Dale Abbey, also known as the Abbey of Stanley Park, was a religious house, close to
Ilkeston in
Derbyshire
Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southern end of the Pennine range of hills and part of the National Forest. It borders Greater Manchester to the nor ...
. Its ruins are located at the village of
Dale Abbey
Dale Abbey is a village and civil parish in the borough of Erewash in Derbyshire in the East Midlands of England, 6 miles north east of Derby. The population of the civil parish on the 2011 census was 1,351. Formerly known as Depedale or Deepda ...
, which is named after it. Its foundation legend portrays it as developing from a
hermitage, probably in the early 12th century. After several false starts, it was finally constituted as an abbey in 1204. It was affiliated to the
Premonstratensians
The Order of Canons Regular of Prémontré (), also known as the Premonstratensians, the Norbertines and, in Britain and Ireland, as the White Canons (from the colour of their habit), is a religious order of canons regular of the Catholic Church ...
(also called Norbertines and White Canons), an order of
canons regular
Canons regular are priests who live in community under a rule ( and canon in greek) and are generally organised into religious orders, differing from both secular canons and other forms of religious life, such as clerics regular, designated by ...
in which it played, at times, a leading part among English Houses. It acquired a large number of small properties, concentrated in areas of the
East Midlands
The East Midlands is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. It comprises the eastern half of the area traditionally known as the Midlands. It consists of Leicestershire, Derbyshire, L ...
, developed a network of
grange
Grange may refer to:
Buildings
* Grange House, Scotland, built in 1564, and demolished in 1906
* Grange Estate, Pennsylvania, built in 1682
* Monastic grange, a farming estate belonging to a monastery
Geography Australia
* Grange, South Austr ...
s and appropriated a number of lucrative parish churches. Its discipline and reputation varied considerably, particularly in the 15th century, and it seems to have fallen away from the originally austerity. By 1536 its income was well below the threshold set for the
Dissolution of Lesser Monasteries. Although there were accusations of grave immorality, the abbey was allowed to pay a fine to continue its existence until 1538.
Foundation legends
From the Premonstratensian point of view, Dale Abbey was founded in 1204 from
Newsham Abbey
Newsham Abbey was an abbey in Newsham, a small hamlet north of Brocklesby village in Lincolnshire, England. Founded by Peter of Gousla in 1143, Newsham was a daughter house of the Abbey of Licques, near Calais, and the first Premonstratensian hou ...
in
Lincolnshire
Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-we ...
. However, the
chronicle
A chronicle ( la, chronica, from Greek ''chroniká'', from , ''chrónos'' – "time") is a historical account of events arranged in chronological order, as in a timeline. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and ...
of the abbey, which dates from the mid-13th century, gives a long and detailed prehistory. The author of the chronicle was Thomas de Muskham: the initial letters of the various sections of the foundation legend make up the name T. H. O. M. A. S. D. E. M. V. S. C. A. Thomas did not trust in the detective work of later generations, but tells the reader explicitly that his name is in the capital letters of the text. Muskham's chronicle places the origins of the abbey early in the previous century and credits the initiative not to a monastic order or member of the landowning class but to a local working man.
Baker to holy man
![Dale Abbey 2019 Hermitage03](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1d/Dale_Abbey_2019_Hermitage03.jpg)
Muskham attributes the first part of the foundation legend to Matilda de Salicosa Mara of
Lindsey, a local landowner whom he regarded as foundress of the community at Dale. She recited the story in his presence early in the 13th century, when he had been a canon at Dale for about four years. Matilda's narrative begins with a baker of
Derby
Derby ( ) is a city and unitary authority area in Derbyshire, England. It lies on the banks of the River Derwent in the south of Derbyshire, which is in the East Midlands Region. It was traditionally the county town of Derbyshire. Derby g ...
, who is compared with
Cornelius the Centurion
Cornelius ( el, Κορνήλιος, translit=Kornélios; la, Cornelius) was a Roman centurion who is considered by Christians to be the first Gentile to convert to the faith, as related in Acts of the Apostles (see Ethiopian eunuch for the com ...
, according to a man who, even before his conversion, "gave alms generously to the people and prayed constantly to God." Like Cornelius the unnamed baker spent his disposable income on food and clothes for the poor, which he took to his parish church, St Mary's, for distribution among the poor. Like Cornelius, he underwent a visionary experience which sent him to a new place in quest of a new life.
The Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to him in a dream one autumn afternoon, telling him ''vade apud Depedale et ibi servies filio meo et mihi vita solitaria'' – "go to Depedale and there you will serve my son and myself in a solitary life." There his
eremitic
A hermit, also known as an eremite (adjectival form: hermitic or eremitic) or solitary, is a person who lives in seclusion. Eremitism plays a role in a variety of religions.
Description
In Christianity, the term was originally applied to a Ch ...
existence would lead to a promised
afterlife
The afterlife (also referred to as life after death) is a purported existence in which the essential part of an individual's identity or their stream of consciousness continues to live after the death of their physical body. The surviving es ...
in "the kingdom of brightness, mirth and eternal happiness that God has prepared for those who love him."
The baker kept the religious experience secret but immediately gave up all he had and set off eastward. As he did not know the place he was looking for, he began to listen to ordinary conversation for clues as to its location and character. Passing through the village of
Stanley, he overheard a woman dispatching her daughter to Deepdale with a herd of calves. The former baker took this as a sign from God and asked the woman the way. He was told to follow the girl to Deepdale and so quickly arrived at his destination, described as ''locum palustrem valde terribilem longeque ab omni habitacione hominum separatum'' — "a marshy place, extremely frightening, and far from human habitation." Deepdale is about km south east of Stanley, so about from the hermit's former home in Derby: clearly it was damp pasture land at the time, watered by the Sow Brook, in the catchment of the
River Erewash
The River Erewash is a river in England, a tributary of the River Trent that flows roughly southwards through Derbyshire, close to its eastern border with Nottinghamshire.
Etymology
The approximate meaning of the name is not in doubt, b ...
. At the south east edge of the place he cut out a small rock house in the hillside and settled to an
ascetic
Asceticism (; from the el, ἄσκησις, áskesis, exercise', 'training) is a lifestyle characterized by abstinence from sensual pleasures, often for the purpose of pursuing spiritual goals. Ascetics may withdraw from the world for their p ...
existence.
The local landowner is named as Ralph Fitz Geremund, lord of a
moiety
Moiety may refer to:
Chemistry
* Moiety (chemistry), a part or functional group of a molecule
** Moiety conservation, conservation of a subgroup in a chemical species
Anthropology
* Moiety (kinship), either of two groups into which a society is ...
of the manors of
Ockbrook
Ockbrook is a village in Derbyshire, England. It is almost contiguous with the village of Borrowash, the two only separated by the A52. The civil parish is Ockbrook and Borrowash. The population of this civil parish at the 2011 Census was 7,33 ...
and
Alvaston
Alvaston (/ˈɒlvəstən/ or /ˈælvəstən/) is a village and ward of Derby, England. Alvaston is situated on the A6, three miles south-east of Derby city centre and probably owes its name to Allwald. It is bordered to the north by the ...
''cum soc'', i.e., holder of
soke, the right and duty to constitute a court. He is portrayed by the chronicle as a
Norman baron with interests on both sides of the
Channel. During one of his visits to England, he noticed the smoke of the new settlement while out hunting in his forest and assumed that it was a case of illegal
assarting
Assarting is the act of clearing forested lands for use in agriculture or other purposes. In English land law, it was illegal to assart any part of a royal forest without permission. This was the greatest trespass that could be committed i ...
. However, on investigation, he was so impressed by the hermit and the wretchedness of his existence that he granted him a
tithe
A tithe (; from Old English: ''teogoþa'' "tenth") is a one-tenth part of something, paid as a contribution to a religious organization or compulsory tax to government. Today, tithes are normally voluntary and paid in cash or cheques or more ...
of the proceeds of his own mill at Burgh (now thought to be at Alvaston, although earlier at
Borrowash
Borrowash is a village in the Erewash district of Derbyshire, England, situated immediately east of the Derby city boundary. The appropriate civil parish is called Ockbrook and Borrowash.
History
Borrowash was, for most of its history, the se ...
). This was important to the chronicler, as the tithe of the mill was still a significant asset of Dale Abbey in his own day.
The remainder of the hermit's story is attributed to one Humfrid, a former canon who was still well-remembered in Thomas Muskam's time. The hermit suffered spiritual torment in his later years, said by the chronicler to be the assaults of ''antiquus autem generis humani inimicus milleartifex'' – "the ancient enemy of human kind, master of a thousand tricks," that is, Satan. To gain relief from these assaults, and from the lack of water at his hermitage, he searched for a new home. By a spring in the little valley below he built a hut for himself and an
oratory, dedicated to God and to the Blessed Mary, who seems to have been central to his spiritual life. There he lived in God's service until his death, which is described by the chronicler in almost
Manichaean
Manichaeism (;
in New Persian ; ) is a former major religionR. van den Broek, Wouter J. Hanegraaff ''Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times''SUNY Press, 1998 p. 37 founded in the 3rd century AD by the Parthian prophet Mani (AD ...
terms as release from the ''ergastulum'', prison, of the body.
Vision of glory
Thomas Muskham, the chronicler, then switches to an entirely different story, this time concerning the vision of a man he tells us was called Uthlagus and who was in the vicinity of Deepdale because of the regular traffic between
Nottingham
Nottingham ( , locally ) is a city and unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east of Sheffield and north-east of Birmingham. Nottingham has links to the legend of Robi ...
and Derby through the forest that stretched from the
River Derwent bridge at Derby to the Erewash. Although Thomas does not tell us so explicitly, Uthlagus is not a name but a Latinised form of Old English ''utlaga'', the modern English "outlaw." So presumably this man was a highway robber and when Thomas describes him as ''famosissimus'' it is in the sense of "extremely notorious," not "most renowned," as the translator has it: possibly the chronicler's ambiguity is deliberate. The outlaw fell asleep one summer day on Lindridge, the hill to the west of the later abbey site, and had a dream in which the future glory of the place was revealed to him.
After revealing and explaining his dream vision, Uthlagus announced that it meant he could no longer keep company with his band. He took his leave and was not seen again, although it was rumoured he had become a hermit at Deepdale.
Muskham's account of the origins of religious life at Deepdale is marked by free use of
legend
A legend is a genre of folklore that consists of a narrative featuring human actions, believed or perceived, both by teller and listeners, to have taken place in human history. Narratives in this genre may demonstrate human values, and possess ...
, although key features of his account were probably plausible to his readers. It was not improbable that the area was plagued by banditry during
the Anarchy
The Anarchy was a civil war in England and Normandy between 1138 and 1153, which resulted in a widespread breakdown in law and order. The conflict was a war of succession precipitated by the accidental death of William Adelin, the only legi ...
of
Stephen's reign, when at least some of his account is possibly set. A number of important new monasteries and even monastic orders of the early 12th century were credited to the work of individual hermits. A close parallel is
Arrouaise Abbey
The Abbey of Arrouaise in northern France was the centre of a form of the canons regular, canonical life known as the Arrouaisian Order, which was popular among the founders of canonry, canonries during the decade of the 1130s. The community began ...
in northern France, which its historians portrayed as appearing in bandit country and inspired by the work of a hermit called Roger. The Deepdale foundation and the Arrouaisians alike were secured a role in the Church by assimilation into an order of
canons regular
Canons regular are priests who live in community under a rule ( and canon in greek) and are generally organised into religious orders, differing from both secular canons and other forms of religious life, such as clerics regular, designated by ...
following the
Rule of St. Augustine
The Rule of Saint Augustine, written about the year 400, is a brief document divided into eight chapters and serves as an outline for religious life lived in community. It is the oldest monastic rule in the Western Church.
The rule, developed ...
.
False starts
The Grendon family
![All Saints Dale Abbey Verger's House from footpath](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/73/All_Saints_Dale_Abbey_Verger%27s_House_from_footpath.jpg)
Thomas Muskham's account of the attempts to plant a cell of canons at Deepdale is very different from the foundation legends, outlining a process of trial and error by which members of a local landed gentry family, or group of families, sought to establish and consolidate a religious house at Deepdale. While he never gives actual dates, he does give enough information about contemporaries to locate events fairly closely in the history of 12th century England.
The chronicle focusses on Serlo de Grendon, giving a detailed account of his family connections, including his sons and daughters. Serlo enters the story because he married Margery, the daughter of Ralph de Geremund, the benefactor of the Deepdale hermit. The chronicler tells us that Serlo received a moiety of Ockbrook as Margery's
dowry
A dowry is a payment, such as property or money, paid by the bride's family to the groom or his family at the time of marriage. Dowry contrasts with the related concepts of bride price and dower. While bride price or bride service is a payment ...
. He mentions that, although Serlo had several sons, his co-heirs ultimately were his three daughters, Johanna, Isolda and Agatha. They are also recorded in 1219 as involved in a suit over
dower
Dower is a provision accorded traditionally by a husband or his family, to a wife for her support should she become widowed. It was settled on the bride (being gifted into trust) by agreement at the time of the wedding, or as provided by law. ...
relating to Whittington, a manor within
Grendon in
Warwickshire
Warwickshire (; abbreviated Warks) is a county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, and the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare at Stratford-upon-Avo ...
. The
overlord
An overlord in the English feudal system was a lord of a manor who had subinfeudated a particular manor, estate or fee, to a tenant. The tenant thenceforth owed to the overlord one of a variety of services, usually military service or ser ...
ship of both Whittington and Grendon manors was held by the Ferrers family, with
mesne lord
A mesne lord () was a lord in the feudal system who had vassals who held land from him, but who was himself the vassal of a higher lord. Owing to '' Quia Emptores'', the concept of a mesne lordship technically still exists today: the partitioni ...
ship held by the Camville family, to whom the Grendons rendered their feudal dues. Serlo is not part of the succession given for the main manor of Grendon, so it seems that he belonged to a junior branch of the family that held Whittington, an estate in Grendon that became a separate manor. Serlo is styled by Muskham "lord of
Bradley
Bradley is an English surname derived from a place name meaning "broad wood" or "broad meadow" in Old English.
Like many English surnames Bradley can also be used as a given name and as such has become popular.
It is also an Anglicisation of t ...
," a Derbyshire manor which had also the Ferrers family as
Tenants-in-chief
In medieval and early modern Europe, the term ''tenant-in-chief'' (or ''vassal-in-chief'') denoted a person who held his lands under various forms of feudal land tenure directly from the king or territorial prince to whom he did homage, as oppos ...
since the time of
William the Conqueror
William I; ang, WillelmI (Bates ''William the Conqueror'' p. 33– 9 September 1087), usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman king of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 10 ...
. In the mid-12th century the head of the Ferrers family was
Robert de Ferrers, 2nd Earl of Derby
Robert II de Ferrers, 2nd Earl of Derby (c. 1100 – 1162) was a younger, but eldest surviving son of Robert de Ferrers, 1st Earl of Derby and his wife Hawise. He succeeded his father as Earl of Derby in 1139 (William, his elder brother, havin ...
, whose wide political and ecclesiastical interests must have borne considerable weight for Serlo de Grendon.
Muskham tells us that Serlo de Grendon was particularly attached to an aunt who was also his
godmother: as with a number of other figures linked to the foundation of Dale Abbey, her name is not given.
[Chronicle of the Abbey of St Mary de Parco Stanley, or Dale, Derbyshire, p. 22.]
/ref> Serlo made a lifetime grant of Deepdale to her and she thus became known as the ''Gomme'' or godmother of the Dale. She had a house constructed on part of what later became the abbey site and installed her own son, Richard, as chaplain, presumably in or on the site of the hermit's oratory.
Calke cell
On the Gomme's request, Serlo de Grendon granted Deepdale to the Augustinian community of Calke Priory and Richard the chaplain entered the Augustinian order to join them. Calke had done well from the wealth of Ranulf de Gernon, 4th Earl of Chester
Ranulf II (also known as Ranulf de Gernon), 4th Earl of Chester (1099–1153), was an Anglo-Norman baron who inherited the honour of the palatine county of Chester upon the death of his father Ranulf le Meschin, 3rd Earl of Chester. He was desc ...
, powerful in Warwickshire and Leicestershire, who had found the Anarchy of Stephen's reign particularly lucrative. After his death in 1153, his widow Maud had assured the survival and future prosperity of the Calke community by granting them the church at Repton
Repton is a village and civil parish in the South Derbyshire district of Derbyshire, England, located on the edge of the River Trent floodplain, about north of Swadlincote. The population taken at the 2001 Census was 2,707, increasing to 2,8 ...
and other property on the express condition that they move their headquarters and establish a new priory at Repton at the first suitable opportunity. Although this was not to happen until 1172, the canons seem to have been prepared for colonisation. Robert de Ferrers, Serlo de Grendon's overlord, was another important benefactor of Calke, and the desire to remain on good terms with such a powerful figure may have played some part in the choice of that particular priory.
An Augustinian colony from Calke became established at Deepdale, comprising six canons in total: the Humfrid mentioned earlier by Muskham, who was the prior; Nicholas and Simon, who had both studied in Paris with William de Grendon, Serlo's son, known as "the cleric
Clergy are formal leaders within established religions. Their roles and functions vary in different religious traditions, but usually involve presiding over specific rituals and teaching their religion's doctrines and practices. Some of the ter ...
;" two others, whose names were forgotten; and Richard the chaplain.[ They built a church at considerable cost. Humfrid was credited with a journey to the Roman Curia, which brought the priory burial rights and exemption from ]interdict
In Catholic canon law, an interdict () is an ecclesiastical censure, or ban that prohibits persons, certain active Church individuals or groups from participating in certain rites, or that the rites and services of the church are banished from ...
: a matter of great importance to the chronicler for whom the six years of Papal interdict during John's reign were a living memory. Benefactions began to come in, particularly from families wishing to use the church as a mortuary chapel: Muskham claims that forty ‘’milites’‘ (soldiers or knights) were buried there in this period, as well as a notable anchorite
In Christianity, an anchorite or anchoret (female: anchoress) is someone who, for religious reasons, withdraws from secular society so as to be able to lead an intensely prayer-oriented, ascetic, or Eucharist-focused life. While anchorites are ...
. However, discipline began to slip and the canons took to hunting in the forest. This drew the attention of the king, who compelled them to leave because they were a threat to his game. Humfrid retired to live as a hermit, while the others transferred back to Calke, leaving the priory in the hands the Grendon family. Howard Colvin
Sir Howard Montagu Colvin (15 October 1919 – 27 December 2007) was a British architectural historian who produced two of the most outstanding works of scholarship in his field: ''A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600–1840 ...
dates the Augustinian cell at Deepdale to the period between 1149 and 1158. Its collapse is likely to have been 1154–8, as the king who insisted on its suppression was probably Henry II, who established several new forests.
