The Chantry College of Cobham

ArticlesVolume 125
Written By KAS

The Chantry College of Cobham

james m. gibson

Following the death of his father on 25 February 1355, Sir John de Cobham succeeded to the lands and title of 3rd Lord Cobham. Throughout the 1350s he had distinguished himself by military service, fighting with the Black Prince in France and taking charge of the captured King John at the battle of Poitiers in 1356; and during a long military and diplomatic career spanning the next fifty years of fighting the French, he went on to serve three monarchs – Edward III, Richard II, and Henry IV – both as knight and statesman, having first been summoned to Parliament on 20 September 1355 and thereafter until 1406.1 At the outset of his illustrious and lucrative career, even before beginning the extensive building works at Cooling Castle during the 1380s, Sir John first provided for the spiritual welfare of the Cobham family by establishing a chantry college in the parish church of St Mary Magdalene at Cobham.2

During the fourteenth century the chantry movement had popularised the practice of celebrating intercessory masses for the well-being of ecclesiastical benefactors during their lifetime and for the repose of their souls after death.3 Pre-Reformation wills of ordinary people often included provision for such masses to be said for a specified period of years on the anniversary of their death. Wealthier parishioners provided for such chantry masses in perpetuity or might even have endowed a chantry priest to pray for themselves and their families in a side chapel in the parish church. Wholeheartedly following this fashion in fourteenth-century piety, Sir John established not just one priest, but a college of five chantry priests or chaplains, one of whom would serve as master, to celebrate divine service and pray for the health and well-being of Edward III and Queen Philippa along with John de Cobham and Margaret his wife during their lives, for the repose of their souls after their death, and for the souls of their ancestors and heirs. As a reminder to his chantry priests Sir John commissioned during the 1360s a series of commemorative brasses for the chancel of the parish church, including memorials for his father, Sir John, the 2nd Lord Cobham, his cousin, Sir Thomas de Cobham of Beluncle, and his own memorial comprising a knight dressed in the style of armour worn at the battle of Poitiers and holding in his hands the stylized representation of a church with an inscription identifying him as ‘foundeur de ceste place’.4

Sir John de Cobham received the royal licence from Edward III on 18 November 1362,5 granting him permission to establish a chantry of five chaplains and to endow them with property, including a messuage and toft on Church Street adjacent to the churchyard in Cobham, 250 acres of marshland in the parish of Hoo St Werburgh, and the manor of Westchalk in the parish of Chalk, one of five manors forming part of the ancient lands of the Cobham family.6 Property deeds dated between 1 April 1363 and 20 July 1364 effect the transfer of this property,7 and the whole foundation and endowment were confirmed by Pope Urban V on 29 April 1364.8 Although the foundation statutes or rules for the college have not survived, the petition of Sir John to the pope briefly describes the new arrangements. The advowson of the church belonged to the prior and convent of St Saviour, Bermondsey, who collected the tithes of the church and appointed the vicar. According to Sir John, however, the vicar’s portion was so small that no priest could be found to serve the parish and the church building had fallen into a ruinous state. He had undertaken to provide the vicar’s stipend, had paid the debts of the church, repaired the building and furnished it with books and ornaments, and endowed five chantry priests to be appointed jointly by himself and the monastery and instituted by the bishop of Rochester. Precisely when these new arrangements took effect remains unknown; however, the first surviving account roll of the college covering the period Michaelmas 1365 to Michaelmas 1366 shows a collegiate community comprised of the master, four chaplains, two clerks, and four choristers.9 Total receipts for the year of £83 18s. 10½d. came principally from the manor of Westchalk but included the sum of £23 in diuersis parcellis from Lord Cobham.

Over the next three decades Sir John de Cobham continued to increase the endowment and to enlarge the establishment of the college of Cobham. To encourage other donations to the college, a second petition also confirmed by the pope on 29 April 1364 granted relaxation of a year and forty days of penance in purgatory to penitents who on the principal feast days of the church year, including the feast of St Mary Magdalene, visited the church and gave alms to the college.10 Similar papal indulgences were also granted on 18 December 1366 and 24 July 1367.11 In addition, on 29 March 1367 Sir John secured a royal charter granting him and his heirs a weekly market in Cobham on Mondays and an annual fair on the feast of St Mary Magdalene, thus ensuring a steady stream of visitors to the village and the church.12

During the same year Sir John obtained a second licence from Edward III, also dated 29 March 1367, enabling the master and chaplains of the college of Cobham to acquire further lands, tenements, and rents to the annual value of £40.13 To effect this second transfer of land, Sir John on Monday next after the feast of St. Luke [19 October] 1366 had enfeoffed four trustees – Reginald de Cobham, rector of Cooling, Sir Thomas de Ludelowe, knight, William de Halden, and John de Idelegh – and granted to them all his land and rents in the parishes of Birling, Cliffe, Cobham, Cuxton, East Malling, Frindsbury, Halstow, Higham, Iwade, Leybourne, West Peckham, Luddesdown, Meopham, Northfleet, Nursted, Rainham, Hoo St Mary, Shorne, Strood, Thurnham, Upchurch, and reversions of the manor of Stanpete on the Isle of Sheppey.14 In the following year on Monday next after the feast of St Luke [25 October 1367] the four trustees released the above lands and rents back to Sir John to hold at their will.15 In a long series of property transactions between 14 May 1369 and 4 May 1380, but concentrated mainly in 1369 and 1370, the trustees then conveyed to the master and chaplains of the college certain of these properties whose total rents equalled the annual income of £40:

one messuage, 18 acres of land, and 4 acres of marsh called Potemannes, and the marshes called Bolehame and Swanpole in Shorne;16

12 acres of land, 32 acres of marsh called Botelereshope and Morlakemede, and 120 acres marsh called Pykeworth in Cliffe;17

10 acres and 2½ dayworks of land in Cooling;18

30½ acres and 3 dayworks of land in Frindsbury;19

the third part of 200 acres marsh called Chattenmarsh with reversion of the other two parts in Upchurch, Rainham, and Iwade;20

4 acres of meadow called Dykemede in Birling;21

½ acre of land and 12 acres wood called Readwode in Luddesdown;22

100 acres of wood called Clerhegge in West Peckham;23

and ‘certain other parcels of land and tenements aforesaid with appurtenances in the vills aforesaid’ including

land and wood called Batailleswode in Cobham,24

a wood called Bernardesgrene in Cobham,25

5¼ dayworks of land in Cobham,26

a messuage on Church Street in Cobham,27

land called Vyaundes in Cobham and Luddesdown,28

a messuage in Cobham and 120 acres of marsh called Shirlandesmarsh in Cooling,29

60 acres land and 89¼ acres marsh in Cooling, Frindsbury, and Shorne,30

land and pasture called Wellemarsh in Hoo,31

a shop in Dartford,32

a mill, 52s. rent, and a moiety of a messuage in Dartford and Frinds-bury,33

12 acres called Southland in Frindsbury,34

various other lands in Frindsbury, Cliffe, and St Margaret’s, Rochester,35

various rents in Higham and Shorne,36

and a messuage, a mill, 160 acres land, 200 acres pasture, and 15 acres woodland in Cobham and Shorne.37

Finally, on 8 February 1381 the two surviving trustees – Reginald de Cobham and William de Halden – conveyed back to Sir John de Cobham all their interest in his remaining lands and rents.38

While his trustees pursued these property transactions, Sir John turned to another source of income: the advowsons of churches in his patronage. Because the prior and convent of St Saviour, Bermondsey owned the advowson of Cobham, the master and fellows of the college did not receive the parish tithes. Sir John therefore obtained permission from Pope Gregory XI on 28 June 1376 to appropriate to the college one of the churches in his patronage, subject to the reservation of a vicar’s stipend.39 On 24 November 1376 he received a licence from Edward III granting the appropriation of any two churches in his patronage40 and on 27 October 1377 a further licence from Archbishop Simon de Sudbury to appropriate the church of Horton Kirby to the master and chaplains.41 Accordingly, on 10 April 1378 Thomas de Brynton, Bishop of Rochester, confirmed the transfer of the advowson of Horton Kirby from Sir John de Cobham to the master, John Wetewang, and the fellows of the college.42 Later documents reveal that in 1502 the master and fellows were paying 40s. annually to John Bache, then vicar of Horton, for his stipend and 6s. for ‘the ordynary Charges duryinge the tyme that he shalbe vyker there’.43 In 1515 and again in 1516 they paid 40s. for the church of Horton Kirby to the collector of the subsidy of Henry VIII and a further 20s. in 1519.44 In return, however, according to the Valor Ecclesiasticus in 1534 the advowson was yielding to the college an annual income of £13 13s. 4d.45

