THE RELIGIOUS HOUSES OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE
INTRODUCTION
Northamptonshire was honourably distinguished for the number and
variety of its monastic and other religious foundations. The Carthusian order
was the only one of any considerable repute which was not represented, but
English houses of that order were few.
The magnificent abbey of Peterborough was the one foundation that
went back to pre-conquest days. It was a splendid representative of the great
order of Black Monks of St. Benedict; to it pertained a neighbouring cell at
Oxney, served by the parent house. A small Benedictine priory was founded
temp. Henry I at Luffield in Whittlebury Forest. The buildings were in
Buckinghamshire, but the church stood in Northamptonshire. It was suppressed by Henry VII, and the trifling revenues annexed to his foundation at
Westminster. There were also other small Benedictine settlements in the
county, off-shoots of the great abbeys of Normandy, but they were all suppressed before the days of Henry VIII. Such were the cells or small alien
priories of Everdon, pertaining to the abbey of Bernay, of Weedon Pinkney
to the abbey of St. Lucian, and of Weedon Beck to the abbey of Bec.
The Order of Cluny (reformed Benedictines) was founded in 912 at
Cluny in Burgundy, by Berno, abbot of Gigny, with the co-operation of
William duke of Aquitaine. The monks of the new order came to England
in the following century and established their first house at Barnstaple. (fn. 1)
Northamptonshire possessed two important priories of Cluniac foundation,
and a nunnery of the order.
This order (fn. 2) was the first to obtain immunity from diocesan visitation;
this coveted privilege being granted by Pope Gregory VII, who had
himself been a monk of the order. But all the houses, whether abbeys,
priories, or smaller cells, had to submit to visitation by commissioners of their
own order. Two were selected for this duty for each ecclesiastical province
(England and Scotland forming one) at the annual general chapter held at
Cluny. The time for meeting was September, and the attendance of the
superior of every house was compulsory; the priors, however, of England,
Spain, Lombardy, and Germany were privileged, and not obliged to attend
more than once in two years, a period afterwards extended to three, with
occasional remissions up to seven years. The priors also of dependent houses
or cells owed special allegiance to the parent house, and were expected, with
some irregularity, to respond to a chapter summons.
None of their priors could be elected by their own convent, but were
nominated by the mother-house beyond the seas, which almost invariably sent
foreigners to this country. The majority of the monks until the time of
Edward III were French, for novices could not be professed by the priors in
England. During the wars with France these houses were not unnaturally
treated as alien priories, and their revenues and patronage administered by the
crown. Some few were altogether suppressed and transferred to other religious
foundations, but the majority were gradually made denizen, and discharged
from foreign subjection and obedience, while remaining under the discipline
of the Order of Cluny. One or two, such as Daventry, took out new foundation charters and united themselves to the general chapter and congregation of
the Benedictines; but even these usually styled themselves Cluniac, and the
priors (thirty-two in number) at the time of the dissolution surrendered under
that title. The great majority of the English houses, however, continued
down to the dissolution to make considerable payments or annual pensions to
Cluny, the abbot of Cluny drawing from this source an annual income of
£2,000. But up to the time of the suppression of the alien houses, the whole
income of the English cells or priories was subject to foreign administration,
a certain portion only being reserved for local needs.
The Northamptonshire religious houses of Cluny are peculiarly interesting as illustrating the gradual way in which foreign rule was lost, and diocesan
control substituted. The story, however, of St. Andrew's will be found to
differ materially from that of Daventry; while the record of the convent of
Delapré admits of no comparison, for it was one of the very few houses of
Cluniac nuns in England.
The austere order of the Cistercians, another reformed Benedictine branch,
was first established in England in 1128. In 1142 a colony of these white
monks from Newminster in Northumberland (which was itself the eldest
daughter of Fountains) established an abbey at Pipewell. This order generally
sought out unreclaimed wastes or undrained valleys for their houses, but now
and again they were content to settle in some thick-grown forest. The yet
unwritten history, for which there is abundant material, of these monks of
Rockingham Forest is full of exceptional interest.
