52 WH1TECHURCH CANONICORUM. 



churches derive their names from the parishes in which they are 

 built, but in all probability this parish derived its name from the 

 church having been built of white stone, or possibly having been 

 whitewashed.* 



In his will, dated A.D. 901, King Alfred bequeathed Hwitan 

 Cyrican to his youngest son Ethehvald. In the next century, 

 about the year 1060, the then Rector of Withchirche, Guntard 

 by name, who was Chaplain to William the Conqueror, " being 

 desirous to retire into the Monastery of S. Wandragesil, pre- 

 vailed upon the King to grant the two churches (Whitechurch 

 and Sherston) to the monks of that house." Accordingly the 

 Rectory of Witcerce was given by William to the Benedictine 

 Abbey of S. Wandragesil, now called S. Wandrille (near Caudebec 

 in Normandy), and was constituted a "cell of the abbey" under 

 the name of Album Monasterium. This connexion lasted about 

 a hundred and forty years, during which time the monks began 

 to rebuild King Alfred's Church on a larger scale. 



The Abbey of S. Wandrille surrendered the Rectory of 

 Witcherch to the Church of Old Sarum in 1200. The right of 

 presentation to the Rectory then passed to Sir Robert de 

 Mandivel, a resident knight (whose name survives to this day in 

 Mandivel Stoke), apparently on his undertaking to carry out the 

 unfinished work of the abbots, and this was done in the Early 

 English style in the early part of that century. This accounts 

 for the different shapes of the arches and the admixture of 

 Norman and Early English in the nave arcades. By the addition 

 of transepts the church was now made ' cruciform.' It was on 

 Christmas Day of the year 1240 that a charter was signed by 

 which the Rectory and rectorial revenues were assigned to the 

 Canons of the Cathedrals of Salisbury and Wells, from which 

 time the church became known as Whitechurch of the canons, or, 

 in its latinised form, Canonicorum. Thus we have the earliest 



* NOTE. This theory of the origin of the place-name is simple and in harmony 

 with the well-known instance of " Candida casa " in Galloway. Vide Article 

 by the Eev. Charles Druitt in the Club's Proceedings, Vol. XIX., 1898. 