After making these arrangements concerning the advowson of Horton Kirby, Sir John also negotiated the appropriation of the advowson of Chalk. As early as 21 March 1368 his trustees Reginald de Cobham and John de Idelegh had obtained a licence from Edward III permitting them to grant to the master and chaplains of the college part of the manor of Martham (Norfolk), which belonged to Sir John de Cobham, and permitting the master and chaplains to exchange that land in the manor of Martham for rents from the manor of Eastchalk and the advowson of the church of Chalk, which belonged to the prior and convent of Norwich.46 After receiving a further royal licence on 21 February 1369,47 the trustees had completed the grant of land at Martham to the college on 1 July 1369;48 however, the exchange with the prior of Norwich was never completed, since the manorial rents from Martham were worth less than the advowson and rents from Chalk.49 In 1380 Sir John de Cobham reopened the negotiations, receiving confirmation of the exchange from the bishop of Norwich on 3 March,50 the prior and convent of Holy Trinity, Norwich on 1 July,51 and the archbishop of Canterbury on 16 July.52 Meanwhile, the master and fellows of the college had petitioned Richard II for permission to acquire additional land with an annual value of £20 and permission to grant the same to the prior and convent of Norwich in order to equalise the exchange.53 Following the supplication of Sir John de Cobham, the royal licence was granted on 1 September 1380,54 and the exchange was eventually completed.55 Later documents reveal that the master and fellows in April 1390 presented John Long, one of the chaplains of the college, to be instituted vicar of Chalk56 and in June 1396 provided a messuage in Chalk for the vicar and his successors.57 A valuation and division of the rents of Chalk church, made by William de Bottlesham, Bishop of Rochester, on 24 May 1391, valued the great tithes at 20 marks and the small tithes at 10 marks, making a total of £20.58 In return the master and fellows had to spend at least £5 on the vicarage, provide new books and vestments, maintain the chancel, and provide bread, wine, and candles. According to the Valor Ecclesiasticus in 1534 the advowson was yielding to the college an annual income of £15.59

While pursuing the appropriation of these advowsons of Chalk and Horton Kirby, Sir John also successfully petitioned Pope Urban VI for appropriation of the advowson of Cobham and permission to increase the number of chaplains in the college by two. A papal mandate to the bishop of Rochester approved the increase and ordered the appropriation to the college of a parish church in Sir John’s patronage so that the master and fellows could exchange it with the prior and convent of St Saviour’s, Bermondsey for the advowson of Cobham.60 There is no evidence for the completion of this exchange or for the appropriation of the advowson of Cobham, which would have made Cobham a true collegiate church rather than just a parish church with a college attached. However, Sir John must have reached some agreement with the prior and convent of St Saviour’s, Bermondsey, for the 1534 Valor Ecclesiasticus does show that the college received an annual income of £7 from the advowson of Cobham, although that amount is far lower than the receipts from the advowsons of Chalk, Horton Kirby, Rolvenden, or Tilbury (Essex).61 Whatever agreement Sir John may have made concerning the advowson, later documents do reveal that sometime before 1385 he had increased the number of chantry priests in the college from five to seven, as authorised by the papal mandate, financing the augmentation with the income from the advowsons of Chalk and Horton Kirby and the additional income from property conveyed to the college by his trustees.

During the 1380s Sir John continued to augment the endowment and to increase still further the number of priests first to nine and then to eleven. On 28 April 1383 he agreed with Sir Richard de Ponynges to exchange an acre of wood and the advowson of the church of Elsing (Norfolk) for the advowson of the church of Rolvenden ‘pour lez mestre & lez chapilleyns del collegie de Cobeham’.62 A series of property transactions with Sir Richard de Ponynges and Sir John de Clinton completed this exchange between May and July 1383,63 and in October 1385 he then sought papal authority from Urban VI to carry out his plans. A petition of Sir John de Cobham, dated Genoa, 12 October 1385, states that ‘for the honour of God and the glory of the Virgin Mary and the blessed Mary Magdalene he has established a college of one master and six chaplains and other ministers for the perpetual celebration of divine service day and night in the parish church of Cobham’ and seeks permission to grant to the master and fellows the advowson of Rolvenden and to augment their number by two additional chaplains.64 Although this petition was approved and countersigned at Genoa on 23 March 1386, the papal bull to Thomas de Brinton, Bishop of Rochester, consenting to these changes bears the much later date of 8 March 1388; and the proposed appropriation and augmentation were not finally authorised by the bishop until 23 March 1389,65 and then only after he had directed the rector of Southfleet on his behalf to make further enquiries into the annexation of the church of Rolvenden on 12 March 1389.66

On 1 April 1389, in the chapter house of the college, Walter Chudham, master, John Moys, submaster, and the five fellows John Thurston, William Tanner, John Mercote, Richard Yonge, and Ralphe Lister agreed under seal their acceptance of the enlarged establishment. In addition to the current seven perpetual chaplains, there would be admitted two temporal chaplains who would celebrate chantry masses not only for Sir John de Cobham and Margaret his wife, but also for Lady Joanna, their only daughter and heir, for Sir John de la Pole, her husband, and for his parents, Sir William de la Pole and Lady Margaret his wife. Although these two temporal chaplains would live in common with the fellows of the college, they would not be full members of the college chapter, they would receive a smaller stipend, and they would be removable at the pleasure of the master and greater part of the fellows. In addition to these two temporal chaplains, Bishop Thomas de Brinton also established the appointment of two clerks, who would live in the college, study in the school, and serve as sacristans in the church. On 2 April 1389, the day after signing this agreement, Walter Chudham, master of the college, was then admitted as vicar of the church of Rolvenden.67

During the negotiations for the appropriation of Rolvenden, Sir John was also negotiating the appropriation of Tilbury church and the further increase of chaplains from nine to eleven. On 31 December 1388 he received a licence from Joan de Bohun, Countess of Hereford and Essex, to grant the advowson of Tilbury to the master and fellows.68 After directing John Mory, rector of Southfleet, to inquire into the proposed annexation on 2 March 1389,69 Thomas de Brinton, citing a papal bull dated 23 March 1386, granted his episcopal licence on 30 March 1389 for the appropriation of Tilbury and the enlargement of the college to a chantry of nine perpetual chaplains and a further chantry of two temporal chaplains. These arrangements were ratified by the master, submaster, and five fellows on 1 April 1389; by the bishop of London on 3 April 1389; by the dean and chapter of St Paul’s on 8 April 1389; and by the archdeacon of Essex on 1 April 1389.70 Royal licence was received on 10 November 1389,71 and on 12 November 1389 Sir John completed the grant of the advowson to the master and fellows.72 A year later on 18 December 1390, when the vicarage became vacant, William Tanner, master of the college, was admitted as vicar of Tilbury.73

Having completed the appropriation of Tilbury church to the master and fellows of the college, Sir John de Cobham obtained from Richard II a royal Deed of Confirmation, dated 18 January 1390, reciting and confirming all the licences, grants of property, and appropriations of advowsons dating back to the foundation licence of Edward III in 1362.74 With the endowment of the college now secure and well-funded, Sir John once again petitioned the pope for permission to enlarge the college, increasing the number of chaplains for a final time from eleven to thirteen. A papal mandate dated 4 July 1391 from Boniface IX to William de Bottlesham, Bishop of Rochester, ordered the bishop to grant the desired licence.75 To ensure that his foundation would continue to prosper financially, Sir John also secured additional papal indulgences on 4 July 139176 and 16 May 1405,77 granting relaxation of penance in purgatory to those who on the four feasts of St Mary the Virgin or on the feast of St Mary Magdalene visited the college and gave alms for the conservation of the church of Cobham.

Over the years other benefactors did give gifts of money and property to the college. Some benefactors, like William Wangford of Northfleet in 1415, bequeathed sums of money so that the master and fellows would pray for the repose of their souls and for their families.78 Others granted land to the college during their lifetime or left bequests of property in their wills. In 1375 Thomas de Brinton, Bishop of Rochester, gave 5½ acres of land belonging to him in the manor of Cobhambury.79 In 1379 John de Kirkeby and Alice, widow of Sir John de Kirkeby deceased, perhaps influenced by the recent appropriation of the church of Horton Kirby in 1378, granted to the master and fellows of the college 216 acres land, 12 acres meadow, 80 acres pasture, 2 acres wood, and 28s. 3d. rents plus the rent of 3 hens in the parishes of Horton Kirby, Fawkham, Farningham, and Sutton next Dartford.80 In 1392 Reginald de Cobham joined with Ralph Cobham of Chafford, William Makenade, and John Baker to grant to the master and chaplains various lands in Chalk, Hoo, Northfleet, Nursted, Halling, and Strood.81 In 1397 William Wodcock gave 7 acres of land in Luddesdown,82 and in 1420 John Catel of Chalk gave two houses and a garden in Chalk.83 In 1496 John Wrygth of Cobham gave 5 virgates of arable land in Cobham called Long Wynterhams,84 and in the same year John Hale also of Cobham gave two pieces of land in Cobham called Hoo Hill and Alseys.85 In 1505 John Russell gave 12 dayworks of land in Cobham,86 and in 1517 William Sprever, executor of his father, William Sprever deceased, granted to the master of the college two further pieces of land in Cobham.87 Altogether these grants and bequests, along with the endowment of Sir John de Cobham, produced for the master and fellows a gross annual rental income of £142 1s. 2½d., according to the 1534 Valor Ecclesiasticus, arising from the advowsons of Chalk, Cobham, Horton Kirby, Rolvenden, and Tilbury, and from land and tenements in Birling, Chalk, Cliffe, Cobham, Cooling, Dartford, Frindsbury, Halstow, Higham, Hoo, Horton Kirby, Iwade, West Peckham, Luddesdown, Nursted, Singlewell, Shorne, Stoke, Strood, St Margaret’s, Rochester, and Hoo St Mary.88

