ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 347 



availed himself by marrying women of property. By my evidences 

 it appears that he had three wives, and probably in the follow- 

 ing order : Constantia, Ameria, and Agnes. The first of these 

 ladies, who was the companion of his middle life, seems to have 

 been a person of considerable fortune, which she inherited from 

 Thomas Makerel, a gentleman of Selborne, who was either her 

 father or uncle. The second, Ameria, calls herself the quondam 

 wife of Sir Adam, " quae fui uxor," &c. and talks of her sons 

 under age. Now Gurdon had no son: and beside Agnes in 

 another document says, " Ego Agnes quondam uxor Domini Adae 

 Gurdon in pura et ligea viduitate mea:" but Gurdon could not 

 leave two widows ; arid therefore it seems probable that he had 

 been divorced from Ameria, who afterwards married, and had 

 sons. By Agnes Sir Adam had a daughter Johanna, who was his 

 heiress, to whom Agnes in her life-time surrendered part of her 

 jointure : he had also a bastard son. 



Sir Adam seems to have inhabited the house now called Temple, 

 lying about two miles east of the church, which had been the 

 property of Thomas Makerel. 



In the year 1262 he petitioned the prior of Selborne in his own 

 name, and that of his wife Constantia only, for leave to build 

 him an oratory in his manor-house, " in curia sua." Licenses of 

 this sort were frequently obtained by men of fortune and rank 

 from the bishop of the diocese, the archbishop, and sometimes, 

 as I have seen instances, from the pope ; not only for conveni- 

 ence-sake, and on account of distance, and the badness of the 

 roads, but as a matter of state and distinction. Why the owner 

 should apply to the prior, in preference to the bishop of the 

 diocese, and how the former became competent to such a grant, 

 I cannot say ; but that the priors of Selborne did take that pri- 

 vilege is plain, because some years afterward, in 1280, Prior 

 Richard granted to Henry Waterford and his wife Nicholaa a 

 license to build an oratory in their court-house, " curia sua de 

 Waterford," in which they might celebrate divine service, saving 

 the rights of the mother church of Basynges. Yet all the while 

 the prior of Selborne grants with such reserve and caution, as if 

 in doubt of his power, and leaves Gurdon and his lady answer- 

 able in future to the bishop, or his ordinary, or to the vicar for 

 the time being, in case they should infringe the rights of the 

 mother church at Selborne. 



The manor-house called Temple is at present a single building, 



