Religious Houses

B

ISHOP Stillingflect is of opinion that St. Patrick first founded monasteries in Britain;* and though Capgravet says, that Pelagius the heretic, who flourished about A.D. 400 was abbot of Bangor, that judicious prelate saith," There is no probability at all in the monkish tradition of Pelagius's being abbot of Bangor; and there is not much more of Bangor's being so famous a monastery at that time, or of Pelagius's being a monk therein. For the British monasteries were no older than St. Patrick's time; and in Pelagius's time those were called monks at Rome, who, having no office in the church, retired from the common employments of the world, for sacred studies and devotion and where any number of these lived together, that was called a monastery." This is confirmed by William of Malmsbury, who calls Glastonbury the oldest monastery he knew in England, and founded by St. Patrick, "For after St. Patric had converted the Irish to the Christian faith, A.D. 433, he came over into this island, and finding at Glastonbury twelve anchorites, he gathered them together, and making himself abbot, taught them to live according to monas-. tic rules. §

*Origin of British churches.

+ Vita S. Albani, fol. viii. b.

§ De antiquitate Glaston. Oxon. 1691. Mon. Ang. i. 2,

Although authors differ as to the time and place of the first monastic institution, it is evident they were founded wherever Christianity got footing. Monasteries were more frequent in the north of England even from their first receiving Christianity. The converts here, being much taken with the powerful preaching and exemplary lives of Aidan and the Scotch monks, were very zealous in building and endowing religious houses; and they had so great an opinion of the sanctity of these monks and their way of living, that it was very usual for their nobles, and sometimes even for their kings and queens† to renounce the world (as they called it) and to put on religious habits.

Before the invasion of the Danes, several religious houses were established in Yorkshire, viz., at Lastingham, in the year 648; at Tadcaster, Newton Kyme, or Aberford, in 655; at Whitby, in 657; at Gilling, in 659; at Ripon, ante 661; at Hackness, ante 680; at Craike, circa 685; at Watton, circa 686; at Beverley, circa 700; and at Barwick in Elmet, circa 730.§ These houses suffered in the Danish incursions, Simeon of Durham says, "After the devastation of the country A.D. 867, by the Danes, who reduced the churches and monasteries to ashes, Christianity was almost extinct, very few churches (and those only built with hurdles and straw) were rebuilt. But no monasteries were refounded for almost two hundred years after. The country people never heard of the name of a monk, and were frighted at their very habit, till some monks from Winchelcomb brought again the monastic way of living to Durham, York and Whitby."

From this period to the reign of king Henry VIII., there had been no less than 14 abbeys, 60 priories, 13 cells, 4 commanderies and preceptories, 30 friaries, 20 colleges, and 58 hospitals founded in the county of York.

Two friaries, of the conventual or mendicant orders, viz., the Austin friars, and the Carmelite or White

+ Speed, in his "Historie of Great Britaine" mentions eight kings and two queens; and Dugdale in his preface to the "Monasticon" says, that thirty English Saxon kings and queens did so in two hundred years. Lawton's Religious Houses of Yorkshire.

friars; and two hospitals under the rule of St. Augustin, viz., St. James and Maison Dieu, (the latter still subsisting as an almshouse is recorded among the charities,) were established here.

The mendicant order, commonly called friars, first sprang up early in the 13th century, when the monastic orders had, in several instances, begun to degenerate. They travelled where they pleased, instructed youth, and heard confessions, and for a long time exercised unbounded influence.* They were professedly poor, but obtained large sums from casual charity, which they expended in erecting magnificent refectories and churches; and it also became fashionable for persons of rank to bequeath their bodies to be buried in the friary churches.

AUSTIN FRIARS.

William de Alverton gave the Austin friars eight acres of ground in this town, to build them a church and habitation thereon, in the 14th Edwd. III.,† (1340.) The site of this house was on the east side of the town, now occupied by the Fleece Inn, the Post Office, and the house adjoining on the south side.

The origin of the Austin friars, or friars eremites of the order of St. Austin, is uncertain, but they were first brought into England about A.D. 1250. The habit of these monks was a white garment and scapulary, when they were in the house, but when in the choir or abroad, they had over the former a caul and a hood, both black, which were girt with a black leathern thong.

