ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



The addition of Norman and foreign superiors to those monastic 

 bodies already holding property in Dorset marks the great dynastic and 

 political change that had recently taken place, but so far as the older 

 houses are concerned the Survey shows that it had had, with some excep- 

 tions,** comparatively little effect in the loss or depreciation of their lands ; 

 while in the case of Shaftesbury these had greatly risen in value. If the 

 monks of Abbotsbury had reason to complain of the losses they had suffered 

 under Hugh Fitz Grip, late Norman sheriff, and his widow," and the com- 

 munity at Sherborne reported that William, son of the Conqueror, had seized 

 three virgates of land in their manor of Stalbridge ' without the consent 

 of the bishop and the monks,' ** the abbess and nuns of Shaftesbury had 

 not forgotten their injuries at the hands of Earl Harold, while they placed 

 on record that the Conqueror had, at least, restored to them the manor of 

 Stour of which they had been deprived by the late earl though he still 

 retained that of Melcombe.*^ 



But if the Conquest brought little territorial change to the mon- 

 astic establishments of the county, the eleventh century witnessed various 

 other changes that had a distinct bearing on the social and ecclesias- 

 tical position of Dorset,'" An administrative scheme, rendered necessary 

 by the Conqueror's action in separating the secular from the ecclesias- 

 tical courts of justice, was the division of the diocese into districts and the 

 appointment of an official hitherto known as the bishop's ' eye,' his 

 deputy or archdeacon, who now became a territorial officer with definite 

 functions, holding courts and presiding over a district for which he was per- 

 sonally responsible to the bishop. The first mention of this newly constituted 

 officer occurs in a copy of that original Institutio Osmundi, contemporary 

 with the foundation charter of the cathedral of Salisbury in 1091, which, 

 in elaborating and explaining the rights and duties of the cathedral 

 dignitaries, orders that the attention of the archdeacon should be specially 

 directed to the 'care of parishes and the cure of souls.' *^ The 'Consue- 

 tudinary ' of the bishop states that in the church of Sarum are four 

 archdeacons, one for Dorset, one for Berkshire, and two for Wiltshire.'^ 

 To the archdeaconry of Dorset, sometimes called the Jirst {primus) arch- 

 deaconry,*' was annexed the rectory of Gussage Regis, the valuation of 

 which was assessed in the Taxatio of 1291 at £j2 ^^- 8^^-^* The Register of 



of" Hinton) 'holds another priest living in Tarrant one hide and a third part of a hide,' probably constitutes a 

 reference to the incumbent of a church at Tarrant. A resident priest is mentioned under the manor of Roger 

 de Belmont in Church Knowle (ibid. Son), and another priest is recorded in the manor of Long Blandford 

 or Langton held by Edwin Venator (ibid. 84J). 



** The exceptions are notoriously house property in the boroughs. In Shaftesbury, for example, of the 

 153 houses belonging to the abbess in the time of Edward the Confessor, 1 1 1 were left at the date the Survey 

 was taken ; 42 had been altogether destroyed (ibid. 75 a). In Wareham of 45 houses standing in the demesne 

 of the abbey of St. Wandragesil 1 7 were laid waste. The estates of the abbot of Glastonbury are another 

 exception, but the lands of the abbey had recently been in the custody of the crown following the wasteful 

 management of Abbot Thurston. R. W. Eyton, op. cit. 21. 



«' Dcm. Bk. (Rec. Com.), i, 78. *» Ibid. 77. ^' Ibid. 78^. 



'" The transfer of the bishop's seat from Sherborne to Old Sarum and the removal of the capital from 

 Winchester to London naturally moved this county further away from the centre of activity and tended to 

 place it outside the circle of influence it had once occupied. As regards this diminution of importance 

 it has elsewhere been pointed out (H. J. Moule, Old Dmet, 51), that in the following centuries 

 the position of Dorset, as compared with the advance of other counties, would more fitly be described as 

 stationary. 



" Reg. of St. Osmund {Ko\h Ser.), i, 214. '' Ibid, i, 3. 



'" Valor EccL (Rec. Com.), ii, 72. '' Pope Nick. Tax. (Rec. Com.), 182^. 



2 



