ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE 263 



granges to foreign abbeys, and their priors little more than bail- 

 iffs removable at will; whereas the Priory of Selborne pos- 

 sessed the valuable estates and manors of Selborne, Achangre, 

 Norton, Brompden, Bassinges, Basingstoke, and Natele ; and 

 the prior challenged the right of pillory, thurcet, and furcas, 

 and every manorial privilege. 



I find next a grant from Jo. de Venur, or Venuz, to the prior 

 of Selborne, " deto ta mora [a moor or bog] ubi Berne 

 oritur, usque ad campum vivarii, et de prato voc. Sydenmeade 

 cum abutt : et de cursu aque molendini." And also a grant in 

 reversion " unius virgate terre " (a yard land), in Achangre at 

 the death of Richard Actedene his sister's husband, who had 

 no child. He was to present a pair of gloves of one penny 

 value to the prior and canons, to be given annually by the said 

 Richard ; and to quit all claim to the said lands in reversion, 

 provided the prior and canons would engage annually to pay 

 to the king, through the hands of his bailiffs of Aulton, ten 

 shillings at four quarterly payments, " pro omnibus serviciis, 

 consuetudinibus, exactionibus, et demandis." 



This Jo. de Venur was a man of property at Oakhanger, and 

 lived probably at the spot now called Chapel Farm. The grant 

 bears date the i/th year of the reign of Henry III. (viz., 1233). 



It would be tedious to enumerate every little grant for lands 

 or tenements that might be produced from my vouchers. I 

 shall therefore pass over all such for the present, and conclude 

 this letter with a remark that must strike every thinking per- 

 son with some degree of wonder. No sooner had a monastic 

 institution got a footing, but the neighborhood began to be 

 touched with a secret and religious awe. Every person round 

 was desirous to promote so good a work ; and either by sale, 

 by grant, or by gift in reversion, was ambitious of appearing 

 a benefactor. They who had not lands to spare gave roads 

 to accommodate the infant foundation. The religious were not 

 backward in keeping up this pious propensity, which they ob- 

 served so readily influenced the breasts of men. Thus did the 

 more opulent monasteries add house to house, and field to field, 

 and by degrees manor to manor, till at last " there was no place 

 left ; " but every district around became appropriated to the 

 purposes of their founders, and every precinct was drawn into 

 the vortex. 



