Twelfth- and early Thirteenth-Century Charters containing pledges naming Thomas Becket

TWELFTH- and early THIRTEENTH-century charters containing pledges naming Thomas Becket

mary berg

During research into the early patronage of Patrixbourne Church¹ a catalogue reference to four early documents relating to Patrixbourne mill² was found in Canterbury Cathedral Archives (CCA). Two charters in the name of Ingelram Patrick are nearly identical and date from between 1174 and 1191 and donate sums of money to be paid annually to ‘God, the Blessed Martyr Thomas and the monks of Canterbury’. The other two, dating from about fifty years later, refer to a settlement following a complaint by the monks of Christ Church Priory, Canterbury to the pope about loss of revenue.³ Their immediate relevance was that the earlier documents make the first known mention of ‘Paterichesborne’ rather than simply ‘Bourne’ or ‘Burne.’ The documents are of more general interest because neither the manor nor the church at Patrixbourne were ever held by any of the great ecclesiastical houses in Canterbury and there are no other documents relating to Patrixbourne from this period in the Canterbury Cathedral collections.⁴ The early charters contain pledges specifically naming the murdered archbishop, Thomas Becket, as a recipient and were for relatively small sums of money (2s. and 4s.). In isolation, it would seem a little strange that it was worth complaining to the pope about the loss of four shillings a year. So, why did Christ Church Priory take the case to such a high authority? This question will be considered over the period from the martyrdom to the translation of St Thomas’s remains into a new shrine in the Trinity Chapel in 1220. First the background to the complaint and gifts to shrines will be considered followed by the evidence from the registers of documents held at Canterbury. The Patrick donation and the other donations naming St Thomas will then be discussed before drawing some tentative conclusions.

Background

The importance the Christ Church Canterbury monks seem to have attached to regular gifts, however small, to provide a stable income and to fund their ambitious building programme is not surprising. Long before Thomas Becket’s murder in 1170 it was already common to give a small piece of land or a sum of money in the name of a favourite saint, usually one associated with the church to which the donation was made, or for masses for the soul of a particular person or persons. The difference after the murder was that, unlike other local saints, such as St Dunstan or St Alphege, Thomas Becket was well known outside England. Indeed, popes promoted his cult in Europe, especially in Italy.⁵

Of course, money was required to meet the daily needs of religious houses and they owned manors, farms and other property to generate regular income. In addition, Benedictine houses at this time assigned regular sums to the almonry for charitable purposes.⁶ In many cases this income came from rents or tithes specifically acquired for that purpose. The Christ Church monks had particular need of money in the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries: to re-build the choir damaged by fire in 1174, to provide a shrine for St Thomas grand enough to ensure that Canterbury remained an important destination for pilgrims and to combat inflation.⁷ The new shrine would serve two purposes: it would improve cash flow and it would strengthen the monks’ political and ecclesiastical positions. The monks seem to have set about their task in a professional fashion and used methods very like those of fund-raisers today by encouraging regular donations as a way of ensuring future income.

The plans for the new choir and Trinity Chapel and for the shrine were ambitious and a flow of funds would be needed over the lifetime of the project. Gifts, large and small, would be required as well as some more significant donations. No doubt, gifts of a regular portion of rent or a small piece of land from which the priory could receive rent ‘in perpetuity’ were especially welcome.⁸ The original Patrick gift of rent payable by the tenant of Patrixbourne mill, is a good example of such an arrangement and is among the earliest citing St Thomas as a beneficiary (see below for a more detailed discussion).

It seems from contemporary and other accounts that by 1185 when Baldwin became archbishop the building was largely complete but much remained to be done to make the Trinity Chapel a fitting resting-place for a major saint. Woodman suggests that much of the surviving painted glass and the lost painting cycles in the choir were complete before the expulsion of the monks and the interdict in 1207/8.⁹ Work probably did not start again until around 1213 when the monks returned but it had progressed far enough for work on the new shrine to have been included in the Christ Church accounts for 1216. St Thomas’s body was moved from the crypt to the Trinity Chapel on 7 July 1220 – almost six months before the fiftieth anniversary of his murder. A number of donations, many of them annual amounts rather than one-off gifts or property which translated into regular rent, date from the period 1174 to 1220 providing the monks with a largely predictable stream of income to cover the building and decoration of the new choir and chapel. The Appendix table lists all the charters with grants to the priory mentioning Thomas Becket and assumed to be pre-1221 that are recorded in the main series of Christ Church Canterbury cartularies held at the CCA. All these gifts are included in Christ Church’s Registers held in the CCA (see below for more details): surviving charters mentioned are also held in the CCA. Gifts to St Thomas continued throughout the Middle Ages, but were generally one-off gifts from pilgrims and most were recorded only in the total income from the shrine without individual charters, unlike those made in the 50 years following the martyrdom.

Gifts to shrines

The principal motive for giving was, of course, to ensure a place in heaven or reduce the time spent in purgatory. Donors usually asked for prayers to be said for their souls and for those of their families. Sometimes donations were made as thanks for a cure, safe arrival or deliverance from some peril. There were also particular reasons for making grants in the name of particular saints. In the case of St Thomas, not only were very many miracles associated with him but his murder was politically motivated. St Thomas’s murder could be seen as the Crown versus the Church. Some of those involved, such as William de Tracy and Henry II, made grants to Christ Church as part of their penance. Others may have wished to make a political gesture by supporting St Thomas, as a representative of the Church, against the secular power of the Crown.

