A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



conveyed to Cornworthy.i Jn December, 1312, 

 the poor woman declareil her penitence, and the 

 bishop of Exeter was commissioned to absolve 

 her ; - but there must have been a relapse, for the 

 unhappy Agnes remained in solitary confinement 

 at Cornworthy until August, 1 3 14, when Peter 

 de Helewell was commissioned to bring her back 

 to Stamford.s The register of Bishop Dalderby 

 contains yet one more entry relative to the 

 ' apostate,' who in truth was probably a lunauc. 

 In September, 13 18, a letter was addressed to the 

 prioress, wherein it was recited that Agnes Flix- 

 thorp had three times left her order and assumed 

 a secular habit, and had then for two years re- 

 mained in the world ; the prioress was ordered, 

 under pain of excommunication, and without any 

 dissimulation, to find Agnes and bring her back 

 to the convent as an obstinate apostate, and to 

 keep her in safe custody at her peril. She was to 

 be kept in solitude, to receive no letter or mes- 

 sages, and to undergo the discipline.^ There is 

 no further information as to Agnes ; Bishop 

 Dalderby died about a year after this injunction, 

 and it is but charitable to hope that no further 

 steps were taken to secure the poor woman. 



This house, in common with most religious 

 foundations in Northamptonshire, suffered severely 

 in the visitation of the plague in 1349. The 

 small adjacent nunnery of Wothorpe was united 

 in 1354 with the larger house of St. Michael, as 

 described in the account of the former. Bishop 

 Gynwell in his confirmation of the union speaks 

 in the warmest terms of St. Michael's, and states 

 that the amalgamation was granted at the express 

 petition of the prioress and convent, setting forth 

 the losses they had incurred through the recent 

 epidemic, and in order that hospitality might 

 be maintained.^ The bishop in 1359 granted the 

 nuns a licence to beg alms in order to assist them 

 in their poverty.^ Some years later the diocesan 

 issued an inhibition to the prioress and convent 

 forbidding the residence of any secular persons 

 within the precincts of the priory, as being 

 prejudicial to religion.^ 



Entries relating to this priory in the fifteenth 

 century are rare. The prioress, Agnes Leek, 

 appointed in 1413, resigned on 12 August, 1429, 

 as set forth at some length in the register of Abbot 

 John Deeping. The declaration of the prioress 

 is entered in English. She describes herself as 

 ' perioresse of ye nunnes of ye pryorye of Seynt 

 Michel by syde Stamford of ye order of Cistewes 

 of ye diocyse of Lincoln ' ; her resignation was 

 not brought about by constraint, ' nor by strength, 

 drede, nor decyt induced bot purely wyllfully 

 sympylly and absolutely and by myne own fre 

 and greable wytte.' Licence was at once granted 



1 Line. Epis. Reg. Memo, of D.ilderby, f. 206. 

 sibid. f. 235. 3 Ibid. f. 272. * Ibid. f. 274b. 

 ^Thesanction is given in full in l]\tMo>iasticon,\v. 268. 

 ^ Line. Epis. Reg. Memo, of Gynwell, f. 117. 

 7 Ibid. Memo, of Bokyngh.im, ii. 357. 



by the abbot to the nuns to choose a successor.* 

 This reference to the priory being of the Cister- 

 cian order is, we believe, an error of either Prioress 

 Agnes or the scribe. The house is elsewhere ex- 

 pressly described as Benedictine, and as it was 

 founded by a Benedictine abbot, it is scarcely • 

 likely that it would have followed the reformed 

 rule of Citeaux. In January, 1457—8, the bishop 

 of Lincoln granted the prioress and nuns a licence - 

 to lease out and dispose of the fruits and revenues 

 of any of their appropriated church is.^ 



Margaret Stainbarn was prioress on 29 Septem- 

 ber, 1528, when she executed on behalf of her 

 convent a curious lease, which in view of the 

 storms at that time gathering between the king 

 and Rome was certainly a shrewd bargain. In 

 return for a yearly rental of £6 13;. 4^. she 

 made a lease for two years to Isaac Mychell of 

 Blandford, Dorset, of ' all the comodyteys profetts 

 and advantageys that by the Reyson or occasyon 

 off all Indulgencies, pardons, and faculteys, be 

 gyfFen to the seyd Monastery by divers Holy 



Fathers, Popes of Rome So that yt shalbe 



lafuU to the seyd Isaac and to hys lafull assignes, 

 in the Dyocese of Salysbury, Wynchester, Bathe, 

 Excetter, Saint Davyd, London, and Canterbury, 

 to declare the seyd Pryvylegeys and pardons, and 

 to gedder the Brotherhed and Devocion of good 

 Crystyn people, to hys best advantage and profet.' 

 Payment was to be made at four yearly terms at 

 the ' Crosse Aultar in the hye quere of the seyd 

 Monastery,' beginning on Christmas Day next.^* 



The value of the house was declared in the 

 Valor of 1535 at ^^65 i<)s. ()dy^ ; it was suppressed 

 with other houses of a less yearly value than ;^200 

 yearly.^- Isabel Savage, the last prioress elected 

 shortly before the suppression, obtained a pension 

 of £i^^ The site and demesne lands of the 

 priory were granted by Henry VIII. to Richard 

 Cecil ' of the Household.''^ Francis Peck, who 

 published the /f«nfl/f of Stamford m 1727, says : — 

 ' Nothing of the monastery or church is now 

 standing, but the site is well known, and at this 

 day called the Nunns in St. Martin's. There are 

 divers traditions both of the beauty of the church 

 and the stately remains pulled down in the 

 memory of man ; these last not without the loss of 

 his life who threw down the first stone and the 

 leg of another labourer miserably broken.' '^ 



Prioresses of Stamford 



Alice,^^ died about 1240 



Petronilla of Stamford,^^ elected about 1240 



Mabel le Venur,i8 appointed 1306, resigned 



1337 



8 Add. MSS. 25,288, fF. 14, I4ib-i42. 



s M.idox, Fot-m. Anglic, dxc. '" Ibid. ccli. 



11 Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.), iv. 140-1. 



12 L. and P. Hen. Fill. xiii. pt. 2, 1 195. 



13 Ibid. xiii. pt. I, 575. 1* Ibid. p. 58c. 

 15 Lib. v. p. 7. 1^ Soc. of Antiq. MS. Ix. {. 205. 

 17 Ibid. 13 Cott. MS. Vesp. E. xxii. f. 50. 



100 



