Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 2.djvu/250

 242

NOTES AND QUERIES. & s. n. SEPT. 24,

Little as we know of the organization and history of the Augustales, there are points of resemblance between them and the monastic orders. Of the former Prof. Wayte writes :

" Under later emperors the institution spread throughout the empire, and one object of it was probably to open a career of honour elsewhere to the libertini, who were purposely kept down at Rome. There was a property qualification required, which is not stated, but must have been consider- able ; besides the sacrifices, they had to pay a fine on admission (summa honoraria) and give games and other treats to the people. These admission fees went into the chest of the municipality, not into a corporate fund of their own ; they were thus an orao, not a collegium. In return they had the dis- tinction of the prcetexta while in office, and might also be buried in it ; that of the bisellium, with a place of honour in the theatre ; and were accom- panied on state occasions by two lictors bearing fasces. We are reminded of some of the incidents of municipal dignity in modern times."*

It is remarkable that English monasteries provided games for the people. For instance, the Prior of Tutbury provided a bull-running every year. At St. Edmunds-bury a white bull used to be brought in procession yearly to the bier of St. Edmund. The monks of St. Edmunds-bury claimed and exercised the right of appointing the prefects,t bailiffs, or mayors of that town, and even carried on the municipal business themselves. In the twelfth century, however, this right began to pass into the hands of the burgesses, though the change was stoutly resisted by the monastery. On the death of Abbot Hugh in 1192 the custodians of the abbey wished to depose the prefects of the town and to appoint new prefects, alleging that this power rested in the king. The monastery complained of this to the king's justiciar, and in the end the old prefects of the town were deposed by the joint consent of the monastery and of the custodians. But as soon as Samson, the new abbot, had been elected he asserted, at a meeting in the chapter-house, the rights of the monastery to the appointment of prefects :

" And, at the same hour, two burgesses, Godfrey and Nicholas, were appointed prefects, and, it being disputed from whose hand they should receive the horn, which is called moot-horn, at length they re- ceived it from the hand of the prior, who, next to the abbot, is the head of the conventual affairs. Those two prefects kept their office (bailivam suam) peace- fully for many years, until they were accused of negli- gence in maintaining the king's peace. Thereupon, the abbot having demanded that greater security should be given to the convent in this matter, the

i. 259.
 * In Smith's 'Diet, of Greek and Roman Antiq.,'

t Prof. Wayte, however, says that the Augustales in the municipia were an intermediate class between the municipal senators (decuriones) and plebs (municipes).

prefects were removed, and Hugh the sacristan received the town into his keeping, appointing new agents who would be responsible to him for the towa government (prefectura)."

The chronicler goes on to say : "However, in the process of time, I know not how, new prefects were appointed elsewhere than in the chapter-house, and without the authority of the convent."*

After various disputes, and after com- plaints by the monastery that the burgesses had encroached on the market-place (forum) by erecting shops, booths, and stalls there, the matter was partly adjusted in the year 1194, when Abbot Samson by a charter con- firmed the customs of the burgesses,t and declared that every man who held a mansura in burgage tenure should pay a farthing half- yearly, presumably to the monastery. Long after this period, however, disputes between the monastery and the burgesses continued to arise.

The canons of Southwell "exercised also the. municipal power of assizes of bread and ale, and punished forestallers, regraters, and adulterators, and other like offenders."! Their house was of unknown origin. Their chapter was a republic, and, like Ripon, acknowledged no head.

To return to the Priory of Hexham and the ancient forms of its name, we have to consider the A.-S. hagosteald (or, as Etmiiller gives it, hagusleald, heagosteald\ a celibate or bachelor. The word occurs in O.H.G. as hagastalt or hagustalt, and in modern German as hage- stolz. We must particularly notice that in old German the illegitimate children of priests were so called. || Dr. Sweet divides the word as hago-steald. He gives no etymo- logy, nor have I ever seen a derivation suggested. The three meanings, however, of bachelor, priest's son, and bastard seem to point to Augustal-is, in the transferred sense of monk or celibate. There is not much difficulty in the initial A, for, as we have seen, it is added or omitted indifferently in the old forms of the name Hexham. Just as the sur- name Monk suggests that its original bearer was either a monk or the child of a monk, so

Rokewode, p. 53 et stq.
 * ' Chronica Jocelini de Brakelond,' ed. J. Gage

t See the charter in Dugdale's ' Monasticon,' ed 1821. vol. iii. 153.

I Leach's 'Visitations, &c., of Southwell Minster, p. xxxi.

Ibid., p. xxxiv.

II Grimm in ' Rechtsalter thinner,' p. 485, quotes Ad. Keller, 'De Offic. Jurid. Polit., p. 431: "In landgraviatu nellenbergensi accipit fiscus bona fili- orum sacerdotum (pfatfenkinder) et aliorum noth- orum, spuriorum, et bastardorum, vocanturque antiquitus hagestolzen."