The monks of Canterbury soon realised that the murder of their archbishop was of international significance, but they did not make the first moves. Immediately after the crime had been committed, the monks were devastated because the cathedral had been desecrated and could not be used for services. However, word of miraculous cures as a result of contact with St Thomas’s blood, proximity to his body or even simply invoking his name soon spread. The earliest cures were of afflictions suffered by ordinary people in Canterbury but very quickly pilgrims started to arrive, many seeking cures for themselves or others. Over the next fifty years, Canterbury became the most important destination for pilgrims in England. St Thomas’s tomb – still at this time in the crypt of the cathedral – also received visitors from Europe, especially France and Flanders. In these early years, English pilgrims were predominantly from the eastern and southern parts of England with fewer from the west.¹⁰ Despite the somewhat limited area around the tomb in the crypt and the fact that the tomb was a relatively simple one, the tomb itself was clearly of considerable significance. A number of the early charters which will be considered below specifically requested that grants should be placed on the tomb (seven are listed in the Table).

Saints’ bodies were ‘translated’ to shrines after canonisation because it was felt that saints’ bones should not remain underground. Nilson reports that Archbishop Stephen Langton (1207-28) felt that even a crypt was not suitable. There is a dearth of early data about shrine income and none of the six main shrines in England in the period under consideration (Canterbury, Durham, Hereford, Ely, Lincoln and Norwich) have records dating back to the beginning of gifts specific to shrines.¹¹ Indeed, Canterbury provides the only source of accounts from before the end of the thirteenth century so there is nothing with which to make direct comparisons for the period under consideration.

The Christ Church Treasurers’ accounts relating to the donations con-nected with the tomb of St Thomas show that income over the period 1198-9 to 1206-7, when the monks went into exile, averaged about £290 a year and ranged from £180 in 1203-4 to £455 in 1198-9. Some £300 is recorded in 1213 but this probably includes some of the donations collected on the monks’ behalf while they were in exile. When the interdict was laid in March 1208, the king immediately announced the confiscation of church property. At first confiscation seems to have been widespread but soon deals were struck and property was recovered. The laity was not inclined to rise against the king, as the pope had hoped, but rather criticised the clergy for obeying the interdict and, in some cases, for fleeing the country. There is no doubt that revenue was lost, not least because of the lack of public liturgical occasions to generate offerings. General revenue recovered quite quickly after the return of the monks and the translation of the body of St Thomas from the crypt to the new Trinity Chapel in 1220 led to combined revenue of over £1,000 in the year 1219-20 from the new shrine, the Martyrdom and the crypt site.¹²

There were other building projects in the years that followed. Some improved access for pilgrims and some were connected with the accom-modation of the monks and their prior, reflecting the new status of the prior (in 1220 Christ Church priors were granted the right to wear the episcopal ring and mitre) and of the monks as guardians of St Thomas’s shrine. Money was always needed and there was, therefore, an incentive for the monks to seek to recover any revenues lost as a result of the interdict, or for any other reason. Patricia Barnes in editing Documents concerning Christ Church Cathedral Priory, Canterbury 1207-1213 writes that, ‘No evidence has been found to suggest that charters or leases were violated by John or his officers; indeed there is evidence to the contrary.’ She goes on to say, ‘… from the evidence available, it appears that the Christ Church administrative system, after perhaps a few months hesitation, worked fairly normally in the years of the confiscation.’ However, the Priory certainly suffered because damages were paid by the crown after the lifting of the interdict.

Once the major building programme at the east end of the cathedral was complete and initial excitement over, income from the sites associated with St Thomas fell but then remained fairly steady throughout the thirteenth century. Nilson reports that before the translation the shrine of St Thomas contributed 88 per cent of all offerings and 28 per cent of Canterbury Cathedral’s income. The proportion of total income received from shrines at other cathedrals was generally of the order of 10 per cent. Thus, income from the shrines was of key importance to the monks. Lessons learned during and after the interdict are likely to have played a part in persuading thirteenth-century priors that record-keeping was essential.

The evidence from the Registers

It is clear from the endorsements on the back of the Patrixbourne documents that the three charters, but not the settlement, were recorded in the cathedral priory’s cartularies compiled under Henry of Eastry, Prior from 1285-1331. Record keeping was, and is, an important element in the Benedictine Rule and Christ Church was no exception, but it is especially fortunate that much survives in Canterbury. Registers A, C, E and H reveal a number of fascinating new features. First, there are more than 25 charters datable to the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries that specifically grant sums – typically 3-5s. – to be paid annually and mention Thomas Becket. In addition, there are at least 15 gifts of property (land or a building, usually a messuage) yielding rent of similar sums. Two charters relate to both property and a small donation. Many of the donors of the smaller amounts in both these categories lived within the Canterbury diocese. Donors from Scotland and France were prevailed upon to pledge larger sums, perhaps partly to defray the cost of collection and partly because these donors were wealthier than local landowners.

Examining the registers has thus yielded further charters with donations to St Thomas, but has also provided evidence on how the documents were categorised – and perhaps even physically organised – at the time. Some collections of charters have essentially retained their original medieval organisation.¹³ However, the charter collection of Canterbury Cathedral has been significantly reorganised and added to since the Middle Ages, and the charters’ order in the Chartae series is far removed from their medieval organisation. Preserving multiple copies of documents, whether multiple originals or transcribed copies, could have had a number of purposes. It would have been a means of preserving the text of documents in case the originals kept at Christ Church were stolen or destroyed. Multiple copies could also publicise further the contents of the charters and thus the priory’s possessions and rights. There is evidence for copies being used in this way from later on in the Middle Ages.

