FOSBROKE.

IT has been seen in the last chapter that the early lords of Hallamshire did not hold that entire and undisputed sway over the Manor of Ecclesfield, which they held over the rest of their Yorkshire dependencies. Here, as in many other places, a rival interest of a powerful nature existed from a very early date, in the claims of a religious. community, whose representatives had the advantage of being settled upon the spot, and continued for several centuries to exercise far more influence than the distant lay-lords over the affairs of the parish.

From the very first institution of religious houses, it had been customary for the owners of estates to assign

some portion of their rents or lands to one or other of these foundations; usually to the one founded or enriched by their ancestors, if such existed, in order to secure for themselves the benefit of the prayers and devotions which were likely to be made with more regularity and certainty in a house, bound by the very terms of its constitution to occupy itself in such matters, than in an ordinary Church. The effect of this was that an enormous proportion of property, even in Saxon times, passed into the hands of Monasteries and Abbeys. The Normans, ever vigorous in their undertakings, were not behind their Saxon predecessors in this matter, and seem never to have wearied in extending and endowing the Church. Sometimes they founded an abbey in Normandy, and endowed it with English lands; and sometimes they took the opposite course, as in the case of the house of Lewes, in Sussex, which had dependencies at Stuteville or Estoutteville. Before the Conquest of England, we read of their founding or restoring abbey after abbey, and church after church; but the Conquest gave them larger means for carrying out those large-hearted designs, which resulted in edifices which to this day

"Tell of a race that nobly, fearlessly

On their heart's worship pour'd a wealth of love." 1

Certain it is they endowed their monasteries with noble estates both in England and Normandy.

The separation of Normandy from England, which took place more than six centuries ago, has so well-nigh obliterated from men's minds all capability of realizing their close connexion under the Norman Kings, that it is hard to picture the time when they were but one kingdom. Yet once their connexion was most intimate. Warriors from remote Norman villages, became great lords in England, still retaining their comparatively insignificant

1 Hemans.

manors in Normandy. The Lovetots, who became possessed of enormous estates in S. Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, took their name from a Norman hamlet of now 920 souls, whose little church was a dependency of the great Abbey of St. Wandrille. In like manner, as these small Norman lords became in England powerful barons, so when they had reared their monasteries and churches, and brought over their Norman brethren to fill them, the village monk of Normandy became the great Abbot in England, and the Church in England was given to the Monastery in Normandy. It was natural enough that they should select some foundation in their original country for the object of the pious benefactions, which their newly gained wealth enabled them to make on so large a scale; and this led to the establishment of Alien Priories, which according to Gough "were cells of the religious houses in England which belonged to foreign monasteries. For when manors or tithes were given to foreign convents, the monks, either to increase their own rule, or rather to have faithful stewards of their revenues, built a small convent here for the reception of such a number as they thought proper, and constituted Priors over them.”1

Fuller's account of their origin is not materially different. "When the kings of England, by conquest or inheritance, were possessed of many and great territories in France, (Normandy, Aquitaine, Picardy, &c.), many French monasteries were endowed with lands in England. For an English kitchen or larder doth excellently well with a French hall. And whilst foreigners' tongues slighted our island, (as barren in comparison of their own country,) at the same time they would lick their lips after the full fare which our kingdom afforded. Very numerous were these cells in England relating to foreign abbeys

1 Alien Priories, published by Nichols.

And it is re

markable that as one of these priories was granted before the kings of England were invested with any dominion in France, so some were bestowed in those places in foreign parts, where our English kings never had finger of power or foot of possession. Belike men's devotion in that age, looked on the world as it lay in common, taking no notice how it was subdivided into private principalities, but proceeded upon that rule; 'The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof,' 1 Cor. x. 28; and charity, though wandering in foreign parts, counted itself still at home because dwelling on its proper uses. These alien priories were of two natures; some had monks with a prior resident in them; yet not conventual, (i.e. appointed by the convent itself,) but dative and removable ad nutum of the foreign abbey to which they were subservient. Others were absolute in themselves, who though having an honorary dependence on, and bearing a subordination of respect unto French abbeys, yet had a prior of their own, being an entire body of themselves to all purposes and intents;-the former not unlike stewards, managing profits for the behoof of their master, to whom they were responsible; the latter resempling retainers at large, acknowledging a general reference, but not accountable unto them for the revenues they received." The former of these transmitted all their revenues to the foreign house, for which reason their estates were generally seized to carry on the wars between England and France, and restored to them again on return of peace. The Priory of Ecclesfield which was a dependency of the monastery of St. Wandrille, in Normandy, seems to have been one of this latter kind, for its charters all run in the name of the Abbot and Convent of that monastery, and were many of them executed at the parent house. This monastery was anciently called

1 Fuller's Church Hist. Bk. VI. § ii. ch. 8.

Fontenelle, and its remains are thus described by one who lately visited the scene. "About three miles from the right bank of the Seine, in a small valley, near the town of Caudebec, in Normandy, there stands the shell of what was once a large abbey. The cloister is entire; and the elegant doorways, which lead on either hand into the church or refectory, point to a by-gone day of splendour. The church is now represented by a few broken arches, and the hall itself, though still canopied by its keel-shaped ceiling of woodwork, is empty; the finely-wrought lavatory is unused; the niches unoccupied, or their occupants neglected. The grounds correspond with the mansion; where gardens once flourished, grass grows rank; and the luxuriant fringe of woodland, which used to protect the orchard and parterre, now serves only to shelter the cattle from the wind. One feature however remains unchanged. In the middle of the valley, unaltered by the lapse of 1200 years, a little brook still wanders on its way to join the Seine. With that appreciation of natural beauty which we recognise in the names of our English abbeys, Fountains, Rievaulx, and Roche; St. Wandrille called his monastery from this little brook, Fontenelle."1

It was for monks of the Benedictine order, and according to Neustria Pia it was founded as early as A.D. 654. The account of its founder and foundation is thus given in the "Catalogus Sanctorum, ed. 1519." St. Wandragesilius was born of noble parentage, being the son of Valcis, son of Pepin, King of France. Under King Dagobert he was made constable of the palace, or count palatine, a post which he filled with zeal and energy. The king made him marry a lady of illustrious birth, though much against his will. He persuaded her to take a vow of chastity, and she became a nun. He then left the court and became a monk, living at first with St. Waltfride, in

1 MS. of Rev. J. T. Jeffcock, F S.A. &c.