Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 37.djvu/276

 attempt to renew the policy of Stephen Langton had been but a sorry failure.

Thrown back upon the purely ecclesiastical side of his office, Meopham showed considerable activity in holding church councils and visiting his province. The first of his provincial councils was held at St. Paul's on 27 Jan. 1329, which was begun by the archbishop preaching a long sermon to the clergy (Ann. Paul. p. 344). The proceedings continued until 10 Feb., on which day the prelates assembled at St. Paul's, where the archbishop solemnly excommunicated those who had taken part in the murder of Bishop Stapleton of Exeter, those who had plundered and burnt the abbeys of St. Edmundsbury and Abingdon, and the other robbers of church property during the troubles incident on the deposition of Edward II. A large number of canons were promulgated, which, in Murimuth's opinion, were arrived at too hastily. It was ordered that no manual work should be done on Good Friday and All Souls' day; that the feast of the Conception of the Virgin should be observed in all churches; and, in order that poor men should be able to bequeath freely their property by will, ordinaries were forbidden to take fees for the probate of testaments dealing with estates of less value than a hundred shillings (, ii. 552–4; Ann. Paul. pp. 344–5;, p. 59).

In 1329 Meopham summoned a convocation of the clergy of his province to Lambeth, which refused to grant any money to the king (Ann. Paul. p. 348). In 1330 another council at London forbade any persons from becoming hermits without the permission of their diocesan. In 1332 a council at Mayfield, Sussex, drew up canons for the better observance of Sundays and holy days, the results of which were communicated by Meopham in a circular addressed to his suffragans.

Meopham's zeal for the rights of the church of Canterbury was tempered neither by tact nor by knowledge. In 1329 he refused to institute the Cardinal Annibale de Ceccano, archbishop of Naples, on whom the pope had conferred the church of Maidstone. John XXII grew angry, cited Meopham to the papal curia, and suspended him from his office, but was soon pacified and restored the archbishop (ib. p. 347). Meopham now entered into a series of systematic visitations of his province, which soon embroiled him fatally with his suffragans. He began with the see of Rochester, against whose bishop, Haymo Heath, a series of charges was brought, which was investigated by a commission appointed by the archbishop (, ii. 556). The bishop was fined and excommunicated, but was soon reconciled to Meopham and became his fast friend. In 1330, when Meopham reopened the frivolous old contention with regard to the right of the Archbishop of York to have his cross borne erect before him in the southern province, the Bishop of Rochester was the only one of the suffragans of Canterbury who gave him any support, and advised him to refuse to appear in parliament until the rights of the primatial see had been duly acknowledged ( in Anglia Sacra, i. 370–1).

Meopham's persistence in his visitations sufficiently explains the lukewarmness of his suffragans in backing up his claims. He visited in succession the dioceses of Chichester, Salisbury, and Bath and Wells. In 1331 he kept his Christmas at Wiveliscombe, and in the spring proposed to proceed with the visitation of Exeter. The Bishop of Exeter, John Grandison [q. v.], had already annoyed Meopham by refusing to attend his council in 1328 because of the enormous expense involved and the great danger incurred in leaving his unruly diocese. Meopham now threatened all sorts of penalties against Grandison and his clerks. Grandison therefore appealed to the pope to prevent Meopham proceeding with his visitation. Meopham took no notice of the appeal, and on 1 June 1332 appeared with a great train before the gates of Exeter. But a body of armed men surrounded the cathedral and cloisters, and prevented the archbishop from effecting an entrance (Ann. Paul. pp. 356–7;, p. 65). Meopham and his followers remained in the neighbourhood, and a pitched battle was only prevented by the intervention of the king, who persuaded Meopham to desist for a time from holding his visitation. Another provincial council was summoned to London to settle the matter, but the other bishops took up the cause of Grandison, and, by reason of the discord between Meopham and his suffragans, no result was arrived at.

Not content with quarrelling with the pope, the Archbishop of York and the suffragans of his province, Meopham was always on the verge of a quarrel with Henry of Eastry and the monks of Christ Church, and plunged into a hot dispute with the monks of St. Augustine's Abbey at Canterbury. In 1329, while visiting his own diocese, Meopham had required the convent of St. Augustine's to produce the evidence on which were based their claims to the appropriation of a larger number of Kentish churches. The abbot and monks refused to justify their well-known and long-