The cartulary now known as Register E was made in duplicate, apparently with the intention of adding material to the second copy. The duplicate’s quires were left unbound and are now combined with additional material from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries to form the present Registers A to D. Eastry’s cartularies contain transcriptions of charters arranged into different sections, beginning with sections for particular classes of documents such as papal, royal and archiepiscopal charters, followed by sections for the individual priory manors. The cartularies include contents pages at the beginning. Each document transcribed into the cartularies was endorsed with a description, a number in Roman numerals, and the abbreviation ‘Reg’, to indicate that it had been registered. Those relating to a manor were in addition endorsed with the name of the manor. We do not know exactly who carried out this formidable task. Unlike Registers A-E, Register H is clearly not in any original order and contains a mixture of rentals and charters. No witness lists are recorded.

The three charters that led to this paper were clearly felt to be important enough to be included in Register E. All but the 2s. charter are also in others. Most charters with which we are concerned appear in Register E and/or H with some also recorded in other registers. Register E is especially relevant because it relates largely to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. In addition to sections for altars and St Thomas, there are Royal and archbishops’ charters and a long section relating to the Priory’s manors and places where they held property, e.g. Sandwich and Canterbury parishes. The charters copied include witness lists, which is not the case in Register H, for example.

Register H has no separate French or Scottish sections and most of the ‘St Thomas’ charters are found on three folios within the total of 231. The register starts with rentals (folios 1-24) and then charters start with folio 25. Folios 26-34 and 47 seem to be in the same hand and record charters of roughly the same period. Some 24 of the charters with which we are concerned are copied into Register H and are concentrated on folios 28, 31, 32, 33, 34 and 47 with all but three on folios 33, 34 and 47. Of these, 13 do not appear in other registers but six are made by members of two families (three Baliol charters and three Evreux, see below).

Documents relating to Patrixbourne, c.1174 to c.1230

The two earlier charters were drawn up in the name of Ingelram Patrick, lord of the manor of Patrixbourne. He inherited the manor in 1174 and died between September 1190 and September 1191. The Patricks came to Kent from Normandy at the time of the Conquest and were granted English manors for their good service. They were not amongst the elite either in England or Normandy but the family was one of some substance in both countries. Since Patrixbourne is only a short distance from Canterbury in the direction of Dover, it is likely that Ingelram would be known to the monks of Canterbury, even though neither Patrixbourne manor nor the church was part of the priory’s direct sphere of influence. The Patricks had a history of pious giving in Normandy and almost certainly built the church at Patrixbourne so it is entirely consistent that they should also make a gift to Christ Church. In addition, Ingelram’s father was one of the nobles imprisoned in Normandy for opposing Henry II and so it may not be too fanciful to suggest that Ingelram wished to make a public gesture in support of St Thomas.¹⁴

In his two charters Ingelram Patrick agreed to donate an annual sum to St Thomas the Martyr and the monks of Christ Church Canterbury from the rent due to him for the mill at Patrixbourne.¹⁵ The only significant differences between the documents are the sums involved and the lists of witnesses. In one charter the sum mentioned is 2s. and in the other 4s. Other than that of the tenant, no name appears in both witness lists and in the 4s. charter many of the witnesses are members of the Patrick family. Was this one drawn up in the Patricks’ own court? There is no way of knowing. The donation was to be made from the rent payable by the tenant of Patrixbourne mill, at that time Robert of Dive, and placed on St Thomas’s tomb. In exchange the monks were asked to pray for the souls of the Patricks. These charters pose some tantalising questions. Why were there two Patrick charters for different amounts? Neither refers to the existence of the other and it would have been more usual to refer to the 2s. charter when drawing up the 4s. one. Was 2s. a mistake by a scribe? Did something happen after drawing up the 2s.-charter that caused Ingelram to double his donation? Again, no answers have been found but there is an even more intriguing question. It is particularly interesting that neither of the Patrick charters was witnessed by men who regularly witnessed Cathedral charters. The charter donating 4s. was witnessed by a number of members of the Patrick family and others in the Patrixbourne area. This is common where transfers of land are concerned in order to demonstrate that heirs agree to the arrangements, but the grant in question does not involve such a transfer. Indeed, the majority of charters under consideration here were witnessed by few or no family members. The Patrick family presence may have been intended to stress the political significance of the gift, i.e. the family’s support for the church, as well as its pious intent. It is possible that it was drawn up at Patrixbourne rather than at Christ Church. Furthermore, few of the 2s.-charter witnesses were even, apparently, local residents and at least one seems to have been based in Normandy because he is called Hamo of Falaise. The tenant of the mill, Robert of Dive, witnessed both, as is usual with this type of document.

One of the two later documents is the report of the settlement of a complaint to the Pope made by Christ Church Priory that Holy Trinity, London, G [sic] of Cheriton and others had disturbed their possession rights to various property, but only Ingelram Patrick’s donation is cited in the settlement.¹⁶ This document refers to a request by Pope Gregory IX dated 4 April 1229 that the Abbot of Faversham, the Prior of St Gregory’s Priory in Canterbury and the Rural Dean of Canterbury should deal with the case. Unfortunately, no record survives of the original complaint to the pope. The fourth document is in the name of Ralph, son of Warin of Hegham, in which he agreed to abide by a ruling made by an ecclesiastical judge that the monks of Canterbury should receive the annual donation due to them under the terms of Ingelram Patrick’s earlier gift. According to the settlement, he also agreed to pay 16s. to cover arrears. Ralph’s charter is witnessed by Thomas the Prior of St Gregory’s (1227-1241), and William, Rural Dean of Canterbury, presumably the same involved in the settlement. Of the charter’s other 10 witnesses, four were also clerics and three regular witnesses of priory documents leaving only three about whom we know nothing. This suggests that the document was drawn up in the priory court, possibly even at the same time as the settlement was presented to Ralph.

