some personal friend. When this was done, the bishop was already dead, and the king claiming the appointment to benefices during the vacancy of the See, and being wholly ignorant of what the pope had done, presented his treasurer, John de Crakehall, to the vacant prebend, and caused him to be solemnly installed. In a short time, however, there appeared in England the proctor of the pope's nominee claiming the stall for him. The archbishop of Canterbury, seeing that the document nominating the Roman was dated before the king's appointment, decided judicially that the benefice belonged to the foreigner. In spite of this decision, however, the papal claimant was refused admission to the house attached to the canonry, and failed to force his way into it. In the struggle the unfortunate proctor for the pope's nominee and his socius were killed, and the inquiry that followed failing to discover the guilty parties, it was shrewedly suspected that many in the city were not altogether displeased that the foreigners should have received a lesson. For, says the chronicler, "the English were indignant that so many Romans were frequently enriched with some English benefice, whilst no Englishman was rewarded by them (the Romans) once in a year. And because they were wont to walk as if they thought the whole earth belonged to them, the English hoped this might prove a lesson to them, and frighten them in the future from coming so often and so uselessly into the kingdom.' " 1 As the year 1260 drew to a close, the pope made a piteous appeal to Prince Edward to try and stir up his father, the king, and the English barons to come to the aid of the Church, and indeed of the civilised world, by ii. 445. 1 Flores Hist., helping to press back the Tartar hordes which then threatened to overrun the whole of Christendom. He describes them as bursting with irresistible fury over the land, sweeping all before them, and leaving in their train only desolation and ruin. To the Christian people, it appeared as if hell itself had broken loose, and they were inclined to believe the boast of the barbarians that "the God of the heavens had given over to them the entire earth." Some of the most famous Christian cities were already in ruins, and Hungary and Poland were desolated to the very confines of the Roman power. Pope Alexander, therefore, beseeches Prince Edward to consult with the king and his nobles, and to devise some measure by which Europe could be saved, and the tide of barbarian invasion arrested, if not rolled back.1 With the coming of the year 1261, Henry began to manifest impatience at the restraints imposed upon him by the "Provisions of Oxford." In February he had made up his mind once more to free himself from the oath he had taken to the barons. He told them that, although they had professed to act for the good of the country and to free him from debt, his experience had shown them that this was not the effect of the arrangements made at Oxford, and he asked them not to be surprised if he determined no longer to follow their advice. Acting upon this warning, Henry sent agents to Rome to obtain absolution from his oath, and he wrote to his son and the king of France to secure their help for this attempt to recover the mastery in his own country. Alexander IV was not long in coming to a decision upon the royal petition. On 13th April, 1261, he issued a Bull absolving the king from the oath he had taken at Oxford. It had been proved to him, he says, 2 Flores Hist., ii. 468. 1 Rymer, i. 403. "that you were induced by the pressure of the lords and people of your kingdom to bind yourself by oath to observe certain statutes, laws and ordinances, which they, under a pretext of reforming the condition of the country, are said to have made in your name and strengthened by their oaths." These really are calculated "to lessen your power and to lower your royal liberty." The pope then, out of the plenitude of his power, declares Henry absolved from his oath; but adds that if there should be anything in these laws and ordinances which secures the rights and benefits of prelates, churches and ecclesiastical persons, he has no intention of declaring these void, nor of freeing the king from his oath as regards them.' According to the chroniclers, Prince Edward at this time also received absolution from the oath he had taken with the barons; but on being informed of the remission, he immediately renewed his promise. The barons endeavoured to force the king to discuss the special points in their working arrangement to which he took exception, but they failed to obtain from him more than a promise that matters should remain as they were till the return of Prince Edward to England. The pope, however, did not wait; but on 27th April, 1261, he condemned the oath of the barons, and ordered the archbishop to declare that all who had taken it, prelates and nobles alike, were to be declared absolved from any obligation. A week later, on 7th May, Alexander IV directed the archbishop of Canterbury not only to publish this absolution from the oath, but to declare excommunicated any one who refused to return to his loyalty to his prince by accepting this dispensation. In the same month of May, the king caused the papal dispensation of 2 Flores Hist., ii. 466; cf. Ann. Mon., iv. 128. 4 Rymer, i. 406. 5 lbid. Ve Rymer, i. 405. 3 lbid. the oath to be published, so that all might know that the "Provisions of Oxford" were to be regarded as altogether set aside by the pope.1 On 25th May, Pope Alexander IV died, and was succeeded by Urban IV. In the August of this same year, 1261, the archbishop of Canterbury, by reason of the Bull of the late pope, felt bound to proceed against those who still held to the obligations of the "Provisions of Oxford." He ordered Hugh Bigod, for example, to be informed that unless he gave up the castles of Scarborough and Pickering he should be compelled, according to the apostolic mandate, to declare him excommunicate.2 Urban IV found himself in no less need of money than his predecessor, and like him, he not unnaturally turned towards England in his difficulties. On 7th September, he wrote to Leonard, precentor of Messina, his agent in England, to say that Rustand, the late papal nuncio, in his somewhat hasty flight from England, had left behind some sums of money, which were to be secured, if possible. On 26th September, he again wrote to John of Frosinone to secure all money owing to the pope in Ireland, and send it to Reynerio Bonaccursi, Bonaventure Bernardini, and R. Iacobi, merchants of Siena, and bankers for the Apostolic See in England. So, too, to take one more example, Albert of Parma is charged to demand from the archbishops and bishops the money which is due to the Holy See, and to secure from the executors of Aylmer, late bishop of Winchester, the eighty marks which he had promised to various Roman cardinals. Besides this, in December, Urban IV wrote to remind the king that the tribute of 1,000 marks, payable by England to the Holy See, was 3 1 Flores Hist., ii., 471. 2 Rymer, 408, 409. 3 Brit. Mus. Add. MS, 15,360, f. 1. 4 Ibid., f. 4. 5 Ibid., f. 13. 6 Ibid., f. 10. overdue for two years, and that he had written to Friar John of Kent, his collector, to receive the amount and pay it to his bankers in England.1 The English king, on his side, in the first months of the new pontificate, thought it necessary to acquaint the pope with the difficulties which had arisen between him and the barons. On 24th October, 1261, he wrote to Urban IV to introduce the proctors he was sending to the Curia on his business. They would, he says, explain his reply to the complaints made against him by the archbishop of Canterbury and his suffragans. They would also be able to show how certain statutes had been made in prejudice to the rights of the Crown, and in his name they would ask His Holiness to annul these statutes and provisions. By the first day of the new year, 1262, Henry must have received intimation from his agents in Rome that matters were not succeeding altogether as he wished in regard to his quarrel with the barons and bishops. On that day, he addressed an urgent appeal to the pope to absolve him from his oath, and not to listen to the petition of the barons. He had, he said, always trusted confidently in the wonted loving-kindness of the Apostolic See, and so now he came asking with confidence that the letter of the pope's predecessor, Alexander IV, regarding the state of his kingdom, and regulating the difficulties existing by absolving him from his oath, might be again approved. At the same time, he wrote to Cardinal Ottoboni in the same terms, begging him to use his influence to secure the condemnation of the position taken up by the barons, and the absolution of their oath. This had been done before; but it could not be made use of before the death of the 1 Rymer, i. 413; Brit. Mus. Add. MS, 15,360, ff. 24, 28. |