A HISTORY OF HAMPSHIRE 



sioned Lydeforde, his official, and John Ware 

 to visit Selborne and other monasteries. 

 Their report was apparently a serious one, 

 for it resulted in a personal and searching 

 visitation made by the bishop himself. On 

 27 September, Bishop Wykeham issued an 

 exceptionally long series of injunctions, 

 thirty-six in number, which afford evidence 

 of laxity and neglect of rules. Mr. Macray 

 says, but without sufficient warranting evi- 

 dence : ' The prior and canons, without being 

 guilty of any gross and crying scandal, had 

 become a society of worldly gentlemen living 

 carelessly and very much at their ease.' The 

 following is a summary of the injunctions, 

 which in many respects are the same as those 

 laid down by Wykeham for observance by 

 the monks of St. Swithun, and may therefore 

 be taken as a matter indicating Wykeham's 

 ideal for a monastic house rather than neces- 

 sarily directed against specific offences. The 

 night and day hours and the customary 

 masses were to be attended by all ; contuma- 

 cious absentees to fast on Fridays on bread 

 and water ; the rules of silence to be ob- 

 served ; masses for founders and benefactors 

 to be duly celebrated ; the cloister not to be 

 used by lay persons of either sex on pain of 

 the greater excommunication ; the doors of 

 church and cloister to be duly closed ; ignorant 

 brethren who could not read Holy Scripture 

 aright were to be duly taught ; the papal con- 

 stitutions of the Austin Order were to be 

 read twice a year in chapter, and the novices 

 were to learn the rule of the order by heart ; 

 no allowance in money was to be made for 

 clothes and shoes, and the old clothes were to 

 be given to the poor ; the canons and brethren 

 were not to leave the priory without special 

 leave, nor without a canon as a companion ; 

 hunting and the keeping of hunting dogs 

 (saving any customary right) were strictly 

 prohibited ; two canons were to visit the 

 manors twice a year ; the full number of 

 fourteen canons was to be kept up ; the 

 prior was to inquire twice a year into private 

 ownership of property on the part of the 

 canons ; annual accounts were to be ren- 

 dered ; dilapidated buildings of the priory and 

 granges were to be repaired ; no corrodies nor 

 pensions were to be granted without the 

 bishop's leave ; chantries were to be duly 

 served ; alms were to be duly distributed to 

 the poor, as well as the fragments left from 

 meals ; offenders were to be duly corrected 

 without respect of persons, officers liable to be 

 suspended, and special penance inflicted on 

 the prior for neglect ; pittances on anniver- 

 saries were to be duly distributed ; no impor- 

 tant business was to be transacted without the 



consent of the majority of the chapter ; the 

 common seal was to be kept under five keys ; 

 the statutable boots were to be worn, and not 

 coloured shoes nor leggings, and all luxurious 

 dress forbidden in detail ; sacred vestments 

 and vessels were to be kept clean, and the 

 sacramental wine to be pure and good and 

 not sour (acetosum) ; relics and sacred vessels 

 were not to be pawned ; diligent private 

 reading of Holy Scripture was to be main- 

 tained ; and the injunctions were to be 

 written out, and read before the whole con- 

 vent twice yearly. 



Apparently Bishop Wykeham was satisfied 

 that his visitation injunctions were being ob- 

 served at Selborne ; otherwise he could 

 scarcely have issued a mandate, in March 

 1389, to the prior and convent of Selborne to 

 receive John Chertese, a canon of Newark, 

 guilty of a grave scandal, to do penance there, 

 and to be kept in seclusion until further orders. 1 



Wykeham's registers afford, however, a 

 better and later proof of that bishop's good 

 opinion with regard to Selborne. At the 

 time of the appointment of Weston as prior, 

 namely in 1377, the generous diocesan had 

 discharged the debts of the house, which then 

 amounted to 73 195. lod. Some years after 

 the visitation Wykeham again saw fit to ex- 

 tend his generosity to this house, for in May, 

 1401, Prior Weston sent a formal acknow- 

 ledgment on behalf of his chapter of the 

 bishop's great goodness and liberality in pre- 

 senting them with a hundred marks ; he 

 promised (though that seems to have been no 

 condition of the gift) that two of the canons 

 should for ten years say masses daily for the 

 good estate of Wykeham, or for his soul when 

 he died. 8 



John Stepe, the twelfth prior, was elected 

 about 14 1 5, and his name occurs in evidences 

 down to 1453. Among the Magdalen muni- 

 ments is an interesting and full inventory of 

 vestments and church goods delivered to Peter 

 at Berne, sacrist, by Prior John Stepe, on 7 

 October, 1442, as well as one of a somewhat 

 later date. The inventory included sixteen 

 copes, seventeen chasubles, three white chasu- 

 bles for Lent, five albes without apparel for 

 Lent. The relics enumerated are a pax with 

 a bone of the little finger of St. John ; a gold 

 ring of St. Hippolitus ; a silver gilt ring of 

 St. Edmund of Canterbury, and a comb and 

 pome (calefactorium) of St. Richard of Chi- 

 chester. 8 



The affairs of the priory became much in- 



1 Winton. Epis. Reg., Wykeham, iii. f. 

 * Ibid. iii. f. 334 ; Moberly's Life of Wykeham, 

 262-3. 



3 Macray's Seltortte Charters, i. in, 112. 



I 7 8 