These documents are interesting in themselves from a number of angles. They are all fine examples of their type and three of them still have seals attached. However, they beg a number of questions. They appear together in early – near-contemporary – registers of Christ Church documents drawn up by the monks and so were clearly felt to belong together. The question is why this relatively minor donation was thought to have been of sufficient interest to be the subject of an appeal to the pope. No other complaints by the monks of Canterbury or settlements can be identified as forming part of the same appeal, despite the strong implication in the settlement that the Patrixbourne Mill case was not isolated. Further research showed that Ingelram Patrick’s donation was by no means the only small donation pledged on a regular basis. Were these among the first charitable donations made by ‘standing order’?

Other local donors

At roughly the same time, in the fifty or so years after St Thomas’s death, other local families made similar gifts to that of Ingelram Patrick, that is a donation to St Thomas as well as the monks in exchange for the monks’ prayers. These grants include one by a local lord, Hugh Bardolf, a national figure. According to Hasted, King Richard I exchanged the manor and hundred of Hoo with Hugh Bardolf for the honour of Bampton in Devonshire, which had been forfeited to the crown by Fulk Paganel or Painel, as he was usually called, to whom it had been given by King Henry II.¹⁷ Hugh Bardolf was a justiciar of the curia regis, an itinerant justice 1184-9 and justiciar with Puiset and Longchamp in 1189. He was also one of those whom Henry II entrusted with charge of the kingdom in his absence in 1188.¹⁸ Young mentions in his life of Hubert Walter that Bardolf was replaced as Sheriff of York on Richard I’s return in 1194 but he was an ally of Archbishop Hubert Walter and seems later to have been accepted by Richard.¹⁹ He subsequently became involved in the dispute between Richard and Hubert Walter on the one hand and the pope and the Canterbury monks on the other on the question of an establishment for the archbishop at Lambeth. On 22 June 1198 Bardolf and Geoffrey FitzPeter arrived in Canterbury with a ‘threatening letter’ from Richard I.²⁰ In 1202 King John asked Innocent III through Archbishop Hubert Walter, to give dispensation to a number of Anglo-Norman magnates on both sides of the Channel from their vows to go on a crusade ‘on the grounds that their presence was indispensable to him’. In England he needed Geoffrey FitzPeter, chief justice, to act as regent in his absence. He also named six more judges who could not be spared: Hugh Bardolf, William de Stuteville, William Briwer, Robert de Berkeley, Alan and Thomas Basset.²¹

Bardolf may have been an influential figure but his gift was very like Ingelram Patrick’s, indeed the appearance of the two charters is strikingly similar.²² The amount was the same (4s.) and was to come from annual rent owed by a named tenant but was to be made on the feast of St Thomas, presumably December 29, rather than Easter. Only the monks of Canterbury are named as recipients and it differs from the Patrick charter in that there is no precise instructions about where the gift is to be made. Many of the witnesses lived in Canterbury or the immediate area around the city.²³ Hugh Bardolf’s gift was confirmed by his brother Robert after Hugh’s death in 1203.

Another local donor, Philip of Hardres, went on Richard I’s crusade but before he set out, he took the crusader’s cross from the hand of Geoffrey then sub-prior of Christ Church and donated land in the parish of St Alphege rented by Hugh Fugard.²⁴ Like the Patrick gift, the rent was to be placed on St Thomas’s tomb but Philip did not specify when it was to be paid. We do know from the charter, however, that the document was written in the chapter house. The mention of Geoffrey as sub-prior is helpful because Geoffrey became prior in 1191 so this charter clearly predates that appointment. Many crusaders set out with Richard in December 1189 and Archbishop Baldwin followed in March of the following year.²⁵ Richard I’s visit to St Thomas’s tomb on 5 December, 1189 on his way to Dover to embark on the Third Crusade may have served as an example to other crusaders. This all indicates a date for Philip’s charter of mid-1189 to mid-1190, with a likely date between December 1189 and March 1190. Philip’s tenant, Hugh Fugard, was among the witnesses to the charter and Ely the parmenter (robe-maker or furrier) who owned land adjoining that donated was also a witness. We no longer have the original charter but the text is recorded in Registers A, E and H with no material variations.

Hamo son of William le Boef donated land just outside Canterbury city wall ‘between Queningate and Burgate’ for love of St Thomas in a charter witnessed by others living in or near Canterbury.²⁶ Land near St Thomas’s or Eastbridge Hospital is mentioned and the hospital is believed to have been founded around 1180.²⁷ The charter is still held in CCA and is similar in appearance to those of Ingelram Patrick and Hugh Bardolf. The presence of John, alderman of Burgate, and Alfred, priest of Ridingate, implies a date in the late twelfth century.²⁸ The charter is recorded in Registers E (f.130v) and A (f.442v) and is first in the parish list for St Mary’s in Register E.²⁹ Land in Canterbury yielding 3s. a year was donated by Juliana, prioress of St Sepulchre. The rent was payable by Osbert, the priest of Thanington. Both this charter and one by Juliana granting the land to Osbert as hereditary tenant are still held in Canterbury and the latter document retains the St Sepulchre seal.³⁰ There were two prioresses of St Sepulchre named Juliana; the first was certainly prioress around 1184, according to Urry, and the second died in 1258. The style, date and seal point to the time of the first Juliana and so this belongs with the other late twelfth-century charters.

