A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



PRE-REFORMATION ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS 



The following pre-Reformation schools appear to have been either of a purely or of a 

 mainly elementary type : — 



BARNACK SCHOOL 



This school is the second earliest in the county of which we have specific documentary 

 mention. On 3 September, 1359,^ the bishop of Lincoln, Gynwell, as it was 'the duty of 

 a prudent shepherd of the church to increase the number of those serving in it, especially 

 clerks to be taken into the Lord's domain {sortem), which has been everywhere much lessened 

 since the last plague of men (i.e., the Black Death), and that the rector of Barnack (Barnake) 

 wished to nourish and favour in his parish poor {inopes) boys and others under the rod of a 

 master in reading, song, and grammar, to the increase of divine learning,' granted licence to 

 the rector, Gervase of Willeford, ' to choose a lettered [litteratum] and fit master in the parish 

 to teach the boys and others going to him the said sciences.' Like the school at Northaller- 

 ton in 1440- the school contemplated in this document being a mixed school of reading, song, 

 and grammar must have been of a low grade ; the grammar and classics probably being of the 

 same sort of type as in those later schools which professed to teach the three R's and ' the 

 classics, if required.' We may assume that Barnack school was established ; but how long it 

 lasted and what became of it we do not know. In the chantry certificates ' we find a gild 

 maintaining a priest. 



FARTHINGHOE SCHOOL 



A merely elementary school is found at Farthinghoe or Fingeringho, as it has been variously 

 called. On 19 June, 1443,^ John Abbot, citizen and mercer of London, made his will of 

 lands ' as well in the city of London as in Farnyngho and Astrop in the county of North- 

 ampton, namely, that the masters or wardens of the Mistere of the Mercers of London 

 {Magistri sive Gardiani Mistere Mercerorum) and the commonalty {communitai) of the same 

 mistere, should have and hold to them and their successors all those his lands and tenements in 

 Catton Lane, on condition that they should find yearly a fit and honest chaplain to celebrate 

 in the church of Farningho for his soul and the souls of his parents, friends, and benefactors 

 for ever, to teach and instruct little boys ' freely and gratuitously, without taking any pay or 

 gain for the same.' The company were to pay the chaplain ' thus celebrating and teaching, 

 by way of his salary or stipend for the said divine service and labour 10 marks a year 

 [£t 1 31. 4^/.), quarterly.' 



Abbot's will of personalty made nearly two years later, 27 February, 1443-4, gave 

 considerable legacies to Farthinghoe poor church, and was proved 5 March, 1443-4. The 

 directions of the testator were not apparently effectively carried out till 12 February, 1449,* 

 when John Fray, Recorder of London (afterwards Chief Baron of the Exchequer), by will of 

 lands of that date, enrolled in the Hustings Court in 1475, gave to the Mercers' Company 

 tenements held by him in trust in Cattestrete, otherwise Catton Lane, in St. Laurence, Jewry, 

 charged with the maintenance of a chantry in the church of Farnyngo for the souls of John 

 Abbot and others. The will being enrolled in the Hustings operated as a conveyance and 

 under the custom of London obviated the necessity of a licence in mortmain. 



This chantry-school was still going on 100 years later, when it appears in the chantry 

 certificates.^ 



But the commission of Edward VL shows that Farthinghoe had already forgotten the name 

 of its benefactor, for the return ^ runs : ' Farninghoo. A stipendary preest, founded by whom yt is 

 unknown, but the incumbent is payed a pencion of £6 1 35. ^d. a yere by the Companye of 

 Mercers in London.' The incumbent was 'James Coles, of thage of 40 yeres, well learnyd, 

 and teacheth children frely and hathe a pencion of £6 6s. 8d. of the king as a late monk of the 

 late monastery of Billesdon.' The goods were worth 13^.4^. The company itself, however, 



' Lincoln Epis. Reg, Gynwell, fol. 135^. ' Ear/y Yorkshire Schools, ii, 62. 



' Chant. Cert. 36. * P.C.C. 34, LufFenam, p. 269. 



' 'Ac parvulos parochie de Farningho predicta libere et quiete docturum et imformaturum absque 

 stipendio vel lucre proinde recipiendo.' 

 ' Cal. Hustings Wills, ii, 574. 



' English Schools at the Reformation, 146-7, from Chant. Cert. 36, No. 5. 

 * Chant. Cert. 35, No. 21. 



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