A HISTORY OF DURHAM 



The main interest, however, during this period is in the struggle between 

 the bishop and his great feudatories — a fitting prelude to the coming conflict 

 between Bek and the crown. During the thirteenth century the bishop was 

 engaged in a contest for supremacy with the prior and convent of Durham 

 and the three principal lay tenants, Balliol, Bruce, and Neville, each of whom 

 attempted to oust or evade the bishop's jurisdiction. Almost from the be- 

 ginning there had been friction between the bishop and the great Benedictine 

 convent which Carileph founded at Durham. During Flambard's episcopacy 

 relations were very strained, due, the convent alleged, to the bishop with- 

 holding part of the conventual estates. '- 



Towards the end of the twelfth century another difficulty arose — that 

 of jurisdiction. Under Pudsey, who had acted as a royal justice in eyre, the 

 bishop's court was being gradually transformed from a seignorial court into 

 one modelled on the royal courts of Henry 11.°' The convent also tried to 

 develop their seignorial court on similar lines, and during the long vacancy 

 after Bishop Poitou's death with some measure of success. 



With Bishop Richard Marsh's accession a struggle began and con- 

 tinued till 1229, when by an agreement between Bishop le Poor and the 

 convent the attempt of the latter to render their court co-ordinate in juris- 

 diction with that of the bishop was defeated. 



By this agreement, while the convent obtained a share of the profits of 

 the jurisdiction in matters both civil and criminal affecting their tenants, the 

 bishop's right of jurisdiction was upheld and the powers of the prior's court 

 restricted to seignorial matters."* 



The trouble with the Nevilles arose from an attempt to exclude the 

 bishop from the right to primer seisin. Humphrey de Conyers died seised 

 in capite of the bishop of certain lands which the bishop's bailiff seized 

 except the manor of St. Helens, Auckland, part of the Neville fee. Robert 

 Neville seized the manor and refused to give it up. The bishop thereupon 

 appealed to the king, who in 1271 commanded Neville to permit the bishop 

 and his bailiffs to have possession." The question of primer seisin was not 

 settled definitely till Bishop Bek's time.°^' 



In the case of the disputes with Bruce and Balliol the question raised 

 was whether the bishop had the same jura regalia within Sadberge as he 



" See Canon Greenwell's pref. to the Feodarium (Surtees Soc.) as to the joint ownership of the bishop and 

 congregation of St. Cuthbert and subsequent partition of the estates. " Lapsley, op. cit. i6l et seq. 



" The convenit with 'attestationes de placitis coronae' and ' attestationes testium ' are printed in the Feed. 

 (Surtees Soc), 212 seq. The evidence on the bishop's behalf falls into three groups : pp. 221-230, witnesses 

 dealing with North Durham matters; pp. 230-253, witnesses relating to Durham matters ; and pp. 254-261, 

 witnesses dealing with matters relating to Yorkshire. No similar division is noticeable in the case of the 

 convent's witnesses, many of whom speak to matters concerning the then widely separated divisions of the 

 Palatinate. 



^' Writ dated 8 Sept. 1 271 (55 Hen. III). The writer has had the advantage in this and other instances of 

 using the valuable collection of transcripts made by the late Mr. W. H. D. LongstafFe which are now deposited in 

 the Dean and Chapter Library at Durham. Also Durham Treasury Cart, i, fol. 189, where this and three 

 other cases are referred to. One of these seems to indicate that the bishops in the thirteenth century 

 could not always maintain an effective hold over their tenants : ' Quando Philippus de Chyleforth senior 

 decessit venit Dominus Nigellus de Rungeton tunc ballivus Episcopi et misit se in saysinam terrae de Coton 

 prope Elleton quam idem Philippus tenuit de domino Radulpho de Coton patre Radulphi de Coton junio.is 

 quod audiens idem dominus Radulphus senior congregatis amicis suis et consanguineis violentissime ejecit 

 dominum Nigellum cum suis. Hoc videns dominus Nigellus congregavit omnes quos potuit de potestate 

 episcopi et euntes ad aratrum ut ipsum ejecerit. Sed dictus Radulphus cum suis defendit domum et earn 

 tenuit contra potestatem episcopi et oplinuit custodiam terrae et heredis qui pene erat quatuor annorum usque ad 

 legitimam aetatem et turn tenuit de Episcopo alias terras per servitium militare.' '" hifra. p. 151. 



146 