The rules observed were sufficiently precise and singular. They enjoyed all things in common; and the rich, who entered this order, sold their possessions and gave the money to be equally appropriated to the use of the brethren. They were not allowed to receive

* The friars mendicant heretofore would take their opportunity to come into houses when the good women did bake, and would read a ghospel over the batch, and the goodwomen would give them a cake, &c.-Lansdowne MS. No. 231.

+ Mon. Ang. vi. 1603. Tanner's Notitia, 692.

alms without delivering the whole up to their superior. They employed the first part of the day in labor, and the remainder in reading and devotion. Saturday was allowed to provide necessaries, and on the sabbath day they were permitted to drink wine. When they went abroad they were obliged to go two together; nor were they permitted to eat out of their convent, let the calls of nature be ever so urgent. There were forty-one houses of this order in England and Wales.

CARMELITE FRIARS.

Dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and founded by Thomas Hatfield,* bishop of Durham, or, according to some, by king Edward III., or to others, both jointly, about the year 1354.

The Carmelites pretended to derive the institution of their order from the prophet Elijah, who, they asserted, was the first Carmelite. But the æra of their foundation was the year 1122, by Albert, patriarch of Jerusalem, who, with a few hermits, resided on Mount Carmel, from whence they were finally expelled by the Saracens, about A.D. 1238. They were brought into England in 1240, by the lords John Vesci and Richard Grey; and here they had forty houses, the first of which was established at Alnwick, in Northumberland.

They were called Carmelites from the place of their first residence; white friars, from the color of their habit; and also brethren or friars of the blessed virgin. They wore a white cloke and hood, and under it a coat, with a scapulary; but the Saracens, as a mark of contempt, obliged them to make them party-colored garments of white and red, which they continued to

Thomas Hatfield, second son of sir Walter de Hatfield, of Hatfield, co. York, was secretary of state, and keeper of the privy seal to Edw. III., and was elected 8 May, 1345, bishop of Durham, at the king's request; consecrated 10 July following. He built a noble palace in London for himself, and for the bishops his successors. He erected a strong tower in the castle of Durham, for the better defence of it and the town. He enlarged Durham college, in Oxford (now Trinity coll.) for eight monks, students in divinity, and eight scholars. To every monk he allowed £10, and to each scholar £3 6s. 8d. per ann. And though this bishop expended large sums in building, in alms to the poor, in hospitality and housekeeping, he died rich 8 May, 1381, and was buried in his cathedral, in the tomb prepared by himself.

wear near fifty years after their arrival in England.* About 1285, the white dress was resumed by order of pope Honorius III.†

The rule was, prior elected unanimously, or by majority. To have places in deserts or elsewhere; separate cells; common refectory, and reading. Not to change their places without the prior's leave. Prior's cell near the entrance of the house, that he might be the first to meet comers. All to remain in their cells, meditating day and night. At fit hours in church, cloisters. To stay and walk freely and lawfully (libere et litite). All things common. Asses or mules allowed, and nourishment of animals or birds. Church in the middle of the cells. Sundays, or at other times, as necessary, the correction of abuses. No flesh but to the sick. To carry with them, to eat on journeys, dumplings (pulmenta, a very equivocal term among the monks) drest with flesh. Fast every day except Sunday from Holyrood-day to Easter, except the sick and infirm. Charity; labour; silence after complin till prime; might talk at other times moderately.§ There is a mitigation of this rule, anno 1247, in the Bullarium Romanum.

BENEFACTIONS. In the Dodsworth MSS., (vol. cxxi. f. 30 b.) in the Bodleian Library, is the following grant of a croft, called Tentour, and a pasture, together containing 3a. 1r. in North Allerton, from John Yole of the said town, which was confirmed by Edward III.

Rex omnibus ad quos &c. Salutem. Sciatis quod nos gratum obsequium Deo omnipotenti impendere et servicuim cultus divini ampliare corditer affectantes, dedimus concessimus et confirmavimus pro nobis et heredibus nostris per præsentes dilectis nobis in Christo Priori Provinciali et fratribus ordinis beatæ Mariæ de Monte Carmeli in Anglia pro quadam domo ordinis prædicti apud Northalverton in Com. Ebor. de novo ad laudem et honorem Dei et gloriosa virginis Mariæ

Tanner.

† Dugdale's Warwickshire, 186. § Fosbrook's Monachism, 121. Vol. i. p. 116.