A HISTORY OF DORSET 



A thirteenth-century round seal with very 

 fine but imperfect impression represents the 

 west front of the church, with elaborate details 

 of early English architecture. On the foliated 

 crockets of the roof on the left side there is a 

 small bird, on the right the corresponding bird 

 has been broken off. In base under two round- 

 headed arches of masonry are two half-length 

 figures of the founders, St. Augustine and 

 iEthelmar, with their hands uplifted to support 

 the church above therh. On each side behind 

 them a cinquefoil, that on the right broken 

 away. The legend is wanting.*"" 



An example of the above seal with very im- 

 perfect impression is to be found attached to the 

 surrender deed of the abbey.*' 



The abbot's seal of the fifteenth century, 

 pointed oval, with fine but imperfect impression, 

 shows in three canopied niches full-length 

 figures of the Virgin crowned, with the Child in 

 her right hand, and a sceptre fleur-de-lis in her 

 left hand, St. Catherine with crown, nimbus and 

 wheel on the left, and St. Margaret with crown 

 on the right standing on a dragon and piercing 

 his head. In base under a round-headed arch 

 the abbot, half-length, with mitre and staff, 

 praying. On the masonry at the sides two 

 shields of arms ; on the left a lion rampant 

 within a border bezanty ; the right a cross 

 engrailed between four lily-flowers slipped, 

 Cerne Abbey.'''* Legend defective : — 



SIGILL 



DE CERNE 



The signet of Abbot Roger Bemyster is at- 

 tached to a deed dated 1475, of which only an 

 indistinct fragment remains representing a ram 

 or goat with the legend [r]oger[us].*' 



3. THE ABBEY OF MILTON 



The Benedictine abbey of Milton or Middle- 

 ton was built in the year 933 ^ by King jEthelstan 

 for the soul of his brother Edwin, or, as some his- 

 torians aver, to expiate the crime of a brother's 

 murder," the king, in his foundation charter, 



« B.M. Seals, Ixii, 30. 



" Deeds of Surrender, No. 52. 



«' B.M. Seals, Ixii, 31. '" Harl. Chart. 44 B. 48. 

 ' Tanner, Notitta, Dorset, xviii. The tenth year 

 of King jEthelstan is the date generally accepted, 

 and it agrees with the date of the death of Prince 

 Edwin. Angl.-Sax. Chron. (Rolls Ser.), 85 ; Sim. 

 of Durham, Oj>. (Tvvysden), p. I 54. Dugdale quotes 

 an account of the foundation from a register of 

 I the abbey, no longer in existence, which states that 

 the house was built in the tenth year of .(Ethelstan's 

 reign, which began in 824 {Mon., Chart, of Milton, 

 No. 3, vol. ii, 348). This is palpably a mistake, as 

 is also the date given in the foundation charter. 

 Birch, Cart. Sax., ii, 452-3. 



■ According to the account given in the above- 

 mentioned register ^thelstan, upon false suggestions 

 that Edwin was concerting a plot against him, caused 



testifying (without reference to the above inci- 

 dent) that for an endowment he had granted 

 for the good of his soul, and the souls of 

 his successors, the kings of England, to God, 

 St. Mary, St. Sampson, and St. Branwalader 

 the following lands : — 26 hides at Milborne, 5 

 at Woolland, 3 at Fromemouthe, viz. : 2 in 

 an island and one at Ore (Ower), 3 hides at 

 Clyffe with a meadow, 3^ at Lyscombe, i at 

 Burleston, i at Little Puddle, 5 at Cattistock, 

 6 at Compton Abbas, 2 at Whitcombe, 5 at 

 Osmington, 6 at Hoi worth — in all 67 hides; a 

 weir on the Avon at Twyneham (co. Hants), 

 all the water within the shore at Weymouth 

 and half the stream out to sea, 12 acres of land 

 for the support of the weir and the person in 

 charge of it, and 3 thaynes in Sussex and a 

 saltern by the weir, 30 hides of land at Sydling 

 for the maintenance of the monks, 2 at Chel- 

 mington, 6 at Hillfield, and 10 at Ercecombe 

 (Stockland).^ The king further bestowed rich 

 gifts on the abbey wherein he buried the body 

 of his mother, together with numerous relics 

 procured from Rome and Brittany, including the 

 arm and bones of St. Sampson, archbishop of 

 Dol, and the arm of St. Branwalader the 

 bishop.^ In the reform of monasticism under 

 Edgar and Dunstan the secular priests here were 

 replaced in 964 by monks under an abbot, 

 Cyneward.' 



At the time of the Domesday Survey besides 

 twelve acres of land in Hampshire, held of the 

 abbey by the sheriff Edward,^ the church of 

 Milton had manors or estates in the following 

 places : — Sydling, Milton, Compton Abbas, 

 Cattistock, Puddle, Clyffe, Osmington, Whit- 

 combe, Lyscombe, Woolland, Winterborne, 

 Hillfield — the rent of which was £2 and a 

 sextary of honey — ' Ora ' (Ower), Stockland — 



the prince to put out to sea in an open boat with a 

 single attendant. The prince in despair threw him- 

 self overboard and was drowned, his squire with great 

 difficulty managed to swim to shore at Whitsand with 

 his body. The king repenting of his deed is said to 

 have confined himself seven years at the monastery 

 of Landport (Somerset) as a penance, and to have 

 founded the two abbeys of Michelney and Milton. 

 Dugdale, Moti., Chart, of Milton, No. 2, ii, 34S ; 

 Will, of Malmes. Gesla Regum (Rolls Sen), i, 156 ; 

 Lel.md, Coll., ii, 252 ; iii, 71 ; Stowe MS., 104.6, 

 fol. 24. 



^ Birch, Cart. Sax., ii, 452-3. The version given 

 by Kemble {Coii. DipL, ii, 245) omits the grant of 

 the ' water at Weymouth,' but it is included in what 

 is called the Middle English version of the same 

 charter (v, 235), though left out in the confirma- 

 tion charter of Henry I. Dugdale, Mon., Chart, of 

 Milton, No. 7, ii, 350. 



■■ Ibid. Chart, of Milton, No. 5, ii, 349 ; Will, of 

 Malmes., Gesta Pontif. (Rolls Ser.), 186, 400-1 ; 

 Leland, Coll., iii, 71. 



' Ibid, ii, 186; iii, 72. Jngl.-Sax. Chron. (Rolls 

 Ser.), 94. 



'^ Dom. Bk. (Rec. Com.), i, 43^. 



58 



