MEDIÆVAL WILLS, CHANTRIES, AND OBITS
The value of side-lights in an historical picture is frequently
overlooked, or not duly appreciated. The main facts of a story may
be presented with accuracy and detail, and yet the result may be as
unlike the reality as the fleshless skeleton is to the living man.
More especially are these side-lights requisite when the object of the
inquirer is to ascertain the tone and temper of minds at some given
time, and to discover what men, under given circumstances, were doing
and thinking about. In trying, therefore, to gauge the mental attitude
of Englishmen towards the ecclesiastical system existing on the eve
of the Reformation, it is important not to neglect any faint glimmer
of light which may be reflected from the records of the past, the
brightness of which in its setting has been obscured only too well by
the dark storm-clouds of controversy and prejudice.
Not the least valuable among what may be described as the minor
sources of information about the real feeling of the people generally
towards their religion on the eve of the Reformation are the wills, of
which we have abundant examples in the period in question. It may, of
course, appear to some that their spirit was in great measure dictated
by what they now hold to be the erroneous opinions then in vogue as
to Purgatory and the efficacy of prayer for the dead. That these
doctrines of the Church had a firm hold on the minds and hearts of the
people at large is certain. The evidence that this was so is simply
overwhelming, and it may be taken to prove, not merely the existence
of the teaching, but the cordial and unhesitating way in which it was
accepted as a necessary part of the Christian faith. But this, after
all, is merely a minor point of interest in the wills of the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries. What clearly appears in these documents,
however, is the Catholic tone which pervades them, and enables the
reader to realise perhaps more than he is able to do from any other
class of document, the strong hold their religion must have had on the
love and intelligence of the people of those days. The intelligences
may not, indeed, have been of any very high order, but the souls were
certainly penetrated by true Christian ideals. To those who penned
those early wills, Faith was clearly no mere intellectual apprehension
of speculative truth. Religion, and religious observance, was to them
a practical reality which entered into their daily lives. The kindly
Spirit that led them, brought them strength to bear their own and
others’ burdens, in sickness and health, in adversity and prosperity,
from childhood till their eyes closed in their last sleep. If we may
judge from these last aspirations of the Christian soul as displayed
in mediæval wills, we must allow that religion was very real indeed to
our English forefathers in the sixteenth century, and that in reality
the whole social order was founded upon a true appreciation of the
Christian brotherhood in man, and upon the doctrine of the efficacy of
good works for salvation. These truths of the social order were not
indeed taught perhaps scientifically, and we might look in vain for any
technical expression of them in the books of religious instruction
most used during this period, but they formed none the less part of the
traditional Christian teaching of the Middle Ages founded on the great
principles of the Bible which then dominated popular thought.[349]
Those who would understand what this Christian spirit meant and the
many ways in which it manifested itself, need only compare the wills of
the late fifteenth and the early sixteenth centuries with those, say,
of the later years of Queen Elizabeth, when the religious revolution
had been accomplished, and note the obvious difference in tone and
purpose. The comparison need not be searching or entail much study; the
change is patent and striking, and lies on the very surface.
Some examples of notes taken from pre-Reformation wills may be here
given from the collection of Northern wills published by the Surtees
Society under the title _Testamenta Eboracensia_, the fourth volume of
which contains many wills made during the period in question. It may be
useful to remark that one and all of these documents manifest the same
spirit of practical Christianity, though of course in various degrees.
Most of them contain bequests to churches with which the donors were
chiefly connected; money is frequently left to the fabric, or to some
special altar, or for the purchase of vestments, or to furnish some
light to burn before the Blessed Sacrament, the rood or some image, to
which the deceased had a particular devotion. Specific gifts of silks,
rich articles of clothing and embroidered hangings fitted to adorn
the Church of God, to make chasubles and copes, or altar curtains and
frontals, are common. Practical sympathy with the poor is manifested by
provision for distributions of doles at funerals and at anniversaries,
and by gifts of cloaks and other articles of clothing, to those of
the parish who were engaged in carrying torches at the burial, or had
promised to offer up prayers for the soul of the testator. Besides
these general features of interest, the wills in question show us
that building operations of great magnitude were being carried on at
this time in the parish churches of the North, and they thus furnish
an additional proof of the very remarkable interest thus taken by the
people at large in the rebuilding and adornment of the parish churches
of England right up to the very overthrow of the old ecclesiastical
system. These particular wills also bear a singular testimony to the
kindly feelings which existed at this time between the general body of
the clergy and the regular orders. Nearly every will of any cleric of
note contains bequests of money to monks, nuns, and friars, whilst, in
particular, those of the canons and officials of the great metropolitan
church of York bear testimony to the affection and esteem in which they
held the Abbot and monks of St. Mary’s Abbey in the same city, which
from its close proximity to the minster might in these days have been
regarded as its rival.