Gilbert of Barham donated 9d. from rents in Canterbury in St Thomas’s name and it is interesting that it was felt to be sufficiently important to be included in both Registers E (f.140v) and H (f.32). Adam, son of Elgar of Sturry, made a number of donations, including several to Christ Church and to St Lawrence Hospital. Only one of five gifts of land granted to Christ Church specifically mentioned St Thomas³¹ but all five are listed together in Registers C (f.80), E (f.218), and H (33), although not always in the same order. This implies that they were not copied from previous register material but from the original charters. Urry in Canterbury under the Angevin Kings reports that one of the pieces of land is also included in Rental F as being held by Adam, but the entry had been crossed out indicating that while the rental was being used the circumstances had changed. Again, a late twelfth-century date is most likely. Alice, Countess of Angus can also be counted as a local donor since she donated rent of half a silver mark (6s. 8d.) annually from rent payable on her land at Elham to St Thomas. The gift appears in her own name in Registers E (f.143) and A (f.276) but in Register H (f.34) there is a somewhat different version written by Alfred of St Martin’s on her behalf. Alice was the daughter of the justiciar Richard de Lucy. Although her husband is known to have died in 1192, we do not know when Alice died.

It has not always been possible to identify where the donor lived but there are four gifts of land in and around Sandwich that seem from the witnesses to date from around 1200. They are all recorded in the Sandwich section of Register E but only two are also found in Register C and none elsewhere. William son of Master Robert donated a chase in the parish of Eastry sometime in the first quarter of the thirteenth century on the basis of what we know of the local witnesses. The charter is only recorded in Register E (f.195). Adam de Botelier donated a field at Cliffe in a charter dated 1219 but, again, this only appears in Register E (f.342).

Donors from elsewhere

Canterbury’s location on the route between London and the channel ports meant that many travellers would have passed that way, but the presence of one of the most important shrines in Europe attracted many more and perhaps led to travellers spending more time in Canterbury than would otherwise have been the case. Register E is arranged so that it is possible to identify where some of the donors, most of whom were likely to have been visitors at the shrine, came from. English and French gifts from royalty and confirmations of earlier royal gifts, of which there are many, are not dealt with here because they are generally in a different category from the smaller gifts that are the subject of this paper. It is also the case that the net impact of royal gifts was reduced by the cost of entertaining royal visitors but the symbolic significance of such pious gifts should not be underestimated. One particular gift worth mentioning is the donation by one of St Thomas’s murderers, William de Tracy, of his manor of Doccombe. De Tracy was the only one of the four knights involved in St Thomas’s murder that we know made tangible recompense.³²

Most pilgrims visiting St Thomas’s shrine from a distance would have made their donations directly and anonymously but some long-term gifts of rent or outright grants of land are recorded. The parents of Fair Rosamund (acknowledged mistress of Henry II), Walter and Agnes Clifford, whose main home was in Herefordshire, donated seven acres of land for lights at St Thomas’s tomb as well as 3s. a year from the rent of a marsh. This charter is listed in Register E (f.184v) under Ickham, presumably because the marsh in question was in Wickhambreaux, and in Register H (f.33v). Walter died around 1190. Agnes Clifford was a member of the Condy family from Lincoln and Sandwich who held land at Wickhambreaux. In her will, she made the following bequests: 100s. to Christ Church; 40s. to St Augustine’s Abbey; 20s. each to St Gregory’s Priory, St Sepulchre, St Martin’s Priory at Dover and St Radegund’s Abbey; two and a half marks to every hospital in Canterbury; 12s. to every anchorite in Canterbury; 12d. to every parish church in Canterbury and ten marks to the church at Wickhambreaux where she was to be buried.³³ In addition, she made many bequests to churches in other parts of England.

Bernard of Baliol was a member of an established Norman family who came to England with William the Conqueror and received lands in the north of England from William II. They later built Castle Barnard in Durham. A Bernard Baliol was among those who captured William the Lion, King of Scotland in 1174 and that is almost certainly the Bernard who donated one mark a year and land in Southmere to Christ Church and St Thomas in two separate charters.³⁴ He also granted three churches and land to the monks of St Mary’s, York while Hubert Walter was Dean of York (1186-89). Bernard was succeeded by his son Eustace who added to the original gift bringing the total value to 20s. Eustace died in about 1215.³⁵ Carrying on the family tradition of donations, Eustace’s grandson, John, founded Balliol College, Oxford in 1263.

Henry de Pomeroy donated half a mark annually from rent to St Thomas and the monks of Christ Church.³⁶ There were at least six Henry de Pomeroys from the mid twelfth to the end of the thirteenth centuries, each eldest sons in turn.³⁷ One Henry who died in 1207 had other dealings with Hubert Walter when the latter was archbishop and so its seems distinctly possible that he also made the donation in St Thomas’s name. The Pomeroys held land in the West Country and the rent was for property in Exeter. William de Bosco’s gift of three acres of land and a messuage may have been made when he was in the service of the bishop of Rochester around 1200 but he features in biographies of Hubert Walter, whom he also served.³⁸ The gift is recorded in Register H (f.47) where de Bosco’s charter is recorded under Doccombe together with William de Tracy’s grant. Doccombe is in Moretonhampstead, South Devon, and so presumably William de Bosco’s land was in the same area.

