ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY of Cologne '^ for at least ten months, and before they arrived in Rome Pope Nicholas, by a bull issued in August 1453, decided the case against Wright, and definitely fixed the number of offering days. The decision was not accepted by the City, and a 'composition' made in 1457 ^^^° failed to put an end to the dispute, though the king's council had meanwhile intervened." A riot occurred at St. Dunstan's in the West,^^ while a sermon preached by a White Friar at Paul's Cross, blaming 'priests that had temporal livelihood,' made men ' to muse passing sore.' The City clergy, however, successfully opposed the friars, and obtained a papal bull against their ' heresy.' *' At last, in March 1475, ^^^ ^'^7 finally decided to obey the bull, which was to be sealed by the archbishop and the Bishop of London.*" Offerings at the rate of id. in 10s. rent were to be made for thirty" feast days in the year, besides Sundays, and curates were to read the bull in their churches four times a year.*" This settlement, however, ignored the question of the payment of per- sonal tithes, and gave no directions regarding rents of less than los. or between IOJ-. and 20s., &c. Rent was in fact usually reckoned by the noble (6s. Sd.), on which it became customary in parishes within the walls to pay 14^'. a year,*^ amounting to 3;-. 6d. in the pound instead of the 3J. 5^. of the bull. The subject was evidently one of great interest when Arnold was compiling his Customs of London ;** he gives in full the bull of Pope Nicholas and the ' com- position' of 1457,*^ ^^^ declares that 26s. 'id. ought to count as zos. in assessing the offering.*^ The visitation articles of that period *^ include two respecting due payment of tithes and one inquiring ' whether the curate refuse to do the solemnization of lawful matrimony before he have a gift of money, hose or gloves.'*^ A curate was brought before the bishop's court for this in 1498,*' and the custom is referred to in a list of reforms which the ' commons of the City ' desired about that time, which also recommended negotiation with the curates on the whole question.^" A serious case occurred in 1500 in the parish of St. John the Baptist, Walbrook ; ^^ the vicar of Allhallows Barking was brought before the bishop's court for illegally demanding a mortuary, and there were instances of refusal to give offerings in 1509 and 1510.^" Colet in his Convocation sermon in i 5 1 2 included among the evil results of covetousness 'suing for tithes, for offering, for mortuaries,'" and a draft petition to the king, apparently belonging to this period, particularly mentions among the wrongful demands made by the curates the demand of mortuaries for persons who had '* Rec. Corp. Journ. v, fol. c)()b, lizb. " Arnold, op. cit. 71 ; Journ. v, fol. 156^ ; vi, fol. 96. '* Early Chan. Proc. bdle. 1 1, no. 219. Another case connected with this dispute is in bdle. 66, no. 304. " Hist. Coll. of a Lond. Citizen (Camd. Soc), 228 et seq. ; Three i^th-cent. Chron. (Camd. Soc), 180. See section on ' Religious Houses.'
- " Rec. Corp. Journ. viii, fol. 95 ; Letter Bk. L, fol. 109 ; Arnold, Customs of Lond. 178.
- ' See note 31.
" Other details of this controversy are to be found in the bull and 'composition ' (Arnold, op. cit. 65 et seq.) ; Letter Bk. K, fol. 274, and other entries in the City records, passim. See Index to Journals, vol. i. " Rec. Corp. Letter Bk. O, fol. ob. Cf. the account given by Arnold of the income of the rector of St. Magnus. Three cases of refusal to pay, on various grounds, are recorded as early as 1480-2 ; Hale, Series of Precedents, i, 7, 10.
- ' Cf. the entry on fol. 43 of the somewhat similar commonplace book, B.M. Lansd. MS. 762.
" Op. cit. 57-73. ■'* Ibid. 178. " Vide supra. " Arnold, op. cit. 274-5. " Hale, op. cit. 64. '" Arnold, op. cit. 86, 89. " Rec. Corp. Rep.ert. i, fol. 71^, 89. " Hale, op. cit. 75, 83, 87. " Lupton, Life of Colet, App. 296 ; cf. p. 303, and &ongs, Carols, &c. (Early Engl. Text Soc), 82. I 249 32