As an illustration of the religious spirit which pervades these
documents, we may take the following preface to the will of one John
Dalton of Hull, made in 1487. “In nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus
Sancti. Amen. I, John Dalton of the Kingstown upon Hull--considering
and remembering, think in my heart that the days of man in this mortal
life are but short, that the hour of death is in the hand of Almighty
God, and that He hath ordained the terms that no man may pass. I
remember also that God hath ordained man to die, and that there is
nothing more uncertain than the hour of death. I seeing princes and
(men of) great estates die daily, and men of all ages end their days,
and that death gives no certain respite to any living creature, but
takes them suddenly. For these considerations, I, being in my right
wit and mind, loved be God, whole not sick, beseech Almighty God that
I may die the true son of Holy Church and of heart truly confessed,
with contrition and repentance, of all my sins that ever I did since
the first hour I was born of my mother into this sinful world, to the
hour of my death. Of these offences I ask and beseech Almighty God
pardon and forgiveness; and in this I beseech the Blessed Virgin Mary
and her blessed Son Jesu, our Saviour, that suffered pain and passion
for me and all sinful creatures, and all the holy company of Paradise
to pray for me.… For these causes aforesaid, I, being alive of whole
mind and memory, loved be God, dispose and ordain such goods as God
hath lent me movable and immovable by my testament, and ordain this my
last will in the form and manner that followeth: First, I recommend in
humble devotion, contrition, and true repentance of my faults and sins,
praying and craving mercy of our Saviour Jesus Christ … my soul to our
Lord Jesus Christ when it shall depart from my body, and to our Lady
St. Mary, Saint Michael, St. John the Baptist, St. John the Evangelist,
St. Katherine and St. Barbara, and to all the whole company and saints
of heaven: and my body I will to the earth whereof it came.”
The testator then proceeds to direct that his executors shall give
his wife a third of his property, and his children another third. The
rest he wishes to be bestowed in charity as they may think best “to
the pleasure of God and the health of my soul” … “as they shall answer
before God at the dreadful day of doom. (Especially) I will them to pay
my debts, charging them before God to discharge me and my soul; and in
this let them do for me as they would I did for them, as I trust they
will do.”[350]
Of much the same character is the briefer Latin preface to the will
of a sub-dean of York in 1490. “I protest before God Almighty, the
Blessed Mary, and all saints, and I expressly proclaim that, no matter
what infirmity of mental weakness may happen to me in this or any
other sickness, it is not my intention in anything to swerve from the
Catholic faith. On the contrary I firmly and faithly believe all the
articles of faith, all the sacraments of the Church; and that the
Church with its sacraments is sufficient for the salvation of any one
however guilty.”[351]
To take one more example of the same spirit, Thomas Dalton, merchant of
Hull--probably son of the John Dalton whose will is quoted above--died
in 1497. After charging his wife, whom he leaves his executrix, to
pay all his debts, he adds: “And I will and give my mother forty
shillings, beseeching her meekly to pray for me and to give me her
daily blessing, and that she will forgive me all trespasses and faults
done by me to her since I was born of her, as she will be forgiven
before God at the great day of judgment.”[352]
Much the same spirit evidently dictated the following clause in the
will of John Sothill of Dewsbury, 1502: “Also I pray Thomas my son, in
my name and for the love of God, that he never strive with his mother,
as he will have my blessing, for he will find her courteous to deal
with.”[353]
Other examples of the catholicity of these mediæval wills may be here
added as they are taken from the volume almost at haphazard. In 1487,
a late mayor of the city of York leaves money to help in the repairs
of many churches of the city and its neighbourhood. He charges his
executors to provide for the maintenance of lamps and lights in several
places, and specially names a gold ring with a diamond in it, which
he desires may be hung round the neck of Our Lady’s statue in York
Minster, and another with a turquoise “round our Lord’s neck that is
in the arms of the said image of Our Lady.” After making provision