The establishment and endowment of the chantry college of Cobham, so carefully planned and nurtured by Sir John de Cobham in the fourteenth century, came to an abrupt end during the Henrician Reformation in the sixteenth century. Henry VIII had surveyed the immense national wealth of monastic and chantry lands in the 1534 Valor Ecclesiasticus,89 and in 1535 he had required secular clergy to renounce papal supremacy and to register their submission to the king as head of the church.90 Sir George Brooke, 9th Lord Cobham, from his vantage point in Parliament and on the privy council, could see where events were moving and arranged on 15 September 1537 for the master and fellows to surrender all the college lands, estates, and advowsons pro diuersis racionabilibus et iustis causis to himself.91 A subsequent petition to the king, reciting this grant and requesting ratification by letters patent, was evidently never granted;92 however, the 1539 statute for dissolution of the monasteries states that Henry VIII gave ‘Licence by his Grace’s Word, unto the Right Honorable George Lord Cobham, to purchase and receive to him and to his Heirs for ever, of the late Master and Brethren of the College or Chantry of Cobham in the County of Kent, now being utterly dissolved, the Site of the same College or Chantry, and all and singular their Hereditaments and Possessions, as well Temporal as Ecclesiastical, whatsoever they be or were within the Realm of England’.93 This saving clause goes on to exempt Lord Cobham from all other requirements of the statute, as does a similar saving clause in the 1547 Chantries Act.94 Thus the lands and rents given to the college almost two hundred years earlier through the piety of the 3rd Lord Cobham passed back into the possession of the politically astute 9th Lord Cobham,95 who also on 12 December 1538 finally obtained from the abbot and convent of St Saviour’s, Bermondsey, just before the dissolution of that monastery, possession of the advowson of the church of Cobham that had so long eluded his ancestor.96

Although the statutes and ordinances established by Sir John de Cobham for the college have not survived, many details about the everyday communal life of the college may be gleaned from the surviving account rolls and inventories.97 As noted above, the earliest extant accounts for the college from Michaelmas 1365 to Michaelmas 1366 showed that the college establishment consisted then of a master, four chaplains, two clerks, and four choristers. The next surviving accounts from Michaelmas 1402 to Michaelmas 1403 reveal a much more complex community organized in an increasing hierarchy of ranks and degrees. After the successive enlargements of the college by Sir John de Cobham in the fourteenth century, the college establishment at the beginning of the fifteenth century consisted of a master, a submaster, seven chaplains, one deacon, three clerks, six choristers, and a number of servants. The master had two servants, a personal servant (valettus) and a treasurer or keeper of the keys (claviger). The master and fellows also employed a cook and a cook’s boy, a brewer/baker and a brewer’s boy, two carters to care for the horses in their stable, and a master of the grammar school to teach the boys of the college. Other regular payments appear in the fifteenth-century accounts for a collector of the rents, a laundress to wash the table linen and altar linen, a barber to shave the tonsures of the choristers, and a tailor for fitting and sewing the livery of the choristers.

The surviving accounts indicate that during the fifteenth century the size of the community slowly waned from the peak numbers during the lifetime of the founder. In 1425-1426 the numbers had fallen to master, submaster, five chaplains, four clerks, and six choristers and in 1463-1464 had further slumped to master, submaster, two chaplains, two deacons, two clerks, and five choristers. An undated petition to the archbishop sometime during the fifteenth century reveals that the number of fellows had shrunk to four with the same number of clerks and choristers, the master’s salary remained unpaid, and the water conduit taking water from the college to the village had become rotten with age, forcing the villagers to seek water elsewhere since through sickness the fellows were unable to repair it.98 Just two years before the surrender of the chantry to Sir George Brooke, only the master and four fellows signed the renunciation of papal supremacy on 27 October 1535.

Nevertheless, the finances of the community remained strong; only twice did the surviving fifteenth-century accounts show a deficit for the year. The principal source of income throughout the century remained rents from the college properties and advowsons, supplemented by such occasional receipts as sales of grain at various mills belonging to the college, amounting to £11 in the 1425-1426 accounts and by oblations from donors, amounting to £3 2s. 11d. in 1461-1462, £5 7s. in 1462-1463, and £9 5s. 4d. in 1473-1474. In 1402-1403 the master, William Tanner, accounted for £111 9s. 10½d. received from advowsons, £92 1s. 5d. from rents, £15 1s. 4d. from sales of grain, and arrears of £12 8s. 3¼d. carried forward from the previous account, amounting to total receipts of £231 10¾d. During the same year the master and fellows paid £2 14s. 2½d. for quitrents on various properties; £14 13s. 9½d. for costs of the church, including the submaster’s expenses for bread, wine, candles, and incense, as well as other charges arising from their advowsons; £75 4s. 6d. for food and drink; £76 17s. 4d. for stipends and livery; £14 15s. 6d. for repairs to their properties; and £10 15s. 11d. for such miscellaneous necessary expenses as making and mending various vestments, binding books, mending an incense thurible, and purchasing linen napkins, parchment, paper, and red wax. Altogether the expenses during 1402-1403 totalled £219 10s. 1d., leaving a small surplus at the end of the year.

The major expenses for the master and fellows, then, consisted of feeding, clothing, and paying the college community. In the 1402-1403 accounts the total payment of £75 4s. 6d. for communal food and drink included £46 16s. for the diet of the master and eight chaplains (24d. per person per week), £10 8s. for the deacon and three clerks (12d. per person per week), and £10 8d. for the six choristers (8d. per person per week), plus an extra 26s. 10d. in expenses on the feast of St Mary Magdalene. A similar payment of 29s. 6d. appears in the 1425-1426 account, and the 1482-1483 account of rent collector Robert Holt includes a payment of 2s. for an extra cook on the patronal feast in 1483. In the 1402-1403 accounts the total payment of £76 17s. 4d. for stipends and livery included £12 for the master, £4 for each of the chaplains, 40s. for the deacon, 24s. for each of the clerks, and 10s. for each of the choristers. In other years the accounts show further differentiation among the clerks and deacons. In 1462-1463, for example, John Lincoln, one of the deacons received 40s., and John Lorkyn, the other deacon, received 20s. In the same year Thomas Mores, one of the clerks, was paid 26s. 8d., while William Sawnders, the other clerk, earned only 20s. The chaplains also earned additional money for additional duties. In 1402-1403 the submaster was paid an additional stipend of 6s. 8d. for his office. Another chaplain chosen by the master to instruct the choristers in singing also received 6s. 8d. The parochial chaplain received an extra 20s. for serving as vicar of the parish of Cobham. The instructor in the grammar school earned £5. Among the servants the cook received 16s. and his boy 10s., the brewer/baker received 20s. and his boy 14s., one carter received 26s. 8d. and his fellow 20s., and the laundress received 6s. 8d. Some of the fifteenth-century accounts also include additional payments for livery over and above the stipends. In 1473-1474, for example, livery payments at the feast of St Mary Magdalene amounted to £41 9s. 8d., with the master, submaster, and four fellows each allotted four yards of cloth and the clerks each three yards.99

Although the surviving accounts offer glimpses into the social organisation of the medieval college, very little documentary evidence survives for the physical layout of the college. On 24 June 1370 the prior and convent of St Saviour’s, Bermondsey did grant a licence for the master and fellows to erect a range of buildings extending the length of the church and chancel but leaving room for a processional way along the south side of the church for parishioners to use at matins, mass, and vespers;100 however, no accounts or plans survive for the construction of the college. Some of these medieval buildings, notably the college hall, still stand intact; however, others were altered in the late sixteenth century to form the almshouses of the New College of Cobham, and the remainder now lies in ruins.

In 1962, Peter J. Tester undertook an archaeological survey of the new college and the medieval ruins,101 establishing the boundaries of the medieval kitchen and other unidentified rooms in the south court and the passageways between the west wing of the college and the nave of the church and between the east wing of the college and the chancel of the church, along with the boundaries of a room adjacent to the south side of the chancel, in the north court. Although constrained by the presence of the almshouses, in the college quadrangle he discovered remains of destroyed walls and passageways running along the east and west sides of the quadrangle in front of the present walls of the almshouses and evidence of a pentice on the south side of the quadrangle formerly attached to the north wall of the college hall, and he further conjectured the presence of a similar pentice along the north wall of the quadrangle now covered by the north range of the almshouses. In his discussion of the use of the college buildings, he suggested that the master would have occupied part of the east range with his private access to the chancel and that the fellows would have occupied the west range with their own passageway to the nave.

Tester also called attention to several college rooms or buildings briefly mentioned in other sources: the chapter house, the sacristy, and the schoolhouse. That the chapter house was a separate room distinct from the college hall may be inferred from the letters patent of Bishop Thomas de Brinton, dated 23 March 1389, which forbade the newly created temporal chaplains from entering the chapter house (nec intrabunt capitulum dicti collegij) or having a voice in the business of the master and fellows (nec vocem habebunt inter alios, nec secreta domus sive collegij predicti quovismodo cognoscent).102 Leases were no doubt signed and sealed in the chapter house, as were the agreements of the master and fellows to the appropriation of Rolvenden and the appropriation of Tilbury, both dated in the chapter house of the college (in domo nostra capitulari dicti collegij) on 1 April 1389.103 Just where in the college the chapter house was located remains unknown, although Tester suggested that the building attached to the south side of the chancel in the north court may have been either the chapter house or the sacristy.104

Given its location near the medieval door leading to the chancel, however, this building more likely served as the sacristy or vestry (vestibulum) mentioned in two agreements between the master and submaster dated 25 December 1479105 and 25 December 1487.106 These agreements list the chalices, crosses, thuribles, images, relics, and other precious objects (jocalibus) of the college placed in the keeping of the submaster. Notable among the treasures belonging to the master and fellows were a silver and gilt receptacle with the image of the Virgin Mary given to the college by archbishop William Courtenay (1381-1396) to be used for carrying the sacrament in the Corpus Christi procession and various relics, including a book impressed with a particle of the Cross and a crystal box decorated with silver and gilt bands containing a thorn from Christ’s crown of thorns (spina de corona christi). A third agreement, also dated 25 December 1479, between the submaster and the sacristans lists the service books, vestments for everyday use and for feast days, altar hangings and linen, and liturgical vessels, as well as a lectern and five iron chairs for the choristers, placed in the keeping of the sacristans for daily use in the church.107

Although the location of the sacristy remains conjectural, the schoolhouse of the college, located at the north-east corner of the churchyard, can be confidently identified as the building now known as Stone House.108 Mentioned in a mason’s bill in 1383 for work done at the ‘colegue et skolehous de Cobham’,109 this building is identified in the 1572 terrier ‘of the landes belonginge to the late dissolved Colledge of Cobham’, where it is described as ‘the Stone howse sometyme a Scole howse, wythe the garden and orcharde thereunto adjoyninge’ situated with the high street to the north, the churchyard to the west, and the lands and tenements of the college to the south and east.110 Payments to the master of the grammar school ‘pro instructione puerorum dicti Collegij’ in each of the surviving fifteenth-century accounts, although unknown to Tester, confirm the existence of the school and emphasize the importance of education in the chantry college at Cobham as in the chantry movement generally.

