A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



In cathedral the head master and second master had stalls assigned 

 them, and it was provided that the former should rank next above 

 and the latter next below the minor canons, just as the head master 

 at Winchester and Eton ranked next above the fellows but below the 

 warden or provost, and the second master next below the fellows. 



In some loose leaves ' in the possession of the dean and chapter, 

 entitled ' The Booke of the Erection of the King's new College at Peter- 

 borowe,' is contained a list of ' the names and portions of livings assigned 

 to the Bishop and all other officers appointed for the accomplishment of 

 the same.' In this list the ' living ' assigned to each member is arrived 

 at by treating the commons as a weekly payment, or if monthly as lunar 

 monthly, at the rate of thirteen to the year, and the livery as its value in 

 money. In this book the value of the school portion was as follows : — 



The Schoolmaster and Usher of the Grammar School : 



Mr. Robert RatclyfFe, Scholem' there i6 13 4 



John Cheyne, Usher there 800 



The XX Scholars to be taught grammar, each 2134 



These livings should be compared with that of the dean, X^ioo; 

 of a canon, ^^20 ; and of the choristers' master, £2. The choristers 

 had £1 6s. 8<y. each, so that it was clearly intended that the parents 

 of the grammar boys should pay part of the cost of their keep, while 

 the choriste^s were wholly supported by charity. 



A special clause was inserted in chapter 36, 'Of Alms,' providing 

 that ' forasmuch as the Grammar School and almost all the buildings, in 

 which we will have the minor canons, clerks, and other ministers of our 

 church to lie, are in a ruinous, dilapidated, and unsightly condition,' the 

 sum of jTao assigned for the repair of bridges and highways (then a 

 matter of charity and not of county or highway rates) might be applied 

 to the repair of those buildings. These words certainly imply that 

 the grammar school was an existing building. 



The ' Booke of Erection ' was followed or had been preceded (it is 

 not clear which) by a commission, dated 20 July, 1541, directed to the 

 bishop, John Chamber, Sir Richard Sapcote, and others, to appoint to 

 the various members of the cathedral according to their degrees ' con- 

 venient dwellinghouses and places to be devyded forth and assygned to 

 them within and as farr as the buildings and grounds of the said syte of 

 the said late monasterye doth extend.' How long the college system 

 lasted at Peterborough cannot be determined. There do not appear 

 to be any accounts extant before the reign of James I, and it was not 

 then in existence. The seeds of its dissolution were sown from the 

 beginning. Chapter 26 of the statutes contained permission to the dean, 

 or in his absence the sub-dean, to grant the schoolmasters, ' if they have 

 wives,' and to the married clerks, and to any one who was sick, a portion 

 of money in lieu of their living or commons ; while any one else might 



' They were copied by the Rev. W. D. Sweeting, formerly head master, some twenty years ago, 

 but cannot now be traced. 



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