Page:Notes on the churches in the counties of Kent, Sussex, and Surrey.djvu/172

134 my intelligence is defective. According to one account, tradition states it to have been destroyed in 1523; another says it was burnt down about the middle of the seventeenth century. The place where it stood, close to the farm-house, is indicated by a stone, on which was inscribed, "Here did stand the parish church of Polton, mentioned in Domesday Book ix under the title of Chinth, (an ignorant mistake for Chenth, Kent) in the hundred of Besboro'." In (D.B.) the church is called "æcclesiola," that is, a small one, or chapel. In (Val. Eccl.) "The chapell of our Lady of Poulton, called Poulton chapell" is named in the enumeration of the possessions of St. Radigund's abbey, but it is not mentioned in the (Clergy List).—The abbey was founded A.D. 1191, 3 of K. Richard I, by Jeffry and Thomas, earls of Perth, and others, for Premonstratensian monks at Bradsole in Polton; this is Tanner's account: according to Leland Hugh, a canon, was the founder and first abbot. (Hasted.)—The only remains of the abbey are the gateway, which is remarkably low. The facings of the wall are curious from the variations of pattern in the flint and Caen stone.

264. .—"Two small churches æcclesiolæ." (D.B.)—"In the chancel, against the north wall, is a small stone fixed in it of about six inches square, with an inscription in old capitals denoting, that on the nineteenth calend of September, on the day of St. Eusebius confessor of the Roman church, this church was dedicated to the honor of St. Mary." (Hasted.)

266. or Bromehill. Situated at the extreme south-western corner of Romney Marsh, not very far from Rye, is always deemed to have belonged to Kent, though the church is declared to have stood in Sussex.—This place was overwhelmed by an irruption of the sea about A.D. 1280, temp. K. Edward I. (Kilburne.) The church is however specially mentioned in (Val. Eccl.) as appropriated to the college of Wye.—"The ruins of the church were visible in the year 1637." Bromehill is reported "to have been once so considerable, as to have had in it above fifty inns and taverns. Deering MSS." (Harris.) This last story however does not quite accord with Camden's description, who styles the place merely a little populous village. There is still some land belonging to this parish in the county of Sussex. (Horsfield's Sussex.)

267. .—This place was so named by K. Edward III in honour of his queen Philippa, a Kingsborough previously existing in the centre of the Isle. (Lambarde.)—