RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



character. The visitation is left incomplete, 

 much of the last folio being blank. 1 



The result of this grievous exposure seems 

 to have brought about the enforced resigna- 

 tion of the aged and evil abbess, and in June, 

 1502, Joyce Rowse was elected abbess and 

 received the temporalities. 2 



It was difficult for the abbey to recover 

 from the long laxity that had so unhappily 

 prevailed under Elizabeth Brooke, and in 1506 

 Bishop Fox had to remove the sub-prioress 

 and to administer severe censures. 3 



Abbess Joyce resigned in September, 1515, 

 and on the i6th of that month the conge 

 tfelire was granted to the prioress and convent, 

 who elected Anne Westbrook, ' sexteyn ' of 

 the monastery, as their abbess. 



Elizabeth Ryprose, the last abbess, was 

 elected on 15 December, 1523. The docu- 

 ments relative to this election are set forth in 

 great detail in the episcopal registers. 4 The 

 temporalities were restored in the following 

 month. 6 In November 1537 the abbey, 

 alarmed at the fate of the smaller houses, 

 procured an elaborate inspection and confir- 

 mation of all their royal charters from the 

 time of Henry I. downwards. 6 But this was 

 so much waste of parchment and fees. 



Sir Richard Lister wrote to Cromwell in 

 September, 1537, informing him that the 

 nuns of Romsey, hearing they were in danger 

 of suppression, were making leases and alien- 

 ating their goods. He desired to know 

 whether he was to stay them in this. 7 



On 28 December, 1538, John Foster re- 

 ported to Sir Thomas Seymour as to the state 

 of the house of Romsey. He pronounced the 

 house out of debt ; that the plate and jewels 

 were worth 300; the bells worth 100. 

 The church is described as a great sumptuous 

 thing, all of freestone and covered with lead, 

 and worth 300 or 400 more. The 

 annual rents are returned at 481 is. 8d. 

 The names of the abbess, Elizabeth Ryprose, 

 the prioress, Edith Banester, and the sub- 

 prioress, Katharine Wadham, are set down, 

 together with twenty-three other nuns. Mr. 

 Foster wrote : ' In answer to your letter by 

 Mr. Flemynge, whether the abbess and nuns 

 would be content to surrender their house, 



1 Sede Vacante Register of Canterbury Priory. 



3 Lansd. MS. 963, f. 55. 



3 Winton. Epis. Reg., Fox, iv. f. 80. The 

 confessions are given of Alice Goreyn for slander 

 and Margaret Dowman of incontinence. 



* Ibid. v. ff. 54-62b. 



s Letters and Papers, Hen. VIII. iv. 66. 



6 Ibid. xii. 1 1 50 (5). 



7 Ibid. Jciii. 35*. 



the truth is, that, in consequence of the mo- 

 tion made by your kinswomen and other 

 friends, they will be content to do you any 

 pleasure, but they would be loath to trust to 

 the commissioners' gentleness, as they hear 

 that other houses have been straitly handled.' 8 



Nearly a third of this community had made 

 their religious profession in July, 1534, very 

 shortly before the beginning of their troubles. 

 One of these was Katherine, youngest 

 daughter of Sir Nicholas Wadham, Governor 

 of the Isle of Wight, whose sister Jane had 

 also been for some years a professed nun of 

 the same abbey. John Foster, whose letter 

 to Seymour has just been cited, lived at 

 Baddesley near Romsey, and was convent 

 steward. His reference to ' kinswomen ' ap- 

 plied to the two Wadham nuns and to 

 another nun of the name of Elizabeth Hill. 

 Sir Nicholas Wadham's first wife was a 

 daughter of Robert Hill of Antony, and his 

 second was Margaret, sister to Queen Jane 

 Seymour and Sir Thomas Seymour. Through 

 their influence it was hoped that a quiet sur- 

 render would be made. 9 



Whether this was effected or not cannot 

 now be asceertained, for there is no extant 

 formal surrender. But the abbess and con- 

 vent in January, 1539, had licence to alienate 

 their lordships or manors of Edingdon and 

 Steeple Ashton and all their lands and tene- 

 ments in Hampshire and Wiltshire to Sir 

 Thomas Seymour. 10 



The clear annual value of the abbey was 

 reckoned by the commissioners at 161 

 js. iod. 11 The lands returned on the first 

 minister's account after the dissolution of the 

 house were the manors of Romsey with the 

 rectory and fair, Moor Abbas, ' Moor Malwyn,' 

 Itchenstoke with the rectory, Sway, Sidmon- 

 ton, Holm Lacy (Hunlacey) with ' Torleton 

 juxta Coates,' and ' Bardolfeston ' in the parish 

 of Puddle. 12 



The parishioners of Romsey managed to 

 save the fine old conventual church from de- 

 struction by buying it back from the Crown 

 in 1554 for ;ioo. This is much below 

 Steward Foster's valuation ; but it must be 

 recollected that the parish had an unassailable 

 right to a considerable portion of it, which 

 even Henry's counsellors could not ignore. 



The pointed oval seal, of late twelfth cen- 



B Ibid. xiii. 1155. 



9 Abbot Gasquet's Hen. VIII. and the Engfish 

 Monasteries, i. 3103. 



10 Letters and Papers, Hen. Vlll. xiv. 191. 



11 Aug. Off. Misc. Books, cccxlii. f. 9. 



13 Noted in Dugdale's Monasticon, ii. 510. 