for several series of masses to be said, as for example one of thirty
in honour of the Holy Trinity, another in honour of the Holy Cross,
a third in that of Our Lady, &c., the testator bequeaths a large sum
of money to dower fifteen poor girls, and to find fifty complete
sets of beds and bedding for the poor, as well as other extensive
charities.[354]
Thomas Wood, a draper of Hull, was sheriff in 1479 and died in 1490. By
will he left to his parish church a piece of worked tapestry, and the
clause by which the bequest was conveyed shows that the church already
possessed many costly hangings of this kind. It runs thus: “To the
Trinity Church one of my best beds of Arras work, upon condition that
after my decease the said bed shall yearly cover my grave at my _Dirge_
and Mass, done in the said Trinity Church with note (in singing) for
ever more. Also I will that the said bed be yearly hung in the said
church on the feast of St. George the Martyr among other worshipful
beds, and when the said bed be taken down and delivered, then I will
that the same bed be re-delivered into the vestry and there to remain
with my cope of gold.”[355]
The same kind of gift appears in the last testament of William
Rowkshaw, Rector of Lowthorpe, in 1504. “I leave,” he says, “to the
Church of Catton a bed-covering worked with great figures to lie
in front of the High Altar on the chief feasts. And I leave also a
bed-covering (worked) with the image of a lion (a blue lion was the
family arms) to place in front of the altar in the parish church of
Lowthorpe on the chief feasts.” Also in the will of William Graystoke
of Wakefield, executed in 1508, there is made a gift to the parish
church of “a cloth of arras work sometime hanging in the Hall.”[356]
Poor scholars at the universities were not forgotten in the wills of
the period. Mr. Martin Collins, Treasurer of York, for instance, in
1508 charges his executors to pay for a scholar at either Oxford or
Cambridge for seven years to study canon law, or the arts. The only
condition is that they are to choose him from the “poor and very
needy, and even from the poorest and most necessitous.”[357] So, too,
William Copley in 1489 leaves money to support two poor priests for
the purpose of study at Cambridge. Archbishop Rotheram in his long and
most Christian will, executed in June 1500, makes provision for the
education of youth. He founds a college in the place of his birth--the
College of Jesus at Rotheram--in thanksgiving for God’s providence in
securing his own education. “For,” he says, “there came to Rotheram,
I don’t know by what chance, but I believe by the special grace of
God, a teacher of grammar, who taught me and other youths, and by
whose means I and others with me rose in life. Wherefore desirous of
returning thanks to our Saviour, and to proclaim the reason, and lest I
might seem ungrateful and forgetful of God’s benefits and from whence
I have come, I have determined first of all to establish there for
ever a grammar master to teach all gratuitously. And because I have
seen chantry priests boarding with lay people, one in one place one in
another, to their own scandal and in some places ruin, I have desired,
in the second place, to make them a common dwelling-house. For these
reasons I have commenced to build the college of Jesus, where the head
shall teach grammar and the others may board and sleep.” Moreover,
as he has seen, he says, many unlettered and country folk from the
hills (_rudi et montam_) attracted to church by the very beauty of
ceremonial, he establishes at Rotheram a choir-master and six singing
boys to add to the attraction of the services, and for such of these
boys, who may not want to become priests, he endows a master to teach
them the art of writing and arithmetic.[358]
A merchant of Holme, one John Barton, after leaving legacies to his
parish church, charges his executors to pay the king’s taxes for all
people of the town assessed at 4d. and under, for two years after his
death. John Barton was a merchant of the staple, and had made his
wealth by the wool trade. At Holme he built “a fair stone house and a
fair chapel like a parish church,” and to remind his descendants of the
source whence their means had come, and in humble acknowledgment of
God’s goodness to him, he set in the windows of his home the following
posie--
“I thank God, and ever shall,
It is the sheep hath payed for all.”[359]
As an example of specific bequests for pious purposes, we may take the
following: Sir Gervase Clifton in 1491 gives many sums of money to
churches in Yorkshire and to various chantries in Southwell Minster.