All the above are known because the donors were local or because they were active in the service of the king, archbishop or bishops. Other charters record grants by others not so easily identifiable even though they clearly relate to English donors. Such charters found with a specific reference to St Thomas and dating on stylistic grounds from around 1180-1220 include: in Register E, Hunfrid and his wife Aliza (13d. annually, f.47v), John de Aldbury (rent of a mill for lights at St Thomas’s tomb, f.365), Robert of Eastwood (land in Hadleigh, f.389) and John Kepeharm (a messuage, f.397): in Register H, Robert of Tilbury (12d. annually, f.33v), William of St John’s (5s. rent from a messuage in Winchester, f.34), Roger of Colnton (12d. annually, f.47), Thomas son of Geoffrey of Winterton (Lincs.) (land, f.47), Conan son of Helias of Holbeach in the same county (4s. annually, f.47) and Ralph of Grenested (Essex) (12d. annually, f.47) in Register H.³⁹ All these are grants of relatively small but regular contributions to the monks.

Three members of the same family granted one mark each annually: the Count and Countess of Evreux and their son. These three charters are recorded only in Register H (f.34v) and must date from the end of the twelfth century because in 1200 the title was ceded to King Philip Auguste of France and the Count of Evreux named in the first charter died in 1191. Three further donors of sums of money are identified as French: Manasser de Insula (5s. annually), Adam de Insula (5s. of his own in addition to confirming the 5s. donated by his brother, Manasser) and Guy and Allione Malevicin (Manveisin?) who donated 10s. annually.⁴⁰ The five Scottish charters recorded in both Registers A (all on f.276) and E (all on f.143) were made by Alice Countess of Angus (see above), Robert de Brus (one mark annually), Alan Stewart (half a mark, later increased to a whole mark by his son Walter) and Michael of Scotland (20s.).

There are also six later charters mentioning St Thomas. The first is that of Ralph son of Warin confirming the original Patrick grant discussed above. Two others relate in effect to one gift (Andrew granted a house and that was confirmed by Andrew of Bridge on his behalf as 15s. a year rent) and the date must be similar to a document dated 1284 relating to a grant of 3s. a year by John, son of William of Quetherinton, because the witness lists are similar.⁴¹ The latest charter from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries follows directly from those three. There is a grant of 50s. annually by Edmund of the Dead Sea [sic] to be placed at the foot of St Thomas’s tomb and one by William and Agnes de Chetney giving 10s. for lights in front of the tomb and land yielding 7s. a year rent.⁴² All appear in Register E and in either A or C, but not both. With the exception of Ralph’s charter, these all seem too far removed from the others mentioned, all of which seem to date from around 1180 to around 1220.

Ralph’s charter agreeing to abide by the terms set as a result of the appeal to the pope by the monks in 1229 appears to be a unique survival in Canterbury. Is this because it was the only one? That seems unlikely since the settlement itself implies that the case of rent due from Patrixbourne mill was just one example of interference with monks’ revenues. Or did this settlement survive because it was the only one that found in favour of the monks? We know that in other cases the monks could be selective in what they chose to include in or exclude from their records.

some conclusions and questions

Although giving was undoubtedly driven by pious motives, the financial success of the St Thomas cult enabled the monks of Canterbury to build a splendid resting-place for the martyr with a new shrine and a big chapel to accommodate large numbers of pilgrims. Most of the twelfth-century donors mentioned above committed regular amounts of income to the monks. Having completed the building and the infrastructure for receiving large numbers of pilgrims, the monks of Christ Church defended their position to the best of their ability. They felt threatened by kings and archbishops in the 50 years after St Thomas’s death, but they used their possession of St Thomas’s body as a means to ensure that Christ Church remained the centre of the Church in England. This perhaps provides an answer to the question of why the monks complained to the pope about the loss of a small amount of revenue. The fact that the pope was known to support St Thomas and his cause may be why the monks appealed to him rather than the king, but this does not tell us what examples other than the Patrick donation there were of interference with the monks’ revenues. There is also no clue as to why two similar charters were drawn up by Ingelram Patrick for different sums or why so many members of the Patrick family witnessed one of them. These and other questions remain unanswered. Other donors’ motives may have varied: some were no doubt entirely pious and were, perhaps, thanks for a cure or another favour but some may have also been making a political point by naming an opponent of the Crown and supporter of ecclesiastical authority as a beneficiary.

acknowledgements

Without the help, support and encouragement of Cressida Annesley at the CCA, this paper would never have been completed. At an early stage of this paper a workshop took place in the CCA at which the Patrixbourne documents were discussed. The workshop was facilitated by Andrew Butcher, Director of the Medieval and Tudor Studies Centre at the University of Kent; thanks are due to him and to the present and past postgraduate students of the Centre who attended the workshop for their ideas and encouragement. Sheila Sweetinburgh, Andrew Butcher and Meriel Connor kindly read drafts and made helpful suggestions. The opinions expressed in the study are entirely the writer’s and she bears full responsibility for any errors and omissions.

endnotes

¹ M. Berg, ‘Patrixbourne Church: Medieval Patronage, Fabric and History’, Archaeo-logia Cantiana, 122 (2002), 113-142.

² Possibly on a site near the ford now occupied by Patrixbourne Lodge.

³ CCA. DCc/Chartae Antiquae P.38.

