Page:The Early English Organ Builders and their work.djvu/42

 Club in 1844, has a valuable entry for our purpose. Under the date of 1482 we read:

"'Item, the xxi. day of March, my Lord payd of Stowmarket, the organ-maker, for mendyng of organys, vijs.'"

This person, from his being called "organ-maker of Stowmarket," was, in all probability, a professional builder, not a priest. This conjecture receives some confirmation from an entry that immediately follows the one just given, where the person spoken of is styled priest:

"'Item, the same tyme my Lord toke Sir William Davyes, the pryst, to pay for a lok [lock?] to the orgyns, iiijd.'"

Sir was formerly the designation of certain members of the clergy. Bishop Percy says: "Within the limits of my own memory all Readers in chapels were called Sirs, and of old have been writ so; whence, I suppose, such of the laiety as received the noble order of knighthood, being called Sirs too, for distinction sake had Knight writ after them, which had