In addition to these scattered references to college rooms in the accounts and other documents, the important evidence of the late fourteenth-century inventory of the goods and chattels of the college, also apparently unknown to Tester, both confirms his archaeological evidence and raises questions for further archaeological investigation.111 This inventory, originally made on 30 September 1397 and subsequently updated on 30 September 1399 and 30 September 1400, lists the livestock (de stauro viuo) and equipment (de stauro mortuo) at the college farms in the manor of Westchalk and Vyaundes and in the marshes let by the college and then proceeds to inventory the contents of each of the common rooms in the college.

Some of these rooms correspond to rooms already identified through the archaeological evidence, and the inventory thus offers further insight into the activities carried out there. The college hall, for example, contained a chair (probably for the master), two tables, two pairs of trestles or benches, four bench covers stored in a basket, four basins and ewers (probably for hand washing), and an iron fork for the fire. The pantry and buttery, placed on Tester’s plan at the southern end of the east range opposite the door to the hall, contained various silver bowls and other serving bowls with covers, a great bowl called ‘Wassail’ (magnus mazerus vocatus Wassayl) given to the master and fellows by Sir William Peche (1358-1412) of Lullingstone, twelve silver spoons, tankards, salt-cellars, candlesticks, and numerous quantities of towels, napkins, and tablecloths. The description of the latter indicates that the college community was segregated by rank during meals, for there were fine linen tablecloths, napkins, and towels (de paryswork) for the high table (pro mensa superior or pro mensa gentilium) where the master and fellows ate and other table linen for the table where the clerks and choristers ate (pro mensa clericorum). Tester also noted the monastic custom observed in some chantry colleges of reading aloud during meals and suggested that the light bracket on the southern wall of the hall with sockets for candles may have enabled one of the fellows to read while the others ate in silence.112 This suggestion is corroborated by the 1397 inventory, for the list of books in the library notes that one of the bibles (vocata liber de prophecijs) was in the hall. The other room identified by Tester, the kitchen in the south court, according to the inventory contained seven platters for carrying joints of meat, three dozen plates, three dozen dishes, thirty-one saucers, five brass pots, two pitchers, two brass pans, a frying pan, a skillet, an old frying pan, various items for the fireplace including a tripod, a meathook, two pothooks, a gridiron, two andirons, and three iron spits, and various utensils including a dressing knife, a mortar with pestle, an axe, two strainers, and an iron cresset.

The 1397 inventory also lists the contents of four other college rooms or buildings not mentioned by Tester in his archaeological survey: a bakehouse, an infirmary, a stable, and a library. The fifteenth-century accounts reveal that the master and fellows employed a servant, variously described as a baker (pisticator) or a brewer (pandoxator) or (braciator), and also a brewer’s boy. The inventory of the bakehouse (pistrina) contains implements for both trades including various casks, barrels, sacks, and bushel baskets, eight tubs for brewing or kneading, sieves, strainers, two tap-holes, a hand-mill, two bills for dressing millstones, a winnowing-fan, a scale with a one-pound lead weight, and a rammer for packing flour. Tester did identify a room in the south court adjacent to the kitchen with the foundations of a circular structure in the south-east corner, which he suggested might be either a newel stair, although he found no trace of stone steps, or an oven, although he found no lining of brick, tiles, or clay, and no marks of burning.113 It is possible, had he known about the documentary evidence for a bakehouse and brewhouse, that he might have identified this room with the bakehouse of the inventory and the circular structure with the foundations of the bakehouse oven.

There is no indication thus far, either documentary or archaeological, for the location of the infirmary, the library, or the stable. According to the 1397 inventory, the college infirmary contained a bed, a mattress, a canopy for the bed, several coverlets including one of rabbit skins, four woolen blankets, two pairs of linen sheets with a head sheet for men of good birth (pro gentilibus), and one pair of canvas sheets for the servants (pro valettis). The library, apparently a separate collection from the service books kept in the vestry, included various theological, devotional, and historical works: two bibles, and two glossed psalters, a book of homilies, a volume of St John Chrysostom and another of St Clement of Alexandria, the Meditations of St Bernard of Clairvaux, the Moralia of Gregory the Great, Peter Lombard’s Sentences, Giovanni d’Andrea’s commentaries, a work by Hugh of Pisa, a decretal collection, a book of saints’ lives, a Mariale in praise of the Virgin, a miracle play (miraculum) of the Virgin Mary, a book of grammar, and a copy of Polychronicon, a universal history by the Cheshire monk Randulph Higden from the beginning of the world to 1327, extended by others down to 1357, and widely distributed throughout the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In the stable there were a cart with iron-rimmed wheels, three cart horses, two riding horses for the master, a saddle, three halters and other items of harness for the cart horses, and various implements and equipment including a chain, two locks, three picks, two axes, a dung fork, a shovel, a mattock, a handcart, and a pair of leather gloves. This building, whether within the south court or somewhere outside the college walls, provided the place of work for the two carters included among the servants in the fifteenth-century accounts. Further archaeological investigation could yet discover the location of these rooms, since ample space remains in the south court for other rooms or buildings and since the purpose of the large room west of the kitchen has not yet been established.

The picture of the communal life of the college then that emerges from the documentary evidence of the college inventories and accounts and from the archaeological evidence shows a multi-layered community descending in degrees from the master through the perpetual fellows, temporal fellows, deacons, clerks, sacristans and choristers to the servants and servant boys, a hierarchy reinforced by where they sat at table and the food they ate, by the college livery that they wore, by the location of their rooms in the quadrangle or in the servants quarters in the south court, by the horses in the stable, and even by the bed linen in the infirmary. For almost two hundred years, however, this chantry college community worked and lived together, feeding and clothing the college family, administering extensive property holdings including the advowsons of five parish churches, and above all celebrating divine services and praying daily for the well-being of the founder, Sir John de Cobham, and his successors and for the repose of their souls after death.

Masters of the College114

William de Newton ( -1371) Probably the first master, he is mentioned in the will of Thomas de Cobham dated 20 December 1367: ‘Item lego domino willelmo magistro cantarie de Cobeham et sociis suis ibidem celebrantibus c.s’.115 At his resignation as master on 17 March 1371 he was described in the bishop’s register as vicar or perpetual chaplain of Cobham.116

Edward de Stanlake (1371- ) He was appointed master of the college on 17 March 1371 upon the joint presentation of Sir John de Cobham and the prior and convent of St Saviour’s, Bermondsey.117 The end of his term is unknown due to the missing register of Bishop Thomas de Brinton (1373-1389).

John Wetewang (c.1378-1379) The beginning and end of his term are unknown due to the missing register of Bishop Thomas de Brinton (1373-1389). He is mentioned as master both on 10 April 1378, when the bishop of Rochester confirmed to the college the appropriation of the church of Horton Kirby,118 and also on 3 October 1378 and 28 December 1379 in grants of land in Horton Kirby to the master and chaplains of the college.119

Walter Chudham ( -1390) The beginning of his term is unknown due to the missing register of Bishop Thomas de Brinton (1373-1389). He was master as early as 2 April 1389, when he was admitted as vicar of the church of Rolvenden.120 He resigned as master on 5 December 1390.121

William Tanner (1390-1418) William Tanner was instituted as master on 5 December 1390.122 He was admitted as vicar of Tilbury on 18 December 1390;123 he submitted accounts for the year Michaelmas 1402-Michaelmas1403;124 and he is further mentioned in various property deeds and leases dated 28 September 1392,125 3 November 1395,126 20 June 1396,127 6 May 1397,128 4 October 1400,129 24 June 1405,130 8 October 1406,131 and 10 October 1409,132 and in connection with a legal suit on 19 January 1418.133 According to his brass in the parish church of Cobham, he died on 22 June 1418.

John Gladwyn ( - c.1445) The beginning of his term is unknown due to the missing folios at the end of the register of Bishop Richard Yonge (1404-1418) and the missing register of Bishop John Kempe (1419-1422). He is mentioned in property deeds dated 12 June 1420134 and 4 October 1420,135 and his accounts for the college survive for the year Michaelmas 1425-Michaelmas 1426.136 On 28 November 1444 he petitioned bishop John Lowe to fix a date for auditing his accounts for the year Michaelmas 1443-Michaelmas 1444.137 The end of his term as master is not recorded in the bishop’s register, but his successor William Bocher is mentioned on 20 April 1445. According to his brass in Cobham church, John Gladwyn died in 1450.