⁴ The church passed into the hands of Merton Priory, Surrey during the Hundred Years’ War and remained there until the Reformation, with few documents surviving.

⁵ T. Borenius, St Thomas Becket in Art (London, 1932). Examples of early tributes to Thomas Becket include: Agnani Cathedral; SS Giovanni e Paolo in Spoleto, and Monreale in Sicily.

⁶ Harvey, B. F., Living and Dying in England 1000-1540 (Oxford, 1989).

⁷ Harvey, P., ‘The English Inflation of 1100-1200’, Past and Present 61 (1973), 3-30. Harvey gives concrete examples of prices that doubled or trebled between 1180 and 1220, e.g. corn and livestock, and makes a case for rising wages over the same period. In addition, the need to raise a ransom for King Richard and money for King John’s defence of Normandy required large sums and worsened the general economic crisis.

⁸ Regular gifts, normally made annually on a given feast day, were almost always made in perpetuum, but this did not mean literally for ever but something along the lines of ‘until further notice’.

⁹ In 1207 King John did not accept the pope’s consecration of Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury. Instead, he expelled the monks from Christ Church Canterbury. The bishops of London, Ely and Worcester failed to persuade the king to accept Langton and had to publish a general sentence of interdict throughout England and Wales in March 1208. An interdict was a sort of general strike by the clergy during which priests could only baptise infants and hear the confessions of the dying.

¹⁰ R.C. Finucane, Miracles and pilgrims: popular beliefs in medieval England, pp. 121-6, 162-6.

¹¹ Thus at Lincoln the lack of a major saint’s relics seems to have hampered rebuilding after damage in 1185. Although small donations were plentiful enough from the start, the large donations needed to give the project momentum were not forthcoming until the cult of St Hugh could be promoted in the thirteenth century. St Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln (1180-1200), canonised 1219. Kidson, P., ‘St Hugh’s Choir’, Medieval Art and Architecture at Lindoln Cathedral (BAACT, 1986).

¹² Prof. Dobson in A History of Canterbury Cathedral suggests that the monks recovered much of the property confiscated in the interdict and that donations at St Thomas’s shrine reached a record £1,142 in 1220, when presumably the donors could be shown how the money was being used.

¹³ This is the case with the Durham charters, where the present catalogue and document references are based on a catalogue dating from the mid-15th century. Indeed, it is thought that the documents were kept in their original medieval chests until the 19th century.

¹⁴ Berg, ‘Patrixbourne Church’.

¹⁵ CCA, DCc/Chartae Antiquae P.39 and P.40.

¹⁶ CCA, DCc/Chartae Antiquae P.38 and P.41. An example of a similar dispute is cited by Hasted in the parish of Crundale where one member of the Valoyns family had given the rectory to the prior and canons of Leeds Priory in Henry II’s reign but the heir did not ratify the gift. Archbishop Hubert Walter apparently persuaded Hamo de Valoyns to pay the prior and canons 25s. a year, but that does not seem to have been paid because it was the subject of a complaint to the Pope in Henry III’s reign, i.e. possibly at about the same time as the complaint about non-receipt of the Patrick gift. The pope found in favour of Leeds.

¹⁷ Hasted, ‘Hoo hundred’.

¹⁸ Concise Dictionary of National Biography, v.1 (Oxford 1995).

¹⁹ C.R. Young, Hubert Walter, Lord of Canterbury and Lord of England (Durham USA, 1968), pp. 51, 54.

²⁰ C.R. Cheney, Pope Innocent III and England (Stuttgart 1976) p.214.

²¹ Ibid. p. 253.

²² Copies of the Patrick and Bardolf documents are in Canterbury Cathedral Archives (Chartae Antiquae P38-41 and M275).

²³ Roger of Boughton could come from Boughton under Blean, Boughton Aluph or Boughton Monchelsea. Stephen of Godinton presumably comes from the manor near Ashford. Robert son of Richard, the Cauderun family and John the mercer are among those named in Urry, Angevin Kings as living in Canterbury at the end of the twelfth century.

²⁴ CCA, DCc Register E, f99v.

²⁵ History of Canterbury Cathedral (eds) P. Collinson, N. Ramsay and M. Sparks (Oxford, 1995).

²⁶ CCA, DCc/Chartae Antiquae C.1066.

²⁷ S. Sweetinburgh, ‘Supporting the Canterbury Hospitals: Benefaction and the Language of Charity in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 102, 2002, 239.

²⁸ Urry, Angevin Kings, pp. 46, 47, 92, 96 and 177.

²⁹ Urry says that the two Register entries are in the same hand (Angevin Kings, p. 421n).

³⁰ CCA. DCc/Chartae Antiquae C.1161 and C.1184.

³¹ CCA. DCc/Chartae Antiquae C.1128.

³² CCA. DCc/Chartae Antiquae D.20.

³³ The Registrum Antiquissimum of the Cathedral Church of Lincoln, v1, ed. C. W. Foster, The Lincoln Record Society, v.27, 1931.

³⁴ Register H, ff.34v and 34v.

³⁵ Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911 edition).

³⁶ Register H, f 34.

³⁷ Sanders, pp. 106-7.

³⁸ William de Bosco is known to have been in the bishop of Rochester’s service in 1201 (Curia Regis Rolls, I, 458) and a clerk to Hubert Walter in Canterbury (Young, Hubert Walter, p61).

