Richard Poore, 1217—1229, 247 



Rectory of Laverstock^ which still to this day belongs to the com- 

 monalty of the Vicars Choral. Next the Bishop consecrated an 

 altar at the east end o£ the north aisle in honor of S. Peter and the 

 rest of the apostles, and a third in a like place in the south aisle, in 

 honor of S. Stephen and the noble army of Martyrs. This was the 

 solemn inauguration of his great undertaking. Before going down 

 again to the Bishop's house they spent some hours in the new Church 

 — no doubt part of them in private prayer — for none knew better 

 than our Bishop that, — " Except the Lord build the house, they labor 

 but in vain that build it.'' 



On the following day — the Festival of S. Michael and All Angels 

 — the grand public function of consecration was carried on. First of 

 all, a sermon was preached to the people, who flocked in numbers to 

 listen, by Stephen Langton, the Archbishop. Where it was preached 

 we are, as far as I am aware, not told — it was most probably in the 

 open space between the Bishop's house and the southern entrance to 

 the cathedral, then by S. Peter's Porch, which was not removed till 

 the close of the last century. The sermon ended, they entered the 

 new church in procession and celebrated divine service therein, 

 carrying out in this, without doubt, all the directions contained in 

 the Consuetudinary.^ Many knights and barons were present, to- 

 gether with the Archbishop of Dublin, and the Bishops of Durham, 

 Wells, Rochester, and of Evreux in Normandy. 



Four days afterwards. King Henry III., attended by Hubert de 

 Burgh the Justiciary, came to the Cathedral, and after hearing the 

 Mass of the Blessed Virgin, gave as offerings a costly piece of silk and 

 ten marks of silver. At the same time the King granted the privi- 

 lege of holding a fair annually from the vigil of the Assumption of 

 the Blessed Virgin — eight days complete. The Justiciary, moreover. 



' William de Wanda gives us no detailed account of the consecration of the 

 of the cathedral ; it is not worth our while therefore to draw upon our ima<nna- 

 tion to describe the ceremony, which was no doubt very imposing. All he says 

 is " Episcopus intravit novam basilicam, et in ea divina soleniniter celebravit." 

 The reader who is curious in such matters may see the oiEce " De Ecclesise 

 Consecratione " from a Pontifical of Sarum Use, in Maskell's Monum. Ritualia, 

 i., 162—203. 



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