A HISTORY OF LONDON others to various persons * for good counsel,' ** of which they certainly stood in need. But these were as useless in averting the fate of the house as was the denial by the nuns of the papal supremacy/' though they may have ob- tained better conditions for the inmates. The priory was surrendered 25 November, 1538,^' but there are no signatures to the deed. In January, 1539, the king granted to the prioress, Mary RoUesley, a life pension of £2,0 ; to Mary Shelton one of £^ ; to five other nuns pensions of £2, 6s. Sd. each ; and to the remain- ing eight pensions of four marks each.** The number of nuns appears to have been about stationary since 1466, when eleven besides the prioress witness a deed.*' The convent was probably much larger in the fourteenth century, for in 1372 seven nuns took the vows at one time 60 The only official mentioned besides the prioress is the sub-prioress. The business of the nunnery was managed by a steward, ^^ who collected the rents of the lands owned by the priory, and had an annual salary oi £12 with 20J. for his livery, eatables and drinkables, two cart-loads of fuel, lO qrs. of charcoal, and the use of a chamber within the priory precinct.'^ From a document apparently of the sixteenth century*^ the household expenses of the priory for a year were £it,^ is. (>d.; of this the sum of j^22 was spent on corn, £i>0 135. 4^. on meat and other victuals, ^^lO on thirty pittances. The debts of the house at the same time amounted to ;^90 4J. ^d., and included ^15 owing to Robert ' at ye Cokke,' brewer, £() 13X. 4^. to a ' cornman,' ^^4 to a fish- monger, and 56J. 2d. to another, £() 12s. ^.d. to a butcher, ^^6 13;. i^d. to a draper, and 20;. to John, the servant of the prioress. The income of the house amounted in 1535 to ^^376 6;. gross and ;^320 15;. 8^;^. net," and was chiefly derived from possessions in London,'^ where the nuns held nearly the " Cox, op. cit. 20. 21 Jan. 1538, a pension of 4 marks to John Lewstre. Ibid. 22. 26 June, 1538, to John RoUesley an annuity of 4 marks. Ibid. 23, 24 and 25. « L. and P. Hen. VIII, , 1025 (2). " Ibid, xiii (2), 908. "Aug. Off. Misc. Bk. 233, fol. 101-3. Six nuns were alive in 1556, of whom one was allowed 66s. %d. a year, the others 53/. d. each. Add. MS. 8102, fol. 3. " Add. MS. 15664, fol. 230. " Lend. Epis. Reg. Sudbury, fol. 139. " Cox, op. cit. 15. » Ibid. " Doc. of D. and C. of St. Paul's. A. Box 77, No. 2042. " Fahr Eccl. (Rec. Com.), i, 393- " These were worth ^312 6s. J. a year. Ibid, i, 392. whole of St. Helen's parish and lands and rent in sixteen other parishes. The convent also owned at this time the manor of Bordeston or Burston in Brentford,*' which they had held in 1290, and woods in Edmonton, co. Middlesex ; rents in Eyworth, co. Bedford, where they had land in 1316;** land in East Barming, co. Kent ; " the manor of Marks '" and land at Walthamstow,'^ co. Essex ; rents in Ware, co. Herts., where they had a holding in 1392;" the manor of Datchet, co. Bucks. ; since 1303 and earlier they had held the advowsons of St. Mary Axe, St. John Walbrook, St. Mary Woolnoth and St. Ethelburga, with pensions of 4 marks and 2s. respectively from the last two ; ** to them also belonged the rectory of St. Helen's " and the church of Eyworth," appropriated to them in 1 331. The prioress in 1346 held a fraction of a knight's fee in East Barming, '^ and in conjunction with Anna le Despenser half a knight's fee in Eyworth. '^ Prioresses of St. Helen's, Bishopsgate D. occurs <:. 1210'° Matilda '1 Helen, occurs 1229-30, 1235-6, 1243-4, 1247, 1248,'* died 1255" Scholastica, died 1269 Felicia de Basinges, elected 1269" Joan de Wynton, died 1324"^ Beatrix le Boteler, died 1332" ^ L. and P. Hen. Fill, xviii (1), 982, 346 (54), 981 (68) ; xix (i), 1035 (50, 55, 68, 135), etc. " Pari. R. (Rec. Com.), i, 475. " Feud. Aids, i, 19. Hasted, Hist, of Kent, ii, 1 5 I . ' St. Helen's is a deputed manor in Barming ... it formerly belonged to the nunnery of St. Helen's, London, hence its name.' ^ Morant, Hist, of Essex, i, 68. " L. and P. Hen. Fill, xv, 557. " Cal. of Pat. I 391-6, p. 156. ^^ L. and P. Hen. Fill, xv, 498 (35). "* Mun. Guildhall Lond. ii (i), 236. ** Ibid. " Falor Eccl (Rec. Com.), iv, 196. " Cal. Pap. Letters, ii, 368. ^ Feud. Aids, iii, 45. ^' Ibid, i, 22. ■° Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. ix, App. i, 57. Her letter — Cott. Chart, v, 6 (2) — must be before 12 16 as it is addressed to A. the Dean. " A grant by her is witnessed by William Fitz Alice and John Travers, so that it must have been made early in the thirteenth century. Guildhall MS. 122, fol. 263. Hardy and Page, Cal. oj Lond. and Midd. Fines, 18, 22 and 28. " CaL of Chart. R. (P.R.O.), i, 318. " E. the prioress, presumably Elena. Doc. of D. and C. of St. Paul's, Liber A. fol. 44. " Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. ix, App. i, 27. " Ibid. 57. " Ibid. " Ibid. 27. "' Ibid. 28. 460
