NOTICES OF AN ENAMELLED CHALICE, AND OF
OTHER ANCIENT RELIQUES, FOUND ON
THE SITE OF RUSPER PRIORY.
BY ALBERT WAY, ESQ., M.A.
On a former occasion I communicated to the Society certain documents relating to the Benedictine Priory of St. Mary Magdalen, at Rusper, accompanied by the few scattered notices which I had been enabled to collect regarding that conventual establishment, situated on the borders of Sussex and Surrey. These have been printed in the fifth volume of the Sussex Arch. Coll., pp. 244-262.
The site of the Nunnery of Rusper is now occupied by a modern house. Some alterations were made in 1840, and in digging foundations several interments were brought to light, supposed to be those of a prioress and some of the sisterhood, with certain reliques, of which I purpose to give a description, supplementary to my former notices. The remains were reinterred in the churchyard at Rusper; a small tablet was affixed to the outer wall of the church, by direction of the late James Broadwood, Esq., of Lyne, as a memorial of their discovery and removal. The objects found were preserved by the late Robert H. Hurst, Esq., of Horsham, and were exhibited, by his permission, at the Meeting of the Sussex Archaeological Society, at that place, in July, 1855.[1]
I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr. John Honywood, of Horsham, for the following detailed narrative of the discoveries in question, which occurred under his immediate observation:—
"In the spring of 1840 considerable additions were made to the Nunnery Mansion, and in digging out the earth for the foundations of the new buildings, some human bones were
- ↑ Sussex Arch. Collections, Vol. III. p. x.