For the use of these latter also, he directs that “all the altar cloths
of silk, a bed of gold bawdkyne and another bed of russet satin,
which belonged to (Archbishop Boothe of York) be delivered to make
vestments.”[360] In 1493-4, John Vavasour, Justice of the Common Pleas,
leaves £100 in money to the monastery of Ellerton, to which he says he
had previously given all his vestments. He names the Priors of Ellerton
and Thorneholme his executors, and tells them that the Prior of the
Charterhouse of Axholme has £800 of his in his keeping, and also that a
chest of his plate is in charge of the London Carthusians.[361]
Again Agnes Hildyard of Beverley, in 1497-8, leaves “an old gold
noble to hang round the neck of the image of Our Lady in the church
of Beverley,” some money to purchase a mantle for the statue of the
Blessed Virgin at Fisholme, and another gold piece for the statue at
Molescroft.[362] About the same time Lady Scrope of Harling left “to
the Rood of Northdor my heart of gold with a diamond in the midst. To
Our Lady of Walsingham, ten of my great gold beads joined with silk
of crimson and gold, with a button of gold, tasselled with the same.…
To Our Lady of Pew ten of the same beads; to St. Edmund of Bury ten
of the same; to St. Thomas of Canterbury, ten of the same; to my Lord
Cardinal, ten aves with two _Paternosters_ of the same beads; to Thomas
Fynchman ten aves and two _Paternosters_ of the same beads.”[363]
Again, in 1502, Elizabeth Swinburne bequeathed to the Carmelites of
Newcastle a piece of silver to make a crown for the image of Our
Lady at her altar “where my mother is buried,” and to Mount Grace a
rosary, “fifty beads of gold, a hundred of corall, with all the gaudys
of gold,” on condition that she and her mother might be considered
_consorores_ of the house, and that thirteen poor people might be fed
on the day of her burial.[364] So, too, a chain of gold is left to
make a cup for the Blessed Sacrament, velvet and silk dresses to make
vestments,[365] plate to make a new chrismatory, crystal beads to adorn
the monstrance used on Corpus feast day.[366]
William Sheffield, Dean of York, whose will is dated 1496, after some
few bequests to friends, leaves the residue to the poor, and he thus
explains the reason: “Also I will that the residue of my goods be
distributed among the poor parishioners in each of the benefices I have
held, according to the discretion of my executors, so that they may
be bestowed more or less in proportion to the time of my living and
keeping hospitality in them; for the goods of the church are the riches
of the poor, and so the distribution of church goods is a serious
matter of conscience, and on those badly disposing of them Jesus have
mercy.”[367]
The Vicar of Wighill, William Burton, in 1498-9, left a sum of money to
remain in the hands of his successors for ever “to ease poor folk of
the parish, for to pay their farms with, so that the said people set
not their goods at wainworth (_i.e._ cartloads--what they would fetch),
and that they have a reasonable day to pay the said silver again duly
and truly to the Vicar for the time being, and the said Vicar to ask
and keep eyes (aye) to the same intent, as he will answer for it at
the dreadful day of judgment betwixt God and the devil; and he shall
not lend the foresaid money for any tax or tallage, nor for any common
purpose of the town, but only to the said poor men.” With kindly
thought for the young among his old flock, the Vicar adds a bequest of
4d. “to every house poor and rich among the children.”[368]
The above is not by any means an isolated instance of a sum, or sums,
of money being left to assist the poorer members of the Christian
brotherhood, represented by the parish, with temporary loans. One
document sets out the working of such a common parish chest under
the supervision of the priest. The original chest and the necessary
funds for starting this work of benevolence were furnished by one of
the parishioners. In order to maintain “this most pious object,”
as it is called, the rector undertakes to read out the name of the
original donor at the “bedes-bidding” on principal feasts, together
with those of all who may subsequently add to the capital sum by alms
or legacies, in order that people might be reminded of their duty to
offer up prayers for the eternal welfare of their benefactors. The
chest was to have three locks, the keys being kept by the rector and
the two wardens. Those who might need to borrow temporarily from the
common stock to meet their rent, purchase of seed or stock, or for any
other purpose, were to bring pledges to the full value of the loan,
or else to find known sureties for the amount. No single person was
to be surety for more than six shillings and eightpence, and for wise
and obvious reasons the parish priest was not to be allowed to stand
security under any circumstances. The loan was for a year, and if at
the end of that time the pledge was not redeemed, it was to be sold,
but all that it might fetch over and above the amount of the original
loan was to be returned to the borrower.[369]
In close connection with the subject of wills in pre-Reformation times
is that of chantries and obits. Both these two institutions of the
later mediæval church in England have been commonly much misunderstood
and misrepresented. Most writers regard them only in the light of the
doctrine of Purgatory, and as illustrating the extent to which the
necessity of praying for the dead was impressed upon the people by the
ecclesiastical authorities, and that with a view to their own profit.
It has come, therefore, to be believed that a “chantry” only meant a
place (chapel or other locality) connected with the parish church,
where masses were offered for the repose of the soul of the donor,
and other specified benefactors. No doubt there were such chantries
existing, but to imagine that all followed this rule is wholly to
mistake the purpose of such foundations. Speaking broadly, the chantry
priests were the assistant priests or, as we should nowadays say, the
curates of the parish, who were supported by the foundation funds
which benefactors had left or given for that purpose, and even not
infrequently by the contributions of the inhabitants. To speak the
language of our own time the system held the place of the “additional
curates” or “pastoral aid” societies. For the most part the _raison
d’être_ of these chantry priests was to look after the poor of the
parish, to visit the sick, and to assist in the functions of the parish
church. By universal custom, and even by statute law of the English
Church, every chaplain and chantry priest, besides the fulfilment of
the functions of his own special benefice, was bound to be at the
disposition of the parish priest in the common services of the parish
church. His presence was required in the choir, vested in a surplice
or other ecclesiastical dress proper to his station, or as one of the
sacred ministers of the altar, should his services be so required. In
this way the existence of guild chaplains, chantry priests, and others,
added to the dignity of the ecclesiastical offices and the splendour
of the ceremonial in most parish churches throughout the country, and
afforded material and often necessary assistance in the working of the
parish.