Tupholme cell
The next attempt to colonise Deepdale was made by a party of six canons from Tupholme Abbey
Tupholme Abbey was a Premonstratensian abbey close to the River Witham some east of the city of Lincoln, England. The Witham valley in Lincolnshire is notable for its high concentration of monasteries—there were six on the east bank and ...
in Lincolnshire, a daughter house of Newsham Abbey
Newsham Abbey was an abbey in Newsham, a small hamlet north of Brocklesby village in Lincolnshire, England. Founded by Peter of Gousla in 1143, Newsham was a daughter house of the Abbey of Licques, near Calais, and the first Premonstratensian hou ...
, the first Premonstratensian
The Order of Canons Regular of Prémontré (), also known as the Premonstratensians, the Norbertines and, in Britain and Ireland, as the White Canons (from the colour of their habit), is a religious order of canons regular of the Catholic Church ...
house in England. Colvin originally assigned a starting point of 1175 to the founding of the Tupholme cell at Deepdale. However, he revised this view and he and subsequent scholars accepted that Tupholme was probably founded between 1155 and 1166, which is much less neat. Muskham thought the canons from Tupholme were granted Stanley Park, although could not explain the details, and that they built a mill there. However, they found the arable land insufficient to support them, as the site was hemmed in to the south by Boyah, where Serlo de Grendon had a probably new "mansion:" the Latin original is ', which suggests just a small house or farmstead. After seven years they were recalled and they pollarded
Pollarding is a pruning system involving the removal of the upper branches of a tree, which promotes the growth of a dense head of foliage and branches. In ancient Rome, Propertius mentioned pollarding during the 1st century BCE. The practice oc ...
the oaks in the park for cash before returning to Tupholme – except for Henry the Prior, who moved in with a sex worker ('), with whom he was already acquainted. On the abbot's orders, Henry was retrieved by force and taken back to Tupholme, where he committed suicide by slitting his arms while in a hot bath.
Welbeck cell
A further attempt to colonise Deepdale with Premonstratensian canons was organised by William de Grendon, who procured from Welbeck Abbey
Welbeck Abbey in the Dukeries in North Nottinghamshire was the site of a monastery belonging to the Premonstratensian order in England and after the Dissolution of the Monasteries, a country house residence of the Dukes of Portland. It is o ...
in Nottinghamshire
Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated Notts.) is a landlocked county in the East Midlands region of England, bordering South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. The trad ...
a party of five, headed by Prior William Bensyt. The chronicler places it during the Abbacy of Richard of Welbeck, who occurs from 1194 to 1224. It must have been early in his rule, in the period 1194–6. These canons too struggled with poverty and misfortune, culminating in the destruction of all their lamps which fell to the floor together while being hoisted before the altar
An altar is a table or platform for the presentation of religious offerings, for sacrifices, or for other ritualistic purposes. Altars are found at shrines, temples, churches, and other places of worship. They are used particularly in pagan ...
. The abbot visited the embattled canons and found that they lacked even food and drink. He returned to Welbeck and then recalled the cell from Deepdale.
Establishment
The successful establishment of a religious house at Deepdale came about almost by accident. During the period of false starts, William FitzRalph
William FitzRalph was the High Sheriff of Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and the Royal Forests from 1169 to 1177. , Margery's brother and Serlo de Grendon's brother-in-law, was an important figure both regionally and within the Angevin Empire
The Angevin Empire (; french: Empire Plantagenêt) describes the possessions of the House of Plantagenet during the 12th and 13th centuries, when they ruled over an area covering roughly half of France, all of England, and parts of Ireland and W ...
. He was sheriff of Nottingham and Derby from 1168 to 1180, with Serlo de Grendon as his deputy for the last three years. From 1178 he served as Seneschal of Normandy
Normandy (; french: link=no, Normandie ; nrf, Normaundie, Nouormandie ; from Old French , plural of ''Normant'', originally from the word for "northman" in several Scandinavian languages) is a geographical and cultural region in Northwestern ...
. William had been acquiring properties to complete the dowry of his daughter Matilda, who had married Geoffrey de Salicosa. Geoffrey seems to have been a Norman knight, perhaps introduced into England by William himself: certainly he held lands in Normandy and he exchanged some with John de Wiburvile for six bovate
An oxgang or bovate ( ang, oxangang; da, oxgang; gd, damh-imir; lat-med, bovāta) is an old land measurement formerly used in Scotland and England as early as the 16th century sometimes referred to as an oxgait. It averaged around 20 English ...
s at Ockbrook. He and Matilda, along with William FitzRalph himself, were to be regarded as the founders of Dale Abbey.[
One of William's acquisitions for Matilda and Geoffrey was the township of Stanley, and the charter confirming his gift to the couple forms part of the ]Cartulary
A cartulary or chartulary (; Latin: ''cartularium'' or ''chartularium''), also called ''pancarta'' or ''codex diplomaticus'', is a medieval manuscript volume or roll ('' rotulus'') containing transcriptions of original documents relating to the f ...
of Dale Abbey. However, Geoffrey and Matilda, who had been married for seven years without children, asked William to give Stanley to the Premonstratensians in order to found a house in Stanley Park. William consulted with his nephew, the clerk William de Grendon, and invited him to donate the Grendons' site at Deepdale, where the main cause of previous failures had been poverty.[Chronicle of the Abbey of St Mary de Parco Stanley, or Dale, Derbyshire, p. 27.]
/ref> So the Deepdale site was not part of the initial plan, but an afterthought. The Cartulary shows that Stanley Park was actually transferred by Geoffrey and Matilda to the Premonstratensians for the projected new community, with no mention of the Deepdale site. Moreover, William FitzRalph charged Geoffrey and Matilda £100 for his "gift," presumably on the basis that it would now be alienated outside the family. The priority of the Stanley Park project in the process of establishing an abbey meant that it continued to be called the Abbey of Stanley Park, ''de Parco Stanley'', long after Dale Abbey was a reality. William de Grendon donated the Deepdale site, along with six shillings in rents, by charter to the Stanley Park church of St Mary, for the good of his own soul and that of his brother Jordan,[Cox, J. C. (1901]
The Chartulary of the Abbey of Dale, p. 87, folio 13b.
/ref> and his grant was confirmed by Geoffrey and Matilda. William's solicitude for the souls of his entire family — past, present and future — was to be shown by the foundation of a chantry
A chantry is an ecclesiastical term that may have either of two related meanings:
# a chantry service, a Christian liturgy of prayers for the dead, which historically was an obiit, or
# a chantry chapel, a building on private land, or an area i ...
in the "chapel of Deepdale, which they shall sustain" – probably meaning the chapel built there for the ''Gomme'', his great-aunt, which William anticipated the canons would continue to use. In addition, in memory of the de Grendons, there was to be a daily gift of bread and beer in the refectory of the new house for distribution to the poor.[ A definite date associated with the foundation at Stanley would be 1 April 1196. Although an original document to support this is no longer extant, the abbey's attorney presented to ]quo warranto
In law, especially English and American common law, ''quo warranto'' (Medieval Latin for "by what warrant?") is a prerogative writ requiring the person to whom it is directed to show what authority they have for exercising some right, power, or ...
proceedings in 1331 a charter issued by Richard I on that date, giving the Premonstratensian Abbey of Stanley "all the liberties and free rights which the other abbeys of the Premonstratensian Order have in England."
William FitzRalph left his daughter and her husband to work out the details of the new foundation, pleading the urgency of the king's business overseas. The couple went to meet Abbot Lambert of Newsham or Newhouse Abbey and secured from the chapter a delegation of nine canons to establish a colony at Deepdale. Some of the founding canons are named by the chronicler: Walter de Senteney, John de Ryford, Hugh de Grimsby, Roger de Alesby, William le Sores. The Victoria County History account of Dale Abbey, edited by William Page, but written by John Charles Cox
John Charles Cox (1843–23 February 1919) was an English cleric, activist and local historian.
Life
He was born in Parwich, Derbyshire, the son of Edward Cox, vicar of Luccombe, Somerset, and was educated at Repton School. He studied at The Queen ...
, dates this to 1195, which seems too early, while the earlier account of Newsham, also edited by Page, has Lambert occurring 1200–3, a much more plausible time frame. Colvin reckoned that the leader of the canons, Walter de Senteney, became abbot of Dale in January 1200. The date accepted for the foundation of Abbey is 15 August, the Feast of the Assumption
The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Pope Pius XII defined it in 1950 in his apostolic constitution ''Munificentissimus Deus'' as follows:
We proclaim and define it to be a dogma revealed by Go ...
, 1204, as reported by Bishop Richard Redman, Vicar-General of the Abbot of Prémontré, during his canonical visitation
In the Catholic Church, a canonical visitation is the act of an ecclesiastical superior who in the discharge of his office visits persons or places with a view to maintaining faith and discipline and of correcting abuses. A person delegated to ca ...
in 1478. This probably marks the founding or consecration of the new abbey church, rather than the inception of the convent itself.[Colvin, H. M. (1940]
Dale Abbey: Its Foundation, p. 6, see note 5.
/ref> However, there are considerable problems with the chronology and order of events – partly because the relevant royal confirmation charters and papal bulls are missing from the cartulary – that make an entirely satisfactory account of the foundation of Dale Abbey impossible. Whenever the new community was founded, it would have been a priory initially, as the complement required for an abbey would be 12 canons and their abbot, based on the precedent of Christ and the Twelve Apostles
In Christian theology and ecclesiology, the apostles, particularly the Twelve Apostles (also known as the Twelve Disciples or simply the Twelve), were the primary disciples of Jesus according to the New Testament. During the life and minist ...
. The 1204 date perhaps simply reflected the achievement of a steady quorum: the precise date reflects the Premonstratensian preoccupation with the Assumption of Mary, a doctrine that was not confirmed as a dogma until Pope Pius XII
Pope Pius XII ( it, Pio XII), born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli (; 2 March 18769 October 1958), was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2 March 1939 until his death in October 1958. Before his e ...
's definition in 1950.
Endowments and benefactors
The Cartulary
A cartulary or chartulary (; Latin: ''cartularium'' or ''chartularium''), also called ''pancarta'' or ''codex diplomaticus'', is a medieval manuscript volume or roll ('' rotulus'') containing transcriptions of original documents relating to the f ...
of Dale Abbey, containing records of grants made to it over several centuries, runs to 172 folios and forms part of a 196-page volume in the Cotton library
The Cotton or Cottonian library is a collection of manuscripts once owned by Sir Robert Bruce Cotton MP (1571–1631), an antiquarian and bibliophile. It later became the basis of what is now the British Library, which still holds the collection ...
, part of the British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the Briti ...
, that also contains Muskham's chronicle and a list of abbots. It consists of transcripts of about 530 deed
In common law, a deed is any legal instrument in writing which passes, affirms or confirms an interest, right, or property and that is signed, attested, delivered, and in some jurisdictions, sealed. It is commonly associated with transferrin ...
s. The great majority date from the 13th century, with a few from the preceding century and only two that are known to be later.[Saltman, A (ed.) (1967) The Cartulary of Dale Abbey, p. 16.] Information about later acquisitions comes from other sources: letters patent
Letters patent ( la, litterae patentes) ( always in the plural) are a type of legal instrument in the form of a published written order issued by a monarch, president or other head of state, generally granting an office, right, monopoly, tit ...
, for example, give considerable detail about the acquisition of land and appropriation of churches from the 14th century.
The founders and their children
In the early days valuable acquisitions continued to come from the families of William FitzRalph and Serlo de Grendon. See the family tree below to identify the relationships between these.
William de Grendon, described as the advocate of the abbey, contributed land from the Grendon estates at Ockbrook along with his own body and that of his brother Bertram,[ who became a canon of Dale Abbey. William died by 1203, when his widow Ermentrude remarried: William was presumably in ]minor orders
Minor orders are ranks of church ministry. In the Catholic Church, the predominating Latin Church formerly distinguished between the major orders —priest (including bishop), deacon and subdeacon—and four minor orders—acolyte, exorcist, lec ...
, as priestly celibacy was generally accepted by this time. The six shillings in rents he gave alongside his gift of Deepdale came from the six bovates Geoffrey de Salicosa had obtained from John de Wyburville. William's brother, Serlo de Grendon II, initially gave the abbey land, including woods and pannage
Pannage (also referred to as ''Eichelmast'' or ''Eckerich'' in Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Austria, Slovenia and Croatia) is the practice of releasing livestock- pigs in a forest, so that they can feed on fallen acorns, be ...
for 20 pigs, at Ockbrook.[Cox, J. C. (1901]
The Chartulary of the Abbey of Dale, p. 87, folio 13.
/ref> This grant also included his land at Boyah, just south of Deepdale, which was evidently considered vital for the abbey's prospects by the chronicler. Later he conceded all his remaining land at Ockbrook for the safety of his own soul and that of his second wife, Julian. The habit of giving was passed to the next generation. Engenulf, nephew of William, gave the abbey land at Ockbrook that he had been given by Serlo.
Geoffrey de Salicosa and Matilda made considerable additional grants to Dale Abbey. Geoffrey gave all his lands in Sandiacre
Sandiacre is a town and civil parish in the borough of Erewash in Derbyshire, in the East Midlands region of England adjoining the border with Nottinghamshire. The population of the town was 8,889 at the 2011 Census.
The name Sandiacre is usua ...
as well as the six bovates in Ockbrook he had obtained in exchange for his lands in Normandy. Matilda gave her manorial lordship of Alvaston, together with meadow ans pasture there, to the abbey for the souls of herself, Geoffrey, her brother, Bishop Robert FitzRalph
Robert FitzRalph (sometimes known as Robert son of William FitzRalph) was a medieval Bishop of Worcester.
Life
FitzRalph was the son of William FitzRalph, who was a landowner in Derbyshire and was High Sheriff of Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire an ...
and other family members. She also passed on or confirmed half the mill at Borrowash. It seems that the couple left all their lands in Nottinghamshire to the abbey. If the couple hoped for a child in consideration of their gift, they were well-rewarded, as they went on to have two sons and two daughters. Geoffrey, who opposed John, King of England
John (24 December 1166 – 19 October 1216) was King of England from 1199 until his death in 1216. He lost the Duchy of Normandy and most of his other French lands to King Philip II of France, resulting in the collapse of the Angevin ...
in the First Barons' War
The First Barons' War (1215–1217) was a civil war in the Kingdom of England in which a group of rebellious major landowners (commonly referred to as barons) led by Robert Fitzwalter waged war against King John of England. The conflict resulte ...
, died by 1229, when Matilda made an agreement with Abbot Walter to provide her with board and lodging at the abbey until her death, although she did not retire there until she was old. Roger, their son, gave Dale Abbey two bovates of land at Stanton: he died without issue, as did their other son John, leaving the daughters Avice and Johanna as joint heirs. As a widow in 1272, Johanna confirmed her husband William de Poynton's grants of land to Dale Abbey. She also gave the abbey rents from her own lands in Alvaston, Elvaston, Ambaston and Thulston. Avice also gave lands in Alvaston. Another Avice, the sister of Matilda, had married Sir Geoffrey Musters and he gave Dale Abbey half the advowson
Advowson () or patronage is the right in English law of a patron (avowee) to present to the diocesan bishop (or in some cases the ordinary if not the same person) a nominee for appointment to a vacant ecclesiastical benefice or church living, a ...
of Egginton church. By another husband she had a daughter, Agnes, who married Robert de Muskham. The de Muskham family made many grants to Dale Abbey, especially in Stanton by Dale, and the chronicler Thomas must have been a member of the family, although he does not clarify the details. Avice also had a son, Amalric, who donated the other half of the advowson of Egginton church to Dale Abbey.
Precarious patchworks
The greater part of Dale Abbey's cartulary is made up of small grants. The estates thus formed were patchworks of land, relatively dense in some areas where granges were established, but generally interspersed by the holdings of other landholders, both secular and ecclesiastical. Frequently the abbey had to defend its holdings against the ambitions of others. However, it also invested surplus cash in the developing land market, exploiting the indebtedness of landholders, both great and small.
At Stanley, for example, there were many small grants to the abbey by local peasants and craftsmen, although the full extent is unclear as the relevant section of the cartulary is damaged.[ The occupation very first donor mentioned in the extant part of the chartulary, Walter Laundri is given as ''cementarius'', ]stonemason
Stonemasonry or stonecraft is the creation of buildings, structures, and sculpture using stone as the primary material. It is one of the oldest activities and professions in human history. Many of the long-lasting, ancient shelters, temples, ...
: first he donated five acre
The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial and US customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one chain by one furlong (66 by 660 feet), which is exactly equal to 10 square chains, of a square mile, 4,840 square ...
s, a rood
A rood or rood cross, sometimes known as a triumphal cross, is a cross or crucifix, especially the large crucifix set above the entrance to the chancel of a medieval church.
Alternatively, it is a large sculpture or painting of the crucifixion ...
and a toft for the soul of Goscelin, then a single acre, and finally he quitclaimed 6½ roods. Some donations were considerably smaller. Geoffrey, son of William of Boyah, donated just half an acre each for the burial of himself and his wife, Matilda. He also committed himself to give the abbey a pound of incense
Incense is aromatic biotic material that releases fragrant smoke when burnt. The term is used for either the material or the aroma. Incense is used for aesthetic reasons, religious worship, aromatherapy, meditation, and ceremony. It may also b ...
each year for the Feast of the Assumption, its anniversary. The expansion of abbey's lands around Stanley led to a dispute with William de Ferrers, 4th Earl of Derby
William II de Ferrers, 4th Earl of Derby (c. 1168 – c. 1247), was a favourite of King John of England. He succeeded to the estate (but not the title) upon the death of his father, William de Ferrers, 3rd Earl of Derby, at the Siege of Acre in ...
, and in 1229 a perambulation was ordered to fix the boundary with the earl's estates in Spondon.
Sandiacre was another area where Dale Abbey's lands had to be defended at law. The main landowner there at the abbey's foundation was Peter III of Sandiacre, who held five bovates at Sandiacre by a serjeanty
Under feudalism in France and England during the Middle Ages, tenure by serjeanty () was a form of tenure in return for a specified duty other than standard knight-service.
Etymology
The word comes from the French noun , itself from the Latin ...
tenure of bearing a red goshawk
Goshawk may refer to several species of birds of prey, mainly in the genus ''Accipiter'':
* Northern goshawk, ''Accipiter gentilis'', often referred to simply as the goshawk, since it is the only goshawk found in much of its range (in Europe and N ...