William Bocher/Bouchier ( -1458) The register of Bishop John Lowe does not record the admission of John Bocher, but he is mentioned as master on 20 April 1445, when he assented to the admission of Thomas Carpentar to the vicarage of Chalk.138 He is also mentioned in a lease dated 1 October 1448 for land in the parish of St Margaret’s, Rochester.139 He died in office in 1458, and his successor was instituted on 10 August 1458.140

William Hobson (1458-1473) William Hobson was instituted on the Feast of St Lawrence, 10 August 1458.141 He is mentioned in an undated decision of John Stoke, auditor of Archbishop Thomas Bourchier, in favour of John Claypole, perpetual chaplain of the chantry of Horton Kirby, in a suit with William Bocher, master of Cobham College now deceased, and William Hobson now master of Cobham College, concerning the chantry of Horton;142 and he is further mentioned in leases granted by the master and fellows of the college on 29 September 1459143 and 29 September 1462.144 Accounts of William Hobson also survive for the year Michaelmas 1462-Michaelmas 1463.145 The exact date of the end of his term is unknown due to the missing register of Bishop John Alcock (1472-1476), but he apparently died in office during August or September 1473.

John Hotte (1473-c.1476) Both the exact beginning and end of his term are unknown due to the missing registers of Bishops John Alcock (1472-1476), John Russell (1476-1480), and Edmund Audley (1480-1493). The consistory court act book, however, shows that on 23 September 1473 John Hott (magistro ad presens dicti Collegij) was granted administration of the estate of William Hobson (nuper magistri Collegij de Cobham).146 Accounts of John Hotte, master of the college, survive for Michaelmas 1473-Michaelmas 1474,147 and he is further mentioned in a lease dated 29 September 1476.148

John Bygcrofte (c.1480-c.1481) Both the beginning and end of his term are unknown due to the missing registers of Bishops John Russell (1476-1480) and Edmund Audley (1480-1493). He is mentioned in leases granted by the master and fellows on 12 October 1480149 and 15 April 1481.150

Edward Underwode (c.1482-c.1486) Both the beginning and end of his term are unknown due to the missing register of Bishop Edmund Audley (1480-1493). He is mentioned on 28 September 1482 in the presentation of Robert Tyve of Willoughton to the vicarage of Horton Kirby,151 and Edward Underwode and the fellows of the college were summoned to appear in the consistory court on 6 October 1486 in a dispute concerning arrears of stipends.152

Thomas Lyndley (c.1488-1492) The beginning of his term is unknown due to the missing register of Bishop Edmund Audley (1480-1493). His accounts survive for the period from August 1488 to July 1490,153 and he is mentioned in a lease granted by the master and fellows of the college on 20 June 1491.154 He died 22 April 1492.155

John Sprotte (1492-1498) The exact beginning of his term is unknown due to the missing register of Bishop Edmund Audley (1480-1493); however, on 27 April 1492 John Sprott, Richard Walker, and John Baker petitioned John de Cobham, patron of the college, for the institution of John Sprott as master following the death of Thomas Lyndley.156 His accounts survive for Michaelmas 1495-Michaelmas 1496.157 He is mentioned in two separate leases dated 18 November 1492,158 in connection with a grant of land to the college by John Wryght on 20 March 1496159 and 20 November 1496,160 and in connection with a further grant of land by John Hale on 5 February 1498.161 According to his brass in Cobham church, John Sprott died on 25 October 1498.

John Alan (1499-1502) John Alan was instituted and admitted master of the college on 12 January and vicar of Cobham on 13 January 1499,162 and he is mentioned on 15 December 1500 in a dispute concerning the stipend of the vicar of Chalk.163 During his tenure as master he also served as commissary to the bishop of Rochester, vicar of St Nicholas, Deptford, and vicar of Hoo St Werburgh.164 He died in office during October 1502.165

John Baker (1502-1512) John Baker was admitted and instituted as master on 16 October 1502.166 He is mentioned in numerous legal documents: deeds concerning William Horsey, the prebend of Cobhambury, on 17 November 1502167 and 7 November 1504;168 an agreement concern-ing the stipend of John Bache, vicar of Horton Kirby on 3 December 1502,169 the settlement of a complaint by Thomas Weele, vicar of Chalk on 4 November 1507 concerning his stipend;170 and various leases and other property transactions on 11 October 1503,171 16 September 1504,172 8 December 1504,173 20 April 1505,174 25 May 1509,175 and 26 September 1511.176 He died in office during May 1512.177

William Borowe (1512-1513) John Brooke, 7th Lord Cobham died on 9 March 1512, and Thomas Brooke, 8th Lord Cobham did not receive livery of his father’s lands until 29 May 1512.178 During this vacancy in the patronage of the college, Bishop John Fisher (1504-1535) admitted and instituted William Borowe as master on 23 May 1512.179 However, Henry VIII, claiming patronage of the college during this vacancy, had appointed George Crowmer as master on 21 May 1512, just two days before the admission of William Borowe.180 Some negotiation ensued. After receiving a letter from Henry VIII requesting institution of George Crowmer,181 the bishop of Rochester eventually admitted George Crowmer on 27 June 1513.182 On 20 March 1517 William Borowe, ‘late master’ of Cobham College, signed a general release of all claims to George Crowmer, ‘current master’, and to the brethren.183

George Crowmer (1513-1532) George Crowmer was appointed on 21 May 1512 and instituted and admitted on 27 June 1513 as explained above. He is mentioned in property deeds and correspondence dated 24 October 1515,184 16 July 1517,185 20 July 1518,186 9 April 1519,187 25 April 1523,188 and 6 March 1528.189 During this time Crowmer had also served as rector of Murston until 1513 and rector of Stanford le Hope (Essex) from 1511 to 1514.190 In 1521 he was appointed archbishop of Armagh, and prior to his consecration and enthronement he executed the oath of fidelity and obedience to the Pope Leo X.191 He resigned as master of the college in 1532,192 at which time he also held the posts of vicar of Benenden (1513-1542), archbishop of Armagh (1521-1543), and lord chancellor of Ireland (1532-1534).193

Robert Johnson (1532-1533) Robert Johnson was admitted as master on 3 August 1532194 and resigned little more than a year later in October 1533.195 He received the degree of Bachelor of Canon Law at Cambridge in 1531, and during a career devoted to the church he served as vicar of Yalding, July 1524; rector of Stone-by-Dartford, 1525-1558; prebendary of Rochester, 1541; prebendary of Worcester, 1544-1548; prebendary of Tamworth, Staffordshire, 1547-1548; prebendary of Hereford, 1551-1559; rector of Clun, Shropshire, 1553; prebendary of York, 1556-1557; master of York School, c.1557; rector of Bolton Percy, 1558; and prebendary of Southwell, 1558-1559.196

John Wylbor/Wildbore (1533-1534) John Wylbor was admitted as master sometime between 28 October and 12 November 1533197 and like Robert Johnson resigned after little more than a year on 14 December 1534.198 Like Johnson he also held a variety of other ecclesiastical posts, including vicar of Lamberhurst, 1515; master of Strood Hospital, 1517-1540; vicar of St Nicholas, Rochester, 1519-1522; rector of Chislehurst, 1523-1552; and second prebendary of Rochester Cathedral 1542-1552.199

John Bayly (1534-1537) John Bayly received the degree of Bachelor of Canon Law from Cambridge in 1525-6 and afterwards was appointed to Cardinal College, Oxford.200 He was admitted as master of Cobham College on 14 December 1534.201 He is mentioned in financial records dated 14 July 1535202 and 16 December 1535.203 He was destined to be the last master of the college. On 27 October 1535 along with four fellows of the college, he acknowledged his submission to the king as the head of the church and his renunciation of papal supremacy;204 and on 15 September 1537 the master and chaplains privately surrendered the college, conveying all the lands and possessions of the college back to George Brooke, 9th Lord Cobham.205

endnotes

1 The Complete Peerage of England Scotland Ireland Great Britain and the United Kingdom, s.v. ‘Cobham’; J.G. Waller, ‘The Lords of Cobham, Their Monuments, and the Church’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 11 (1877), 70-86.

2 Earlier investigations of the college of Cobham, based on incomplete and sometimes inaccurate information, include L.B.L, ‘Notes for the History of Cobham Church and College’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 2 (1859): 223-25; W.A. Scott Robertson, ‘Chimney-Piece in Cobham College Hall’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 18 (1889), 447-50; A.A. Arnold, ‘Cobham College’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 27 (1905), 64-109; Aymer Vallance, ‘Cobham Collegiate Church’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 43 (1931), 133-60; D. Knoop, G.P. Jones, and N.B. Lewis, ‘Some New Documents Concerning the Building of Cowling Castle and Cobham College’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 46 (1934), 52-56; and Peter J. Tester, ‘Notes on the Medieval Chantry College at Cobham’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 79 (1964), 109-20. A more recent summary of the historical and archaeological evidence may be found in Nigel Saul, Death, Art, and Memory in Medieval England: the Cobham Family and their Monuments, 1300-1500 (Oxford, 2001), pp. 37-60.

3 For a general introduction to chantry foundations, see G.H. Cook, English Collegiate Churches of the Middle Ages (London, 1959), pp. 12-18, and for a summary account of the college of Cobham, pp. 206-10.

4 Nigel Saul, Death, Art, and Memory in Medieval England, pp. 75-122.

5 Calendar of Letters Patent. 36 Edward III. Part 2, m. 16.

6 Teresa May, ‘Estates of the Cobham Family in the Later Thirteenth Century’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 84 (1969), 211-29.