The Austin or Black Canons, an order of conventual clergy following
the rule of St. Augustine of Hippo, were next in numbers in this country
to the Benedictines. The abbey of St. James, on the west side of Northampton, was their largest house in the county, and of some importance. They
had three priories in Northamptonshire: at Canons Ashby, Chalcombe, and
Fineshade. There was also a hermitage or small priory at Grafton Regis, the
brethren of which, in its earlier days, probably followed the Austin rule. On
the Northamptonshire side of Stamford there was a twelfth-century house of
St. Sepulchre.
The Premonstratensian, or White Canons, a reformed order of canons
regular, founded their first English house in 1140 at Newhouse, Lincolnshire;
thence a colony established themselves at Sulby in 1155.
Four of the six chief orders of nuns found in England had houses within
the county. The Benedictine nuns were at Stamford Baron and Wothorpe.
The Austin nuns had a small settlement at Rothwell. The Cluniac nuns had
a house of some importance, termed an abbey, at Delapré on the south side of
Northampton. The most strictly cloistered order were the Cistercian nuns;
they had a house, under exceptional rule, at Catesby, also a small convent of
early foundation at Sewardsley.
The two great orders of knights following the rule of St. Austin had each
possessions in Northamptonshire. The Knights Hospitallers had a commandery at Dingley, founded temp. Stephen. The Knights Templars had three
'camerae' at Blakesley, Guilsborough, and Harrington, which were all
transferred to the Hospitallers when the Templars were suppressed in 1312.
The strange and terrible suppression of the Templars occurred during
the episcopate of the saintly Bishop Dalderby, who was nominated by the
pope as one of the commissioners to try the accused in England. The bishop
avoided acting with the other commissioners, but held a private inquiry, so
far as his own diocese was concerned, in the Lincoln chapter-house, and
subsequently declined to take any further part in the proceedings. From
letters in his register, it is concluded that he believed in their innocence.
When, however, the Provincial Synod of Canterbury passed sentence against
the Templars in 1311, the bishop of Lincoln had to carry out the archbishop's
sentence in consigning the knights to the various monasteries as prisoners to
fulfil their penance. Seventeen of the order were sent to as many monasteries
of the diocese. The monks of St. Andrew, Northampton, were ordered to
receive William de Pocklington, but the monastery refused to receive him
and sent a letter to that effect to the bishop. The bishop repeated his order
in sterner tones, but the priory again refused obedience. Bishop Dalderby
then took the grave step of writing to the rural dean of Northampton,
bidding him to cause to be published in every church of the deanery the
excommunication of the prior, sub-prior, precentor, cellarer, and sacristan of
St. Andrew's. This apparently secured the desired result, for there is no
further reference to the matter in the bishop's register. (fn. 3) There is no other
incident in the jurisdiction of this great diocese during the fourteenth century
that shows in such a marked way the strength of the episcopal power, for the
priory of St. Andrew dominated the town of Northampton, and almost every
church in the deanery was in their gift.
Those great evangelizers of the towns, the friars, who, theoretically at
least, rejected endowments and lived on the alms of the faithful, naturally
found their way with speed to Northampton, as one of the chief towns of
the kingdom. The Franciscans established themselves in 1224, the very
year of their first arrival in the kingdom, at Northampton, where they
eventually had one of the largest and most handsome churches of any pertaining to the mendicant orders in England. They were closely followed by
the Dominicans, whose friary at Northampton was subsequently chosen as
the place for holding provincial chapters. Somewhat later in the century,
the Carmelites and Austin Friars started houses in the same town, so that
Northampton shared the distinction with eleven other boroughs of having
settlements of all the four great orders of mendicant brethren. Stamford,
on the northern verge of the county, was another of these twelve boroughs,
so that the smaller towns and villages of Northamptonshire would speedily
be stirred by the earnest eloquence of these vagrant missioners. Bishop
Grossetête was a great patron of the friars, urging the parish clergy to
give them ready access to their pulpits, and a free hand in the hearing of
confessions. The impression that they made on the religious life of the
shire in the thirteenth century could not fail to be considerable.
