The Holy Maid of Leominster, known only as Elizabeth, was installed in the

rood loft The rood screen (also choir screen, chancel screen, or jubé) is a common feature in late medieval church architecture. It is typically an ornate partition between the chancel and nave, of more or less open tracery constructed of wood, stone, o ...

above the

chancel In church architecture, the chancel is the space around the altar, including the choir and the sanctuary (sometimes called the presbytery), at the liturgical east end of a traditional Christian church building. It may terminate in an apse. Ove ...

of the priory of

Leominster Leominster ( ) is a market town in Herefordshire, England, at the confluence of the River Lugg and its tributary the River Kenwater. The town is north of Hereford and south of Ludlow in Shropshire. With a population of 11,700, Leominster is t ...

by its prior in the late 15th or early 16th century. The prior claimed that she had been sent by God, and that she could survive without either food or drink except for "Aungels foode" ( communion bread). Elizabeth had no need to descend to the chapel for her sustenance, as during

Mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different elementar ...

the bread was seen to fly up out of the prior's hands and into her mouth.

Margaret Beaufort Lady Margaret Beaufort (usually pronounced: or ; 31 May 1441/43 – 29 June 1509) was a major figure in the Wars of the Roses of the late fifteenth century, and mother of King Henry VII of England, the first Tudor monarch. A descendant of ...

, the mother of King Henry VII, had convened a council whose task was to investigate cases like those of the Holy Maid, who had developed a cult following, and attracted visitors seeking cures and blessings. Upon investigating Elizabeth's living quarters they discovered excrement that had "no saintly savour", meat bones hidden under her bed, and perhaps most damning of all, a thin wire extending from the altar to her loft. Margaret ordered that Elizabeth was to be removed from the chapel, following which the latter confessed that she was in reality the prior's mistress. The pair were punished by being ordered to perform a public penance.

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* {{refend Hoaxes in England 16th-century hoaxes Leominster History of Herefordshire