It will give, perhaps, a better idea of the functions of a chantry
priest on the eve of the Reformation than can be obtained by any
description, to take an example of the foundation made for a chantry
at the altar of Saint Anne in the church of Badsworth. It was founded
in 1510 to pray for the soul of Isabella, wife of William Vavasour, and
daughter of Robert Urswick. The charter deed ordains that the chaplain
shall be a secular priest, without other benefice, and that he should
say a Requiem each week with _Placebo_ and _Dirige_. At the first
lavatory of the Mass he is to turn to the people and exhort them to
pray for the soul of the founder, saying _De Profundis_ and the prayer
_Inclina Domine_. Once every year there is to be an anniversary service
on Tuesday in Easter week, when ten shillings and eightpence is to be
distributed to the poor under the direction of the rector. The chaplain
is to be learned in grammar and plain song, and should be present in
the choir of the parish church at Matins, Mass, Vespers, and Compline,
with other divine services on Sundays and feasts, when he is to take
what part the rector shall ordain. He is not to be absent for more than
a month, and then only with leave of the rector, by whom, for certain
specified offences, he may be deprived of his office.[370]
In these chantries were established services for the dead commonly
called “obits.” These were not, as we have been asked to believe,
mere money payments to the priest for anniversary services, but were,
for the most part, bequests left quite as much for annual alms to the
poor as for the celebration of those services. A few examples will
illustrate this better than any explanation. In the town of Nottingham
there were two chantries connected with the parish church of St. Mary,
that of our Lady and that called Amyas Chantry. The former, according
to the record, was founded “to maintain the services and to be an aid
to the Vicar and partly to succour the poor;” the latter, to assist in
“God’s service,” and to pray for William Amyas the founder. When the
commissioners, in the first year of Edward VI., came to inquire into
the possession of these chantries, they were asked to note that in this
parish there were “1400 houseling people, and that the vicar there
had no other priests to help but the above two chantry priests.” They
were not, of course, spared on this account, for within two years the
property, upon which these two priests were supported, had been sold to
two speculators in such parcels of land--John Howe and John Broxholme.
Then again, in the parish of St. Nicholas, in the same town, we
find from the returns that the members of the Guild of the Virgin
contributed to the support of a priest. In that parish there were more
than 200 houseling people, and as the living was very poor, there
was absolutely no other priest to look after them but this one, John
Chester, who was paid by the guild. The king’s officials, however, did
not hesitate on this account to confiscate the property. It is needless
to adduce other instances of this kind, some scores of which might be
given in the county of Nottingham alone. As an example of “obits” and
the purposes for which they were intended, the following instances
may be given, which it must be remembered could be multiplied to any
extent. From the returns of the commissioners in Nottinghamshire we
find that in the parish of South Wheatley there were parish lands let
out to farm which produced eighteenpence a year, say from eighteen
shillings to a pound of our money. Of this sum, one shilling was for
the poor, and sixpence for church lights; that is two-thirds, or, say,
16s. of our money, was for the relief of the distressed. So in the
parish of Tuxford, the church “obit” lands produced £1, 5s. 4d., or
about £16 a year; of which 16s. 4d. was for the poor and 9s. for the
church services.
Mr. Thorold Rogers, speaking of the endowments left by generations
of Englishmen for the support of chantries, obits, &c., says: “The
ancient tenements which are still the property of the London companies
were originally burdened with masses for donors. In the country, the
parochial clergy undertook the services of these chantries … and
the establishment of a mass or chantry priest at a fixed stipend in
a church with which he had no other relation, was a common form of
endowment. The residue, if any, of the revenue derivable from these
tenements was made the common property of the guild, and as the
continuity of the service was the great object of its establishment,
the donor, like the modern trustee of a life income, took care that
there should be a surplus from the foundation. The land or house was
let, and the guild consented to find the ministration which formed the
motive of the grant.”[371]
This is very true, but it is questionable whether Mr. Thorold
Rogers appreciated the extent to which these chantry funds were
intended to be devoted to purposes other than the performance of the
specified religious services. A couple of examples have been given in
Nottinghamshire, and to these may be added one in the south of England.