Among religious foundations must also be included the hospitals, for the
church blended the spiritual with the corporal works of mercy. A hospital
without a chapel and a priest was unknown, and the regular inmates were
always vowed to certain religious observances. The terrible prevalence, even
in this midland shire, of mediaeval leprosy, and the zeal of the church in
providing for the victims, are testified by the founding, in the first half of the
twelfth century, of eight lazar-houses. Six of these, at Northampton, Peterborough, Towcester, Brackley, Thrapston, and in Rockingham Forest, were
dedicated, as was usual with leper hospitals, in honour of St. Leonard; the
seventh, at the Northamptonshire end of Stamford Bridge, was dedicated in
honour of St. Giles; whilst the dedication of the eighth, by the north gate
of Northampton, is unknown. In the same century the large hospital of St.
John the Evangelist and St. John the Baptist was founded at Northampton;
that of St. John and St. James at Brackley; that of St. John the Baptist
and St. Thomas of Canterbury at Stamford Baron; that of St. Thomas of
Canterbury at the abbey gate of Peterborough; and the well-endowed
hospital of St. John and St. James at Aynho under episcopal institution.
In the year 1200 another largely-endowed hospital, the masters of which
were presented by the adjacent priory of St. Andrew to the bishop for
institution, was founded at Kingsthorpe; to this foundation were attached
two chapels, dedicated respectively to St. David and the Holy Trinity. A
small hospital was also founded at Armston in the year 1232, and another at
Pirho about the same time. All these hospitals were for the three-fold
object, in varying degrees, of providing for the aged, the sick, and the wayfarer. Another hospital of some importance, that of St. Thomas of Canterbury,
is said to have been founded in Northampton by the burgesses about 1450;
but this was in all probability a revival of a far older foundation made soon
after the canonization of Thomas à Becket.
Northamptonshire, like other counties, affords numerous examples of
the gross diversion of those early hospital or almshouse establishments from
their original purposes.
Monastic foundations had become so numerous throughout England
that munificently-disposed people sought other channels for the disposal of
their wealth. A method of doing this was suggested by the growing
practice of establishing chantries for one or more priests. The custom
became prevalent of turning parish churches into collegiate institutions. It
has been pointed out by one of the most comprehensive writers on such
subjects that these parochial colleges were really chantry chapels of a larger
size; the chancel being usually allotted to the community as rectors, whilst
the nave remained congregational under a vicar of their appointment. (fn. 4)
The similarity of chantry to college is nowhere more strikingly
illustrated than in the episcopal registers of the archdeaconry of Northampton.
In 1327 Gilbert de Middleton, archdeacon of Northampton, founded a
chantry in the church of Wappenham, in honour of the Holy Trinity, the
Blessed Virgin, and All Saints, for six priests, one of whom was to be termed
the warden (custos), whose first duty it was to celebrate masses for the founder's
family. This foundation is expressly termed a chantry; but in 1337 John
Gifford, a canon of York, founded a 'college' at Cotterstock for a provost and
twelve chaplains, endowing it with the manor and advowson of the church and
other property. This is an exceptionally early instance of a parochial college.
Northamptonshire, for its size, was rich in foundations of this nature; at
Irthlingborough in 1373 there was a foundation of a dean and five canons;
at Higham Ferrers, Archbishop Chicheley established his famous college of
a master and seven canons in the year 1415; in the same year the royal
college of Fotheringhay, with its master, eight clerks, and thirteen choristers,
was established; whilst at Towcester in 1448, and at All Saints, Northampton,
in 1459, colleges of much smaller dimensions were instituted. Though the
distinctive feature of these colleges was, as a rule, that of large chantries for
the repose of the soul of the founder or founders—a fact which secured their
complete destruction under Edward VI—it will be found that the Northamptonshire examples afford evidence of their members being engaged in definite
parochial work, in education, and in the care of the aged. Their numbers,
too, enabled them (on the larger foundations) to provide for the parish
and neighbourhood examples of the highest form of worship, such as could
otherwise only be found in the cathedral churches.
Taken as a whole, the extant records of the visitations of the religious
houses of the county bear no small testimony to the general morality and
devout living of the inmates; the testimony in favour of the good works
and moral lives of the inmates, as supplied by county gentlemen and others,
immediately before the dissolution, is particularly strong in several cases,
notably with regard to the abbeys of Pipewell and St. James's Northampton,
and the nunnery of Catesby. As to their suppression, the main features of
the dissolution in Northamptonshire have been already set forth, and certain
other particulars are given under the respective houses.