Page:VCH London 1.djvu/562

 A HISTORY OF LONDON to other houses,^ but it is clear that provision was not made for all, since John Lichefeld, one of the latest admitted, wrote to Cromwell, saying that after his religious training he is an entire outcast, for no house will receive him.i" In the face of all this it is curious to read that Parliament in 1533-4 confirmed the gift of the monastery to the king ' because the Prior and Convent had departed from the monastery leaving it profaned and desolate for two years and more whereby the services, hospitality, etc. ... re- mained undone.' ^■^ At first there was some idea of placing the friars of Greenwich in the vacant house,^-"" but in 1534 the king granted the site and all the possessions of the late priory in the parish of St. Botolph without Aldgate to Lord Audley." The City, in spite of the fact that the prior was an alderman, seems to have made no protest either about the surrender of the house or about the king's grant, yet it is evi- dent that they afterwards felt uneasy, for before the election of the first lay alderman of Port- soken in January, 1538,^^^'' there appears to have been some idea of buying Lord Audley's lands.'^i' The possessions of the monastery in 1 291 were reckoned in the Taxatio of Pope Nicholas as worth £21,$ los. (>d. per annum, ^ probably too low an estimate.'"^ No valor exists for the whole property ^-* in the reign of Henry VIII, but what the house held in London, valued at ^121 lbs. d^d.in 1291^^' and ^^i 05 i-js.^^d. in 1425,^^* was said to be worth £2>5S '^V- ^^- '" 1537,^^' and consisted of tenements within the site of the priory and in sixty parishes besides,^-* a pension of ;^ioo paid from the farm of the City since 1361 in return for tithes granted "° ' Chron. of Grey Friars,' Monum. Francisc. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 194. '" L. and P. Hen. VIII, v, 1744. '"^Parl. R. 25 Hen. VIII (10). ""> L. and P. Hen. Fill, vi, 1 1 5. ">' Lansd. MS. 968, fol. 52-4. '" Rec. of the Corp. of Lend. Repert, x, fol. ijb. '"' Ibid, ix, fol. 262-3, 270. "* Pofe Nich. Tax. (Rec. Com.), 9, izb, x^b, ^b, 18, 21, zib, 22, 22^, 26, 26b, zgb, 37, 5i3, 52. '" From Harl. MS. 60, fols. 7, 8, 19, 25, 29, 39, 41, 54, 56, 57, 61, 62, 64, 70, 78, the total appears to be a little over £2<^o. '" A marginal note in the Lond. Epis. Reg. Tun- stall, fol. 51, gives it as ^£'508 13/. <)d. Wolsey's pro- curations in 1524 were rated on a value of ^^333 6s. 8d. L. and P. Hen. VIII, iv (i), 964. "' Pope Nich. Tax. (Rec. Com.) According to Harl. MS. 60, fol. 7, 8, ^129 y. zy. "* Stevens, op. cit. ii, 83. This was the worth of the rental. '" L. and P. Hen. VIII, xii (2), 777. "* In 1291 the priory held tenements in 72 parishes (Harl. MS. 60, fol. 7, 8) ; and in 1354 in 71 parishes. Anct. D. (P.R.O.), A. 2529. by the priory to St. Mary Graces'"' ; the churches of St. Botolph without Aldgate and St. Katharine Cree-church appropriated to the priory before the end of the twelfth century and by order of Pope Innocent III ''" served by two of the canons, and the advowsons of St. Ed- mund Lombard Street, St. Augustine Pappey, Allhallows on the Wall, the gift of the founder, and of St. Gabriel Fenchurch Street. From St. Edmund's a pension of 13^. ^d. appears to have been paid before the close of the twelfth century,'^' and from the others small sums were due yearly in I30i.'^' About 1 175 it was ar- ranged that the canons of St. Mary's, Southwark, should pay 10;. per annum from the church of St. Mildred.'^' At the time of the surrender the priory also held in Middlesex a manor at Totten- ham,"^ and the church the gift of Simon, earl of Northampton, to the priory early in Stephen's reign,"^ the tithes being added by David, brother of William the Lion, king of Scotland, before 1214; lands in Bromley* and Edmonton,'"^ where grants had been made to the convent before 1227;^ in co. Herts the church of Braughing given to them by Queen Maud "' the wife of Stephen, and appropriated to them in 1217;"° the manor of Braughing,"' where grants "' Close, 34 Edw. Ill, m.41 in Add. MS. 15664, fol. 142. "° This pope in his fourth year confirmed the an- nexation of the church of St. Botolph and the chapel of St. Katharine and St. Michael within the cemeter)' of the monastery made by apostolic authority. Cott. R. xiii, 18 (28) ; Stevens, op. cit. ii, 85. '" There was a dispute about the church between the priory and the chapter of St. Paul's, which was settled by Gilbert Foliot when bishop of London (1163-1189). It was then decided that the priory should present after the death of the present holder and should give half its pension to St. Paul's. From a confirmation of the settlement in I 300 the pension was evidently 13/. d. Cott. R. xiii, 18 (23 & 24). '" Lib. Custum. in Mun. Gildhall. Lond. (Rolls Ser.), ii (I), 234. '" Cott. Chart, xi, 52. The church itself is said to have been given to them in the time of Prior Norman, but was granted away for a small pension. Guildhall MS. 122, fol. 566. '" L. and P. Hen. VIII, xix (l), 812 (32). The prior's manor of ' Tottenham ' is mentioned in a deed of 1310 (Anct. D. [P.R.O.], A. 7312), but in 1348 and in 1375 the earl of Pembroke held the manor. Chan. Inq. p.m. 22 Edw. Ill (ist Nos.), 47, file 46 ; 49 Edw. Ill (1st Nos.), 70, file 83. '" Cott. MS. Nero, C. iii, fol. 187. The grant was confirmed to the canons by Pope Innocent II in 1 1 37. Rymer, fo^dVrd (Rec. Com.), i (i), 14; B.M. Chart. L.F.C. xxx, 3. "« L. and P. Hen. VIII, xii, p. 696. '"Ibid, xiii (i), 646 (13). "* Charter of 1 1 Hen. Ill, Dugdale, Mon. Jngl. vi, 154. ■'^ Cott. R. xiii, 18 (l) ; Lansd. MS. 448, fol. 5. '" Cott. R.xiii, 18 (2). '" Lansd. MS. 960, fol. 54. 472