A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



Geoffrey de Rarnack in 1327 granted lands in 

 Barnacle and Pllsgate to a chaplain to celebrate daily 

 in the church of Barnack for the souls of Geoffrey and 

 his ancestors.' The chapel, later called the Vincent 

 chapel, on the north side of the church, was probably 

 built for this chantry. According to Sir William 

 Dugdale there was remaining in 1641 coloured glass 

 in the windows of this chapel recording that John 

 Vincent and Margaret his wife caused ' this window to 

 be made.' ' 



In the surveys taken in the reigns of Henry VIII 

 and Edward VI there are two accounts of a gild of 

 Corpus Christi in Barnack. One states that it was 

 endowed to find a priest to pray for ever for the souls 

 of the founders and the brothers and sisters ' who are 

 not resident accorciing to the foundation.' The gild 

 was in the parish church of Barnack.' The other 

 account says the gild was founded within the parish 

 church by Henry Paas to find a priest to sing for 



Barnack Manor House. 



ever ; there was no preacher, school, or poor people, 

 but persons were houseled to the number of 200. 

 John Prior was the incumbent ' meanly learned and 

 having no other living.' ' The lands belonging to 

 this gild were granted in 1553 to David Vincent and 

 passed with his manors of Barnack and Pilsgate to the 

 Cecil family.' 



The manor house of Barnack is a mere 



MJNOR remnant of what it once was, and a rem- 



HOUSE nant which has been incorporated into 



modern additions, which in their turn 



have succumbed to fire, and now (1905) lie in 



a ruinous condition. According to Bridges, the 

 manor house was fairly extensive in his day, and 

 still retained much interesting glass as well as 

 other decorative features. Later writers speak of 

 the glass having been removed in view of the ap- 

 proaching demolition of this building — and Parker 

 gives the date of the demolition as 1830. But the 

 destruction could not have been complete, inasmuch 

 as a 15th-century fireplace and one or two mediaeval 

 windows still survive, together with the walls in which 

 they are set ; but there is not enough left to enable 

 the ancient plan to be recovered. The most inter- 

 esting fict which emerges from the confusion is men- 

 tioned in Parker's Domestic Architecture^ namely, that 

 two arches of the old hall (of which a cut is given by 

 him) had recently been pulled down, and that these 

 arches were part of one of the arcades which origi- 

 nally supported the roof. It is inferred that the 

 hall was similar in treatment and comparable in size 

 to the hall of Oakham Castle. 

 If the conjecture be true, this 

 house at Barnack must have 

 been one of much importance. 



The church of 

 CHURCH St. John the Bap- 

 tist ' has a chan- 

 cel with north vestry and chapel 

 and a l.irge south chapel (the 

 Walcot chapel) ; a nave of 

 three b.ays with aisles and 

 vaulted south porch, and a 

 western tower. It is a build- 

 ing of very great interest from 

 many points of view, and its 

 architectural history can be 

 carried back to the iith cen- 

 tury. The west tower prob- 

 ably belongs to the first half 

 of this century, and has opened 

 on the east into an aisleless 

 nave of which only the north- 

 west and south-west angles re- 

 main, but which was perhaps 

 of the same internal dimensions, 60 ft. by 23 ft., as the 

 present nave. Of the chancel of this early church 

 nothing can be said with certainty. The first evi- 

 dences of enlargement date from the end of the 12 th 

 century, when a north chapel and north aisle were 

 added. The south aisle and south porch seem to 

 have been undertaken in the beginning of the 13th 

 century, and c. 1220 a stone vice was built in the 

 south-west angle of the tower, the ground story of the 

 tower vaulted, and an octagonal belfry stage and low 

 stone spire added.' About 1 300 the present chancel 

 was built, and the north wall of the north aisle of the 



was afterwards successively bishop of 

 Bristol, Worcester, and London, but died 

 in poverty and partial disgrace, having 

 offended the queen by his connexion with 

 the Lambeth Articles, and still more 

 grievously by his second marriage {Dtcf. 

 Nal. Biog.). The father of Charles Kings- 

 ley was rector here from 1824 to 1830 ; 

 there is an account of the room in the 

 rectory where Charles slept as a boy in his 

 Letters and Life. 



^ Inq. a.q.d. File cxciv. No. 21. 



^ Syers, Batnack Church, p. 10. Mar- 

 garet, according to a De Banco Roll (Hil. 

 14 Hen. VI, m. loy d.), was great-grand- 

 daughter of Geoffrey dc Barnack. 



'Chant. Cert. (P.R.O.), 36, No. 18. 



■•Chant. Cert. (P.R.O.), 3;, No. 18. 

 The gild is called in this document and in 

 the patent, gild of the 'Transfiguration of 

 Corpus Christi.' There was possibly some 

 connexion between this gild and the 

 chantry, of which there is no mention in 

 the commissioners' survey. Henry Paas 

 was probably father-in-law of Geoffrey dc 

 Barnack, and the writ for the Inq. a.q.d. 

 appears to have been first made out for 

 some Henry, and afterwards changed for 

 Geoffrey de Barnack. 



^ Pat. 6 Edw. VI, pt. iv, m. 4. 



^Op. cit. i, 52. It is here assumed that 

 there can have been but one manor-house, 



468 



and that Parker's cut refers to some por- 

 tioa of the present manor-house which has 

 been pulled down. The cut is so restricted 

 that the building shown might belong 

 anywhere. 



7 John Gardyner (151 i) leaves his 

 body to be buried in the parish church of 

 St. John the Baptist in Barnack. Will 

 in Northampton Probate Office, Bk. A, 

 fol. 64. See also Bk. A. if. 123, 245, 

 and Bk. D, fol. 247. 



"The tower arch was built up,and a small 

 doorway Inserted jn the blocking, during 

 the 13th century to strengthen the tower 

 under the weight of the newly built belfry 

 stage and spire. 



