RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



Canute by charter dated 1024 bestowed Por- 

 tisham on his servant Orcus.^ Tola or Thola, 

 the wife of Orcus, and a native of Rouen, Nor- 

 mandy, purchased Tolpuddle, and with her 

 husband gave it to the monks together with 

 Abbotsbury, Portisham, Hilton and 'Anstic.'' 

 Edward the Confessor by one charter gave to 

 Orcus, who was his housecari as he had been 

 Canute's, the shore in all his lands and all wrecks 

 of the same,* and by another charter notified Her- 

 man the bishop and Harold the earl that he had 

 granted a licence to Tola the widow of Orcus 

 to bequeath all her land and goods to the 

 monastery of St. Peter of Abbotsbury, accord- 

 ing to an agreement that on the death of 

 husband and wife their possessions should pass 

 to the house, of which the king now declared 

 himself the guardian and protector.' William 

 the Conqueror testified by his charter to the 

 same bisiiop and Hugh Fitz Grip, the Norman 

 sheriff, that, for the love of God and the soul 

 of his kinsman King Edward, he had granted to 

 the abbot and brethren of Abbotsbury their land 

 as fr-;e and quit as it was held in the time of 

 his predecessor together with the right of soc, 

 sac, tol, team, infangnetheof and wreck of the 

 sea, and he desired the abbey should lose nothing 

 unjustly but should be honourably treated.'" 



In the Domesday Survey the abbey held the 

 following manors : Abbotsbury, Tolpuddle, 

 Hilton, Portisham, Shilvinghampton, Wootton 

 Abbas, Bourton and Stoke Atram. The monks 

 complained at the same time that a hide belong- 

 ing to the manor of Abbotsbury, which had been 

 assigned to their living in the time of Edward the 

 Confessor, had been unjustly reft from them by 

 the Norman sheriff Hugh Fitz Grip, and that his 

 widow had taken six ; in the same manner they had 

 been deprived of a virgate of land in Portisham. ^^ 

 In a letter to the king about his assessment in 

 the year 1 166 Abbot Geoffrey deposed that 

 Roger the bishop when he had the custody of 

 the abbey gave to Nicholas de Meriet 2 hides 

 of land at Stoke Atram for the marriage of a 

 niece, the deed being contrary to the wish of 

 the convent.'^ 



By an inquisition before the king's escheator 

 John le Moyne, and Andrew Wake sheriff of 

 Dorset, at Uggscombe, Wednesday before the 

 Feast of St. Simon and St.Jude (28 Oct.), 1268, 

 as to the rights and privileges of the abbey, it 

 was declared that the abbot and his predecessors 

 had all liberties and free customs with soc, sac, 

 tol, team and infangnetheof within their lands 

 in the hundred of Uggscombe but not in their 



* Dugdale, Mon. (No. ii), iii, 55. 



' Ibid. (No. i), iii, 54. « Ibid. (No. iv), iii, 36. 



" Ibid. (No. v) ; Kemble, Codex Dipt, iv, 841. 

 '» By inspex. Ch.irt. R. 8 Edw. II, No. 5. 

 " Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), i, 78. 

 " Red Bk. of the Exch. (Rolls Ser.), i, 2 1 1. William 

 of Malmesbury records {Gesia Regum [Rolls Ser,], ii, 



2 49 



other lands at Hilton, Tolpuddle, * Oth,' and 

 Wootton Abbas ' which last is in the hundred of 

 Whitchurch,' that they were free of the suit 

 of that hundred by grant of Robert de Mande- 

 vile, formerly lord of the hundred, except that 

 their villeins were bound to come thrice a year to 

 la lagh-day to present the pleas of the crown with- 

 out hindrance. The abbot and his predecessors 

 were discharged from all military service to the 

 king by the service of one knight;'' wreck of 

 the sea was said always to have belonged to 

 them, and they had always enjoyed it. The 

 jury further declared that the abbey had acquired 

 grants of land in the following places : Cran- 

 ston, Wytherstone, ' Deneham,' ' Poeyeto,' Bex- 

 ington, Shipton, Poorton, East and West 

 Chaldon, Morebath, Wraxall, Winterborne 

 Steepleton, Wareham, Upway, Broadway, Lang- 

 ton, Bridport, Dorchester, ' Brigge,' Preston in co. 

 Somerset, and Hornington." Henry III by charter 

 dated 15 November, 1269, inspected and con- 

 firmed the charters previously granted to the abbey 

 by his predecessors the kings of England, William 

 the Conqueror, Henry I, Stephen, and Henry II, 

 with all privileges and gifts.'* The convent 

 obtained from the king two years later a grant 

 enabling them to hold a weekly market and yearly 

 fair in their manor of Hilton.'^ Edward I gave 

 them leave to hold a market at Abbotsbury." 

 Edward II in 13 1 5 confirmed anew their right 

 to wreck of the sea in connexion with a whale 

 {crassus piscis) cast up on the coast.'* Edward III 

 confirmed their right of free warren over their 

 lands at Abbotsbury, Portisham, Granston, 

 Wootton Abbas, Wytherstone, Hilton, Tol- 

 puddle, Ramsbury (Dorset), and Holwell (Som- 

 erset." Edward IV in the first year of his 

 reign, 1 46 1, made a grrnt to the abbot and 

 convent of St. Peter's, Abbotsbury, of the hun- 

 dred of Uggscombe, with view of frankpledge 

 and all issues pertaining thereto, rendering the 

 true yearly value at the exchequer."" 



According to the Taxatio of 1 29 1 the spiri- 

 tualities of the abbey amounted to j^i3 gs. ^.d.^ 



559) that Bishop Roger appropriated Abbotsbury to 

 the bishopric so far as he was able. 



'^ The abbot was returned for the service of one 

 knight's fee under Henry II {Red Bk. of the Exch. [Rolls 

 ^e.r.\ passim), Richard I, John, Henry III (Pat. I Hen. 

 Ill, m. 8), and Edward I (Close, 16 Edw. I, m. 3). 



" Chan. Inq. p.m. 53 Hen. Ill, No. 40. 



" The original of this charter according to Hut- 

 chins, who cites it {Hist, of Dorset, ii, 733), was inj 

 the possession of the earl of Ilchester, 1867. 



'" Chart. R. 56 Hen. Ill, m. 3. 



" Ibid. 9 Edw. I, No. 55. 



" Chart. R. 8 Edw. Ill, No. 5 ; Pat. 8 Edw. If, 

 pt. 2, m. 6, 19 a'. In 1388 the owner of a cargo com- 

 plained that his merchandise had been seized by the 

 abbot and others as though it had been wreck, although 

 thirteen of the crew had escaped. Ibid, i 2 Ric. II, 

 pt. I, m. II ^. " Chart. R. 10 Edw. Ill, No. 41. 



'"Pat. I Edw. IV, pt. 3, m. 19. 



