the year 1100. Stow speaks as if there was
no doubt of the matter at all:—
“Beyond this house of St. John’s, was the Priory of Clerkenwell, so
called of Clarks-Well adjoining; which Priory was also founded, about
the Year 1100, by Jorden Briset, Baron, the son of Ralph, the son of
Brian Briset: Who gave to Robert, a Priest, fourteen Acres of Land,
lying in the Field next adjoining the said Clarks-Well, thereupon to
build an House for religious persons, which he built to the Honour
of God, and the Assumption of our Lady; and placed therein black
Nuns. This Jorden Briset gave also to that House one piece of Ground,
thereby to build a Windmill upon, etc. Upon the Dissolution of this
Priory, it became a Parish Church, called St. James, Clerkenwell.”
Mr. J. H. Round, however, has discovered that the date of the
Foundation has been placed too early, and that the founder was not
Jordan Briset at all, but a certain person identified as the younger
son of a Domesday under-tenant, who had himself founded the Priories of
Bricett for Austin Friars and of Stanegate for Cluniac Monks. Both this
House and the Priory of St. John adjacent were founded, in Mr. Round’s
view, about the year 1145.
The value of the House at the surrender was, according to Dugdale,
£262: 19: 0; according to Speed, £282: 16: 5. In the _Calendar of
Wills_ there is not a single bequest to the nuns of this House.
Isabella, the last prioress, was a daughter of Sir Richard Sackville.
She furnishes another instance tending to prove that the monasteries
and nunneries had fallen into the hands of the noble and gentle
families. She received a pension of fifty pounds a year on the
Dissolution; she died in 1569, and was buried in her own church.
The site of the House was given to the Duke of Norfolk, who exchanged
it with the King for another place. Then Walter Henley and John
Williams, knights, got a grant of it. It passed through many hands
during the next hundred years. Among others, it was possessed by Sir
Thomas Challoner, tutor to Prince Henry, son of James the First. He
built a spacious house within the Close of the Priory, on the front of
which he engraved the following lines, a rare tribute to the memory of
the departed Sisters:—
“Casta Fides superest, velare tecta Sorores
Ista relagatæ deseruere licet:
Nam venerandus Hymen his vota jugalia servet,
Vestalemque focum mente fovere studet.”
Thus Englished by Fuller:—
“Chaste Faith still stays behind though hence be flown
Those veyled nuns who here before did rest:
For reverend marriage wedlock vows doth own,
And sacred flames keep here in loyal brest.”
[Illustration: ANCIENT CLOISTERS IN CLERKENWELL]
Some remains of the cloisters were standing in 1785. They were figured
in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ for that year.
The Church of St. James was originally the choir of the nunnery, and
was made a Parish Church on the Dissolution.
“Strype, in his additions to Stow’s account of the church, says,
‘About the year 1623 the steeple fell down, having stood time out of
mind without any reparation; nor among the records of that church
could any mention be found of any such thing. This Steeple in the
rebuilding thereof, and being near finishing, fell again, upon the
undertaker’s neglect in not looking into the strength of that upon
which he was to rear such a burthen. With the steeple fell the bells,
their carriages and frames, beating a great part of the roof down
before them, the weight of all these together bearing to the ground
two large pillars of the south aisle, a fair gallery over against the
pulpit, the pulpit, all the pews, and whatsoever was under or near
it.’ The church, however, was thoroughly repaired, and the steeple
renewed, by 1627, at the expense of £1400.
On August 25th, 1788, the ground was first prepared for the reception
of a new church, which was consecrated on July 10th, 1792, by Beilby
Porteus, Bishop of London.” (_London and Middlesex Notes_, pp. 80-81.)