In connection with the parish church of Alton, in Hampshire, there
were, on the eve of the Reformation, six foundations for obits. The
following is the account of these taken from the chantry certificates
made by the king’s commissioners in the first year of the reign of
Edward VI.: (1) “Issues of land for an obit for John Pigott, growing
and coming out of certain houses and lands in Alton for to maintain for
ever a yearly obit there, in the tenure of Thomas Mathew, of the yearly
value of 23s. 4d.; whereof to the poor 15s. 4d., to the parish priest
and his clerk 8s. (2) The same for an obit for William Reding, of the
annual value of 15s., of which the poor were to have 10s. and the
priest and his clerk 5s. (3) The same for Alice Hacker, of the yearly
value of 10s., of which the poor were to get 7s. 8d. and the priest
2s. 4d. (4) Another of the value of 4s., the poor to get 2s. 10d.
and the priest 1s. 2d. (5) Another for the soul of Nicholas Bailey,
worth annually 11s., and of this 7s. 8d. was intended for the poor
and 3s. 4d. for the clergy. (6) Another for Nicholas Crushelon, worth
annually 4s. 4d., the poor to have 3s. 1d. and the priest 1s. 3d.” In
this parish of Alton, therefore, these six foundations for “obits” or
anniversaries produced a total of 77s. 8d., but so far from the whole
sum being spent upon priests’ stipends, lights, and singing men, we
find that considerably more than half, namely 46s. 7d., was bestowed
upon the relief of the poor of the parish. Or if we take the value of
money in those days as only twelve times that of our present money, out
of a total of £36, 12s. some £27, 19s. went to the support of the poor.
It is obvious that the general advantages derived by a parish from the
foundation of these chantries and obits have been commonly overlooked,
and the notion that they were intended for no other purpose than
procuring prayers for the dead, and that in fact they served no other
end, is altogether misleading and erroneous. Without the assistance
of the clergy, so supported by the generosity of those who left money
for these foundations, the religious services in many of the parish
churches of England in pre-Reformation times could not have been so
fittingly or even adequately provided for. Wherever information is
available this view is borne out, and it is altogether to mistake the
true bearing of facts to suppose that in suppressing the chantries
and appropriating the endowment of obits the officials of Edward VI.
merely put an end to superstitious prayers for the souls in Purgatory.
In reality they deprived the poor of much property left by deceased
persons for their relief, and took away from every parish in England
the assistance of the unbeneficed clergy who had hitherto helped to
support the dignity of God’s worship and look after the souls of the
people in the larger districts.
One instance may be given to illustrate how far the chantry
clergy actually took part in the work of the parish. At Henley on
Thames, on the eve of the Reformation, there were seven chapels or
chantries--namely, those of Our Lady, St. Katherine, St. Clement,
St. Nicholas, St. Ann, St. John, and St. Leonard. These were all
supported by various bequests, and the four priests who served them
all resided in a common house situated in the churchyard known as “the
chapel-house,” or “the four priest chambers.” The disposition of the
services of these chaplains was apparently in the hands of the “Warden
and the commonalty” of the township, and for the convenience of the
people they arrange, for example, that the chaplain of the Lady altar
shall say his mass there every day at six in the morning, and that
the priest in charge of St. Katherine’s shall always begin his at
eight.[372]
“To maintain God’s service” is perhaps the most common reason assigned
to King Edward’s commission for the existence of a chantry, or
chantries, in connection with a parish church. Thus at Edwinstowe, in
Nottinghamshire, there was a chantry chapel a mile from the parish
church known as Clipston Chantry. The priest was John Thompson,
and he had £5 a year, and “hath no mansion but a parlour under the
chapel.”[373] At Harworth in the same county there was the hospital of
St. Mary’s of Bawtree, founded by Robert Morton to serve the people two
miles from the parish church. The priest had a mansion and close, “and
had to say Mass every morning before sunrise, for such as be travellers
by the way and to maintain God’s service there, which towne is also a
thoroughfare towne.”[374] At Hayton, still in the same county, also two
miles from the parish church, was the chantry of Tilne, founded for a
priest to serve the villages of North and South Tilne “to celebrate
mass and minister the sacraments to the inhabitants adjoining, for that
they for the greatness of the waters cannot divers times in the year
repair to the parish church.” For “the water doth abound so much within
the said hamlets that the inhabitants thereof can by no means resort
into their parish church of Hayton, being two miles distant from the
said chapel, neither for christening, burying, nor other rights.”[375]
The purposes which these chantry priests were intended to serve is
seen to be the same all over England. To take Suffolk for example:
at Redgrave, near Eye, or rather at Botesdale, a hamlet about a mile
and a half from Redgrave, there was a chapel of “ancient standing for
the ease of the inhabitants of the said street, which was first built
at their cost, whereunto do belong no other than the chapel yard.”
