Page:Notes on the churches in the counties of Kent, Sussex, and Surrey.djvu/70

38 priory here, belonging to that of Beaulieu, in Normandy, was suppressed 2d of K. Henry V (Harris) ; at which period the alien priories in this kingdom were generally abolished. Tanner says, that the manor was given about A.D. 1200 by John de Pratellis to his recently erected priory of Beaulieu. It was alienated to Merton Priory in the first year of K. Henry IV. (Monast. VI, 1012.)

44. .&mdash;Was given to Rochester Cathedral by K. Henry I. (Reg. Roff.)

The abbey here was founded A.D. 1146, and called "own daughter, filia propria," of Clareval; but in the Chronicles of Rochester it is stated to have been founded by Will, de Ipre, in 1144, for White Monks. (Lambarde). Dugdale (Monast. V, 460) says A.D. 1144 or 1146, by Will. de Ipre, Earl of Kent. The foundations only of the abbey church are now to be traced in the garden belonging to the residence styled Boxley Abbey. (Hist, of Maidstone College, 144.)&mdash;This parish comprises that part of Penenden Heath, on which stands the county hall, where the general county meetings are held, and where, till within a few years, executions took place; the building, however, is very small, little more than a shed. Lambarde says that the name Penenden, in Domesday Book "Pinnedene," is derived from "pinian," "to punish" thus implying the place of execution.

45. .&mdash;United with Monk's Horton. Against the south wall of the chancel of this church is what, but for its height, which is about three feet from the ground, and the pattern cut into it, might be deemed a stone seat; and which yet might have been such, if (which is stated not to be the case) any traces existed that a step, on which the feet were intended to rest, had been chiselled off. The back is an arched canopy with much ornament between buttresses, and under the canopy is a large shield, of which the surface is plain, but it bears marks of having been painted. The upper slab, which is of Weald marble&mdash;similar to that known as Purbeck or Petworth, except that in Kent it is usually perhaps more brown&mdash;has channeled on it in the centre a circle containing a cross, and, right and left, three sides of a parallelogram, which cavities may originally have contained brass. Date, the fourteenth century. This erection has been pronounced " a credence-table" (Archæol. Journal, III, 83); but the composition of it does not seem adapted to that object. As it is certainly too high for a seat, and its ornamentation is of a monumental character, it may