err eS we 
Amesbury Church. Reasons for thinking, ec. 9 
5th year of Edward IV. (1465-6) “concerning the liberties of the 
_ Abbess (formerly of Fontevraud) in the Manor of Leighton Buzzard,” 
looks like it, but the heads of the Amesbury Convent seem never 
to have called themselves anything but “ Prioress,” and continued 
that style to the last. 
My object to-night is not so much to read a critical paper on 
Amesbury Church considered architecturally, for which it would 
have been necessary for me to re-examine the Church, as to carry 
out an intention that I formed, several years ago, of calling attention 
to the fact that the identification of the present Parish Church with 
the Church of Amesbury Priory, which appeared to be becoming a 
matter of pretty general acceptance, was not proved, and that it 
seemed to be contrary to the evidence. 
I was present, in the Church, when the late Mr. John Henry 
Parker, in August, 1876, pronounced it to be undoubtedly the 
Church of the Monastery, because there was evidence of there having 
been formerly a cloister along the north side of the nave. That 
was, I think, his principal, though it may perhaps not have been 
his only reason for forming that opinion. It was contrary to my 
view at the time, though I did not dispute it on the spot, and, on 
examination, it did not appear to be at all conclusive. This led 
me to study Canon Jackson’s paper on Ambresbury Monastery, 
which had been published in the Society’s Magazine,’ in 1867, and 
also a pamphlet by the late Mr. W. C. Kemm, of Amesbury, 
printed in 1876, on the occasion of the combined meeting of the 
Archeological Institute and our Society, at Salisbury, when 
Amesbury was visited. 
The conclusion, I came to, was that the evidence was against the 
theory that the present Church was the Church of the Priory, but 
still Mr. Parker’s dictum that the Church bore evidence of monastic 
arrangement, naturally carried considerable weight, and I think 
that, until I heard his remarks, the significance of the cloister had 
escaped me. It is a matter for consideration therefore, whether the 
plan of the Church and cloister necessarily implies a mozastic 
1 Wilts Arch. Maqy., vol. x., p. 61. 