7 The following deeds relate to the manor of Westchalk: Licence from Alice, Lady Neville of Essex for John de Cobham to grant the manor to the master and chaplains, 1 April 1363 (Centre for Kentish Studies: U601/T9/3); Grant of John de Cobham, 1 May 1363, recited (mb. 40) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32. See also W.H. Hart, Records of Gravesend (1878), pp. 38-55, for detailed calendar of this Deed.); Grant by John de Cobham of all livestock and deadstock, 2 May 1363 (CKS: U601/T9/4); a further Grant and Counterpart Grant, 26 November 1363 (British Library: Harl. Ch. 48.E.19 and CKS: U601/T9/5); and Deed of Release of John de Cobham, 30 November 1363 (CKS: U601/T9/6). Three other deeds relate to the messuage and toft in Cobham and the marshland in Hoo St Werburgh: a Licence by William de Whittlesey, Bishop of Rochester, 7 December 1363 (BL: Harl. Ch. 43.I.30), a Letter of Attorney, 16 July 1364 (Rochester, Archives of The New College of Cobham, E1/1/2) and a Grant by John de Cobham, 20 July 1364, recited (mb. 39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

8 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Petitions to the Pope. W.H. Bliss, ed. (London, 1896), I: 492.

9 BL: Harl. Rolls C.20.

10 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Petitions to the Pope. W.H. Bliss, ed. (London, 1896), I: 492, and Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Papal Letters. W.H. Bliss and J.A. Twemlow, eds (London, 1902), IV: 42.

11 Bliss and Twemlow, eds, Papal Letters, IV: 61, 62.

12 Charter Roll, 41 Edward III. No. 12.

13 Calendar of Letters Patent. 41 Edward III. part 1, m.27.

14 Grant (CKS: U601/T28/1) and Letter of Attorney for delivery of seisin (CKS: U601/T28/2).

15 This second Deed apparently does not survive, but it is recited in the Reconveyance, 8 February 1381 (Rochester, Archives of The New College of Cobham, E1/1/5) discussed below.

16 Grant, 1 July 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/3); Grant, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/5 and Hatfield House Deeds 10/1); Grant, 1 August 1369, recited (mb. 39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Letter of Attorney, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/4); Grant, 14 August 1369 (BL: Harl. Ch. 48.E.25); Deed of Confirmation, 26 September 1369 (BL: Harl. Ch. 53.A.45); and Deed of Release, 3 February 1370 (CKS: U601/T138/6). In later years the master and fellows of the college granted leases of this property on 25 October 1370 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.30), 18 November 1492 (CKS: U601/T149 and BL: Harl. Ch.58.G.36), 8 December 1504 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.48), and 10 April 1537 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.53).

17 Licence, 14 May 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 1, m.8); Licence, 23 July 1369 (CKS: U601/T27/1); Grant, 26 July 1369, recited (mb. 39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Grant, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/5 and Hatfield House, Deeds 10/1); Letter of Attorney, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/4); Deed of Confirmation, 26 September 1369 (BL: Harl. Ch. 53.A.45); Licence, 6 February 1370 (CKS: U601/T27/4); and Deed of Confirmation, 26 May 1370 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.B.46). In later years the master and fellows of the college granted leases of this property on 27 August 1371 (CKS: U601/T27/2), 12 October 1480 (CKS: U601/T27/3), and 18 November 1492 (CKS: U601/T27/5).

18 Grant, 2 February 1371, recited (mb.36) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

19 Grant, 3 February 1372, recited (mb.35) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Agreement, 10 October 1373 (CKS: U601/T97); Grant, 30 January 1374 (CKS: U601/T94). The master and fellows of the college granted a lease for part of this property on 29 September 1373 (CKS: U601/T93).

20 Deed of Undertaking, 10 January 1369, (CKS: U601/T161); Licence, 14 May 1369, (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 1, m.8); Letter of Attorney, 12 June 1369 (BL: Cotton Ch. xxix.48); Licence, 10 July 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 2, m.39); Grant, 20 August 1369 (Hatfield House, Deeds 110/9); Deed of Confirmation, 26 September 1369 (BL: Harl. Ch. 53.A.45); and Grant of Reversion, 1 January 1370 (BL: Harl. Ch. 56.B.19). The master and fellows of the college granted a lease for part of this property on 8 October 1406 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.36).

21 Licence, 14 May 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 1, m.8); Grant, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/5 and Hatfield House, Deeds 10/1); Letter of Attorney, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/4); Licence, 16 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T6/2); Licence, 1 September 1369, recited (mb.35) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Grant, 10 January 1370, recited (mb.37) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); and Deed of Release, 27 January 1370 (CKS: U601/T6/1).

22 Licence, 14 May 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 1, m.8); Grant, 1 July 1369 (CKS: U601/T117); Grant, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/5 and Hatfield House, Deeds 10/1); Letter of Attorney, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/4); and Deed of Confirmation, 26 September 1369 (BL: Harl. Ch. 53.A.45).

23 Licence, 14 May 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 1, m.8); Grant, 1 August 1369, recited (mb.39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Letter of Attorney, 1 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T138/4); and Grant, 10 August 1369 (BL: Harl. Ch. 49.B.5). In later years the master and fellows of the college granted leases of this property on 29 September 1459 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.38), 11 October 1503 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.46), and 6 March 1528 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.51).

24 Grant, 26 July 1375, recited (mb.35) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

25 Grant, 6 June 1377 (CKS: U601/T49).

26 Grant, 28 February 1371, recited (mb.36) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Grant, 29 August 1372 (BL: Harl. Ch. 53.A.48); and Deed of Release, 1 September 1372 (BL: Harl. Ch. 48.E.28).

27 Grant, 20 November 1370, recited (mb.36) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32). The following Deed of Release, 12 March 1505 (BL: Harl. Ch.57.D.43), may be related to this messuage.

28 Grant, 3 December 1370 (BL: Harl. Ch. 53.A.46) and Duplicate Grant (BL: Harl. Ch.53.A.47). An earler Grant of lands and rents in Cobham and Luddesdown, 13 June 1370 (BL: Harl. Ch. 52.B.4), may also be related to this property.

29 Licence, 14 May 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 1, m.8); and Grant, 20 August 1369, recited (mb.39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

30 Licence, 6 February 1370 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 44 Edward III. part 1, m.33); and Deed of Confirmation, 2 May 1387, recited (mb.39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

31 BL: Harl. Ch. 48.E.30.

32 Licence, 10 July 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 2, m.39); Grant, 10 July 1369, recited (mb.37) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); and Deed of Confirmation, 26 September 1369 (BL: Harl. Ch. 53.A.45).

33 Licence, 20 November 1376 (CKS: U601/T85 and Calendar of Letters Patent. 50 Edward III. Part 2, m.14); and Deed of Confirmation, 3 April 1387, recited (mb.39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

34 Grant, 1 August 1369, recited (mb.39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32) and Grant, 4 August 1369 (CKS: U601/T92/2).

35 Licence, 3 July 1371 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 45 Edward III. Part II, mb 32); Grant, 3 July 1371, recited (mb.39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Deed of Release, 13 January 1372 (CKS: U601/T98); and Grant, 4 May 1380 (CKS: 601/T85A and BL: Harl. Ch. 48.F.14). In later years the master and fellows of the college granted leases for part of this property on 1 October 1448 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.37) and 15 March 1536 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.52).

36 Grant, 30 May 1370, recited (mb.36) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); and Grant, 9 February 1371, recited (mb.36) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

37 Grant, 3 July 1369, recited (mb.39) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Letter of Attorney, 4 July 1369 (CKS: U601/T66/1); Letter of Attorney, 4 July 1369 (CKS: U601/T66/2); Grant, 11 July 1369 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 43 Edward III. part 2, m.36).

38 Rochester, Archives of The New College of Cobham, E1/1/5. A photograph of this Reconveyance appears between pages 66 and 67 in A.A. Arnold, ‘Cobham College’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 27 (1905), 64-109, and a translation appears in Appendix 1, pp. 93-94, of the same article.

39 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Papal Letters. W.H. Bliss and J.A. Twemlow, eds (London, 1902), IV: 226.

40 Calendar of Patent Rolls, 50 Edward III, Part II, mb 13.

41 CKS: U601/T113 (see also John Thorpe, Registrum Roffense, p. 431).

42 BL: Harl. Ch. 43.I.32 (see also Reg. Roff., pp. 431-34).

43 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.47.

44 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.I.9, BL: Harl. Ch. 44.I.13, and BL: Harl. Ch. 44.I.10.

45 Valor Ecclesiasticus Temp. Henr. VIII, 6 vols. (London, 1810), vol. I., pp. 104-5.

46 Calendar of Letters Patent. 42 Edward III. Part 1, m.18.

47 Calendar of letters Patent. 43 Edward III. Part 1, m.29; and BL: Harl. Ch. 43.E.4.

48 BL: Harl. Ch. 48.F.8.

49 A further licence (BL: Harl. Ch. 47.G.3) dated 22 February 1372 from Sir William Caly for Reginald de Cobham and John de Idelegh to give to the master and chaplains land in Skronteby and Ormesby, part of the manor of Martham in Norfolk, may represent an attempt to remedy this inequality.

50 BL: Harl. Ch. 43.I.23.

51 Correspondence with the prior, 24 March 1380 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.H.41), led to the Grant, 1 July 1380 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.G.16 and BL: Harl. Ch. 44.H.39) and Letter of Attorney for delivery of seisin, 1 July 1380 (CKS: U601/T15).