, probably implying he had to appear on some occasions as the king's falconer. Dale Abbey ultimately built up a portfolio of seven bovates at Sandiacre, granted by the Sandiacre family themselves or their tenants. However, legal doctrine on serjeanties was hardening in the early 13th century and there was a progressive tightening of conditions: in particular, they were pronounced inalienable
''InAlienable'' is a 2007 science fiction film with horror and comic elements, written and executive produced by Walter Koenig, and directed by Robert Dyke. It was the first collaboration of Koenig and Dyke since their 1989 production of ''Moon ...
and impartible. In 1205 King John launched an enquiry into serjeanties within the honour of Lancaster in order to take into his hands estates which had been alienated without royal permission. The approach was maintained into the reign of Henry III and extended to serjeanties held of the king.[Pollock and Maitland]
The History of English Law Before the Time of Edward I, volume 1, p. 334.
/ref> Five bovates at Sandiacre, granted to Dale Abbey by subtenants, were taken into royal hands. Abbot Grauncourt resolved to recover them and in 1244 obtained permission to recommence cultivating two bovates and thirty acres of the serjeanty held by Richard de Sandiacre. In 1246 he also obtained the release of Driskowe Wood, also part of the Sandiacre serjeanty originally granted to Dale Abbey by Geoffrey de Salicosa Mara when he was under-tenant. In 1250 Henry III sent out Robert Passelewe
Robert Passelewe (or Robert Papelew; died 1252) was a medieval Bishop of Chichester elect as well as being a royal clerk and Archdeacon of Lewes.Greenway Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae 1066–1300: Volume 5: Chichester: Bishops'
Life
Passelewe was ...
to arrent the alienated serjeanties, i.e. to convert them to forms of tenure more profitable to the Crown,[ and many of the lands of the Sandiacre serjeanty were thus turned into tenures that could yield rent. In 1281 the abbey's attorney responded to a ''quo warranto'' writ relating to the history of the five bovates at Sandiacre and the matter was referred to the Exchequer rolls for judgement.
Not all of the Sandiacre family's donations were at Sandiacre itself: they had considerable holdings at Kirk Hallam and other nearby locations. Around 1239 Richard of Sandiacre, Peter III's son, got into financial difficulties. In return for 30 acres in Kirk Hallam, at the excessively reasonable rent of 12 pence, payable annually on St Giles' day (1 September), the canons gave Richard 16 ]mark
Mark may refer to:
Currency
* Bosnia and Herzegovina convertible mark, the currency of Bosnia and Herzegovina
* East German mark, the currency of the German Democratic Republic
* Estonian mark, the currency of Estonia between 1918 and 1927
* Finn ...
s to pay his debt to David, a leading member of the Jewish community of Nottingham. The abbey took advantage of a similar situation facing Ralph of Hallam in 1260. He was forced to pledge land at Kirk Hallam to the abbey in return for 12 marks to repay a Jewish lender. However, this was not the first time Ralph had been forced into such an arrangement: although the ethnicity of the lender was not mentioned on the other occasions, Jews were the main source of credit for middling landowners in this period. H. G. Richardson provides numerous examples of religious houses acquiring land by paying debts to Jewish lenders, including that of Dale's mother house, Newsham. Richardson's study of the phenomenon was in response to a series of anti-semitic tropes rehearsed by Austin Lane Poole
Austin Lane Poole, FBA (6 December 1889 – 22 February 1963) was a British mediaevalist.
Poole came from an academic lineage, being the son of Reginald Lane Poole (archive keeper at the University of Oxford), the nephew of Stanley Lane Poole (p ...
in his Oxford History of England
The Oxford History of England (1934–1965) was a notable book series on the history of the United Kingdom. Published by Oxford University Press, it was originally intended to span from Roman Britain to the outbreak of the First World War in fou ...
volume covering the Angevin kings of England
The Angevins (; "from Anjou") were a royal house of French origin that ruled England in the 12th and early 13th centuries; its monarchs were Henry II, Richard I and John. In the 10 years from 1144, two successive counts of Anjou in France, G ...
, in which he claimed, without citation or evidence, that "as usurers (the Jews) had gained a strangle-hold on the recently founded monastic houses whose splendid buildings they had financed." Richardson countered: "As for the relation of monastic houses to Jewish moneylenders, the sober facts of history show the monks as happy collaborators with them rather than as victims..." In fact, "religious houses were — to use modern phraseology — in the market for encumbered estates." Citing Richardson, Avrom Saltman suggests that Dale abbey its extend its holdings relatively cheaply by "buying up Christian debts and redeeming them probably for less than their face value." However, in modernising the language and concepts, this fails to capture Richardson's explanation, which starts from the consideration that the security provided by land was very poor as medieval conveyancing
In law, conveyancing is the transfer of legal title of real property from one person to another, or the granting of an encumbrance such as a mortgage or a lien. A typical conveyancing transaction has two major phases: the exchange of contrac ...
complex and cumbersome, and so very expensive and uncertain, giving the lender no easy path to transfer title in encumbered land to a potential purchaser. This was especially true for a Jew, as it was questionable whether he or she could have property in land, and so act as an intermediary in the process: there are a few instances of Jews holding lands in fee but it was inconvenient, possibly dangerous, for a lender to do so. The involvement of a cash-rich abbey could greatly improve the position for both lender and borrower, providing much greater security and bringing down the claim by perhaps 40%, as it did in some pursued by Aaron of Lincoln
Aaron of Lincoln (born at Lincoln, England, about 1125, died 1186) was an English Jewish financier. He is believed to have been the wealthiest man in Norman England; it is estimated that his wealth exceeded that of the King. He is first mention ...
. The deal could only be watertight if the monastery had a written agreement from the debtor to hand over his land and had secured effective possession or seisin Seisin (or seizin) denotes the legal possession of a feudal fiefdom or fee, that is to say an estate in land. It was used in the form of "the son and heir of X has obtained seisin of his inheritance", and thus is effectively a term concerned with co ...
in advance. The Kirk Hallam charters provide Dale with this. It was no accident when a monastery acquired several encumbered estates in the same area by buying out the claims of Jewish lenders: monasteries actively pursued a policy of expanding their holdings by this method. This seems to be the case with Dale Abbey at Kirk Hallam, where lender, borrower and abbey all benefited from the arrangement. The original landholders were free of their debts, but would now pay rent to the abbey for the land they were still able to cultivate or exploit in other ways.
In the years immediately after its foundation, the Muskams were very prominent among the benefactors of Dale Abbey. Some of the lands derived from them were close to the abbey. 14 bovates at Little Hallam, east of Kirk Hallam, were donated by Nicholas de Chavencurt for his own soul and the souls of, among others, his wife Gundred, his father-in-law Guy de Vere, and his uncle Robert de Muskham. This land had originally come from the Muskham family in a marriage settlement two generations earlier. The family made a considerable number of donations around eponymous North Muskham
North Muskham is a village and civil parish in Nottinghamshire, England, close to the border with Lincolnshire. It is located between the River Trent and the A1 road, north of Newark-upon-Trent. The parish has a population of 943 (2001 ce ...
, South Muskham
South Muskham is a village and civil parish in Nottinghamshire, England, close to the border with Lincolnshire. It is located west of the River Trent and the A1 road, north of Newark-upon-Trent. The parish includes the hamlet of Little Car ...
, as well as nearby Bathley
Bathley is a village and civil parish in the Newark and Sherwood district of Nottinghamshire, England, north-west of Newark-on-Trent
Newark-on-Trent or Newark () is a market town and civil parish in the Newark and Sherwood district in N ...
, and also confirmed grants by their subtenants, the Bathley family. It seems that William of Southwell, a cleric and possibly a kinsman of Abbot Grauncourt, actively sought out likely donors for the abbey along the Nottinghamshire border with Lincolnshire - small landowners beneath the attention of most money lenders. A typical deal was William of Bathley's transfer of five acres and three roods, "for a certain sum of money, which he (William of Southwell) gave me in my necessity beforehand" - ''pro quadam summa pecunie quam in necessitate mea mihi dedit pre manibus''. William of Southwell was enfeoffed
In the Middle Ages, especially under the European feudal system, feoffment or enfeoffment was the deed by which a person was given land in exchange for a pledge of service. This mechanism was later used to avoid restrictions on the passage of ti ...
with the land, for the service of a single rose. His relationship to Dale Abbey seems to have been similar to that of the Nottingham Jewish community, allowing it to purchase encumbered estates at competitive prices, although William had an advantage over Jewish lenders in that he could hold the lands in fee during the transition period before selling to the abbey. As with the acquisitions from Jewish lenders, the original landholders were not displaced but compelled to pay rent to the abbey for their land. Here too there was no accident in the pattern of acquisitions: William was buying up land in bulk to a predetermined plan. At one point he had made an agreement with the abbot and convent of Dale to buy up forty acres at ten shillings per acre, with a provision for a discount if the acreage was found deficient. In the only recorded example of a price paid by William, it is the same as his regular selling price, suggesting that any reward for William must have been in the form of a retainer
Retainer may refer to:
* Retainer (orthodontics), devices for teeth
* RFA ''Retainer'' (A329), a ship
* Retainers in early China, a social group in early China
Employment
* Retainer agreement, a contract in which an employer pays in advance for w ...
or salary.
Later acquisitions
The Statutes of Mortmain
The Statutes of Mortmain were two enactments, in 1279 and 1290, passed in the reign of Edward I of England, aimed at preserving the kingdom's revenues by preventing land from passing into the possession of the Church. Possession of property by a ...
made acquisition of lands in the 14th century complex and expensive. A series of transaction beginning in 1323 illustrate this. On 7 December Edward II, at nearby Belper, issued a licence for Dale Abbey to acquire land and rents up to the value of 100 shillings, or £5. There would have been a charge for the permission, not recorded, and there had also been an expensive inquest ''ad quod damnum
''Ad quod damnum'' or ''ad damnum'' is a Latin phrase meaning "according to the harm" or "appropriate to the harm". It is used in tort law as a measure of damage inflicted, and implying a remedy, if one exists, ought to correspond specifically a ...
'' to ascertain the precise damage to royal interests that might result from the purchases. Nothing further is recorded until almost twenty years later, when, in July 1343, Edward III licensed the acquisition of land and houses to the value of 5s. 2d. at Hopton and Stanton by Dale, but counted them as 10 shillings against the allowed total of 100s. Not until 1392, under Richard II, was this group of acquisitions completed, with the transfer of 113 acres in total by two chaplains. Meanwhile, Edward III had in 1363 granted a licence for the abbey to acquire land and rents up to an annual value of £20, on condition that the canons mention him every day in prayers, masses and chapter meetings. Richard II's administration, in 1382, took 4 marks (£2.67) off the total allowed the abbey for only 16 shillings (£0.80) in actual acquisitions. The following year £10 was subtracted from the allowance for only 50 shillings (£2.50) in land and rents. Nothing further is heard of this allowance, so the abbey had managed to add only 66 shillings (£3.30) worth of land and rents, having paid for the right to acquire £20. Similarly Edward III's 1365 licence to acquire docking and warehouse facilities in Derby worth 60s. led in 1375 to the purchase of a building worth 10s., although with 13s. 4d. subtracted from the allowance and apparently no further acquisitions. In each case the original licence was pronounced or considered "satisfied" before the allowance had in fact been exhausted, even with the king's inflated estimate of their worth. The latter was probably to counterbalance the tendency of abbeys to undervalue their lands, but in fact encouraged it.
Controlled churches
The patronage of Egginton
Egginton is a village and civil parish in the local government district of South Derbyshire, England. The population of the civil parish as of the 2011 census was 574.
Location
The village is located just off Ryknild Street, otherwise know ...
church was not accompanied by the tithes
A tithe (; from Old English: ''teogoþa'' "tenth") is a one-tenth part of something, paid as a contribution to a religious organization or compulsory tax to government. Today, tithes are normally voluntary and paid in cash or cheques or more ...
. It seems that there were soon challenges to the abbey's right to nominate the rector
Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to:
Style or title
*Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations
*Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...
from other landowners. The greater part of the manor had come into the hands of Richard de Grendon. His widow, Ermentrude, passed it on to her daughter, Margaret, on her marriage to Robert Wakelin. Their daughters and joint heirs, Ermentrude and Margaret, married into the Stafford and Chandos families. The Staffords seem to have litigated to obtain the advowson and succeeded in getting half of it. The last presentation to the other half by an abbot of Dale was in 1344. In the following year, Roger Northburgh
Roger Northburgh (died 1358) was a cleric, administrator and politician who was Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield from 1321 until his death. His was a stormy career as he was inevitably involved in many of the conflicts of his time: military, dynas ...
, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, appropriated the tithes of half the church to the abbot of Dale and his 24 "monks," perhaps as a gesture of recompense. The royal licence for this was issued on 2 August.
Kirk Hallam church was another that the abbey acquired early in its history. Richard of Sandiacre gave the patronage
Patronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows on another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings, popes, and the wealthy have provided to artists su ...
of the church, as well as a toft, a quarry site and some land. Subsequently, the de Sandiacre, their tenants and other smaller landholders contributed to a considerable portfolio of land for the abbey in Kirk Hallam. Although the de Sandiacre grant was only of the advowson of the rectory, by 1298 it had appropriated the church, demoting the benefice
A benefice () or living is a reward received in exchange for services rendered and as a retainer for future services. The Roman Empire used the Latin term as a benefit to an individual from the Empire for services rendered. Its use was adopted by ...
to a vicarage, with the great tithe going to the abbey.[Cox, J. C. (1879]
Notes on the Churches of Derbyshire, volume 4, p. 212.
/ref> It seems that the abbey also obtained exemption from papal taxation from the church, as it does not appear in the Taxatio Ecclesiastica
The ''Taxatio Ecclesiastica'', often referred to as the ''Taxatio Nicholai'' or just the ''Taxatio'', compiled in 1291–92 under the order of Pope Nicholas IV, is a detailed database valuation for ecclesiastical taxation of English, Welsh, an ...
of 1291–2.
The church at nearby Stanton by Dale was also omitted by the Taxatio and is not even mentioned in the Valor Ecclesiasticus
The ''Valor Ecclesiasticus'' (Latin: "church valuation") was a survey of the finances of the church in England, Wales and English controlled parts of Ireland made in 1535 on the orders of Henry VIII. It was colloquially called the Kings books, a s ...
of 1535, which paved the way for the Dissolution of the Monasteries, or in the records of the local Diocese of Lichfield and Coventry
The Diocese of Lichfield is a Church of England diocese in the Province of Canterbury, England. The bishop's seat is located in the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Chad in the city of Lichfield. The diocese covers of sev ...
. In this case there was not even a vicarage, as it is possible the church was entirely a creation of Dale Abbey itself, so both the advowson and the tithes had always belonged to the abbey. Robert Thoroton
Dr Robert Thoroton (4 October 1623 – c. 21 November 1678) was an English antiquary, mainly remembered for his county history, ''The Antiquities of Nottinghamshire'' (1677).
Life
Thoroton belonged to an old Nottinghamshire family, which took it ...
reported that in the mid-13th century Dale Abbey was given a moiety of the advowson of Trowell church by William de Trowell, along with all the rents and lands his father Richard had held in Trowell
Trowell is a village and civil parish in Nottinghamshire, England. It lies a few miles west of Nottingham, in the borough of Broxtowe on the border with Derbyshire. According to the 2001 census it had a population of 2,568, falling to 2,378 at ...
, although the tithes were not included.
The advowson of the church at Greasley
Greasley is a civil parish north west of Nottingham in Nottinghamshire, England. Although it is thought there was once a village called Greasley, there is no settlement of that name today as it was destroyed by the Earl of Rutland. The built u ...
, Nottinghamshire, and rents at Greasley, amounting to 100 shillings, were granted in frankalmoin to Dale by Nicholas de Cantilupe under a licence issued on 11 March 1337.[Calendar of Patent Rolls, 1334—38, p. 392.]
/ref> Nicholas de Cantilupe held the manor and advowson of Ilkeston, as well as Greasley, through the marriage of his grandfather, also Nicholas, to Eustachia de Greasley, heiress of Hugh de Greasley.[ The condition for the grants at Greasley was that the canons of Dale establish and conduct a chantry for Nicholas and his family not at Dale Abbey itself but in Ilkeston church.
File:St Wilfrid's Church, Egginton - geograph.org.uk - 376941.jpg, St Wilfrid's Church, Egginton. A building dating back to about 1300 but with work from several centuries.
File:Kirk Hallam Church.jpg, Church of All Saints, Kirk Hallam, a 14—15th century building, heavily restored in Victorian period.
File:St Michael and All Angels, Stanton by Dale - geograph.org.uk - 1019247.jpg, Church of St Michael and All Angels, Stanton by Dale.
File:Trowell Church tower - geograph.org.uk - 616348.jpg, St Helen's Church Trowell, 13-15th century building with Victorian restoration.
File:Church of St Mary - 1 - geograph.org.uk - 1550415.jpg, St Mary's Church, Greasley: a much-restored 15th century church.
File:St Mary's Church, Ilkeston, Derbyshire.jpg, St Mary's Church, Ilkeston.
File:StLawrence Heanor RH.JPG, St Lawrence's Church, Heanor. Despite substantial rebuilding as late as the 1980s, it retains its ]perpendicular
In elementary geometry, two geometric objects are perpendicular if they intersect at a right angle (90 degrees or π/2 radians). The condition of perpendicularity may be represented graphically using the '' perpendicular symbol'', ⟂. It c ...
15th century tower.
The other churches acquired by Dale came considerably later and show how much more awkward such gifts became as political and legal circumstances changed. On 12 July 1385, Richard II
Richard II (6 January 1367 – ), also known as Richard of Bordeaux, was King of England from 1377 until he was deposed in 1399. He was the son of Edward the Black Prince, Prince of Wales, and Joan, Countess of Kent. Richard's father ...
granted a licence for Hugh de Willoughby, a cleric, and five others, to alienate to Dale Abbey in mortmain
Mortmain () is the perpetual, inalienable ownership of real estate by a corporation or legal institution; the term is usually used in the context of its prohibition. Historically, the land owner usually would be the religious office of a church ...
the advowson of Ilkeston church, and also for the abbey to appropriate the church. The apparent donors were actually a group of feoffee
Under the feudal system in England, a feoffee () is a trustee who holds a fief (or "fee"), that is to say an estate in land, for the use of a beneficial owner. The term is more fully stated as a feoffee to uses of the beneficial owner. The use ...
s employed by William la Zouche, 3rd Baron Zouche, whose father had inherited it from the Cantelupe family, the former manorial lords: such arrangements were often used to by-pass the restrictive provisions of the Statutes of Mortmain.[Cox, J. C. (1879]
Notes on the Churches of Derbyshire, volume 4, p. 257–8.
