MYNCHIN BUCKLAND PRIORY. 51 



So far as we can leam froui the details already presented, 

 and 1 belleve they are veiy nearly all that can now be 

 recovered, the Sisters of Buckland, although constantly 

 numbering in their Community the daughters of great and 

 noble houses, were but slenderly supported, and for a long 

 time at least very far from adequately provided for. They 

 were consldered also in the light of a bürden and grievance 

 by the Officers charged in a special degree with their 

 direction and general well-being. At first consisting, 

 as it would seem, but of a Prioress and nine Sisters, 

 the Society amounted in the year 1338 to so many 

 as fifty ladies, who, together with their servants, must 

 have needed a considerable revenue. No doubt but 

 that a great part of the cost of their maintenance was 

 defrayed, as the Preceptor then hinted in his return, 

 by eleemosynary contributions from the neighbourhood 

 and more distant friends. Their precise relationship to 

 the Order of S. John has been, 1 think, greatly mis- 

 understood. It has been said that they " had, at first, 

 great dependance upon the knights, but afterward they 

 disengaged themselves, and became a distinct Priory or 

 Hospital of Nuns of the order of S. AugUbtine;"* and that 

 "there is no mention of their being subordinate to any 

 other Religious."t The contrary, as it appears to me, has 

 been clearly shown. At no time wei'e they distinct or inde- 

 pendant. Their chaplain and steward were always officers 

 of the Order; and they received their ancient pensicns, and 

 were accounted " obedientiaria;" down to the period of the 

 Dissolution. That the Priory was distinct from the Com- 

 mandry as a religious Community is, of course, certain ; 

 for it was the very reason of its foundation that the Sister- 



* Tanner, Not. Mon. by Nasmith. t If>. 



