A HISTORY OF DORSET 



Anglians, retiring from the world on the death 

 of his brother at the hands of the Danes, lived the 

 life of a hermit at St. Augustine's well ' called 

 the silver well' at Cerne, where he died.' So 

 great was the respect felt for his memory that 

 in later times the abbey appears under his pat- 

 ronage as well as that of the Blessed Virgin and 

 St. Peter.^ After his death Ailmer or ^Ethelmar, 

 generally styled earl or duke of Cornwall, trans- 

 lated the relics of Edwold with the assistance of 

 Dunstan to the old church of Cerne ' where now 

 the parish church is ' and built or rebuilt the 

 monastery which he dedicated to the honour 

 of St. Peter.* The foundation was begun in 

 the reign of Edgar according to Leland and 

 completed in the year 987. 



In his foundation charter of that year 

 .^thelmar (or Ailmer) son of jElward, nobleman 

 of king iEthelred, notifies to Archbishop Dunstan 

 and Bishop iElfheah of Winchester that he has 

 given to God and the monks there the place 

 which is called Cernel in honour of the Blessed 

 Virgin, St. Peter and St. Benedict, for his dear 

 master king jEthelred, for himself and the 

 redemption of his ancestors ; he has granted 

 to them also 6 cassates of land in Minterne, 10 

 manses at Winterborne, 6 at Bredy, 12 in the 

 further Bredy, 3 in Rentscombe ; Leofric, clerk of 

 Poxwell, has added to the donation the vill of 

 Poxwell which was confirmed by grant of king 

 jEthelred ; jElfrith a relative of iEthelmar at 

 Bincombe has given 4cassates of land at Aflfpuddle, 

 Alfwold gave 5 manses at Bloxworth ; after the 

 death of his wife the founder further bestowed 

 on the monaster)' tithes of his yearly rent in 

 Cerne and Cheselbourne together with tithes of 

 honey, cheese and fat hogs in his other lands and 

 desired that the monks should observe the rule of 

 St. Benedict and should choose whatever secular 

 patron they pleased.^ 



Canute is said to have plundered this monastery 

 when he wasted the town but afterwards he 

 became a considerable benefactor to it.' The 

 abbey had added largely to its endowment at 

 the time the Domesday Survey was taken ; the 

 church of St. Peter was then returned as holding 

 land in the following places : Cerne, Little 

 Puddle, Radipole, Bloxworth, AflFpuddle, Poxwell, 

 East Woodsford, HeiHeton, 'Vergroth,' Little 

 Bredy, Winterborne, Long Bredy, Nettlecombe, 

 Milton, Kimmeridge, Rentscombe and Symonds- 



' Will, of Malmesbury, op. cit. ; Leland, Collect. 

 iii, 67. 



* R}mer, Foedera, xiv, 637. 



' Leland, CoUect. iii, 67. The founder's name 

 appears under various forms, Leland calls him Ailmer, 

 Egelward (ibid, i, 26), and ^"Ehvard (i, 285). Previous 

 to his foundation there is said to have been a sm.iU 

 monastery here of three monks. Ibid, iii, 67 ; Tanner, 

 Notitia, Dorset, viii. 



'Cart. Antiq. W. 16. 



" Leland, Collect, i, 66 ; iii, 67. Coker, Particular 

 Sun', of Dorset, 65. 



bury ; * the total, amounting to 113 hides and 

 3 virgates, was valued at ^^115, leaving 

 out AiFpuddle, the assessment of which was 

 omitted. The widow of Hugh Fitz Grip, the 

 Norman sheriff", held, we are told, I carucate in 

 Poxwell formerly belonging to the demesne of 

 the monks. 



In 1 1 56 the abbot of Cerne was returned as- 

 holding by the service of three knights.' Robert 

 the abbot in 1 1 66 notified the king the knights' 

 fees of his church and the knights who held them. 

 Amongst these may be noted Robert Russell 

 who held a knight's fee, less one virgate, unjustly 

 and against the will of the convent because neither 

 his grandfather nor his father held it of the 

 church nor should hold it. In the demesne of 

 the church were three and a half knights' fees in 

 the vill of Cerne with freehold tenure {cum 

 tenura Francolemium). Each one of these ought 

 to keep ward at the king's command at Corfe 

 Castle one month in the year, or, if it should 

 please the king to have them in the army^ 

 two knights should be found for his service 

 in the absence of ward {interim dismissa vjardia.y^ 

 The abbot of Cerne as a knight of the shire 

 was summoned to Parliament in 13 15 and 

 to attend the Great Council at Westminster 

 in 1324." 



The income of the abbey in the Taxatio of 

 1291 was assessed zt £ij'j 8s., including spirit- 

 ualities amounting to ^^13 ijs. j^d. from the 

 churches of Radipole, Poxwell, Hawkchurch, 

 Symondsbury, Long Bredy with the chapel of 

 Little Bredy, and Powerstock,'- and temporalities 

 valued at 1^164 ox. id, within the deaneries of 

 Bridport, Dorchester and Whitchurch.^' The 

 clear annual income of the monks in the 

 Falor Ecclesiasticus of 1535 was declared at 

 ;C575 ^V- ioJ(^.," when they held the par- 

 sonages of Cerne, Kimmeridge, Affpuddle, and 

 Hermitage,'* the manors of Cerne, Hawkchurch, 

 Milton, Symondsbury, Maiden Newton, Mapper- 

 combe with Nettlecombe, Little Bredy, Long 

 Bredy, Winterborne, Nether Cerne, Minterne^ 

 Middlemarsh, Bloxworth, Poxwell, AfFpuddle, 

 and Milborne St. Andrew, with parcels of land 

 in various other manors and parishes.'^ 



The history of the abbey is perhaps the least 

 eventful of any of the Dorset houses with the 

 exception of that of the sisters at Tarrant Kaines j 



» Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), 77 J. 78. 



' Red Bk. of the E.xch. (Rolls Ser.), i, 15. 



'"Ibid, i, 212. 



" Pari. M'rits (Rec. Com.), ii, div. iii, 653. 



" Pope Nich. Tax. (Rec. Com.), 179, 180, 182. 



" Ibid. 183, 1S4. 



" Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.), i, 257. 



"Ibid. 253. 



'* Ibid. 253-6. These manors are returned as 

 being in the poisession of the monks at the date the 

 Valor ws.'i taken. The Monasticon (ii, 622) gives a list 

 of lands and manors held by them at different times 

 extracted from Hutchins' Hist, of Dorset. 



54 