/ref> Earlier, on 13 February William la Zouche had secured the benefits of his gift: chantry masses and prayers at Dale Abbey for himself and his wife, Agnes, as well as for their parents and for William de Clinton, 1st Earl of Huntingdon
William de Clinton, 1st Earl of Huntingdon (c.1304 – 31 October 1354) and Lord High Admiral, was the younger son of John de Clinton, 1st Baron Clinton (d.1312/13) of Maxstoke Castle, Warwickshire, and Ida de Odingsells, the granddaughter of ...
and his wife Juliana de Leybourne. On 12 October he confirmed the transfer of the church, releasing it to the Abbey of "La Dale." The abbey held Ilkeston church for less than a decade before its rights were overridden by Pope Boniface IX
Pope Boniface IX ( la, Bonifatius IX; it, Bonifacio IX; c. 1350 – 1 October 1404, born Pietro Tomacelli) was head of the Catholic Church from 2 November 1389 to his death in October 1404. He was the second Roman pope of the Western Schism.Rich ...
, who in 1394 imposed on the parish John de Aston, formerly vicar of Colston Bassett
Colston Bassett is an English village in the Vale of Belvoir, in the Rushcliffe district of south-east Nottinghamshire, close to its border with Leicestershire. It lies by the River Smite. The population in 2001 of 225, including Wiverton Hall, ...
, noting that the vicarage was worth 40 marks. The church already had a vicar, a canon of Dale called Hugo of Thurgarton. Moreover, the papal presentation was against the Statute of Provisors
The English statute usually called Statute of Provisors is the 25th of Edward III, St. 4 (1350–51), otherwise termed "The Statute of Provisors of Benefices", or anciently ''De provisoribus''. This measure was central to a long disagreement ...
: for this and for vexatious litigation against the abbbot and convent of Dale, Aston was incarcerated in the Fleet Prison, from which the king released him on 20 February 1398, as he had mainprise
Mainprise is a concept in English law regarding the release of a prisoner from custody upon sureties pending trial. It is nearly identical to the concept of bail
Bail is a set of pre-trial restrictions that are imposed on a suspect to ensu ...
. Aston then seized Ilkeston church with Henry, a chaplain, and six others. Bishop John Burghill
John Burghill (died 1414) was a medieval Bishop of Llandaff and Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield
The Bishop of Lichfield is the ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Lichfield in the Province of Canterbury. The diocese covers 4,516&nb ...
wrote to the king requesting secular intervention. It seems that the gang were called before the bench of magistrates, as one who failed to appear, John Wylchar, another chaplain, was pardoned in October 1402, after handing himself in at the Marshalsea Prison
The Marshalsea (1373–1842) was a notorious prison in Southwark, just south of the River Thames. Although it housed a variety of prisoners, including men accused of crimes at sea and political figures charged with sedition, it became known, in ...
.
The church at Heanor
Heanor (/ˈhiːnə/) is a town in the Amber Valley district of Derbyshire in the East Midlands of England. It lies north-east of Derby and forms, with the adjacent village of Loscoe, the civil parish and town council-administered area of He ...
was transferred to Dale Abbey via feoffees in the reign of Edward IV
Edward IV (28 April 1442 – 9 April 1483) was King of England from 4 March 1461 to 3 October 1470, then again from 11 April 1471 until his death in 1483. He was a central figure in the Wars of the Roses, a series of civil wars in Englan ...
. The advowson was actually held by Henry Grey, 4th Baron Grey of Codnor
Henry Grey, 4th Baron Grey of Codnor (1435 – April 1496) was an English nobleman of the fifteenth century. Having initially supported the House of Lancaster during the Wars of the Roses, he later gave his allegiance to the victorious King Edward ...
, who was at this time the key local figure in the Yorkist
The House of York was a cadet branch of the English royal House of Plantagenet. Three of its members became kings of England in the late 15th century. The House of York descended in the male line from Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York, t ...
faction built by Lord Hastings
Baron Hastings is a title that has been created three times. The first creation was in the Peerage of England in 1290, and is extant. The second creation was in the Peerage of England in 1299, and became extinct on the death of the first holder in ...
, which supported the king in his conflict with his brother, George, Duke of Clarence
George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence (21 October 144918 February 1478), was the 6th son of Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York, and Cecily Neville, and the brother of English kings Edward IV and Richard III. He played an important role in t ...
. Grey is not mentioned in either of the two permissions authorised by the king, the first of which was granted at Nottingham on 11 September 1473. Instead Grey sanctified and advertised the solidarity and loyalty of the ruling group and it local allies by including in his list of feoffees John Hales John Hales may refer to:
*John Hales (theologian) (1584–1656), English theologian
* John Hales (bishop of Exeter) from 1455 to 1456
* John Hales (bishop of Coventry and Lichfield) (died 1490) from 1459 to 1490
* John Hales (died 1540), MP for Cant ...
, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield; Hastings himself; Lord Thomas Stanley, a Lancashire magnate and titular King of Mann, active in Derbyshire politics and sometime justice of the peace
A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer of a lower or '' puisne'' court, elected or appointed by means of a commission ( letters patent) to keep the peace. In past centuries the term commissioner of the peace was often used with the s ...
in the county; the brother of Thomas; another brother, James Stanley, later Archdeacon of Chester
The Archdeacon of Chester is a senior ecclesiastical officer in the diocese of Chester. The area in which she, or he, has statutory duties is the Archdeaconry of Chester – those duties include some pastoral care and disciplinary supervision of th ...
; Sir Thomas Burgh, a close friend of the king; the abbot of Rufford Abbey
Rufford Abbey is a country estate in Rufford, Nottinghamshire, England, two miles (4 km) south of Ollerton. Originally a Cistercian abbey, it was converted to a country house in the 16th century after the Dissolution of the Monasteries ...
, named as William; and a number of politically active Derbyshire gentry, including Ralph Sacheverell and Henry Statham, linked by the ill-fated marriage of their son and daughter
A daughter is a female offspring; a girl or a woman in relation to her parents. Daughterhood is the state of being someone's daughter. The male counterpart is a son. Analogously the name is used in several areas to show relations between groups ...
respectively, William Babington and John Staunton. The terms of the licence demanded that the abbey set aside enough from the proceeds of Heanor church to pay both for a perpetual vicarage, i.e. a priest with a regular income, and for an annual distribution of alms
Alms (, ) are money, food, or other material goods donated to people living in poverty. Providing alms is often considered an act of virtue or charity. The act of providing alms is called almsgiving, and it is a widespread practice in a numbe ...
to the local poor, but no fee for the licence is mentioned. The preamble to king's second licence, issued at Westminster on 10 February 1475, makes clear that it was granted only after further negotiations in which the king had wrung major concessions from the abbey. The abbot of Dale, John Stanley (probably from the local village of Stanley and not related to the Lancashire brothers), had agreed to give to the king land at Larkdale, just north of Nottingham, which Edward wanted to include in a new park centred on Nottingham Castle
Nottingham Castle is a Stuart Restoration-era ducal mansion in Nottingham, England, built on the site of a Norman castle built starting in 1068, and added to extensively through the medieval period, when it was an important royal fortress and ...
, so that he and his family could hunt while in residence there.
Economy
Sources of income
In the Taxatio Ecclesiastica, a survey of Church property commissioned by Pope Nicholas IV
Pope Nicholas IV ( la, Nicolaus IV; 30 September 1227 – 4 April 1292), born Girolamo Masci, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 22 February 1288 to his death on 4 April 1292. He was the first Franciscan to be ele ...
in 1291, the holdings of Dale Abbey had a total annual value of £54 17s. 2d.[ The bulk of this came from lands donated early after the foundation by the families of William FitzRalph and Serlo de Grendon.][Saltman, A (ed.) (1967) The Cartulary of Dale Abbey, p. 17.] It was made up of many small amounts, with significant differences in sources between the various area. So the sale of stock
In finance, stock (also capital stock) consists of all the shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided.Longman Business English Dictionary: "stock - ''especially AmE'' one of the shares into which ownership of a compan ...
from Boyah, south of the abbey, came to the considerable sum of £6 4s. 6d., while the land around the abbey itself brought in only 14s. 4d. from stock. Stanley brought in £4 13s. 4d. in rents and £3 in stock sales, with only 10s. from the manorial court. At Borrowash the mill was worth £1 and the fishery, presumably from the mill pond, 4s. The abbey seems to have drawn a large proportion of its income ultimately from stock rearing: even when its revenue came from rents, the tenants would have been making their money mainly from sheep and cattle. When the estates were resold after the dissolution in 1543, they were estimated at 24,000 acres, of which only 3,000, or one eighth, was "land", i.e. arable land, and the rest pasture, meadown, open land, etc.[Bowles, C. E. B. (1905)]
The manors of Derbyshire, p. 99.
/ref> In 1347 the abbot of Dale was among a large number of churchmen — five of them in Derbyshire — who were asked to make a loan to the king in the form of wool, as a subsidy towards the war in France, suggesting that Dale was one of the houses known to produce wool, the most important commodity of international trade, in considerable amounts.
The Valor Ecclesiasticus of 1535 valued Dale Abbey at £144 12s. About a fifth of the income was made up of revenues from churches in the final years. Heanor alone was bringing in £13 according to the accounts of the Court of Augmentations
Thomas Cromwell established the Court of Augmentations, also called Augmentation Court or simply The Augmentation in 1536, during the reign of King Henry VIII of England. It operated alongside three lesser courts (those of General Surveyors (1540 ...
in 1540.[Dugdale, W., et al]
''Monasticon Anglicanum'', p. 897, no. 12.
/ref>
List of granges
The lands granted to Dale Abbey allowed it to establish a number of granges: centres of cultivation under the direct control of the abbey. The table below lists the granges named by Howard Colvin
Sir Howard Montagu Colvin (15 October 1919 – 27 December 2007) was a British architectural historian who produced two of the most outstanding works of scholarship in his field: ''A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600–1840 ...
in a 1939 study.
Mills
Watermill
A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in the production ...
s played an important part in the abbey's economy and were stoutly defended when under threat. The mill built at Stanley by the second Deepdale priory (after 1175) continued in use for centuries, well beyond the dissolution of the abbey, and was known as Parke Mill in the 16th century, later as Baldock Mill. The ''Taxatio'' of 1291 records two mills at Stanley. Richard of Sandiacre gave the abbey a mill at Kirk Hallam. Grants involving a half share of a mill at Bathley show some of the wide range of rights and sources of profit that stemmed from a mill: suit of the tenants compelled them to use the mill; multure made them pay for having their corn ground, generally as a proportion of the flour produced; labour services from villein
A villein, otherwise known as ''cottar'' or '' crofter'', is a serf tied to the land in the feudal system. Villeins had more rights and social status than those in slavery, but were under a number of legal restrictions which differentiated them ...
s dealt with maintenance of mills and millponds; valuable fishing rights in the ponds could either feed the canons or provide an income stream.
The cartulary contains Peter Picot's grant to William de Grendon of a mill at Borrowash, together with the alders on the island of Borrowash for repairs to the mill pond, at an annual rent of two shillings: this seems to be a mill subsequently granted by William to Dale Abbey Abbot Simon seems to have carried out a substantial and rapid building programme on the River Derwent at Borrowash, constructing nine new mills in the first year of his abbacy. This led to legal proceedings by Sir Thomas Bardulph, which came to a head at the assizes in Derby on 29 April 1269. For a consideration of 45 marks, Sir Thomas quitclaimed
Generally, a quitclaim is a formal renunciation of a legal claim against some other person, or of a right to land. A person who quitclaims renounces or relinquishes a claim to some legal right, or transfers a legal interest in land. Originally a c ...
any right to the mills and their sites and also promised to levy a fine of lands to tidy up outstanding matters when Abbot Simon, who was ill, either recovered or was succeeded by a new abbot.
The Borrowash mills also threatened the interests of the merchants of Derby, who complained in 1276 that the abbot of Dale and the Bishop of Chester had obstructed their river, contrary to the terms of charters granted by John and Henry III. The dispute was protracted and in 1281 twelve men of Derby alleged that the Derwent, so clear in the time of John that ships regularly came to trade foodstuffs and other goods at Derby, was now unnavigable because of the abbot's weir
A weir or low head dam is a barrier across the width of a river that alters the flow characteristics of water and usually results in a change in the height of the river level. Weirs are also used to control the flow of water for outlets of l ...
s at Borrowash. In 1283, however, the mills were at the centre of an eruption of violence. The Order of Saint Lazarus
The Order of Saint Lazarus of Jerusalem, also known as the Leper Brothers of Jerusalem or simply as Lazarists, was a Catholic military order founded by crusaders around 1119 at a leper hospital in Jerusalem, Kingdom of Jerusalem, whose care beca ...
, a military order whose English base was at Burton Lazars
Burton Lazars is a village and former civil parish, now in the parish of Burton and Dalby, in the Melton district, in the county of Leicestershire, England. It is south-east of Melton Mowbray, having a population of c.450 in 2015. It is the s ...
in Leicestershire, had been expanding its holdings around Spondon where it held the advowson of the church, and was soon to appropriate it. The order was acquiring lands particularly at Chaddesden
Chaddesden, also known locally as Chadd, is a large residential suburb of Derby, United Kingdom. Historically a separate village centred on Chaddesden Hall and the 14th century St Mary's Church, the area was significantly expanded by 20th-centu ...
, Locko and Borrowash. It seems that the Lazarites occupied one of Dale Abbey's mills in pursuit of a property dispute. In response, a force of at least a hundred armed men headed by Abbot Laurence himself and two future abbots, Richard of Normanton and John of Lincoln, assaulted the Lazarites, as their master complained to Edward I, who issued a commission of oyer and terminer
In English law, oyer and terminer (; a partial translation of the Anglo-French ''oyer et terminer'', which literally means "to hear and to determine") was one of the commissions by which a judge of assize sat. Apart from its Law French name, the ...
from Conwy
Conwy (, ), previously known in English as Conway, is a walled market town, community and the administrative centre of Conwy County Borough in North Wales. The walled town and castle stand on the west bank of the River Conwy, facing Deganwy on ...
on 18 March. The result of the inquiry is not known.
Retreat from the demesnes
In common with most religious houses and secular landholders, Dale Abbey seems to have largely ceased to cultivate its demesnes. This must have been accelerated by the demographic crises of the 14th century, particularly the Great Famine of 1315–1317
The Great Famine of 1315–1317 (occasionally dated 1315–1322) was the first of a series of large-scale crises that struck Europe early in the 14th century. Most of Europe (extending east to Russia and south to Italy) was affected. The famine ...
and the Black Death
The Black Death (also known as the Pestilence, the Great Mortality or the Plague) was a bubonic plague pandemic occurring in Western Eurasia and North Africa from 1346 to 1353. It is the most fatal pandemic recorded in human history, causi ...
, which depressed land values and gave labour a scarcity value. A few leasing agreements made by the abbey survive. Among them is a 1404 lease of land and a house at Lamcote, near Radcliffe-on-Trent
Radcliffe-on-Trent is a large village and civil parish in the Rushcliffe borough of Nottinghamshire, England. The population of the civil parish at the Census 2011 was 8,205.
Location
Radcliffe has a population of about 8,000. It is to the ea ...
, to the Thuryff family. This was agreed, in keeping with tradition, on Lady Day
In the Western liturgical year, Lady Day is the traditional name in some English-speaking countries of the Feast of the Annunciation, which is celebrated on 25 March, and commemorates the visit of the archangel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary, durin ...
and the rent was 20 shillings. The abbey promised to supply timber to help keep the buildings in good repair on condition that the tenants would arrange for its transport beyond Nottingham and supply the labour. On 7 April 1538, in the final year of the abbey, a close at Stanton by Dale, next to the common moor and called "the Condith felde," was leased to John Dylke for 26s. 8d. (two marks). The Court of Augmentations described the revenues from every estate, including the granges it valued, as either a ''redditus'' (something rendered, rent) or ''firma'' (farm), both indicating some kind of leasing arrangement.[ However, the granges of Boyah and Ockbrook are not listed with the others but do appear on the inventory taken on the day of the dissolution. The livestock and foodstuffs they contained were itemised and sold with those from the monastery itself,][ suggesting that their cultivation was still controlled by the canons themselves, as a ready source of food for their own ]refectory
A refectory (also frater, frater house, fratery) is a dining room, especially in monasteries, boarding schools and academic institutions. One of the places the term is most often used today is in graduate seminaries. The name derives from the Lat ...
.
Abbots of Dale
The abbots of Dale could have considerable impact on the wider Premonstratensian order in England and were political figures of some significance.
Abbatial elections
Only one full account exists of an election of an abbot at Dale. As Newsham Abbey
Newsham Abbey was an abbey in Newsham, a small hamlet north of Brocklesby village in Lincolnshire, England. Founded by Peter of Gousla in 1143, Newsham was a daughter house of the Abbey of Licques, near Calais, and the first Premonstratensian hou ...
was the mother house of Dale Abbey, elections took place under the auspices of its abbot and in the presence of his deputies. A detailed account was put on record of an election held at Dale in 1332, when the representatives of Newsham were the abbots of Langdon and Halesowen
Halesowen ( ) is a market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Dudley, in the county of West Midlands, England.
Historically an exclave of Shropshire and, from 1844, in Worcestershire, the town is around from Birmingham city centre, and fro ...
. This was the second election of the year, as the elderly John of Horsley had resigned in May and his successor, John Woodhouse, had resigned after only 15 weeks. After celebrating the Mass of the Holy Spirit, the two abbots and the canons of Dale retired to the chapter house
A chapter house or chapterhouse is a building or room that is part of a cathedral, monastery or collegiate church in which meetings are held. When attached to a cathedral, the cathedral chapter meets there. In monasteries, the whole commun ...
, where a warning was read that all excommunicates should leave the room. The Holy Spirit
In Judaism, the Holy Spirit is the divine force, quality, and influence of God over the Universe or over his creatures. In Nicene Christianity, the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost is the third person of the Trinity. In Islam, the Holy Spirit acts as ...
was invoked and the election proceeded ''per viam compromissi'' — by way of compromission: the delegation of the choice to a panel selected by the chapter. The canons unanimously selected Walter of Tickhill, their prior
Prior (or prioress) is an ecclesiastical title for a superior in some religious orders. The word is derived from the Latin for "earlier" or "first". Its earlier generic usage referred to any monastic superior. In abbeys, a prior would be low ...
