A HISTORY OF LONDON The very list of the monastery's property is sufficient testimony of the light in which the house was regarded by the citizens, for it had possessions in seventy-two London parishes in 1 29 1. Nor had it by that date exhausted its popularity, as is shown by the grants and bequests still made to it, though there were now many newer foundations. Ralph le Blund ^ in 1295 , left to the priory rents in the parishes of St. Mary Woolchurch and All Hallows Bread Street, for the establishment of a chantry ;*° Thomas Romayn, alderman, in 131 2 bequeathed to it 100 marks ; ^* Walter Constantyn in 1349 left tenements and a brewery in the parish of Holy Trinity for the maintenance of its church and the establishment of a chantry in the church of St. Katharine Cree ; *' Thomas de Algate, rector of 'Sheering,' CO. Essex, left to his brother Nicholas the prior, and to the convent of Holy Trinity, tenements and rents in the parishes of St. Katha- rine within Aldgate, St. Andrew Cornhill, and St. Botolph without Aldgate ; *^ and John Malewayn, in 1361,'^ left the residue of his goods, after payment of certain bequests, to the maintenance of chantries there, besides a money legacy to the work of the church. These are, moreover, only examples of many other be- quests.'" The convent certainly needed everything it could get. The rebuilding of the church had been begun about 1339,^^ and engrossed all its available funds, even before the Black Death diminished its revenues, and thereby increased the difficulty of repaying loans which had to be contracted if the work was to go on. The pope in 1352 offered a relaxation of penance to those who contributed to the restoration during a period of ten years. But the house was still burdened with debt in 1368 when Master John Yong, official of the court of Canterbury, gave jTioo to its relief,^' and was rewarded by a daily mass being established in the church for his good estate in life, and for his soul after "^ H.irl. MS. 60, fol. 7, 8. ^ Ralph le Blund was sheriff in 1 291. " Sharpe, Ca/. ofWilh, i, 126. ^ Ibid, i, 238. Thomas Romayn was mayor in 1309. " Ibid. 594. »* Ibid, ii, 10. 8' Ibid, ii, 39.
- ' For other bequests to them see Sharpe, Cat. of
Wills, i, 536, 537, 580, 597, 636 ; ii, 17, 67, 155, 163, 197. 333. &c. " From 1339 to 1345 there are continual acknow- ledgements of debt by the prior : j^55 in 1339, ^^^ Cal. of Close, 1339-41, pp. 239, 339; gio and /106 13/. d. in 1340, ibid. pp. 477, 490 ; ^^loo in I34i,ibid. 1341-3. P-.^?!; in i 343. £80. X^oo, and two sums of ^4°. i^'*^- '343-6, pp. 102, 229, 233.241 ; L° i" 1344. ibid, p. 363; and f^^o in 1345, ibid. p. 572. " Cal. Pap. Letters, iii, 434. Cott. MS. Nero, C. iii, fol. 179, 180. The gift is said to be in relief of the debt by reason of erecting and rebuilding of the church. death. The same fact is also apparent in the grants of corrodies and pensions which were evi- dently made to raise money.'* There may have been other complications which prevented the priory's extricating itself from its difficulties, for in 1369'* the convent had procured from the pope a bull similar to that of 1282 directed against those who occupied its property, and when the king took it into his hands in 1380 he attributed the loss of revenues and the decrease in divine services to its being harassed by rivals.'* After this the convent appears to have enjoyed for more than half a century a tranquillity inter- rupted only by the arrest and imprisonment of one of its members by the council in 1429, for some unexplained cause." In 1438, however, the condition of the house called for serious attention. The archbishop of Canterbury, in a letter to the bishop of London,^* said that he had heard that the prior at the bishop's last visitation was accused of dilapidation and con- sumption of the goods of the house and other wrongdoings, and that the bishop, although re- quested by many noble persons to proceed to correction and reformation in these matters, had neglected to do so. The bishop answered that he had found nothing proved against the prior, William Clerk, for which he could be justly re- moved, but as his administration of the temporali- ties of the priory had been foolish and imprudent, he had committed the management of these, with consent of the prior and convent, to one of the canons and some secular persons, and hoped that the heavy burden of debt might in a short time be lightened and the necessities of the fraternity relieved. This arrangement did not suffice to meet the case, and the next year the king, to raise the house from the deplorable state of want " and insecurity to which it had been reduced by its inefficient head, took it into his hand, and committed it to the care of the abbot of Leices- The indenture between the convent and Robert de Denton, Cal. of Pat. 1377-81, p. 194, states that the pension of 25 marks and the 100 faggots yearly, &c., are given to him for a sum of money paid by him to the convent, and though there is not the same evidence in the other cases (ibid. 72 and 74), it is plain that they are agreements of the same kind. " Stevens, op. cit. App. 328. ^ When he appointed the archbishop of Canter- bury, the Chief Justice of the King's Bench, &c., to the custody and rule of the priory, i Jan. 1 381. Cal. of Pat. 1379-81, p. 599. " Devon, Issues of the Exch. (Pell Rec). It is the more mysterious as this canon, John Asshewell, is called prior, and William Clerk, who was elected in 1420, was still prior in 1438. See Dugdale, Mon. Angl. vi, 151 ; Lond. Epis. Reg. Gilbert, fol. 84. '» Ibid. ™ Pat. 17 Hen. VI, pt. 2, m. 31. The king states that it has come to such want that of the lands, tenements, &c., belonging to it, alms and other works of piety for the souls of his ancestors cannot be maintained. 470
