Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 41.djvu/194

 with France, and on 3 Sept. 1350 to confirm the articles with the count lately considered at Dunkirk. By this time he had risen to be the king's secretary. On 4 Sept. 1351 Northburgh had power to receive security from Charles de Blois for his release, and on 26 March 1352, when he was keeper of the privy seal, to receive Charles's ransom. On 19 Feb. 1353 he was appointed one of three to treat for a truce with France, and again on various occasions up to 30 March 1354 (ib. iii. 175, 188, 202, 230, 241, 253–4, 260–1, 275). On 3 Nov. 1353 he had received a pension of 60s. from Christ Church, Canterbury, for his services as counsel to the convent (Lit. Cant. iii. 317). On 23 April 1354 Northburgh was elected bishop of London. His election was confirmed next day; but, though he received the temporalities on 23 June, he was not consecrated till 12 July 1355 by William Edendon, bishop of Winchester, at St. Mary's, Southwark (, Reg. Sacr. Angl.) After his election as bishop, Northburgh was again commissioned to conduct the negotiations for peace with France at the papal court on 28 Aug. and 30 Oct. 1354. With this purpose he was at Avignon shortly before Christmas; but the French envoys repudiated the proposed terms, and, after the death of the Bishop of Norwich, the other English envoys returned home without having effected their purpose (Fœdera, iii. 283, 289;, p. 421). In the following July Northburgh was once more employed in negotiations with the French at Guisnes (Fœdera, iii. 303, 308). On 27 Sept. 1360 he was present at the consecration of Robert Stretton as bishop of Lichfield. Northburgh died of the plague at Copford, Essex, on 9 Sept. 1361, and, in accordance with the directions of his will, was buried near the west door of St. Paul's Cathedral.

Northburgh's will is dated 23 May 1361. By it he left 100l. for the maintenance of poor scholars of the civil and canon law at Oxford, with 20l. for their master. Various other bequests were made to religious houses, but the chief was of 2,000l. for the Carthusian house at Newchurchhaw, which place and patronage he had acquired from Sir Walter de Manny. He is probably entitled to share with Manny the credit of being the founder of the London Charterhouse [see more fully under ]. Northburgh also left a thousand marks for a chest for loans at St. Paul's. He bequeathed his books on civil and canon law, and also his own magnum opus, called a ‘Concordance of Law and Canons,’ to Michael Fre. Nothing more is known of this ‘Concordance.’ Northburgh's two letters descriptive of the campaign of 1346 are preserved in the original French in Robert de Avesbury's ‘Chronicle,’ pp. 358–60, 367–9. A Latin version of the first is given by Murimuth, pp. 212–14; the second is printed in Champollion-Figeac's ‘Lettres des Rois, Reines,’ &c., ii. 79–81. These letters are a valuable contribution to our knowledge of the campaign. Their importance is illustrated by M. S. Luce in the notes to the third volume of his edition of Froissart. 

NORTHBURGH, ROGER (d. 1359?), bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, was perhaps a native of Norbury, Staffordshire, and educated at Cambridge. He must have entered the king's service at an early age. The first mention of him as a royal clerk is on 27 Oct. 1310 (Cal. Close Rolls, Edw. II, 1307–13, p. 337). He received from the king the livings of ‘Botelbrigge,’ Lincoln, on 16 Sept. 1311, Sprotton, Lincoln, on 17 April 1312, and ‘Harwe’ on 16 May 1313 (Cal. Pat. Rolls, Edw. II, pp. 392, 454, 473). On 18 Jan. 1312 he received a pension of five marks from the Bishop of Durham, and in the following March he is mentioned as a royal messenger (Reg. Pal. Dunelm. i. 278, iv. 103). On 5 Oct. the abbey of Cerne was ordered to provide him with a fitting pension. In December he was one of the witnesses to the pacification between the king and the earls (Fœdera, ii. 192). In May 1313 he went abroad with the king for two months (ib. ii. 212). Godwin says that he was taken prisoner by the Scots in this year; if so his captivity was of short duration. On 16 June 1314 he had custody of the church of Ford, Durham, and on 26 Nov. received it to hold in commendam for six months, being then styled ‘priest and rector of Bannes, Carlisle’ (Reg. Pal. Dunelm. i. 564, 646). In 1315 he was made custos or comptroller of the wardrobe, in succession to William de Melton (d. 1340) [q. v.] (Rot. Parl. i. 344). On 11 June he received the prebend of Wistow, York; this preferment was followed by the prebends of Farendon cum Balderton, Lincoln, in 1316, of Newington, London, 1 Jan. 1317, and of Piona Parva and Well-