Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Caistor, Richard
CAISTOR, RICHARD (d. 1420), theologian, is said to have been born at Caistor, near Norwich, from which place he appears to have derived his surname (Blomefield, p. 591). In October 1386, at a time when he had already received the first tonsure, a title for this diocese was given to him (Tanner, from Reg. Merton. Priorat. Bibl. E. 64). On 22 May 1402 he was instituted vicar of St. Stephen's, Norwich, in which city he died 29 March 1420. For his extreme piety Caistor received the cognomen of 'good,' and Blomefield adds that he was a constant preacher of God's word and a great supporter of Wycliffite doctrines in the reign of Henry V. While living, the common people regarded him as a prophet, and after his death miracles were reported to have been wrought at his tomb, which became the object of local pilgrimage, to the great annoyance of the orthodox authorities. Caistor's popularity may be gauged by the fact that in 1458 John Falbeck, from Thorndon in Suffolk, left money to any one who should make this pilgrimage, and John Stalton Mercer gave a cloth of red tissue to be laid on the 'good veker's' grave (Blomefield). A fifteenth-century manuscript in Merton College Library (Oxford) still preserves a metrical prayer in English verse composed by 'Master Richard Castre.' This composition is followed by another English poem, entitled 'Psalterium Fraternæ Caritatis,' perhaps by the same author. Other works enumerated by Tanner are: 'A Summa Summarum of the Ten Commandments,' and homilies on the eight beatitudes, and on the relationship between master and servant, father and son, man and wife—all apparently written in Latin. To these Tanner adds certain discourses from St. Bernard.
[Tanner; Blomefield's Norfolk (ed. 1744), ii. 591; Coxe's Catalogue of Oxford MSS. i.]