62 WESSEX MINSTERS. 



He writes of Northumbria., Hist. Eccles. III. 3, " Con- 

 struebantur ergo ecclesiae per loca : confluebant ad audiendum 



verbum Dei populi gaudentes donabantur 



possessiones ad instruenda Monasteria." We find also 

 clear evidence of the itinerating Priest in the IXth Decree 

 of the same Council of Clovesho, and apparently the assign- 

 ment of certain districts to certain officiants. Evidence of 

 the same kind is also found in the famous letter of Bede to 

 Egbert, Bishop, and afterwards Archbishop of York, and 

 the word " Ministerium " is regularly used as the technical 

 term for this itinerant visitation. So much is clear, but 

 no evidence comes to light to prove that this name came to 

 be attached permanently to any locality. On the other 

 hand there is plenty of evidence from Bede's History, and 

 from Conciliar decrees, Deeds of Gift, &c., that as soon as 

 any permanent residence of a priest or priests was fixed the 

 name " Monasterium " was used, and the word appears to 

 be employed to signify both the chapel and the lodging of 

 the Officiants. This fact is also illustrated by the con- 

 struction of many very ancient Churches, of which Deerhurst 

 near Tewksbury, and Breamore near Salisbury, may be 

 quoted as specimens. In these instances the existence of a 

 dwelling chamber seems coeval with the existence of a Church, 

 The Saxon form of the Word (i.e., Mynstre) appears in the 

 A. 8. Chronicle to designate a residence of a religious com- 

 munity and also of en ordinary church. Under the year 

 794 A.D. Jarrow is called Ecgfyrde's Mynstre, and under 

 656 A.D. Peter boro* or Medeshampsted is spoken of as 

 " Mynstre." The little Church of Kirkdale in Yorkshire 

 has still over the door the inscription which tells ol its 

 erection and calls it a " Mynstre." It is also remarkable 

 that Ordericus Vitalis, Book II, in gi\ing a long list of 

 endowments by Barons in Normandy, mentions frequently 

 the local " monasterium cum terra presbyteri," which 

 obviously means the parish church and priest's glebe, while 

 the Abbey or Monastic House itself is called " Cenobium," 

 a name which has never found an equivalent in English. 



