210 
A Contemporary Poem on the Granslation of 
the Cathedral from Old to Hew Sarum. 
Communicated by A. R. MaLpen. 
existence as a wee until my aiention was drawn to it by a 
reference in the article on Richard Poore in the Dictionary of 
National Biography. 
The MS. is in the Cambridge University Library (Dd., 11, 89), 
in a small volume containing also other things, and begins on 
fol. 92). The writing is a very clear thirteenth century hand, and 
the poem is here printed from a copy which Mr. F. J. H. Jenkinson, 
the Librarian, kindly had made for me. The contractions in 
the MS. have been expanded, in other respects the original spelling 
has been retained, e.g., u where we should now put v, set for sed, 
capud for caput. The reader must not be too critical as to false 
quantities. 
The writer was Henry D’Avranches, a court poet of the time of 
Henry III., and there is internal evidence (see the last couplet bu 
two) that the building of the new Cathedral was unfinished at th 
time of writing. 
It is to be wished that the poet had said more of the buildin 
and the builders, but his lines confirm, generally, the reasons whie 
are given elsewhere for the translation of the Cathedral. Mor 
than a hundred lines are taken up with an account of the incon: 
veniences of the position of the old Cathedral, the partial destructio 
of which seems (ll. 1387 and 158) to have been begun at once to 
prevent the possibility of return, and, I presume, the consequen 
discontinuance of the new building. The beauties and attractions 
of the new site are then set out, the description culminating in the 
expression of the writer’s opinion that if Adam had come ther 
