A HISTORY OF LONDON advowsons of the churches ; and he enfeoffed John, duke of Lancaster, and others trustees of the manors of Gravesend, Lenches, Leybourne, Wateringbury, Gore, Parrocks and Bicknor, co. Kent, the manor of Rotherhithe and the rever- sion of the manor of Gomshall, co. Surrey, and the advowsons of the churches of Gravesend, Leybourne, and Bicknor, so that they might ultimately convey them to the convent in frankalmoign.^^ The trustees gave the property to the abbey in 1382 for a term of forty years, the convent then leased it to Sir Simon de Burley, on w^hose death for treason in 1388 it fell to the crown. ^^ King Richard, however, had no wish to benefit at the expense of the monastery, and committed the manors to certain persons who were to pay the revenues arising from them to the monks. Finally, in 1398, he made them over to the convent in frankalmoign." King Edward had also bequeathed to the abbey in a similar way the reversion of the manors of Bovey Tracey, ' Northlieu,'^* Holsworthy, ' Longe- acre,' co. Devon ; Blagdon, Lydford,'^ Staunton, CO. Somerset ; and ' Takkebere ' co. Cornwall, with the advowsons of Blagdon, Lydford, •Northlieu,' and Holsworthy ; but when Sir James d'Audele, the life-owner, died, Richard II gave them to his half-brother John Holland, earl of Huntingdon, granting to the abbey instead 1 10 marks to be received every year from Scarborough church as long as the schism and the war with France lasted, and afterwards from the Exchequer.-" John Holland was executed in 1400, and his estates forfeited, whereupon Henry IV revoked the letters patent of his pre- decessor and gave the manors in question to the abbey in frankalmoign.^' It is difficult to say what occurred afterwards, for though the abbey had possession of at least one of the manors after the Hollands had been restored in blood,^- it appears to have held none of them in the next century. In the early days of the foundation the en- dowment was probably little more than sufficient for the maintenance of the monks, so that the construction of the necessary buildings did not proceed very rapidly. The abbey church dedi- " Pat. 22 Ric. II, pt. I, m. 26, in Dugdale, Mon. Jug/. V, 718. " Exemplif. 6 Hen. IV of the indenture, L.P. Exch. (Ser. i), bdle. 7. '* Dugdale, op. cit. v, 718. " Pat. 22 Ric. II, pt. I, m. 26, in Dugdale, Mon. yingl. V, 718. '« Northleigh (?) " West Lydford. ^ Henry IV granted the money from the Exchequer. Exch. Letters Pat. (Ser. l), bdle. 7. " Cal. of Pat. 1399-1401, p. 274. " The heir of the Hollands held at his death in 141 7 the manor of Holsworthy among others {Cal. Inf. p.m. (Rec. Com.), iv, 24), but the convent certainly possessed it in 1 421 (B.M. Chart. L.F.C. xiv, 27). cated to St. Anne was aided by a relaxation of penance offered by the pope in 1374 to those who on the principal feasts during a period of ten years visited it and gave alms.^' But the cloisters and houses were possibly not begun in 1368,^ and were certainly not completed in 1 379, for the trustees then made the convent an annual grant of 100 marks from the manors in Kent ^' partly to meet this expense, and in 1 39 1 the abbot and monks received a pardon from the king for sell- ing wood belonging to the manor of Watering- bury to raise fiinds for their new building.*^ The abbey before the end of the fourteenth century appears to have occupied a position of some importance, for when Pope Boniface IX issued letters^' exempting the Cistercian Order in England, Wales, and Ireland from the jurisdic- tion of the abbot of Citeaux as an adherent of the anti-pope Clement VII, the abbot of St. Mary's was ordered, with those of Boxley and Stratford, to convoke the order, and the abbey was named as the meeting place of the chapter-general. The royal foundation and patronage of the abbey may partly account for this and other tokens of papal favour : between 1390 and 1400 the pope conferred on three of the convent the dignity of papal chaplain,^* and in 141 5 the use of the mitre, ring, and other pontifical insignia was granted to the abbot and his successors.^' A case which occurred about 1401 shows that unruly spirits were sometimes found even within the walls of a monastery. Ralph Bikere, a monk of St. Mary, Swineshead, had been sentenced to imprisonment for violence to his abbot and breach of the rule concerning private property. He fled to St. Mary Graces, made his profession and was allowed to remain.'" Soon afterwards the abbot of Beaulieu, during a visitation of St. Mary Graces, found that he had turned William de Warden, the abbot, out of the dormitory, laid violent hands on him, hindered him from disposing of the goods of the monastery, and applied many of these goods to his own purposes, that he had then apostatized, appealed to the secular tribunal, and caused the appeal to be " Cal Pap. Letters, iv, 199. "The bishop of London in 1 368 said that the abbot and convent had petitioned him to appropriate Allhallows Staining to them because they were ex- tremely poor ; the church, cloister, and necessary houses were not yet built, and their house was founded in a barren and uncultivated spot, all of which he found to be true. Lond. Epis. Reg. Sudbury, fol. 105. " Madox, Formul. Angl. 268. The grant was made for the sustenance of the abbot and monks and ' pur les edefices necessaires illoeqx afFeres come leur Religion demandc* »' Cal. of Pat. 1388-92, p. 397. " This was about 1396. Burton, Chron. Mon. tie Melsa (Rolls Ser.), iii, 258. The letters were revoked in 1397. Cal. Pap. Letters, v, 9. '* Ibid. V, 275, 292, 310. " Ibid, vi, 465. '»Ibid. V, 346. 462