52 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.33.

53 CKS:U601/Q2. This undated petition is endorsed with royal approval dated 1 September 1380.

54 Calendar of Letters Patent. 4 Richard II. Part 1, m.21.

55 This exchange may have taken some time to complete, judging from one surviving prior’s receipt related to Martham dated 29 September 1382 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.H.40).

56 CKS: DRb/Ar1/5, f. 12.

57 Grant, 20 June 1396 (CKS: U601/T17).

58 CKS:U601/Q7.

59 Valor Ecclesiasticus Temp. Henr. VIII, 6 vols. (London, 1810), vol. I., pp. 104-5.

60 This papal mandate of Urban VI has apparently not survived; however, it is recited in the mandate of Boniface IX to the bishop of Rochester dated 4 July 1391. See Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Papal Letters. W.H. Bliss and J.A. Twemlow, eds (London, 1902), IV: 389-90.

61 Valor Ecclesiasticus Temp. Henr. VIII, 6 vols (London, 1810), vol. I., pp. 104-5. The master and fellows received £17 10s. from Rolvenden, £15 each from Chalk and Tilbury, £13 13s. 4d. from Horton Kirby, but only £7 from Cobham.

62 BL: Harl. Ch. 48.E.48.

63 Licence to Richard de Ponynges and John de Clinton, 4 May 1383 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 6 Richard II. Part 3, m.6); Grant of Sir Richard de Ponynges, 20 May 1383, recited (mb.37) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Grant of Sir John de Clinton, 20 May 1383, recited (mb.37) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); Deed of Release by Sir John de Clinton, 28 June 1383 (BL: Harl. Ch. 48.C.41); Deed of Release by Richard de Ponynges and John de Clinton, 30 June 1383 (BL: Harl. Ch. 54.I.32); and further Deed of Release by John de Clinton, 2 July 1383 (CKS: U601/T129).

64 BL: Harl. Ch.48.E.22. A letter to John de Cobham from John Launce, his agent in Rome, dated only 8 December (BL: Harl. Ch. 43.B.22), discusses the proposed papal bull for the appropriation of Rolvenden and for the increase of either two or four chaplains. A further letter and bill for expenses dated only 27 December (BL: Harl. Ch. 43.B.21) may also be connected with this petition.

65 Neither the papal bull nor the bishop’s letters patent survives; however, the episcopal letter, citing the papal bull, was copied into the register of the prior and convent of Christ Church, Canterbury (CCA: DCc/Register B, ff. 296-298v), along with the acceptance of the master and six fellows of the college dated 1 April 1389 and the ratifications by the archbishop of Canterbury dated 2 April 1389, by the prior and chapter of Christ Church dated 10 April 1389, and by the archdeacon of Canterbury dated 13 April 1389 (see Reg Roff., pp. 234-39), and is recited (mbs.35-33) in the Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

66 CKS:U601/Q4.

67 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.34. Later documents relating to this advowson include the archbishop’s licence for the master and fellows to rebuild the rectory, 2 April 1390 (CKS:U601/Q5), and leases dated 12 June 1491 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.44) and 9 April 1519 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.50).

68 This licence is recited (mb 35) in the Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

69 CKS:U601/Q3.

70 The episcopal letters patent with the appended ratifications does not survive but is recited (mbs. 33-32) in the Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

71 Calendar of the Patent Rolls. Richard II. Part I, mb 1.

72 This grant does not survive but is recited (mb.37) in the Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mb 42-32).

73 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.35.

74 Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32.

75 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Papal Letters. W.H. Bliss and J.A. Twemlow, eds (London, 1902), IV: 389-90.

76 Ibid., p. 396.

77 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Papal Letters. J.A. Twemlow, ed. (London, 1904), VI: 27.

78 Donation, 4 January 1415 (BL: Harl. Ch. 56.I.42).

79 Licence, 26 June 1375 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 49 Edward III. part 1, m.10); Grant, 6 August 1375 (BL: Harl. Ch. 43.I.31); and Deed of Confirmation, 16 March 1390 (see W.H. Hart, Records of Gravesend (1878), p. 51).

80 Licence, 10 July 1379 (Calendar of Letters Patent. 3 Richard II. Part 1, m.40); Grant, 1 December 1379 (CKS: U601/T91); and Grant, 28 December 1379, recited (mb.37) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32). For an earlier grant of land from Alice de Kirkeby, see Grant, 8 October 1377, recited (mb.38) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32); and Grant, 3 October 1378, recited (mb.37) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

81 Grant, 28 September 1392 (CKS: U601/T21).

82 Grant, 6 May 1397 (CKS: U601/T118).

83 BL: Harl. Ch. 47.H.26.

84 Grant, 20 November 1496 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.45); and Deed of Release, 20 November 1496 (BL: Harl. Ch.58.C.26).

85 Grant, 7 March 1496 (CKS: U601/T37/2 and (CKS: U601/T37/3); Deed of Release, 20 March 1496 (BL: Harl. Ch. 51.B.40 and CKS: U601/T37/1); and Deed of Confirmation, 5 February 1498 (BL: Harl. Ch. 56.A.30).

86 Grant, 2 January 1505 (BL: Harl. Ch. 55.F.30).

87 Grant, 16 July 1517 (BL: Harl. Ch. 56.D.43).

88 Valor Ecclesiasticus Temp. Henr. VIII, 6 vols (London, 1810), vol. I., pp. 104-5. A small group of property deeds and leases that cannot be definitely linked with the above grants include the following: Lease of 9 dayworks of land in Cobham, 16 September 1371 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.31); Lease of land in Stoke, 1 March 1372 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.32); Grant of unidentified land, 1 November 1380 (CKS: U601/T157); Deed of Release for lands in Higham and Luddesdown, 3 November 1395 (CKS: U601/T119); Lease of land and marsh in Strood, 4 October 1400 (CKS: U601/T154); Lease of Northcourt manor, 29 September 1462 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.39); Lease of a garden in Hoo, 29 September 1476 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.40); Lease of 3 crofts in Cobham, 15 April 1481 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.42); Lease of 3 crofts in Cobham, 16 September 1504 (CKS: U601/T61); Conveyance of a tenement in Cobham, 20 April 1505 (BL: Harl. Ch. 56.A.32); and Lease of marshland in Hoo St Mary, 26 September 1511 CKS: U601/T108).

89 Valor Ecclesiasticus Temp. Henr. VIII, 6 vols. (London, 1810). For the college of Cobham, see vol. I., pp. 104-05.

90 Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of the Reign of Henry VIII, vol IX, item 692. The master, John Bayly, and four fellows, Thomas Webster, William Wharffe, John Norman, and Stephen Tennand, signed this declaration on 27 October 1535.

91 Hatfield House, Deeds 210/15.

92 Hatfield House, Deeds 109/2.

93 The Statutes at Large (London, 1786), vol. 2, 31 Henry VIII, cap. 13, An Act for Dissolution of Monasteries and Abbies, clause xxiv.

94 Ibid., 1 Edward VI, cap. 14, The Act for Chantries Collegiate, clause xxxiii.

95 A Rental and Terrier of the college lands (Hatfield House, Deeds 109/2), dated 1 July 1537, with additions dated 1568 and a second Rental ‘of the late dissolved College of Cobham’ (Hatfield House, Accounts 3/9) passed with many other Cobham family property deeds to the 1st Earl of Salisbury after the attainder for treason of Henry, 11th Lord Cobham in 1603.

96 This Grant, apparently still in private ownership, is cited in A.A. Arnold, ‘Cobham College’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 27 (1905): 72, and a translation of the Grant appears on pp. 98-99 of the article. Various memoranda in the bishops’ registers (DRb/Ar1/15, ff. 19v, 26v, 28, 41v, 49v, 55, 62, 64, and 86) confirm that during the 1540s and 1550s Lord Cobham as patron presented the vicar or curate for the parish of Cobham and paid his wages out of the profits of the advowson.

97 Master’s accounts survive for the following years: 1365-1366 (BL. Harl Rolls C.20); 1402-1403 (BL. Harl Rolls C.22); 1425-1426 (BL: Harl. Rolls C. 23); 1461-1462 (Hatfield House, General 10/1); 1462-1463 (Hatfield House, General 107/5); 1463-1464 (Hatfield House, Court Rolls 14/6); temp. John Brooke (1464-1512) (Hatfield House, Accounts 122/1); 1473-1474 (Hatfield House, Court Rolls 14/7); 1488-1490 (BL: Harl. Rolls C. 25); and 1495-1496 (Hatfield House, Court Rolls 14/8). Accounts of Robert Holt, Collector of Rents, survive for 1479-1480 (Hatfield House, Deeds 66/4) and 1482-1483 (Hatfield House, Deeds 66/4). Two further fragmentary account rolls, BL: Harl. Rolls C. 24 and BL: Harl. Rolls C. 26, are incorrectly attributed to Cobham College in the British Library catalogue. A general inventory of the college survives from 1397 (BL: Harl. Rolls C.18); inventories of liturgical ornaments and vessels date from 1479 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.41) and 1487 (BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.43); and a further inventory of liturgical books and vestments also dates from 1479 (Reg. Roff., pp. 239-41). A translation of the latter document appears in Aymer Vallance, ‘Cobham Collegiate Church’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 43 (1931), 147-56.

98 CKS:U601/Q8.

99A papal indulgence of Innocent VII, dated 24 January 1405, gave to the master permission to wear an amice, or hooded cloak, of grey cloth with a lining of grey squirrel fur in the hood, and to the chaplains permission to wear black amices with silk-lined hoods over their white surplices in summer and black amices with black lambskin lining in winter. See the Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers, relating to Great Britain and Ireland. Papal Letters. J.A. Twemlow, ed. (London, 1904), VI: 49-50.