, Thomas of Tickhill, the sub-prior, Robert of Barton, Simon of Bredon, and William of Horsley. Their mandate allowed them to choose the new abbot from among themselves, from among the other canons, or from any other Premonstratensian house. They were to delegate one of their number to announce the decision and the whole chapter swore to accept it. The five delegates went into private discussion and at length sent William of Horsley out of the room so that they could discuss his suitability in his absence. Finally they elected him "as a provident man, and as one most circumspect in things spiritual and temporal." They then mandated Thomas of Tickhill to introduce William to the chapter as their new abbot. This he did, requesting the two abbots present to ratify their decision. Once they had made due enquiries about William, they confirmed his election and certified that the canonical forms had been observed. The chapter then celebrated William's election by chanting the Te Deum
The "Te Deum" (, ; from its incipit, , ) is a Latin Christian hymn traditionally ascribed to AD 387 authorship, but with antecedents that place it much earlier. It is central to the Ambrosian hymnal, which spread throughout the Latin Chur ...
as they conducted him to the abbey church. There he was installed in office by placing in his hands the bell ropes of the church and seating him in the abbot's stall. Back in the chapter house he received the abbot's seal and each of the canons professed his obedience.
Abbots of Dale within the Order
Dale's abbots had a defined, nuanced rôle within the hierarchy of the Premonstratensian or Norbertine order. As Dale was a daughter house of Newsham, it was subject to canonical visitation
In the Catholic Church, a canonical visitation is the act of an ecclesiastical superior who in the discharge of his office visits persons or places with a view to maintaining faith and discipline and of correcting abuses. A person delegated to ca ...
and correction by the abbot of the mother house. However, abbots of Dale were sometimes asked to accompany the abbots of Newsham and Welbeck in their ministry. In 1450, for example, the abbot of Dale, John Spondon, went with the abbot of Newsham to supervise an abbatial election at Welbeck. The canons decided not to exercise their right of election and asked the two abbots to make an appointment for them. In July 1515 Abbot Richard Nottingham of Dale appended his seal to the election of Edmund Green as abbot of Halesowen Abbey
Halesowen Abbey was a Premonstratensian abbey in Halesowen, England of which only ruins remain. Founded by Peter des Roches with a grant of land from John of England, King John, the abbey's official year of inauguration was 1218. It acquired two ...
, signifying that he had assisted the abbot of Welbeck at the election and approved the result.
Within the order as a whole, Dale was autonomous' represented by its own abbot not only in the provincial chapter, which regulated the affairs of the order in England, but also at the general chapter held at Prémontré Abbey
Prémontré Abbey was the mother house of the Premonstratensian Order and was located at Prémontré about twelve miles west of Laon, ''département'' of Aisne, France.
History
It was founded by Saint Norbert of Xanten in 1120 on waste land that ...
in north-eastern France. Dale's abbots might serve on steering committee, the ''diffinitores'', that did the real work of the provincial chapters, as did John Stanley at a chapter held at Leicester in 1479, and Richard Nottingham at Lincoln in 1495.
Some abbots of Dale had a wider impact on the order. Most prominent was Abbot William, who served at Dale for two and a half years before being elected abbot of Prémontré, and thus head of the whole order, in October 1233. Although widely regarded as a prudent man, he proved an austere reformer: the chronicle of Dunstable Priory
The Priory Church of Saint Peter, St Peter with its monastery (Dunstable Priory) was founded in 1132 by Henry I of England, Henry I for Augustinians, Augustinian Canons Regular#Canons Regular, Canons in Dunstable, Bedfordshire, England. St Pete ...
remarks ''in eodem capitulo ardua plurima sunt statuta'' — "in that chapter there were many rigorous statutes." He quickly ruffled feathers in the order, carrying out a visitation of the Italian abbeys and proposing to change the dress of the lay brothers, and was forced to retire, amid general discord, to Bayham Abbey
Bayham Old Abbey is an English Heritage property, located near Lamberhurst, Kent, England. Founded c. 1207 through a combination of the failing Premonstratensian monasteries of Otham and Brockley, Bayham functioned as an abbey until its dissolut ...
.
Abbot John of Horsley is known to have played a very active part in the affairs of the English Premonstratensians. About 1309 he was by asked by Abbot Adam of Prémontré to intervene in a problem at Egglestone Abbey
Egglestone Abbey is a ruined Premonstratensian abbey on the southern (Yorkshire) bank of the River Tees, in northern England, south-east of Barnard Castle. The abbey was historically within the North Riding of Yorkshire, but since 1974 h ...
in County Durham
County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly About North East E ...
, where the canons were refusing to accommodate or support their retired abbot, William. He was to reconcile William with the convent of Egglestone or find a suitable home for him in another abbey. John wrote to the abbot of Easby or St Agatha's, near Richmond
Richmond most often refers to:
* Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States
* Richmond, London, a part of London
* Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England
* Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada
* Richmond, California, ...
in Yorkshire, asking him to take on the case, as he had important business to transact for Dale in the presence of Walter Langton
Walter Langton (died 1321) of Castle Ashby'Parishes: Castle Ashby', in A History of the County of Northampton: Volume 4, ed. L F Salzman (London, 1937), pp. 230-236/ref> in Northamptonshire, was Bishop of Lichfield, Bishop of Coventry and Li ...
, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield. However, he was politely rebuffed. It seems he then instructed Welbeck Abbey to make arrangements for William's accommodation, as he soon also received a letter from the abbot of Welbeck, incensed at what he considered the threatening and cajoling tone of John's messenger. He pointed out that Egglestone was already in the process of mounting an appeal, so that he would be left footing the bill if William were accommodated in his abbey. John replied that his canon had not exceeded his powers, as his mandate came from the head of the order, and he made clear that he was prepared to stand his ground. The matter dragged on for some years and was finally resolved when Abbot Adam gave plenary powers to the abbot of Newsham to resettle William and he was transferred to a house elsewhere — possibly Torre Abbey
Torre Abbey is a historic building and art gallery in Torquay, Devon, which lies in the South West of England. It was founded in 1196 as a monastery for Premonstratensian canons, and is now the best-preserved medieval monastery in Devon and Co ...
in Devon
Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devon is ...
.
Meanwhile, the abbot of Prémontré became involved in a bitter conflict with Edward II
Edward II (25 April 1284 – 21 September 1327), also called Edward of Caernarfon, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from 1307 until he was deposed in January 1327. The fourth son of Edward I, Edward became the heir apparent to t ...
over the order's right to extract subsidies from the English houses, which had been prohibited by legislation under Edward I in 1306. In 1310 John of Horsley was present at the provincial chapter that wrote to Abbot Adam of Prémontré, excusing the English abbots for the failure to attend the general chapter to render their subsidies, pointing out that they would be punished if they did so. Adam wote back, threatening excommunication
Excommunication is an institutional act of religious censure used to end or at least regulate the communion of a member of a congregation with other members of the religious institution who are in normal communion with each other. The purpose ...
if they did not immediately pay their dues. The Abbots of Langdon and Sulby were ordered to publish the judgement of the general chapter and to collect the subsidies from their English peers, so they instructed the abbot of Newbo Abbey
Newbo Abbey was a Premonstratensian house of canons regular in Lincolnshire, England, dedicated to the Assumption of Mary.
In the Middle Ages, Lincolnshire was one of the most densely populated parts of England. Within the historical county there ...
to convene a provincial chapter for the purpose. John of Horsley was one of those cited at the head of the summons, issued in November, presumably because he was one of the leading figures among the English abbots. After a renewed prohibition from the king on 10 November, both sides appealed to the Pope.
While these manoeuvres continued, Abbot Adam instructed the abbots of Dale and Langdon to carry out a visitation of Halesowen Abbey, taking with them the abbot of Welbeck: they were to correct abuses and be prepared to force the resignation of the abbot if necessary. The king suspected this was a stratagem for extracting a subsidy and sent a copy of his prohibition to both Dale and Langdon on 7 May 1311. They persisted with the visitation and found the abbot of Halesowen incontinent, uncooperative, incompetent and unfit to rule; the prior, son of a cleric, incapable of his office and not trusted to hear confession
A confession is a statement – made by a person or by a group of persons – acknowledging some personal fact that the person (or the group) would ostensibly prefer to keep hidden. The term presumes that the speaker is providing information th ...
by the canons; and several other brothers guilty of various offences. However, before the visitors could proceed against them, the malefactors displayed the king's prohibition, claiming immunity from their sentence. The visitors made clear that they were not to be deterred and so were expelled from the abbey and refused accommodation, even at their own expense, at one of its granges or farms. Instead they travelled to Dale, where on the Nativity of Saint John the Baptist
The Nativity of John the Baptist (or Birth of John the Baptist, or Nativity of the Forerunner, or colloquially Johnmas or St. John's Day (in German) Johannistag) is a Christian feast day celebrating the birth of John the Baptist. It is observed ...
(24 June) they pronounced the excommunication of the abbot, prior, sub-prior
Prior (or prioress) is an ecclesiastical title for a superior in some religious orders. The word is derived from the Latin for "earlier" or "first". Its earlier generic usage referred to any monastic superior. In abbeys, a prior would be lowe ...
, sacristan
A sacristan is an officer charged with care of the sacristy, the church, and their contents.
In ancient times, many duties of the sacrist were performed by the doorkeepers ( ostiarii), and later by the treasurers and mansionarii. The Decretals ...
, precentor
A precentor is a person who helps facilitate worship. The details vary depending on the religion, denomination, and era in question. The Latin derivation is ''præcentor'', from cantor, meaning "the one who sings before" (or alternatively, "first ...
, cellarer
A cellarium (from the Latin ''cella'', "pantry"), also known as an ''undercroft'', was a storehouse or storeroom, usually in a medieval monastery or castle. In English monasteries, it was usually located in or under the buildings on the west range ...
and John of Gorscot, an offending canon: members of the order were not to communicate with them until absolved by the abbot of Prémontré.
The conflict between Prémontré and the king was settled largely in the latter's favour, in 1316. At the general chapter that year the rules on travel by canonesses of the order were tightened and John of Horsley was mandated to carry out visitations of two female Premonstratensian communities: Broadholme Priory
Broadholme Priory was a convent of canonesses of the Premonstratensian Order located near to the village of Broadholme. Historically in Nottinghamshire, since boundary changes in 1989, the priory and village has been in Lincolnshire.
History
The ...
, then in Nottinghamshire, and Irford or Orford Priory
Orford Priory was a priory of Premonstratensian canonesses in Stainton le Vale, Lincolnshire, England.
The priory of Orford, in Stainton-le-Vale, was probably built some time during the reign of King Henry II by Ralf d'Albini, in honour of the ...
in Lincolnshire.
William of Horsley, evidently from John's home village and possibly a relative, also represented Dale effectively within the order. It seems that he was kept in touch with developments by an agent called Hugh of Toft, perhaps a canon of Dale deputed to gather intelligence. By 1336, under Edward III
Edward III (13 November 1312 – 21 June 1377), also known as Edward of Windsor before his accession, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from January 1327 until his death in 1377. He is noted for his military success and for restoring r ...
, the rumblings of what was to become the Hundred Years' War
The Hundred Years' War (; 1337–1453) was a series of armed conflicts between the kingdoms of Kingdom of England, England and Kingdom of France, France during the Late Middle Ages. It originated from disputed claims to the French Crown, ...
threatened to divide the English Premonstratensian houses from the mother house. The abbot of Prémontré was compelled to nominate deputies to administer the order in England and chose the abbot of Dale to head and represent the Midlands ''circaria''. This came at a difficult time, as the order in the region was riven by a succession dispute at Croxton Abbey
Croxton Abbey, near Croxton Kerrial, Leicestershire, was a Premonstratensian monastery founded by William I, Count of Boulogne.
History
Croxton Abbey was founded by William, Count of Boulogne and Mortain, who donated the land for the abbe ...
and a quarrel between Welbeck and Newsham over rights of visitation. William of Horsley was soon compelled to write excusing his failure to attend the general chapter that year: "reason turns away from and nature would abhor" such a course of action, he maintained. He had got as far as Dover but the preparations for war and the king's prohibition on attendance made the risks too great to continue. In 1344, however, William was given rights of visitation over the order in the whole country and thus made effectively the abbot of Prémontré's deputy in England. As war between England and France had now become endemic, he was unable to carry out this mandate without a working agreement with the king and applied for permission to carry out visitations of Premonstratensian houses. This was granted on 4 May. The king stressed that he was allowed to make a charge for his legitimate expenses in visiting abbeys and correcting abuses but not to remit contributions overseas. Two days later William was also granted royal protection while carrying out visitations, extending to his whole entourage, including the horses and their equipment. William's rôle seems to have continued for some years. In October 1345 he supervised the election of a new abbot for St. Radegund's Abbey
St. Radegund's Abbey at Bradsole was a medieval monastic house in the parish of Hougham Without near Dover in southeast England. It was dedicated to Radegund, the sixth-century Merovingian princess, who, once married to the unsavory King Chl ...
in Kent, a house that had been founded directly from Prémontré. He then settled the former abbot at a manor belonging to the abbey, ensuring he had fowls and sheep for his sustenance, as well as a pension of 10 marks, and also arranged a room with comfortable and familiar surroundings at the abbey itself. On 4 February 1346, along with the abbot of Newsham, he again received the king's licence to carry out visitations on behalf of the abbot of Prémontré.
Political involvement
Abbots were important feudal lords and the main channel through which the abbey related to the monarch, the ultimate feudal authority, and in constant and increasing need of money. They were also major landowners, embedded in the often violent politics of their locality, county and region.
On 16 April 1264 Henry III took the abbot of Dale under his protection. However, on 30 April 1263, around the commencement of the Second Barons' War
The Second Barons' War (1264–1267) was a civil war in England between the forces of a number of barons led by Simon de Montfort against the royalist forces of King Henry III, led initially by the king himself and later by his son, the fut ...
, the most violent of the local rebel magnates, Robert de Ferrers, 6th Earl of Derby
Robert de Ferrers, 6th Earl of Derby (1239–1279) was an English nobleman.
He was born at Tutbury Castle in Staffordshire, England, the son of William de Ferrers, 5th Earl of Derby, by his second wife Margaret de Quincy (born 1218), a daught ...
, had issued a charter taking Dale Abbey under his protection. Although the charter was calendared in the ninth report of the Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts
The Royal Commission on Historical Manuscripts (widely known as the Historical Manuscripts Commission, and abbreviated as the HMC to distinguish it from the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England), was a United Kingdom Royal Com ...
in 1890, Isaac Jeays could find no sign of it and some other early charters when he inspected the Pole-Gell papers for his 1906 ''Derbyshire Charters''. The precise contents have not been published and it is impossible to be sure whether Ferrers compelled the abbey to pay for his protection. He did launch a campaign of extortion in the Midlands that included surrounding Buildwas Abbey
Buildwas Abbey was a Cistercian (originally Savigniac) monastery located on the banks of the River Severn, at Buildwas, Shropshire, England - today about two miles (3 km) west of Ironbridge. Founded by the local bishop in 1135, it was spars ...
in Shropshire
Shropshire (; alternatively Salop; abbreviated in print only as Shrops; demonym Salopian ) is a landlocked historic county in the West Midlands region of England. It is bordered by Wales to the west and the English counties of Cheshire to th ...
with an armed force until the monks paid 100 marks (£66 13s. 4d), as well as robbing the Jews of Worcester
Worcester may refer to:
Places United Kingdom
* Worcester, England, a city and the county town of Worcestershire in England
** Worcester (UK Parliament constituency), an area represented by a Member of Parliament
* Worcester Park, London, Engla ...
of their business documents. Cox, however, seems to have given Ferrers the benefit of the doubt by including his charter of protection among grants from the Ferrers family to the abbey.
With the emergence of the English Parliament
The Parliament of England was the legislature of the Kingdom of England from the 13th century until 1707 when it was replaced by the Parliament of Great Britain. Parliament evolved from the great council of bishops and peers that advised ...
in the later 13th century, the importance of attendance by major landowners, like abbots, rose as the needs of the monarchy for resources became steadily more pressing. Edward I abbots of Dale to Parliament in 1294, 1295, 1296, 1297, 1300, 1301, 1302, 1302 (twice), 1305 and 1307. Their actual attendance is uncertain, although it is clear that Richard of Normanton did take part in the 1294 parliament, as he obtained a charter granting free warren
A free warren—often simply warren—is a type of franchise or privilege conveyed by a sovereign in medieval England to an English subject, promising to hold them harmless for killing game of certain species within a stipulated area, u ...
on many of his estates a few days after it was prorogued: it was recorded that he had requested the charter during the course of the parliament.[ Edward II summoned abbots of Dale in 1307 (for the second parliament of that year), 1309, 1311 and 1312
Abbots were sometimes used by kings to carry out tasks on their behalf, although these usually related to other churches. Abbot William de Boney was twice named, in 1364 and 1397, as part of commissions to investigate and reform St Leonard's Hospital, Derby, a notoriously corrupt institution that had royal patronage. Abbots were also commissioned by the king to take the oath of allegiance from abbots of other houses in the order and to take part in ]inquisitions post mortem An Inquisition post mortem (abbreviated to Inq.p.m. or i.p.m., and formerly known as an escheat) (Latin, meaning "(inquisition) after death") is an English medieval or early modern record of the death, estate and heir of one of the king's tenants-in ...
.
Their status and wealth inevitably drew abbots into the politics of the locality and the county, demonstrating the extent to which effective power depended on a complex web of connections at local level. On 28 November 1381 Abbot William de Boney obtained for 20 shillings a commission of oyer and terminer on the complaint that Thomas Foljambe, accompanied by John Smyth of Stanley and other armed men, had assaulted him at Derby and driven him from the town. Foljambe was a lawyer, son of Godfrey Foljambe, who had been a Baron of the Exchequer
The Barons of the Exchequer, or ''barones scaccarii'', were the judges of the English court known as the Exchequer of Pleas. The Barons consisted of a Chief Baron of the Exchequer and several puisne (''inferior'') barons. When Robert Shute was a ...
, and he was to follow his father into the Lancastrian affinity
Affinity may refer to:
Commerce, finance and law
* Affinity (law), kinship by marriage
* Affinity analysis, a market research and business management technique
* Affinity Credit Union, a Saskatchewan-based credit union
* Affinity Equity Par ...
, the network of officers and retainers centred on John of Gaunt
John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster (6 March 1340 – 3 February 1399) was an English royal prince, military leader, and statesman. He was the fourth son (third to survive infancy as William of Hatfield died shortly after birth) of King Edward ...