The “street” consisted of forty-six householders, and by estimation a
hundred and sixty houselings. It was “a common thoroughfare and hath a
liberty of market.” These matters “the poor inhabitants” submitted to
the King; it is unnecessary to say without success.[376] At Levenham
the alderman of St. Peter’s Guild held certain lands to find a priest
who was to teach the children of the town, and was to be “secondary to
the curate, who without help of another priest is not able to serve the
cure there,” as there were two thousand souls in the district.[377]
So, too, at Mildenhall there was a chantry established, as the parish
was long and populous, “having a great number of houseling people and
sundry hamlets, divers of them having chapels distant from the parish
church one mile or two miles, where the said priest did sing Mass
sundry festival days and other holy days, and also help the curate to
minister the Sacraments, who without help were not able to discharge
his cure.”[378] At Southwold were four cottages left by one John Perce
for an “obit.” The property produced twenty shillings a year, and
of this sum ten shillings were to be distributed to the poor; eight
shillings to maintain the town and pay the taxes of the poor, and two
shillings to be paid to the parson and his clerk for their services in
church. There was also in the same town a tenement called Skilman’s,
intended to supply a stipendiary priest for sixteen years to the
parish, and after that to go to the town. The sixteen years were up
when the royal commissioners visited the town, and the whole sum was
then being spent on the town. In vain the people pleaded that “it was
to be considered that the said town of Southwold is a very poor town,
whereupon the sea lies beating daily, to the great ruin and destruction
of the said town, if that the power and violence of the same were
not broken by the maintenance of jetties and piers there, and that
the maintenance of the haven and bridge of the same town is likewise
very chargeable.” The marsh belonging to the said tenement, called
Skilman’s, is let to the poor inhabitants of the same town, every man
paying for his cowgate by the year 20d. only “to the great relief of
the poor.”[379]
So, too, the Aldermen of the Guild of the Holy Ghost in Beccles held
lands to supply a priest to assist in the parish for ninety-nine years,
to find money to pay the tenths, fifteenths, and other taxes, and for
other charitable purposes. The property brought in £10, 9s. 4d., and
each year the poor received forty shillings; thirty shillings went to
pay for the taxes, and the rest--some £6--to the priest. In order to
induce the king to leave this fund untouched, the commissioners of 1547
are asked to note “that Beccles is a great and populous town,” there
being eight hundred houselings, “and the said priest is aiding unto
the curate there, who without help is not able to discharge the said
cure.”[380]
The case of Bury St. Edmunds is particularly distressing. Amongst other
charities, lands had been left by will or given by various benefactors
to find priests to serve St. Mary’s, to sing “the Jesus Mass,” and to
act as chaplain at the Lady altar. Property also was given in charge
of St. Nicholas Guild of the annual value of 25s. 4d., of which sum
22s. was to be distributed to the poor of the town, and the rest was to
go to the annual anniversary services for members of the guild. More
property, too, had been left by one Margaret Oldham for a priest to say
Mass in the church of St. James on the week days, and in the jail on
the Sundays, and to find the poor prisoners in wood for a fire during
winter months. There were several other similar benefactions of the
same kind, and the parishioners of St. James’s church “gathered weekly
of their devotion” the stipend of a priest paid to say “the morrow
Mass”--that is, the Mass at daybreak intended for those who had to go
early to their daily work. When the royal commissioners came on behalf
of the said Edward VI. to gather in these spoils at Bury, they were
asked to forward to the authorities in London the following plea for
pity: “It is to be considered that the said town of Bury is a great and
populous town, having in it two parish churches, and in the parishes
of the same above the number of 3000 houseling persons, and a great
number of youth. And the king’s majesty hath all the tithes and all
the profits yearly coming and growing within the same parishes,[381]
finding two parish priests there. And the said two parish priests are
not able to serve and discharge the said cures without aid and help
of other priests. And further, there is no school, nor other like
foundation, within the said town, nor within twenty miles of it, for
the virtuous education and bringing up of youth, nor any hospital or
other like foundation for the comfort and relief of the poor, of which
there is an exceeding great number within the said town other than what
are before mentioned, of which the said incumbents do now take the
whole[382] yearly revenues and profits, and distribute no part thereof
to the aid and comfort or relief of the said poor people.
“In consideration whereof it may please the king’s majesty of his most
charitable benignity, moved with pity in that behalf, to convert the
revenues and profits of the sum of the said promotions into some godly
foundation, whereby the said poor inhabitants, daily there multiplying,
may be relieved, and the youth instructed and brought up virtuously,
or otherwise, according to his most godly and discreet wisdom, and the
inhabitants shall daily pray to God for the prosperous preservation of
his most excellent majesty, long to endure.”[383]
It is hardly necessary to say that the petition had no effect. At
Bury, as indeed all over England, the claims of the sick and poor were
disregarded and the money passed into the possession of the crown.