100 Rochester, Archives of the New College of Cobham, E1/1/4.

101 Peter J. Tester, ‘Notes on the Medieval Chantry College at Cobham’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 79 (1964), 109-20. A useful plan of the medieval remains in relation to the church and almshouses appears between pages 110 and 111.

102 Recited (mbs.35-33) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32; see also Thorpe, Reg. Roff., p. 237).

103 Recited (mbs.35-33 and mbs 33-32) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32; see also Thorpe, Reg. Roff., p. 238).

104 Tester, 115.

105 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.41.

106 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.43.

107 Formerly in the possession of Bonham Hayes of Cobham, 7 November 1719, this document was printed by John Thorpe in Registrum Roffense (1769), pp. 239-41. A translation is printed by Aymer Vallance, ‘Cobham Collegiate Church’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 43 (1931), 147-56.

108 Tester, 119.

109 BL: Harl. Ch.48.E.46.

110 Quoted in A.A. Arnold, ‘Cobham College’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 27 (1905), 106. This property may be the ‘one messuage with one toft adjacent in Cobham in Churchestreet next the Churchyard’, part of the foundation grant by Sir John de Cobham to the master and fellows on 20 July 1364 (see note 7 above).

111 BL: Harl. Rolls C.18.

112 Tester, 116.

113 Tester, 114.

114 Several previous published lists of the masters of Cobham College are either incomplete or inaccurate: W.A. Scott Robertson, ‘Chimney-Piece in Cobham College Hall’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 18 (1889), 448-49; A.A. Arnold, ‘Cobham College’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 27 (1905), 74-78; C.H. Fielding, The Records of Rochester (Dartford, 1910), p. 65; R.C. Fowler, ‘The College of Cobham’, in The Victoria History of the County of Kent (London, 1926), vol. 2, pp. 231-32; and Nigel Saul, Death, Art, and Memory in Medieval England: the Cobham Family and their Monuments, 1300-1500 (Oxford, 2001), pp. 55-57.

115 A.C. Wood (ed.), Registrum Simonis Langham Cantuariensis Archiepiscopi (Oxford, 1956), p. 333.

116 CKS, DRb/Ar1/4, f 28.

117 CKS, DRb/Ar1/4, f.28.

118 BL: Harl. Ch. 43.I.32. See also Reg. Roff., pp. 431-34.

119 See CKS: U601/T114 for the original 28 December 1379 Deed. This Deed, along with the Deed dated 3 October 1378, was recited (mb.37) in Deed of Confirmation, 18 January 1390 (Calendar of the Patent Rolls. 13 Richard II. Part III, mbs. 42-32).

120 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.34.

121 CKS, DRb/Ar1/5, f 10-10v.

122 Ibid.

123 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.35.

124 BL: Harl. Rolls C.22.

125 CKS: U601/T21.

126 CKS: U601/T119.

127 CKS: U601/T17.

128 CKS: U601/T118.

129 CKS: U601/T154.

130 CKS: U601/T190.

131 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.36.

132 CKS: U609/T138/8.

133 CKS, DRb/Ar1/7, f 2.

134 CKS: U601/T56 and U601/T57.

135 BL: Harl. Ch. 47.H.26.

136 BL: Harl. Rolls C.23.

137 CKS, DRb/Ar1/11, f 3.

138 CKS, DRb/Ar1/11, ff. 9, 11v.

139 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.37.

140 CKS, DRb/Ar1/11, f 31.

141 Ibid.

142 BL: Harl. Ch. 43.G.38.

143 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.38.

144 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.39.

145 Hatfield House, General 107/5. Additional fragmentary account rolls Hatfield House, General 10/1; Hatfield House, Court Rolls 14/6; and possibly Hatfield House, Accounts 122/1 also date from the mastership of William Hobson.

146 CKS: DRb/Pa4, f. 18.

147 Hatfield House, Court Rolls 14/7.

148 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.40.

149 CKS: U601/T27/3.

150 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.42.

151 CKS, U601/Q9.

152 CKS: DRb/ Pa4, f. 198v-199.

153 BL: Harl. Rolls C.25.

154 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.44.

155 CKS, U601/Q10.

156 Ibid.

157 Hatfield House, Court Rolls 14/8.

158 CKS: U601/T27/5 and BL: Harl. Ch.58.G.36. CKS: U601/T149 appears to be a draft of the latter.

159 BL: Harl. Ch. 51.B.40.

160 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.45.

161 BL: Harl. Ch. 56.A.30.

162 CKS: DRb/Ar1/13, f. 6.

163 CKS, U601/Q11.

164 W. Scott Robertson, ‘Chimney-Piece in Cobham College Hall’, Archaeologia Cantiana, 18 (1889), 449.

165 CKS: DRb/Ar1/13, f. 16v.

166 Ibid.

167 BL: Harl. Ch. 43.I.33.

168 BL: Harl. Ch. 51.G.37.

169 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.47.

170 CKS, U601/Q13.

171 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.46.

172 CKS: U601/T61.

173 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.48.

174 BL: Harl. Ch. 56.A.32.

175 BL: Harl. Ch. 51.B.41.

176 CKS: U601/T108.

177 CKS, DRb/Ar1/13, f 42v.

178 The Complete Peerage of England Scotland Ireland Great Britain and the United Kingdom, s.v. ‘Cobham.’

179 CKS, DRb/Ar1/13, f 42v.

180 Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of the Reign of Henry VIII, vol. I, item 3215.

181 BL: Harl. Ch. 49.A.22.

182 CKS, DRb/Ar1/13, f 51.

183 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.49.

184 BL: Harl. Ch. 54.A.24.

185 BL: Harl. Ch. 56.D.43.

186 BL: Harl. Ch. 49.F.28.

187 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.50.

188 BL: Harl. Ch. 55.H.39.

189 BL: Harl. Ch. 44.C.51.

190 Robertson, ‘Chimney-Piece in Cobham College Hall’, 450.

191 An undated and unsealed copy of this document survives as CKS, U601/Q14.

192 CKS: DRb/Ar1/13, f. 149v.

193 Robertson, ‘Chimney-Piece in Cobham College Hall’, 450.

194 CKS: DRb/Ar1/13, f. 149v.

195 CKS: DRb/Ar1/13, f. 162.

196 Dictionary of National Biography, s.v. ‘Johnson, Robert’; C.H. Cooper and Thompson. Athenae Cantabrigienses, 3 vols. 1858-1913, I: 203; John Venn and J.A. Venn. Alumni Cantabrigienses, Part I to 1751 (Cambridge, 1922), II: 480.

197 CKS, DRb/Ar1/13, f 162.

198 CKS, DRb/Ar1/13, f 165.

199 Robertson, ‘Chimney-Piece in Cobham College Hall’, 449.

200 C.H. Cooper and Thompson. Athenae Cantabrigienses, 3 vols. 1858-1913, I: 71; John Venn and J.A. Venn. Alumni Cantabrigienses, Part I to 1751 (Cambridge, 1922), I: 112.

201 CKS, DRb/Ar1/13, f 165.

202 Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of the Reign of Henry VIII, vol. viii, item 1037.

203 BL: Harl. Ch. 47.C.36.

204 Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of the Reign of Henry VIII, vol. ix, item 692.

205 Hatfield House, Deeds 210/15.

PLATE I

Ruins of South Court showing fireplace in the east wall of the medieval kitchen. The recesses in the wall for floor and roof timbers indicate that the building originally had two storeys and suggest that the servants probably slept in the upper storey. Just underneath the turf is the brick floor of the kitchen, and immediately to the north underneath the adjacent carpark are the foundations of the medieval bakehouse and oven. The use of the large room to the west of the kitchen remains unknown.

PLATE II

Arch in the North Court over the processional way between the college and church used by the parishioners during liturgical festivals. On the right is the blocked door to the master’s rooms in the east range of the college, and on the left are the ruins of the college sacristy where the master and fellows kept their liturgical vestments, chalices, and relics, which according to a 15th-century inventory included a frag-ment of the Cross and a thorn from Christ’s crown of thorns.

PLATE III

Licence dated 24 June 1370 from the prior and convent of St. Saviour’s, Bermondsey, for the construction of the college.

PLATE IV

Reconveyance, 8 February 1381, listing lands retained by the trustees and returning remaining land back to Sir John de Cobham.

PLATE V

Ruined wall and blocked doorway leading to the south aisle of the church, marking the former passageway between the church and the west range of the college.

Blocked doorway in the south wall of the chancel marking the former passageway between the church and the east range of the college.

PLATE VI

PLATE VIII

Fifteenth-century fireplace and two-light Perpendicular window in the north wall of the medieval college hall overlooking the quadrangle.

PLATE IX

Detail of the mantelpiece carvings. The scallop shell and cross of St. Andrew represent the See of Rochester, and the Saracen’s head is the crest of Sir John de Cobham.

PLATE IX

Perpendicular windows in the south wall of the medieval college hall overlooking South Court.

PLATE X

Detail of rush-light or candle holder on the south wall.

Brass rubbing of Sir John de Cobham “the Founder” holding a church in his hands.

PLATE XI

PLATE XII

Brass rubbing commemorating William Tanner, master of the college (1390-1418), who died on 22 June 1418.

PLATE XIII

Brass rubbing commemorating John Sprotte, master of the college

(1492-1498), who died on 25 October 1498.

KAS
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