, which dominated Derbyshire, including its parliamentary representation. However, he was a second son and his elder brother's son had inherited the family estates: Thomas would become head of the family only later, on the premature death of his nephew. He was still unmarried (although he was later to marry within the affinity), without great estates to call his own, and not yet on Gaunt's payroll, perhaps with much to prove. The man named at the head of those called to deal with the assault was William la Zouche, 2nd Baron Zouche. The Zouche family had some land in the county, especially around Ilkeston, but their principal estates lay elsewhere. They were called into Derbyshire politics at times of crisis, presumably because they were not aligned with the other main factions. He was assisted by a prominent judge, William de Skipwith
William de Skipwith (died after 1392) was a fourteenth-century English judge, who also served as a judge in Ireland. He held the office of Chief Baron of the Exchequer 1362-5. He suffered temporary disgrace when he was removed from office for co ...
, which suggests that the abbot's complaint was taken seriously. Foljambe had apparently been harassing the abbey in other ways, as he was also accused of trespass
Trespass is an area of tort law broadly divided into three groups: trespass to the person, trespass to chattels, and trespass to land.
Trespass to the person historically involved six separate trespasses: threats, assault, battery, wounding ...
. He evaded questioning by the commission and writs of exigent (''exigi facias'') were taken out against him and the other defendants — a step on the way to outlawry. They countered with a writ of ''supersedeas'', by which mainprise
Mainprise is a concept in English law regarding the release of a prisoner from custody upon sureties pending trial. It is nearly identical to the concept of bail
Bail is a set of pre-trial restrictions that are imposed on a suspect to ensu ...
or surety
In finance, a surety , surety bond or guaranty involves a promise by one party to assume responsibility for the debt obligation of a borrower if that borrower defaults. Usually, a surety bond or surety is a promise by a surety or guarantor to pay ...
was established. The list of mainpernours or guarantors allowed them to display their political connections. First came Sir Nicholas de Stafford, illegitimate son of Richard Stafford, 1st Baron Stafford of Clifton
Richard Stafford, 1st Baron Stafford of Clifton (died 13 August 1380), Lord of Clifton, was an English soldier and diplomat during the Hundred Years' War. He was the second son of Edmund Stafford, 1st Baron Stafford and Margaret Basset, and the ...
, and a key figure in the Stafford family's political dominance in their own county, representing it in the Parliament of England
The Parliament of England was the legislature of the Kingdom of England from the 13th century until 1707 when it was replaced by the Parliament of Great Britain. Parliament evolved from the great council of bishops and peers that advised t ...
no less than nine times. Stafford was closely involved with Thomas Foljambe in the establishment of a chantry
A chantry is an ecclesiastical term that may have either of two related meanings:
# a chantry service, a Christian liturgy of prayers for the dead, which historically was an obiit, or
# a chantry chapel, a building on private land, or an area i ...
at the Foljambe family's church of St John the Baptist, Tideswell. Next came Sir Nicholas Montgomery, an ardent Lancastrian for whom Foljambe acted as attorney while he served overseas. Finally, Thomas Tuchet, a cleric, and Richard Tuchet were members of a Markeaton family known to be close associates of Foljambe, and stepsons of Sir John Dabridgecourt, who drew up to 100 marks as an annuity from John of Gaunt. The case seems to have petered out, without the abbot being able to prove his case. The precise objectives of Foljambe in harassing the abbot and convent remain opaque, although he seems to have established his ability to employ violence with impunity. His career was not interrupted and in 1386 he was appointed for the first time as a justice of the peace
A justice of the peace (JP) is a judicial officer of a lower or '' puisne'' court, elected or appointed by means of a commission ( letters patent) to keep the peace. In past centuries the term commissioner of the peace was often used with the s ...
for the county.
Canons of Dale
Names and numbers
Bishop Roger Northburgh's register indicates that Dale Abbey had 24 canons in 1345.[ The numbers in the late 15th century are very well documented, as Bishop Redman was regular and efficient in his visitations. In 1475 he named 15 canons, in addition to the abbot. The number was the same three years later but fell to 14 in 1482. and 13 in 1488,][Gasquet, F. A. (ed.) (1906)]
Collectanea Anglo-Premonstratensia, volume 2, pp. 178—9, no. 364.
/ref> before rising to 16 in 1491.[Gasquet, F. A. (ed.) (1906)]
Collectanea Anglo-Premonstratensia, volume 2, p. 180, no. 366.
/ref> The convent then remained at what seems its regular complement of 15 canons and the abbot from 1494 to 1500,[Gasquet, F. A. (ed.) (1906)]
Collectanea Anglo-Premonstratensia, volume 2, pp. 182—5, nos. 369—71.
/ref> although in the last of these years four were novice
A novice is a person who has entered a religious order and is under probation, before taking vows. A ''novice'' can also refer to a person (or animal e.g. racehorse) who is entering a profession
A profession is a field of work that has ...
s and low numbers were attributed to the plague. Fifteen canons also signed the deed of surrender and obtained pensions at the dissolution in 1538.
Howard Colvin
Sir Howard Montagu Colvin (15 October 1919 – 27 December 2007) was a British architectural historian who produced two of the most outstanding works of scholarship in his field: ''A Biographical Dictionary of British Architects, 1600–1840 ...
extracted a list of over one hundred named canons and some lay brothers. Many of these have toponym
Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of '' toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...
ic surnames locating their origins firmly in the locality or a little further afield in the East Midlands, like Stanley, Stanton, Ilkeston, Trowell, Wolaton, Derby, Horsley, Nottingham (at least six of them), Monyash, Normanton, Cruch In Chile, universidades tradicionales ("traditional universities") is the group of universities founded before the 1980s. It usually includes universities derived from traditional ones. A more precise term is ''Universidades del Consejo de Rectore ...
, Draykott; close to concentrations of Dale's further flung estates, like Thurgarton
Thurgarton is a small village in rural Nottinghamshire, England. The village is close to Southwell, and Newark-on-Trent and still within commuting distance to Nottingham. It is served by Thurgarton railway station. According to the 2001 cens ...
and Leke
Leke is a town in Diksmuide, a part of Belgium in the province of West Flanders
)
, settlement_type = Province of Belgium
, image_flag = Flag of West Flanders.svg
, flag_size =
, image_shield ...
; in Lincolnshire, with its relatively large number of Premonstratensian house, like Sempringham
Sempringham is a hamlet in the South Kesteven district of Lincolnshire, England. It is situated south from the A52 road, east from Grantham and north from Bourne. The hamlet is in the civil parish of Pointon and Sempringham, and on the west ...
, Hagnaby and Lincoln. Some are less clear: three Bredons may be from Breedon on the Hill
Breedon on the Hill is a village and civil parish about north of Ashby-de-la-Zouch in North West Leicestershire, England. The parish adjoins the Derbyshire
Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes ...
but there are other possibilities, while Wodhouse could refer to one of many localities. There are names like Wheatley and Widdowson, still characteristic of the area, and names that are still widespread all over Britain, like Wilson, Page, Spenser and Rede, but only one Smith. There are few, if any, French or other foreign surnames. The canons seem to have been be exclusively English-born, so far as can be seen from their names, although English toponymic names were adopted by the Anglo-Norman Anglo-Norman may refer to:
*Anglo-Normans, the medieval ruling class in England following the Norman conquest of 1066
* Anglo-Norman language
**Anglo-Norman literature
* Anglo-Norman England, or Norman England, the period in English history from 10 ...
gentry, like the Grendons, so some of the canons and abbots were perhaps from this class.
Rôles and responsibilities
Premonstratensian canons lived by the Rule of St. Augustine
The Rule of Saint Augustine, written about the year 400, is a brief document divided into eight chapters and serves as an outline for religious life lived in community. It is the oldest monastic rule in the Western Church.
The rule, developed ...
, as they still do. It is very short, prescribing little more than the daily office
In the practice of Christianity, canonical hours mark the divisions of the day in terms of Fixed prayer times#Christianity, fixed times of prayer at regular intervals. A book of hours, chiefly a breviary, normally contains a version of, or sel ...
, regular study and moderate work. The main restriction on movement is the requirement that canons travel and dine in pairs or larger groups. Interpretation and local variation were paramount in determining the character of the religious life. The Premonstratensians were influenced by the Cistercians
The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...
in their organisation and lifestyle, while most Augustinians
Augustinians are members of Christian religious orders that follow the Rule of Saint Augustine, written in about 400 AD by Augustine of Hippo. There are two distinct types of Augustinians in Catholic religious orders dating back to the 12th–13 ...
looked more to the Benedictines
, image = Medalla San Benito.PNG
, caption = Design on the obverse side of the Saint Benedict Medal
, abbreviation = OSB
, formation =
, motto = (English: 'Pray and Work')
, foun ...
for example. The prayer life of Premonstratensians has a strong Marian
Marian may refer to:
People
* Mari people, a Finno-Ugric ethnic group in Russia
* Marian (given name), a list of people with the given name
* Marian (surname), a list of people so named
Places
* Marian, Iran (disambiguation)
* Marian, Queenslan ...
focus and devotion to Mary was almost certainly a very important aspect of life in Dale Abbey, with a strong emphasis on key events in her life and death, as well as on the corresponding festivals. The abbey dated itself from a Feast of the Assumption
The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Pope Pius XII defined it in 1950 in his apostolic constitution ''Munificentissimus Deus'' as follows:
We proclaim and define it to be a dogma revealed by Go ...
. A wall painting in All Saints' Church, probably dating from the 13th century, depicts the Visitation, the encounter between Mary and her cousin Elizabeth
Elizabeth or Elisabeth may refer to:
People
* Elizabeth (given name), a female given name (including people with that name)
* Elizabeth (biblical figure), mother of John the Baptist
Ships
* HMS ''Elizabeth'', several ships
* ''Elisabeth'' (sch ...
, as told in . Elizabeth's greeting was incorporated in the Hail Mary
The Hail Mary ( la, Ave Maria) is a traditional Christian prayer addressing Mary, the mother of Jesus. The prayer is based on two biblical passages featured in the Gospel of Luke: the Angel Gabriel's visit to Mary (the Annunciation) and Mary's ...
, a key part of late medieval devotion, and the Visitation was celebrated by an annual festival, at that time on 2 July.
Unlike monks, who might or might not receive ordination
Ordination is the process by which individuals are Consecration, consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorization, authorized (usually by the religious denomination, denominational ...
, Premonstratensian canons normally progressed at least to the priesthood to preside at the altar
An altar is a table or platform for the presentation of religious offerings, for sacrifices, or for other ritualistic purposes. Altars are found at shrines, temples, churches, and other places of worship. They are used particularly in paga ...
s of their own church or of any dependent churches. The visitation documents most often refer to the priests, the great majority of canons at any time, as ',[ doers or makers of the holy, rather than as ', elders. However Redman's visitation of 1488 additionally describes Richard Bredon as ''presbiter'' of Stanton by Dale, as if it were the name of a position rather than an order, although the visitation of 1491 reverts to ''capellanus'', chaplain. In 1488 Richard of Nottingham was vicar of Ilkeston, another man of the same name vicar of Heanor, and John Monyash vicar at Kirk Hallam.][ These duties might call them away from the abbey, so they were sometimes resident elsewhere, although only Heanor was beyond convenient walking distance. Unusually, the visitation of 1500 found a Richard Bredon acting as chaplain at Ockbrook, so more than a quarter of the chapter were at that point engaged in parochial duties.
Although the vicars and chaplains also had ]pastoral
A pastoral lifestyle is that of shepherds herding livestock around open areas of land according to seasons and the changing availability of water and pasture. It lends its name to a genre of literature, art, and music (pastorale) that depicts ...
responsibilities, the essential work of all priests was to celebrate the Eucharist
The Eucharist (; from Greek , , ), also known as Holy Communion and the Lord's Supper, is a Christian rite that is considered a sacrament in most churches, and as an ordinance in others. According to the New Testament, the rite was instit ...
, not only or even generally as part of congregational worship, but in chantries for the donors of land and grantors of charters, including the royal family. The rationale of these depended on the Catholic theology of the Sacrifice of the Mass
Eucharist ( grc-gre, εὐχαριστία, eucharistía, thanksgiving) here refers to Holy Communion or the Body and Blood of Christ, which is consumed during the Catholic Mass or Eucharistic Celebration. "At the Last Supper, on the night he ...
and the belief that there was a "special fruit" of Christ's sacrifice that was applicable at the will and intention of the priest, a belief that was the focus of Lollard
Lollardy, also known as Lollardism or the Lollard movement, was a proto-Protestant Christian religious movement that existed from the mid-14th century until the 16th-century English Reformation. It was initially led by John Wycliffe, a Catholic ...
and, later, Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
, criticism of chantries. Donors, from the wealthy and powerful founders to peasants who granted a single acre, all expected prayers and masses for their souls. For many too there were beloved relatives to consider, like Richard de Jorz, whose soul was to benefit from the gift of a bovate in Stanton by his nephew, William of Sysonby. While most expected to be mentioned at the abbey itself, parish churches and chapels also had chantries operated by the canons, like the important Cantilupe chantry at Ilkeston, which required a daily mass.[ A chantry at Stanton be Dale is mentioned in a document of March 1482, in which Bishop Redman gives William Blackburn permission to serve it: this was in addition to John Green, the regular ''presbiter de Stanton''.
The allocation of responsibilities at Dale Abbey seems to have varied considerably. In 1488 Abbot John Stanley had both a prior and a subprior to assist him:][ a large management team for a convent totalling just 14, although the abbot was an old man. He also had John York serving as his private chaplain. As well as the four parish priests, there were also a ]cantor
A cantor or chanter is a person who leads people in singing or sometimes in prayer. In formal Jewish worship, a cantor is a person who sings solo verses or passages to which the choir or congregation responds.
In Judaism, a cantor sings and lead ...
, assisted by a succentor
The succentor ("under-singer") is the assistant to the precentor, typically in an ancient cathedral foundation, helping with the preparation and conduct of the liturgy including psalms, preces and responses. In English cathedrals today, the prie ...
, a cellarer
A cellarium (from the Latin ''cella'', "pantry"), also known as an ''undercroft'', was a storehouse or storeroom, usually in a medieval monastery or castle. In English monasteries, it was usually located in or under the buildings on the west range ...
, and a sacristan
A sacristan is an officer charged with care of the sacristy, the church, and their contents.
In ancient times, many duties of the sacrist were performed by the doorkeepers ( ostiarii), and later by the treasurers and mansionarii. The Decretals ...
, assisted by an under-sacristan: all but one of the convent thus had a specific office and set of responsibilities. Sometimes a visitation found no prior designated: just a subprior, usually assisted by a ''circator'', who was responsible for patrolling the claustral buildings.[ Sometimes ]deacon
A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian churches, such as the Catholic Churc ...
s are named: in 1494 these are John Bebe, who was the subsacristan, and George Slee, who was also titled the ''servitor infirmorum'', the hospital attendant.[ It seems that the posts of sacristan and under-sacristan were considered good training experience and suitable for a canon not yet ordained to the priesthood: in 1500 the under-sacristan, was Leonard North, who was one of the four ]novice
A novice is a person who has entered a religious order and is under probation, before taking vows. A ''novice'' can also refer to a person (or animal e.g. racehorse) who is entering a profession
A profession is a field of work that has ...
s in the abbey at that time, while in 1491 Ralph Makarelle was sacristan while still a deacon, and in 1488 both the sacristan and his assistant were novices. Sometimes a ''magister noviciorum'', master or teacher of novices, is named: William Lammas held the post in 1500.
Discipline and lapses
Discipline in the abbey largely depended on the relationship between the abbot and his canons, who were pledged to obey him. An essential part of maintaining outward and inner discipline was the practice of confession
A confession is a statement – made by a person or by a group of persons – acknowledging some personal fact that the person (or the group) would ostensibly prefer to keep hidden. The term presumes that the speaker is providing information th ...
: canons were expected to confess at least thee time a year to their superior, at least in the later decades.[ During the ootbreaks of plague in the mid-14th century, given the high mortality rate among clergy, both clergy and laity took the precaution of gaining papal permission to confess to someone of their own choosing: William Rempstone of Dale is recorded as doing so in November 1354, following his abbot, William of Horsley in 1351.
Brother Robert of Derby wrote to the former abbot Lawrence, probably around 1290, in terms that suggest he saw the abbot as a friend and spiritual adviser rather than a mouthpiece of authority. After asking for Lawrence's help in reinstating a lay brother who had left the order but sincerely wanted to return, he reported on his further spiritual journey, which involved a stay at remote ]Cockersand Abbey
Cockersand Abbey is a former abbey and former civil parish near Cockerham in the City of Lancaster district of Lancashire, England. It is situated near the mouth of the River Cocker. History
It was founded before 1184 as the Hospital of St Mar ...
.
For the rest, I have found in a desolate region a man after my own heart (viz. the Lord abbot of Cockersand), who showed me many things for your sake. I said I knew you well. May you, if you will, give him great thanks on my behalf in your letters. In all my prayers I desire to hear of your prosperity, which will come to pass, as I hope, when you give me your gracious reply to what I have written above. As for myself, your son and brother, know that I am well, as my health goes, though I should be even better if I could have the pleasure of conversing with you and enjoying your company. ''Valete''.
It seems unlikely that William of Horsley would have been used so frequently as a visitor unless Dale had good reputation for monastic discipline in the mid 14th century. However, there were clearly variations in reputation. When Redman wrote to Dale in 1474 announcing a visitation, he quoted and then referred to ''publica infame'', which hardly requires translation: the findings of the visitation are not known, but it was certainly additional to Redman's regular cycle, which brought a further visitation the next year. Not until 1478, when Dale was still under the same abbot, John Stanley, does anything of Redman's findings survive. In that year, the visitor general's conclusion was that: "we discovered good reputation, charity and peace, in head and limbs, and nothing criminal in need of correction by either us or the general chapter." His main reservations were that some unauthorised ceremonial practices had crept in, which he ordered to be discontinued, and that the quality of the food needed to be improved if the abbot were to avoid grumbling by the canons.
Some visitations provide evidence of personal crises, as well as serious infractions by particular canons. In 1482 John York had left the order but had been brought back "by the praiseworthy abbot's circumspection:" there must have been a full recovery of trust, as this is the man who was later to become the abbot's personal chaplain. In 1488 Richard Blackwall was found guilty of "vicious disobedience and open rebellion". It was proposed that he be sent to Alnwick Abbey
Alnwick Abbey was founded as a Premonstratensian monastery in 1147 by Eustace fitz John near Alnwick, England, as a daughter house of Newhouse Abbey in Lincolnshire. It was dissolved in 1535, refounded in 1536 and finally suppressed in 1539. ...
for forty days of severe punishment. However, his own convent interceded and had the punishment suspended to allow time for him to mend his ways.