The hospitals that mediæval charity had erected and supported were
destroyed; the youth remained untaught; the poor were deprived of the
charity which had been, as it was supposed, secured to them for ever by
the wills of generations of Catholic benefactors; the poor prisoners
in the jail at Bury had to go without their Sunday Mass and their
winter fire; whilst the money that had hitherto supported chaplains
and chantry priests to assist the parish priests in the care of their
districts was taken by the crown.
For Yorkshire the certificates of the commissioners have been published
by the Surtees Society. The same impression as to the utility and
purpose of the chantry and other assisting priests may be gathered from
almost every page. For example, the chantry of St. Katherine in the
parish church of Selby: “The necessity thereof is to do divine service,
and help the parish priest in time of necessity to minister sacraments
and sacramentals and other divine services.”… For “the said parish of
Selby is a great parish, having but one curate, and in the same parish
is a thousand houseling people; and the said curate has no help in time
of necessity but only the said chauntry priest.”[384]
Again: “Two chantries of our Lady in the parish church of Leeds,
‘founded by the parishioners there to serve in the choir and to
minister sacraments and other divine service, as shall be appointed
by the vicar and other honest parishioners there, which they do.… The
necessity thereof is to do divine service, to help the curate, and
minister the Sacraments, having 3000 houseling people.’”[385]
In the same parish church, the chantry of St. Mary Magdalene was
“founded by William Evers, late vicar of Leeds, to pray for the soul of
the founder and all Christian souls, to minister at the altar of St.
Mary Magdalene, to keep one yearly obit, with seven shillings to be
distributed, and to serve in the choir at divine service all holy days
and festival days, as appears by the foundation deed thereof, dated
A.D. 1524.”[386]
One more example may be taken out of the hundreds in these volumes:
“The chantry, or donative, within the chapel of Holbecke in the parish
of Leeds, ‘the incumbent is used to say daily mass there and is taken
for a stipendiary priest paying tithes. And there is a great river
between the said parish church and the chapel, whereby they can by no
means often pass to the said church.… The said chantry is distant from
the said parish church one mile. The necessity thereof is to do divine
service according to the foundation.’”[387]
A few words enforcing the lesson to be learned from these extracts
taken from the preface to the second part of these interesting
Yorkshire records may be here given. Mr. Page, the editor, says: “Up to
the time of the Reformation nearly all education was maintained by the
church, and when the chantries were dissolved practically the whole of
the secondary education of the country would have been swept away, had
not some provision for the instruction of the middle and lower classes
been made by continuing, under new ordinances, some of the educational
endowments which pious founders had previously provided.”[388]
“The next most important class of foundations, some of which were
continued under the commission … consisted of the chapels of ease,
which were much required in extensive parishes with a scattered
population, and had been generally founded by the parishioners for
their own convenience. It seems, therefore, that the dissolution of
these chapels was a peculiar hardship. As early as 1233, the Pope
granted licence to the archbishop of York to build oratories or chapels
and to appoint to them priests, in places so distant from the parish
churches that the people could with difficulty attend divine service,
and the sick died before the priest could get to them to administer
the last sacraments. The necessity for these chapels of ease was
especially felt in Yorkshire, where the inhabitants of so many outlying
hamlets were cut off from their parish churches in winter time by
impassable roads and flooded rivers, which is the reason time after
time assigned by the commissioners, for the necessity of the existence
of such chapels; and yet comparatively few of them were recommended for
continuance by Sir Walter Mildmay and Robert Kelway in the returns to
the commission. Possibly, it was the loss of the endowments of Ayton
chapel which occasioned the insurrection at Leamer … which chapel the
inhabitants so piously kept up afterwards at their own expense.”[389]
“In most cases, the chantry priest seems to have acted in much the
same capacity in a parish as that now occupied by the curate; he
assisted the parish priest in performing mass, hearing confessions and
visiting the sick, and also helped in the ordinary services of the
church; the few only were licensed to preach, like the schoolmaster at
Giggleswick. In the Cathedral Church at York, besides praying for the
soul of his founder and all Christian souls, each chantry priest had
to be present in the choir in his habit of a parson on all principal
and double feast days, Sundays, and nine lections, at Matins, Mass,
Evensong, and processions, when he had to read lessons, begin anthems,
and to minister at the high altar as should be appointed to him by the
officers of the choir. Besides these purely ecclesiastical duties, very
many of the chantry priests were bound to teach a certain number of
the children of the neighbourhood, which was the origin of most of our
Grammar schools.”[390]