ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



Gilds were founded in this county at High Wycombe, Bucking- 

 ham, Aylesbury, Fenny Stratford, Burnham, Olney, and Stony Strat- 

 ford 1 ; there were probably others of which no record is preserved. 

 None of these were of great importance, and little is known of them 

 except what is given in the Chantry certificates. From these it appears 

 that they had as their object the relief of the poor and the maintenance 

 of one or two chaplains to pray for the brethren living and dead. At 

 Fenny Stratford and in Stony Stratford (St. Mary Magdalene) the 

 brotherhood entirely maintained a chapel for the benefit of the hamlet in 

 which it was built ; the gild at High Wycombe appears in the same 

 way to have partly maintained the chapel of St. Mary called the 

 ' charnell,' which stood in the churchyard. 



During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries two parochial chapels, 

 at Hedgerley and Wexham, became independent parish churches 2 : four 

 others, at Chesham Bois, 3 Weston Underwood,* Boarstall 5 and Chearsley,' 

 by acquiring the right of burial became very nearly free of subjection to 

 their mother churches sometimes, as in the case of Weston Under- 

 wood, only after a long struggle with the rector. 7 Within the same 

 period, the shifting or decrease of population made it necessary to unite 

 the two churches of Great and Little Loughton 8 ; and somewhat later 

 those of St. Mary and St. Nicholas at Saunderton 9 ; the parish church 



of Stoke Poges, one at the altar of St. Katherine in Burnham Abbey Church ; maintained by the gift 

 of the manor of Sylveston, Northants. (ibid. Inst. Burghersh, 3Sid~353). In the chapel of Aston, Iving- 

 hoe, by Ralf Halliwell, 1340 (ibid. Inst. Bek, 147). In the church of Edlesborough by Thomas Butler, 

 1342 (ibid. Inst. Bek, I48d). In the chapel of Colnbrook, by Thomas Purchaceour, 1345 (ibid. Inst. Bek, 

 140, and Memo. Bek, 77). In the church of Thornton, by John de Chastillon, 1356 (ibid. Memo. 

 Gynwell, 62). In the chapel in the churchyard of High Wycombe, by John Talworth, 1358 (ibid. Inst. 

 Gynwell, 269). In the church of Chalfont St. Peter, by William Whappelode, 1449 (ibid. Memo. Smith, 

 240). The Chantry Certificates also mention The Dorney chantry, founded by an ancestor of Lord 

 Windsor. The Bower Chantry in the church of High Wycombe, founded by an abbess of Godstow. 

 The Barton chantry in the church of Buckingham. (His will quoted by Browne Willis, History of Buck- 

 ingham, 54-7, is dated 1431). Two chantries in the church of Thornton, Barton's Chantry and Our 

 Lady's Chantry. The Burgess Chantry in the church of Newport Pagnel, founded in the fourteenth 

 century certainly before 1387 (Bull, History of Newport Pagnel, 123). The Earl of Warwick Chantry, 

 in the churchyard of Olney. None of these are dated : it is very probable that they mostly belong to 

 the fifteenth century. The two chantries in Edlesborough church were united in 1372 (Line. Epis. 

 Reg. Inst. Buckingham, i. 427d~428). 



1 These are all found in Chantry Certificates 4 and 5, except High Wycombe and Olney. Particulars 

 of the gild at High Wycombe are given in Records of Bucks, viii. 136, in a paper already referred to. The 

 brotherhood priest had to commemorate the brethren living and departed every day at the offertory : 

 if he forgot to do so three days in the month, he was to forfeit $d. of his wages. The fraternity of St. 

 Christopher and St. George at Olney is mentioned in a will dated 1535. (Add. MS. 5839, f. 157.) 



2 Hedgerley is called a parish church from 1414, and Wexham from 1413 onwards (Line. Epis. Reg. 

 Inst. Repingdon, 4S2d, 456) ; previous to that they had been a long time called free chapels in the in- 

 stitutions. 



3 Chesham Bois is sometimes called a parish church in the registers from 1368 (Ibid. Inst. Bucking- 

 ham, i. 413, etc.), but in the Valor Ecdesiasticus it is called a chapel. 



4 Ibid. Memo. Buckingham, 205 (1380). 



B Ibid. Memo. Repingdon, i69d-i7O (1417). 

 8 Ibid. Memo. Chedworth, 31 (1458-9). 



7 There was a dispute going on from 1368 to 1380 between the parishioners of Weston Underwood 

 and the rector of Olney, as to the payment of the chaplain : both rector and parishioners appealed to the 

 Pope, and the matter was finally decided by a papal bull, granting all the sacraments and right of burial 

 to the chapel. Ibid. Memo. Buckingham, 62 and 205 ; Cal. of Pap. Letters, iv. 75. 



8 Line. Epis. Reg. Repingdon, 441 (1409). 

 8 Ibid. Inst. Chedworth, 147. 



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