In August 1491 Redman discovered that discipline was suffering because of the "impotence and imbecility" of the abbot and found it necessary to forbid the canons to gamble or keep hounds. The situation cannot have been helped by the presence of two canons who had been sent to Dale from other abbeys for punishment. William or Gyll or Gylling of Coverham Abbey
Coverham Abbey, North Yorkshire, England, was a Premonstratensian monastery that was founded at Swainby in 1190 by Helewisia, daughter of the Chief Justiciar Ranulf de Glanville. It was refounded at Coverham in about 1212 by her son Ranulf fit ...
was at Dale on unspecified disciplinary grounds: in 1478 it was said that "he had brought a woman into the dormitory for the satisfaction of his lust," but he had successfully denied the charge. His case was remitted to the provincial chapter of the following year, which transferred him permanently to Sulby Abbey
Sulby Abbey was a Premonstratensian house in Northamptonshire, England, founded in 1155 as daughter house of the Abbey of St. Mary and St. Martial in Newsham.
History
The abbey of Sulby was founded about the year 1155 for canons of the Premonst ...
.[Gasquet, F. A. (ed.) (1904)]
Collectanea Anglo-Premonstratensia, volume 1, p. 171, no. 90.
/ref> George Littleport had been sent the Dale in September 1489 by the previous provincial chapter, after being imprisoned for theft at his own house, West Dereham Abbey
West Dereham Abbey was an abbey in Norfolk, England.
St Mary's Abbey, West Dereham, was founded in 1188 by Hubert Walter, Dean of York, at his birthplace. It was to be a daughter house of Welbeck Abbey, Nottinghamshire, for canons regular of th ...
. Redman found that at Dale his conversation was "loose and irreligious" and sent him to join the chapter at Beauchief Abbey, a decision that was ratified by the next provincial chapter.[ Blackwall, who had remained at Dale after being found rebellious at the previous visitation, was found not to have reformed: he was placed last in the abbey's hierarchy and deprived of his vote and stall. The situation among the canons clearly worried Redman and it seems he induced Abbot John Stanley to resign, as two months later his pension and retirement were arranged.
Redman carried out another visitation in May 1494 and generally approved of the administration of the new abbot, Richard Nottingham. However, two of the canons were found guilty of sexual "incontinence." Both were sentenced to forty days of severe punishment. Edward Hampton was sent to reside at Dureford Abbey in ]Sussex
Sussex (), from the Old English (), is a historic county in South East England that was formerly an independent medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is bounded to the west by Hampshire, north by Surrey, northeast by Kent, south by the English ...
for five years. However, he probably left the order, as there are no further traces of him in documents relating to Premonstratensian houses. John Bebe, deacon and under-sacristan, had fathered a child by a woman called Margaret Hall and was sent to Halesowen Abbey
Halesowen Abbey was a Premonstratensian abbey in Halesowen, England of which only ruins remain. Founded by Peter des Roches with a grant of land from John of England, King John, the abbey's official year of inauguration was 1218. It acquired two ...
for seven years, although this was suspended for the next provincial chapter to ratify. This sent him instead to Sulby Abbey, for so long as should please the visitor. By 1500 he was back at Dale, acting as cantor. It is likely that he later became abbot.
Decline and dissolution
The last abbot
During his visitation of 1500 Redman found nothing requiring criticism at Dale. He commented that the number of canons was low because of the plague but he was confident numbers would recover as the abbey's means could accommodate them. The number was actually normal, sixteen including the abbot, although four of them were novices, an unusually large proportion. With the death of Richard Nottingham in 1510 the name and identity of the abbot becomes questionable. In the summons to a convocation
A convocation (from the Latin ''wikt:convocare, convocare'' meaning "to call/come together", a translation of the Ancient Greek, Greek wikt:ἐκκλησία, ἐκκλησία ''ekklēsia'') is a group of people formally assembled for a speci ...
of the Province of Canterbury
The Province of Canterbury, or less formally the Southern Province, is one of two ecclesiastical provinces which constitute the Church of England. The other is the Province of York (which consists of 12 dioceses).
Overview
The Province consist ...
in 1529 the abbot of Dale is named simply John. In the ''Valor Ecclesiasticus'' and in the "Black Book" he is named John Stanton.[St John Hope, W. H. (1883]
Abbots of the Abbey of St Mary de Parco Stanley, or Dale, Derbyshire, p. 98.
/ref> Thereafter the abbot is always named John Bebe. Colvin thought it likely John Bebe of Stanton was a single individual who held the abbacy from 1510 until the dissolution in 1538, although there can be no certainty.[Colvin, H. M. (1943)]
The Dissolution of Dale Abbey, p. 2.
/ref> It is also possible that this John Bebe was the same man who was sent to Halesowen for penance after fathering a child in 1494.
Standards
There were apparently no notable accusations against the abbey until its final years but what is known suggests that the life of abbots and canons did not match the standards of austerity expected in earlier centuries. The will of Johanna Holme, a widow of the parish of St Michael's Church, Derby, dated 1506, contains the clause:
"I bequeth to S Jamys Agarde my son Canon Regular of the monastery of oure lady of tha Dale xx'& vi yerdes of white wullen cloth A feyther bed A payr of Shetes and iiii. silv. spones"
In 1516 the abbot was present at an attempt to murder Thomas Mellers, the mayor of Nottingham, in the house of an alderman
An alderman is a member of a Municipal government, municipal assembly or council in many Jurisdiction, jurisdictions founded upon English law. The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking member of a borough or county council, a council membe ...
, John Williamson. Before the mercer
Mercer may refer to:
Business
* Mercer (car), a defunct American automobile manufacturer (1909–1925)
* Mercer (consulting firm), a large human resources consulting firm headquartered in New York City
* Mercer (occupation), a merchant or trader, ...
came into the dining room with a concealed dagger
A dagger is a fighting knife with a very sharp point and usually two sharp edges, typically designed or capable of being used as a thrusting or stabbing weapon.State v. Martin, 633 S.W.2d 80 (Mo. 1982): This is the dictionary or popular-use de ...
, the party, which also included the prior of Lenton, had been "assembled in a friendly manner and joyfully conversing and drinking wine." Feather beds, dinner parties and wine suggest expectations more in keeping with the prosperous burgesses and lower gentry with whom the canons socialised than the severe lifestyle envisaged by St Norbert
St. Norbert (french: Saint-Norbert) is a bilingual (French and English) neighbourhood and the southernmost suburb of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. While outside the Perimeter Highway (the orbital road that surrounds most of Winnipeg), it is ...
, the order's founder.
Preliminaries
The inquiry at Dale Abbey for the ''Valor Ecclesiasticus'' of 1535 was conducted Sir Henry Sacheverell, Sir Thomas Cokayn and Ralph Sacheverell, all from well-known Derbyshire gentry families. The income stood at £144 12 shillings, of which £114 15s. was contributed by temporalities
Temporalities or temporal goods are the secular properties and possessions of the church. The term is most often used to describe those properties (a ''Stift'' in German or ''sticht'' in Dutch) that were used to support a bishop or other religious ...
and £29 17s. by spiritualities Spiritualities is a term, often used in the Middle Ages, that refers to the income sources of a diocese or other ecclesiastical establishment that came from tithes. It also referred to income that came from other religious sources, such as offerings ...
, almost half of the latter coming from Heanor. About £37 was paid out to vicars and in fees to the archdeacon and diocese.
In 1536 Thomas Legh and Richard Layton
Richard is a male given name. It originates, via Old French, from Old Frankish and is a compound of the words descending from Proto-Germanic ''*rīk-'' 'ruler, leader, king' and ''*hardu-'' 'strong, brave, hardy', and it therefore means 'stron ...
carried out a tour of the Midlands, allegedly visiting 88 monasteries, including Dale, in just two weeks, looking for misconduct and superstition. Their report in the "Black Book" runs
It is possible that the allegations made against the abbot are simply a reheating of a very old scandal, the disgrace of the deacon John Bebe more than forty years earlier, although there can be no certainty that this was the same man. There are the same uncertainties with the canon who was criticised: a William, popularly known as Brampton, was removed from Easby Abbey
Easby Abbey, or the Abbey of St Agatha, is a ruined Premonstratensian abbey on the eastern bank of the River Swale on the outskirts of Richmond in the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, England. The site is privately owned but maintained ...
in 1491, on Redman's instructions and for unspecified offences, but it is unclear whether this was the same man, whether the offences were recent, or whether the accusations had any foundation at all. The relics of Mary and Catherine of Alexandria
Catherine of Alexandria (also spelled Katherine); grc-gre, ἡ Ἁγία Αἰκατερίνη ἡ Μεγαλομάρτυς ; ar, سانت كاترين; la, Catharina Alexandrina). is, according to tradition, a Christian saint and virgin, wh ...
are otherwise unknown.
Temporary reprieve
As the abbey's income was well below the threshold of £200 required for it to continue in existence, it would be expected to undergo suppression with the other "lesser" monasteries. However, on 30 January 1537 its exemption was recorded, as one of 33 smaller monasteries permitted to continue. The Court of Augmentations
Thomas Cromwell established the Court of Augmentations, also called Augmentation Court or simply The Augmentation in 1536, during the reign of King Henry VIII of England. It operated alongside three lesser courts (those of General Surveyors (1540 ...
account for the exemption was not filed until 29 September of the following year and revealed that Dale had paid a fine of £166 13s. 4d. for its exemption, more than its annual income. It is notable that none of the canons requested release from their vows, transfer to other houses or to become secular clergy
In Christianity, the term secular clergy refers to deacons and priests who are not monastics or otherwise members of religious life. A secular priest (sometimes known as a diocesan priest) is a priest who commits themselves to a certain geogra ...
, all options that were left open by the commissioners, so there was probably a unanimous desire to carry on the life of the community. However, by 1538 even large monasteries were tumbling into the king's hands as the commissioners exerted ever greater pressure.
Suppression
Dale Abbey and all its estates in Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire were surrendered to William Cavendish, the commissioner for the Crown, on 24 October 1538. Cavendish had begun a tour of religious houses in the Midlands due for dissolution on 15 October. He had dealt with six when he arrived at Dale and four more would follow it. he brought masons and carpenters to unroof the buildings, thus rendering them useless for further occupation. The deed of surrender was signed by Abbot John Bebe, Prior Richard Wheatley, John Gadman (possibly Cadman), Richard Hawsten (or Halsame), Thomas Bagshaw, William Smith, John Banks, John Shelmode, George (possibly Gregory) Coke, Robert Harvey, Ralph Harrison, Robert Wilson (or Herwood), James Cheryholme, James Cleyton, John Bateman, Robert Jerett (possibly Gerard) and Roger Page. Smith, Cleyton and Cheryholme all signed with marks, probably because they were illiterate or incapable. The abbot and canons were each given a sum of money on their departure. For the abbot it was the considerable sum of £6 13. 4. or ten marks. The other canons received either 40s. or 30.s, except for Bateman who got 20s. and Harrison, who went away with just 1 shilling. Various others received small payments, including 20s. for William Cooke, the parish priest of Stanley, and 8s. for "John of the Henhouse."[
On the day of surrender a jury of twelve local people assisted the commissioners in making a full inventory of "all such parcells of implements or householde stuffe, corne, catell, ornaments of the churche and such other lyke founde within the late monastery ther at the tyme of the dissolucon of the same house, soulde by the Kinges Comissionors to Fraunces Pole, esquier..." This included valuable items in the church, including two organs; reusable materials, including lead roofing and glass, in the cloister, valued at £6; valuable brass pots and other vessels in the kitchen, brewery and bakery; feather beds in all the private bedrooms, although none specified in the canons' dormitory, where the contents were valued at only 7s. 6d. There were considerable stores of foodstuffs at both the abbey itself and in the barns and storehouses at the granges, including grain, malt and livestock, as well as horses and " waynes" or carts. There is no mention of books.
The total value was given as £77 12s 2d. Cavendish seems to have let Francis Pole have £30 worth of the goods on account as he deposited a certificate:]"And Sir Wm. Cavendishe owes xxx. li by ffraunces Pole de Rodborne in the Countie of Derby, Armiger a debt to his Majestie ye King by an obligacione given 24 October in the xxx Regis predicti, to be paid on the Feast of the Nativitie 1540, as by an indenture and book more clearly appears."
The jury made a similar note of the shortfall in their inventory. As the commissioners had disbursed considerable payments to the abbot, canons and others, and had to buy fencing to secure the livestock during the sale, Francis Pole's failure to find the full price of his purchases on the day left them temporarily with no net profit: "And so remayneth in the seid Comissioners handes ''nil'', for they have payd more then they have recevyd by the summe of vij l. xvij s. vj d. (£7 7s 6d.)".
Except for a few items, the monastic buildings themselves, with all their valuable roofing and paving, including 200 fother
The load, also known as a fodder, fother, and charrus ( la, carrus, "cartload"), is a historic English unit of weight or mass of various amounts, depending on the era, the substance being measured, and where it was being measured. The term wa ...
s of lead worth a total of £800, were not sold. The roofs were not dismantled systematically: reporting on excavations carried out on the north transept
A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform ("cross-shaped") building withi ...
during 1878, St John Hope reported: "On the east side of this transept is a large square chapel, which originally had a vaulted roof, but, from the way in which the ribs lay on the floor, it is evident that it was demolished by knocking out the keystones, and letting the whole fall."
The six bells, totalling 47 cwt, were also unsold and remained so to the end of Henry VIII's reign. When Cavendish and Legh then returned to inspect them, they were only five in number and weighed 45 cwt., so a small bell had been stolen.
The pension roll of the former convent was later appended to the inventory. The abbot, with £26 13s. 4d. was allotted a much larger pension than any of the canons. Prior Richard Wheatley and five others received 106s. 8d. and the rest lesser amounts, with Jerett on only 16s 8d. One canon, Roger Page, did not qualify for a pension, as he opted to continue his work as vicar of Kirk Hallam, where the living was worth 40s.[ There were also fees and annuities to pay out. Sir Henry Sacheverell, who had assisted at the ''Valor Ecclesiasticus'', for example, received 26s. 8d. and the vicar of Spondon 40s. Sacheverell was also owed £6 13s 4d. and there were various other debts that had to be paid, not all in cash. The vicar of Heanor was owed 20s. but the vicar of Ilkeston some wax and the vicar of ]St Mary's Church, Nottingham
The Church of St Mary the Virgin is the oldest parish churchDomesday Book: A Complete Translation (Penguin Classics) of Nottingham, in Nottinghamshire, England. It is the largest church after the Cathedral in the city of Nottingham. The church ...
four oaks. There were also bills to pay for candles and building materials: brick, tile, iron and steel. These debts totalled £24 11s. 6d.[Walcott, M. E. C. (1871]
Inventories and Valuations of Religious Houses at the time of the Dissolution, p. 224.
/ref> To set against them there was just 20 shillings owed by Robert Nesse, the former bailiff, for woods and hedges in his farm, and not payable until the next Lady Day.
Considerable doubts were expressed about the honesty of Cavendish and Legh during the tour that involved the suppression of Dale Abbey. A commission was appointed to investigate and Sir John Daunce or Dauntesey was ordered by the king to submit a "Declaration for the trial of certain particular sums of money paid by William Cavendisshe, Commissioner appointed with Thomas Leighe, doctor in the law, for the dissolution of divers and sundry houses of religion hereafter ensuing, for the rewards and wages of divers and sundry persons being servants within the same."
The houses involved were listed beneath, Dale Abbey among them. It was alleged that, when the first payments had been recorded, "William Cavendish added sundry sums of money written with his own hand without knowledge of any of his said clerks." The sum in dispute came to £34 13s. 8d. There were also allegations that the pair had pocketed the proceeds of sales of plate from Merevale Abbey
Merevale is a small village and civil parish in the North Warwickshire district of the county of Warwickshire in England. Located about one and a half miles west of Atherstone, it is the site of a medieval Cistercian Abbey (founded in 1148) and ...
to a London goldsmith. It seems that the investigation came to nothing: Cavendish's career continued unimpeded.
After dissolution
The former chapter
The former canons and abbot continued to draw their pensions, in some cases for many years. In 1552, in the reign of Edward VI
Edward VI (12 October 1537 – 6 July 1553) was King of England and Ireland from 28 January 1547 until his death in 1553. He was crowned on 20 February 1547 at the age of nine. Edward was the son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour and the first E ...
, a commission was set up to collect information about the pensions of former monastic communities, as part of a campaign against abuses that had crept in because pensions were being bought and sold as financial investments. In Derbyshire this was conducted by four local landowners, all deeply involved in the new landscape created by the dissolutions of religious houses, which now included the chantries and collegiate church In Christianity, a collegiate church is a church where the daily office of worship is maintained by a college of canons: a non-monastic or "secular" community of clergy, organised as a self-governing corporate body, which may be presided over by a ...
es. The most senior, William Cavendish, was now allowing his government responsibilities to slip into chaos as he settled on his Derbyshire estates with Bess of Hardwick
Elizabeth Cavendish, later Elizabeth Talbot, Countess of Shrewsbury ( Hardwick; c. 1527 13 February 1608), known as Bess of Hardwick, of Hardwick Hall, Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire, was a notable figure of Elizabethan English society. By a series ...
. Sir John Byron was a heavy investor in Nottinghamshire monastic properties. Sir John Porte had bought most of the Dale Abbey estates in 1543[ and made himself perhaps the greatest landowner in Derbyshire;] Thomas Powtrell had bought Stanley Grange and other Dale properties in 1544. The commissioners were instructed:"ffirste ye shall enquire how many of the late Abbots Priours Abbesses prioresses Monkes Channons ffryers nonnys Incumbents and other mynyster of any Abbey Priory hospital howse of ffryers colleges chauntries ffree chapels guilds or ffratemityes and stipendiary priestes or eny other having rent chardge annuytie or pencion going oute or charged of any Abbey Priory hospital &c or out of any their possessions for term of life mentioned in a Sedule or book hereunto annexed be or shal be at the tyme of your session deade and what time and where every of them die."
A letter attached to the commissioners' report, dated 30 October 1552, prefaces a list of pensions and annuities due to be paid out in the year up to Michaelmas
Michaelmas ( ; also known as the Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, the Feast of the Archangels, or the Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels) is a Christian festival observed in some Western liturgical calendars on 29 September, a ...
by Robert Goche, the receiver for the Court of Augmentations in Cheshire, Derbyshire, Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire, 1547–53, and himself an enthusiastic dealer in former monastic properties. The list for Dale Abbey is headed by the fees of William and Henry Sacheverel, who were stewards of the abbey site, and then goes on to the eleven surviving canons, before listing the annuities of Cavendish's hangers-on, still being drawn 14 years after the day the abbey was suppressed. The abbot and prior are not included. The main body of the report then lists the commissioners' findings. For Dale Abbey all of the former canons' pensions are in arrears for six months or a year. The reason for the longer delay is given "as John Okeley." This man was the former prior of Gresley Priory
Gresley Priory was a monastery of Augustinian Canons regular in Church Gresley, Derbyshire, England, founded in the 12th century.
