LEACH. — NORWEGIAN AND ENGLISH CHURCHES, 1066-1399. 557 



About 1300 a sea-route between Bergen and Bruges 186 was estab- 

 lished, 187 and took the place of the old approach to France and 

 southern Europe via Lynn and Dover. As early as 1258 we read, 

 concerning the retinue which accompanied Princess Christina to Spain, 

 that they returned home in various ways, most of them coming, prob- 

 ably, as they had gone, via England ; " but Bishop Peter fared over- 

 land into Flanders, and he came somewhat later." 188 In 1285 Bishop 

 Thorfinn of Hamar died in the monastery of Doest near Bruges. 189 

 In 1301 Archbishop Jorund, returning from Paris to Norway, met in 

 Bruges, John Elk, a refractory cleric, on his way to the pope, and had 

 him arrested. 190 In 1312 envoys from the Council of Vienne returned 

 via Bruges. 191 In 1326 papal messengers came via Flanders; 192 in 

 1330 another papal nuncius. 193 About 1335 Bruges was a papal 

 subtreasury for the deposit of funds from Norway sent by the bishops 

 of Oslo, Hamar, and Stavanger. 194 Bruges was the route used by 

 Norwegians through the fourteenth century in reaching the papal 

 court at Avignon. 195 



The Bruges route brought Norway into closer contact with France. 

 Shortly before 1295 there came to Norway a learned Fleming who be- 

 came the archbishop's right-hand man, — "a great clerk," says the 

 saga, " John Fleming ; he had stayed long at Paris and in Orleans in 

 study ; he was so great a jurist that no one in Norway was his like." 1% 

 In 1301 Archbishop Jorund started for the curia, fell ill in Paris, and 

 returned home via Bruges. 197 Norwegians went to France at this 



186 Not that Bruges was its own seaport. 



187 Our earliest evidence of Norse-Flemish relations is in the reign of Mag- 

 nus (1280-1299), when Count Guido of Flanders sent his servant William to 

 Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. About 1304 Norwegians were trading be- 

 tween Flanders and Lynn. In 1308 they had their own "street" in Bruges, 

 and in the same year Flanders and Norway made their first recorded treaty 

 (see A. Bugge, Byers Selvstyre, pp. 154 ff.). 



188 Hakonar S., chap. 296. 



189 Arna Bisk. S., chap. 54 (Bisk. S., I, 752); Annals, 1285; Munch, IV, 

 2, 50. 



190 Dipl. Norv., Ill, No. 48; Munch, IV, 2, 382. 



191 Dipl. Sv., Ill, 62-64; Munch, IV, 2, 593; Keyser, II, 155-156, 148-149. 



192 Munch, 2. Hovedafd., I, 93. 



193 Ibid., 164. 



194 Dipl. Norv., XVII (publ. 1902), letters, 39 ff. In 1355 (28 November), 

 the pope ordered his legate to pay in Brussels or Bruges moneys collected in 

 Scandinavia (Dipl. Norv., VI, 265). 



195 E. g., papal nuncius via Brugge in 1364 (Munch, 2. Hovedafd., I, 843). 



196 Laurentius Saga, chap. 9 (Bisk. S., I, 799); Munch, IV, 2, 304. 



197 Laurentius S., chap. 13; Annals; Dipl. Norv., Ill, No. 48; Munch, 

 IV, 2, 381. 