³⁹ In addition to naming St Thomas as a beneficiary, William of St John mentioned Henry the Young King (d.1183) in his list of those for whose souls the monks were asked to pray. It is possible that Hunfrid is in fact Humphrey a vice-alderman of Canterbury identified by Urry in Angevin Kings.

⁴⁰ Register E, all f.36, and Register A, all f.269.

⁴¹ Register E, f.143, and Register A, f.276.

⁴² Register E, f.144 and f.184 respectively. Register A, f.276 and Register C 121v respectively.

⁴³ Urry, W., Canterbury under the Angevin Kings (London, 1967), p. 430.

bibliography

Barnes, P.M. (ed.), 1960, Documents concerning Christ Church Cathedral Priory, Canterbury 1207-13, London.

Barnes, P.M. and Powell, W.R. (eds), 1960, Interdict Documents, Pipe Roll Society, London.

Brooke, Z.N., 1968, The English Church and the Papacy, Cambridge.

Collinson, P., Ramsay, N. and Sparks, M. (eds), 1995, History of Canterbury Cathedral, Oxford.

Cheney, C.R., 1967, Hubert Walter, London.

Cheney, C.R., 1976, Pope Innocent III and England, Stuttgart.

Foss, E., 1848-64, The Judges of England, London.

Hasted, E., 1797, The History and Topographical Survey of the County of Kent, 12 vols., Canterbury.

Knowles, D., Brooke, C.N.L. and London, V.C.M. (eds), 2001, The Heads of Religious Houses, England and Wales, v.1, Cambridge.

Nilson, B., 1998, Cathedral Shrines of Medieval England, Woodbridge.

Sanders, I.J., 1960, English Baronies, Oxford

Urry, W., 1967, Canterbury under the Angevin Kings, London.

Urry, W., 1999, Thomas Becket: his last days, ed. P.A Rowe, Stroud,

Woodman, F., 1981, The Architectural History of Canterbury Cathedral, London.

Young C.R., 1968, Hubert Walter, Lord of Canterbury and Lord of England, Durham USA.

PLATE I

Ingelram Patrick’s ‘two-shilling’ charter with ‘Patrichesborne’ in the second line. Date 1174-1191 (Reproduced with the kind permission of the Dean and Chapter of Canterbury Cathedral)

appendix

Pre-1221 annual donations and gifts of land to Christ Church mentioning St Thomas

Donor	Reg- istersa	Amount	Date	Notes
Ingelram Patrick	C, E, H P.39, 40	2s., 4s.*	1174-91
Hugh Bardolf	E, H M.275	4s.	d.1203	Confirmed by his brother Robert.
Philip of Hardres	A, E, H	Rent*	1189?	Drawn up on embarking on a crusade.43
Hamo le Boef	A, E C.1066	Land	1170- 1200?
Juliana	A, E, H C.1161	3s.		Prioress of St Sepulchre c.1184. Also c.1184 giving Osbert the tenancy.
Gilbert of Barham	E, H	4d.	c.1200?	From rent of 9d.
Adam son of Elgar of Sturry	C, E, H C.1128	Land	Late 1100s	Many other donations locally.
Alice Countess of Angus	A, E	6s. 8d.		Alfred’s charters on behalf of Countess Alice in Registers A, E and H refer to the same gift of 6s. 8d. from rent of land at Elham.
Alice Countess of Angus	C	2x5s.
Nicholas the clerk	E	Land		Sandwich
Adam son of Lenenoth	C, E	Land		Sandwich.
David del Kay	C, E	Land		Sandwich
John le Packer	E	Land		Sandwich
William son of Robert	E	A chase	Early 1300s	Eastry
Adam de Botelier	E	Land	1219	Cliffe
William de Tracy	H D.20	Manor	Late 1100s	Doccombe
Walter and Agnes Clifford	E, H	3s.*	Died c.1190
Bernard of Baliol	H	13s. 4d.	Late 1100s?	Two charters. The first donates cash and second land at Southmere. Confirmed and increased to 20s. by son Eustace.
Bernard of Baliol	H	Land
Henry de Pomeroy	H	6s. 8d.	c.1200?
William de Bosco	H	Land	c.1200?	Land in Devon?
Hunfrid and Aliza	H	13d.*
John de Aldbury	E	Rent		For lights. Mill at Mersham?
Robert of Eastwood	E	Land		Land at Hadleigh.
John Kepeharm	E	House
Robert of Tilbury	C, E	12d.
William of St John’s	E	5s.*		Rent from a house in Winchester.
Roger Colnton	C, H	12d.
Thomas of Winterton	H	Land		North Lincolnshire
Conan	E, H	4s.		Holbeach, Lincolnshire
Ralph	H	12d.*		Grenested
Amoury of Evreux	H	13s. 4d.	pre-1200
Mabel of Evreux	H	13s. 4d.	pre-1200
Amoury, their son	H	13s. 4d.	pre-1200
Manasser de Insula	E	5s.
Adam de Insula	E	5s.		Also confirmed brother Manassser’s 5s.
Guy Malevicin	A, E	10s.*
Robert de Brus	A, E	13s. 4d.	c.1220?	Witnessed by Walter Stewart
Alan Stewart	A, E, H	6s. 8d.		Scottish
Walter Stewart	A, E	13s. 4d.	c.1220	Confirms 6s. 8d. from his father Alan and mentions the translation
Michael of Scotland	A, E	20s.		Lights before the tomb, but does not say which tomb.

a Chartae Antiquae in italics.

* To be placed on St Thomas’s tomb.

Donor

Reg- istersa

Amount

Date

Notes