Following the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the priory church became the village's parish church of St George a ...
: as his name is first on the list for the whole county, he is used as reference point for the rest. Okeley had attested that his pension was in arrears because "Mr. Gooche sayd he had a commyssion for the first half yere to stey the payment thereof until the Kyng's mejestyez pleasure were knowen." The advent of the commission, intended to rectify wrongs, had been used as an excuse to postpone payments to the pensioners intended to benefit from it. Of the former canons, Cleyton, Bateman and Gerard had not appeared before the commission. Cadman displayed a deed of the abbey awarding him a corrody
A corrody () was a lifetime allowance of food and clothing, and often shelter and care, granted by an abbey, monastery, or other religious house. While rarely granted in the modern era, corrodies were common in the Middle Ages. They were routinely ...
of 40s. in addition to his pension: this was also in arrears. Former prior Richard Wheatley gave evidence that ex-abbot John Bebe (given as Bebye) had died as early as St Gregory's day (March 12) 1540 at Stanley Grange; Thomas Bagshaw had died at Little Eaton
Little Eaton is a village and civil parish in the English county of Derbyshire. The population as taken at the 2011 Census was 2,430. The name originated from Anglo Saxon times and means the "little town by the water".
It is on the former rou ...
in 1542; William Smith at Stanley Grange around the same time; Robert Harvey at Alton, Staffordshire
Alton ( ) is a village in Staffordshire, England. It is noted for the theme park Alton Towers, built around the site of Alton Mansion, which was owned by the Earls of Shrewsbury, and designed by Augustus Pugin. In the 1914 map by Whiston, there ...
in 1543; and Robert Herwood in 1545. Cadman's evidence about the fate of his former brothers was confusing: he assured the commissioners that Richard Wheatley had been dead for seven years. All of the canons interviewed and listed in 1552 were still alive in 1555/6, in the reign of Mary I
Mary I (18 February 1516 – 17 November 1558), also known as Mary Tudor, and as "Bloody Mary" by her Protestant opponents, was Queen of England and Ireland from July 1553 and Queen of Spain from January 1556 until her death in 1558. She ...
, when a pension list was compiled, but thereafter nothing is known of them.
Estates
The inventory makes clear that Francis Pole of Radbourne, Derbyshire
Radbourne is a small village and civil parish in the English county of Derbyshire, a few miles west of Derby. As the population of the civil parish taken at the 2011 census was less than 100 details are included in the civil parish of Etwall.
O ...
had taken over the estates of Dale Abbey on 23 October 1538,[ the day before he failed to pay in full for the contents he had selected. A record of 1540 mentions the granges of Ockbrook and South-house (Sothome), two other granges, a coal mine in Stanley Field, a water mill and tanhouse (presumably a ]tannery
Tanning may refer to:
*Tanning (leather), treating animal skins to produce leather
*Sun tanning, using the sun to darken pale skin
**Indoor tanning, the use of artificial light in place of the sun
**Sunless tanning, application of a stain or dye t ...
) in Dale and pasture in Dale and Ilkeston:[ useful pieces of information about the abbey possessions, but not a full account. As Pole was leasing the land from the Crown, dealings began in the reversions when Alice Bromley, a London widow, invested £265 18s. 4d. in the reversions and rents for 21 years of various properties in Dale and Stanley in December 1542. Such dealings could undermine the value of the estates and enmesh them in unwelcome legal complexities. Pole simplified matters in February 1544 by converting his leasehold tenure to a grant in fee For this he paid £489 0s. 10d., although this also covered some lands in Yorkshire previously held by Wykeham Priory and the ]Knights Hospitaller
The Order of Knights of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem ( la, Ordo Fratrum Hospitalis Sancti Ioannis Hierosolymitani), commonly known as the Knights Hospitaller (), was a medieval and early modern Catholic Church, Catholic Military ord ...
.[Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, volume 19.1, no. 141/56.](_blank)
/ref> This must have been part of a plan to sell at a profit, as Pole and Katharine, his wife, obtained licences to alienate both groups of estates only a few days later, on 22 February. The Yorkshire land went to Richard and Ellen Hutchinson, Yorkshire gentry already resident in Wykeham, but the much larger portfolio of Derbyshire estates were sold to John Porte,[ his uncle.
]
Porte left his vast estates to his co-heirs, three daughters.[ Elizabeth, who inherited the family seat at ]Etwall
Etwall () is a village and civil parish in Derbyshire, England, southwest of Derby on the A50. The population at the 2011 Census was 2,906.
Geography
Etwall is located between the A516 bypass and the A50 in south Derbyshire. The A516 draws hea ...
, married Sir Thomas Gerard of Bryn: the pair were known to be Catholic recusant
Recusancy (from la, recusare, translation=to refuse) was the state of those who remained loyal to the Catholic Church and refused to attend Church of England services after the English Reformation.
The 1558 Recusancy Acts passed in the reign ...
s during the reign of Elizabeth I and their younger son, John Gerard
John Gerard (also John Gerarde, c. 1545–1612) was an English herbalist with a large garden in Holborn, now part of London. His 1,484-page illustrated ''Herball, or Generall Historie of Plantes'', first published in 1597, became a popular gard ...
was to leave a valuable record of his life as an underground Jesuit
, image = Ihs-logo.svg
, image_size = 175px
, caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits
, abbreviation = SJ
, nickname = Jesuits
, formation =
, founders ...
priest. They were to face constant financial difficulties as a result of their religious and political choices and Thomas was imprisoned for a time, accused of involvement in a plot to free Mary, Queen of Scots
Mary, Queen of Scots (8 December 1542 – 8 February 1587), also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland, was Queen of Scotland from 14 December 1542 until her forced abdication in 1567.
The only surviving legitimate child of James V of Scot ...
. Margaret married Thomas Stanhope, one of a large Nottinghamshire family of politically active brothers. Michael
Michael may refer to:
People
* Michael (given name), a given name
* Michael (surname), including a list of people with the surname Michael
Given name "Michael"
* Michael (archangel), ''first'' of God's archangels in the Jewish, Christian an ...
, their father had been executed in 1552 as a supporter of Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset
Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset (150022 January 1552) (also 1st Earl of Hertford, 1st Viscount Beauchamp), also known as Edward Semel, was the eldest surviving brother of Queen Jane Seymour (d. 1537), the third wife of King Henry VI ...
, who had married their aunt, Anne Stanhope
Anne Elizabeth Stanhope, Countess of Chesterfield (''née'' Weld-Forester; 7 September 1802 – 27 July 1885) was known as a political confidante.
Life
Stanhope was born in 1802, the eldest daughter of Cecil Weld-Forester, 1st Baron Forester, M. ...
. Dorothy married Sir George Hastings, who later became Earl of Huntingdon
Earl of Huntingdon is a title which has been created several times in the Peerage of England. The medieval title (1065 creation) was associated with the ruling house of Scotland (David I of Scotland, David of Scotland).
The seventh and most rec ...
. In 1568 Elizabeth and Margaret, with their respective husbands, sold their shares of the manor of Dale and a large part of the lands to their sister Dorothy and Hastings, with the provision that the estates pass to Dorothy's descendants.[ If Dorothy and Hastings seemed best placed to hold the estates together at the time, their own financial position weakened as their dignity rose because the Huntingdon lands, which George inherited from his brother, ]Henry Hastings, 3rd Earl of Huntingdon
Henry Hastings, 3rd Earl of Huntingdon, KG, KB (c. 153514 December 1595) was an English Puritan nobleman. Educated alongside the future Edward VI, he was briefly imprisoned by Mary I, and later considered by some as a potential successor to E ...
, were heavily encumbered — to the extent that the widow refused to bury her husband or administer his estate. With such a difficult inheritance, the descendants of Hastings and Dorothy chose to sell some of their assets: the Dale estates were bought by Sir Henry Willoughby of Risley Hall and were soon subject to the processes of division, dispersal and recombination that were inevitable in a property market, making the trail is more complex and difficult to follow. Moieties of the manor passed during the 17th century to parts of the Grey family, who held the title Earl of Stamford
Earl of Stamford was a title in the Peerage of England. It was created in 1628 for Henry Grey, 2nd Baron Grey of Groby. This Grey family descended through Lord John Grey, of Pirgo, Essex, younger son of Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dorset, ...
and to the D'Ewes baronets
The d'Ewes Baronetcy, of Stowlangtoft Hall in the County of Suffolk, was a title in the Baronetage of England. It was created on 15 July 1641 for the antiquary and politician Sir Simonds d'Ewes. He was the son of Paul d'Ewes (d.1624), whose mu ...
.
By a process of marriage, inheritance and purchase, the manor was reunited in 1778 in the hands of Philip Stanhope, 2nd Earl Stanhope
Philip Stanhope, 2nd Earl Stanhope, FRS (15 August 1714 – 7 March 1786) was a British peer.
The son of James Stanhope, 1st Earl Stanhope, and Lucy Pitt, he succeeded to his father's titles in 1721. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society from 17 ...
. Although the Stanhope family now owned the site and a considerable estates in the area, most of Francis Pole's original purchase had been dispersed among numerous landowners.
Lay bishop
As the Premonstratensian abbeys were all exempt from the jurisdiction of the local bishop, their abbots effectively had episcopal rights within their own parish. The dissolution of an abbey meant that the lay impropriator
In law and government, appropriation (from Latin ''appropriare'', "to make one's own", later "to set aside") is the act of setting apart something for its application to a particular usage, to the exclusion of all other uses.
It typically refers ...
was considered to inherit these powers and so was considered lay bishop. In the case of Dale parish, the lords of the manor claimed this title and function. Licences for weddings and probate
Probate is the judicial process whereby a will is "proved" in a court of law and accepted as a valid public document that is the true last testament of the deceased, or whereby the estate is settled according to the laws of intestacy in the sta ...
were both ecclesiastical issues until the mid-19th century, so the lay bishop dealt with both through a Peculiar Court.
In 1900 Revd R. Jowett Burton, then curate of Dale published a transcript of the register of All Saints' Church, pointing out that although the church at that time expected to solemnize about three marriages per year, there had been 38 in 1685 and 46 in the following year. This was because under the rules of the Preculiar Court, couples could marry at Dale for a fee of one shilling and the parish clerk could preside when the minister was not available. The Peculiar kept the fees competitive to draw in couples from nearby parishes and the fees were contributed to poor relief. This arrangement was partly disrupted by the Marriage Act 1753
The Clandestine Marriages Act 1753, also called the Marriage Act 1753, long title "An Act for the Better Preventing of Clandestine Marriage", popularly known as Lord Hardwicke's Marriage Act (citation 26 Geo. II. c. 33), was the first statutor ...
, which made the presence of an authorised Anglican minister necessary. A list of wills proved by the Peculiar Court of Dale in the late 18th century was published in 1892 by the legal historian William Phillimore Watts Phillimore
William Phillimore Watts Phillimore (formerly Stiff) MA BCL (27 October 1853 – 9 April 1913) was an English solicitor, genealogist and publisher.
Early life
William Phillimore Watts Stiff was born on 27 October 1853 in Nottingham, the eldest ...
and local probate matters continued to be the preserve of the court until 1857. By this time the Church Discipline Act of 1840 had already deprived the clergy of peculiars of their authority over marriages.
While the lay-bishop had a role, the Earls Stanhope took it seriously, particularly the fourth earl, whose status as lay-bishop is attested on his memorial tablet in All Saints' Church, Dale Abbey. A lay-bishop's throne, apparently from his period, is also housed in the church at the front of the chancel on the south side.
Abbey buildings
The decay of the abbey buildings was intentional, as the commissioners had the roof removed to make it uninhabitable, thus hurrying the former chapter on to their new homes. However, Dale seems to have suffered more than most from use as a convenient quarry for new buildings. It was probably Sir Henry Sacheverell, the steward, who removed to Morley Morley may refer to:
Places England
* Morley, Norfolk, a civil parish
* Morley, Derbyshire, a civil parish
* Morley, Cheshire, a village
* Morley, County Durham, a village
* Morley, West Yorkshire, a suburban town of Leeds and civil parish
* M ...
church a large part of the cloister, with painted glass, an arch and a tomb slab. Sir Henry Willoughby used a large quantity of stone from Dale to build a wall to surround Risley Hall. Local antiquaries found evidence of the reuse of stone from Dale in mason's mark
A mason's mark is an engraved symbol often found on dressed stone in buildings and other public structures.
In stonemasonry
Regulations issued in Scotland in 1598 by James VI's Master of Works, William Schaw, stated that on admission to the guil ...
s on local buildings, notably sixteen such marks on a single building in Stanton by Dale, probably the work of Michael Willoughby in the late 16th century. One even turned up on a lock on the Erewash Canal
The Erewash Canal is a broad canal in Derbyshire, England. It runs just under and has 14 canal lock, locks. The first lock at Langley Mill, Langley Bridge is part of the Cromford Canal.
Origins
The canal obtained its act of parliament in ...
. A number of houses at Dale incorporate stone from the abbey. The ground floor of the northern end of Friar House, for example, is built of dressed stone, contrasting with the timber framing of the rest of the building. Abbey House incorporates a large section of abbey masonry which has escaped dispersal, a chimney and fireplaces, thought to be part of the abbey kitchen. However, the abbey still had a considerable amount above ground in 1727, when it was drawn for Samuel and Nathaniel Buck
Samuel Buck (1696 – 17 August 1779) and his brother Nathaniel Buck (died 1759/1774) were English engraving, engravers and printmaking, printmakers, best known for their ''Buck's Antiquities'', depictions of ancient castles and monasterie ...
's ''Views of Ruins of Castles and Abbeys in England''. While the great east window was much as today, the entire south wall of the nave still stood, large parts of the adjoining claustral buildings were recognisable and the gateway to a garden or close on the north side of the church was visible. In 1730 William Stukeley
William Stukeley (7 November 1687 – 3 March 1765) was an English antiquarian, physician and Anglican clergyman. A significant influence on the later development of archaeology, he pioneered the scholarly investigation of the prehistoric ...
found the kitchen, hall (presumably the refectory), abbot's parlour in good condition, with ceilings still panelled in oak, and a gatehouse. He made a plan that was very rough but nevertheless gave a clear idea of the surviving abbey church and cloisters. On an earlier visit, before 1724, he had been more interested in the hermitage, which he illustrated for his ''Itinerarium curiosum''
The decay of the building in the mid-18th century must have been very rapid. A landscape featuring the abbey painted by Joseph Wright of Derby
Joseph Wright (3 September 1734 – 29 August 1797), styled Joseph Wright of Derby, was an English landscape and portrait painter. He has been acclaimed as "the first professional painter to express the spirit of the Industrial Revolution".
Wr ...
in the 1780s makes clear that the east window was the most striking feature of the site. In 1789 John Byng
Admiral John Byng (baptised 29 October 1704 – 14 March 1757) was a British Royal Navy officer who was court-martialled and executed by firing squad. After joining the navy at the age of thirteen, he participated at the Battle of Cape Passa ...
discovered:"Of all that is described in the print uck's as existing only 6o years ago, (belonging to noblemen, to whom we join an idea of taste) nothing now remains but the lofty arch, which P. did not walk down to, but I took post as near as I dared from a vicious bull, and executed a drawing with more success (I think) than usual. Indeed this bull was its only guard: and I must again express my wonted surprise that a nobleman (of taste I have heard Ld. Stamford to be) who owns, and sometimes visits it, shou'd not enclose, and plant about it; and then it wou'd appear to great advantage."
James Pilkington's comments of the same year confirm Byng's impression:According to tradition the church at Dale was a very grand and magnificent building. It contained several large windows on the north and south sides, and one at the east end in the chancel, which was very spacious and lofty. The arch is yet standing. It is nearly perfect and looks very beautiful.
So by this date the building looked very much as it does today: reduced to its east window and a few less obvious traces, like the kitchen chimney at Abbey House, with only footings to mark its former extent. There was a superstition that if the arch collapsed the village would be subject to tithes.[Colvin, H. M. (1943)]
The Dissolution of Dale Abbey, p. 23—4.
/ref>
File:Dale Abbey 2019 Friars House 01.jpg, Friars House.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 Abbey House 01.jpg, Southern end of Abbey House.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 east window - east02.jpg, External view of the chancel east window.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 east window - west02.jpg, Internal view of the east window, showing moulding and other decoration.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 ruins south overview crossing 01.jpg, South east part of the ruins, showing the outlines of the chancel and south chancel aisle, south transept in the foreground.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 column base south east crossing 01.jpg, Base of a column that stood at the south east corner of the crossing, one of the four main supports for the central tower.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 east window - interior01.jpg, View of the east window from the interior. A small part of the return of the north chancel wall is visible on the left.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 ruins night stairs 01.jpg, Remains of the stairs used by the canons to enter the abbey church for night worship.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 ruins south transept 01.jpg, Footings of south transept and base of a column. The shed in the background is the museum, on the site of the chapter house.
File:Dale Abbey 2019 chapter house vaulting 01.jpg, Parts of the roof vaulting of the chapter house.
See also
*Grade I listed buildings in Derbyshire
There are over 9000 Grade I listed buildings in England. This page is a list of these buildings in the county of Derbyshire, sub-divided by district.
Amber Valley
Bolsover
Chesterfield
City of Derby
...
* Listed buildings in Dale Abbey
Footnotes
References
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* At Hathi Trust
HathiTrust Digital Library is a large-scale collaborative repository of digital content from research libraries including content digitized via Google Books and the Internet Archive digitization initiatives, as well as content digitized locally ...
.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* At Hathi Trust.
* At Google Books.
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
Derbyshire Archaeological Journal (formerly Journal of the Derbyshire Archaeological and Natural History Society, list of volumes.
Listing for Abbey Ruins
at Historic England
Historic England (officially the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission for England) is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. It is tasked wit ...
.
Visiting arrangements for abbey ruins at Historic England.
Listing for Church of All Saints and Vergers Farmhouse at Historic England.
Visiting arrangements for All Saints Church at Historic England.
Listing for Hermitage 170m south east of All Saints Church at Historic England.
Listing for Medieval iron working remains at Stanley monastic grange at Historic England.
{{coord, 52.9443, -1.3503, display=title
1200s establishments in England
Religious organizations established in the 1200s
1538 disestablishments in England
Premonstratensian monasteries in England
Grade I listed buildings in Derbyshire
Grade I listed monasteries
Monasteries in Derbyshire
Ruins in Derbyshire
Borough of Erewash
Monasteries dissolved under the English Reformation