RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



to Bishop Herbert Poor and the chapter of Salis- 

 bury their churches of Powerstock and Fleet,'''* 

 and by a mutual arrangement were allowed to 

 retain the church of Loders and chapel of 

 Bradpole as a prebend in Salisbury, thereby 

 entitling the foreign superior to a stall in the 

 cathedral choir and a voice in the chapter.'^ In 

 the Taxatio of 1 29 1 this prebend of Loders ' with 

 the chapel ' was assessed at ;^20, the vicarage at 

 £S->^' t^lic temporalities of the prior of Loders 

 within the parish were reckoned at £26.^^ A 

 commission was appointed on 18 October, 13 13, 

 to investigate a complaint of the prior that John, 

 rector of St. Mary's church in the neighbouring 

 town of Bridport, had carried away his goods at 

 Bradpole.** 



The external history of Loders as an alien 

 dependency follows very closely that of Frampton, 

 with which it is frequently coupled during the 

 period of the French wars. On its seizure by 

 John in 1 204, together with the property of other 

 Norman landowners in England, the land was re- 

 ported to be worth ^^33 unstocked, with the stock 

 £^0.^^ The sheriff the following year was 

 ordered to restore to Prior Baldwin full possession 

 of his property ' which he holds of the abbot 

 of Montebourg,' for which he had given two 

 palfreys to the king with a promise to pay what- 

 ever he had formerly paid to the abbot, and not 

 to transport any goods abroad without licence.*^ 



The prior received from Edward I in 1 294, 

 1295, and 1297 letters of protection with licence 

 to retain the custody of his goods on the same 

 terms and under the same circumstances as the 

 prior of Frampton.^' On the seizure of alien pro- 

 perty by Edward II in 1324 his goods within the 

 manor of Loders and Bothenhampton, taken into 

 custody from 8 October to 28 December, were 

 valued at ;^99 is. 3^.,*^ the extent of the yearly 

 value of his lands was returned at ;^54 8j. 5J^. ; 

 the church of Loders, which the monks held in 

 proprios usus, a prebend of Salisbury, was worth 

 £,2\; the advowson of the vicarage iooj.,and of 

 the vicarage of Bradpole ;^io.^' On the eve of 

 a threatened invasion of the French in the 

 autumn of 1326 the bishop advised the king that 

 in accordance with his mandate he had caused 

 Ralph Pothyn of Loders Priory, a foreigner, to he 

 transferred to the abbey of Sherborne as further 

 removed from the coast.™ 



The outbreak of war in 1337 resulted in the 

 priory being again taken into the hands of the 



^ Reg. St. Osmund. (Rolls Ser.), i, 225. " Ibid. 226. 

 ^' Pope Nich. Tax. (Rec. Com.), i8i/5. 

 '■^ Ibid. 1%-ib. '■* Pat, 7 Edw. II, pt. I, m. i\J. 

 '''' Rot. Norman. (Hardy), I 24. 

 ^ Rot. de Finibus 1 199-1 2 l 5 (Hardy), 313. 

 "' Pat. 22 Edw. I, m. 8 ; 24 Edw. I, m. 21 ; 25 

 Edw. I, m. 12 d. 



''Mins. Accts. bdle. 1 125, No. 7. 

 "" B.M. Add. MS. 6164, fol. 270. 

 '" Sarum Epis. Reg. Mortival, i, fol. 236. 



king, who restored it to the prior, 3 August, on 

 condition that he should pay 10 marks and a 

 yearly farm of £jo for the custody,'' the payment 

 of this amount superseding all other dues. The 

 possessions of the priory at Loders and Bothen- 

 hampton, with the custody of which the sheriff 

 had been charged, were valued at £s^ 2J. and 

 ;r34 175.'^ An interesting record under the 

 year 1339 states that the king wrote to the 

 bishop of Winchester cancelling his order for the 

 removal of the prior of Applcdurcombe in ths 

 Isle of Wight and two of his monks from their 

 priory near the sea coast to Hyde Abbey, owing 

 to the war with France, desiring that they should 

 be transferred instead to the house of the prior of 

 Loders within the cathedral close of Salisbury, 

 ' which is further still from the sea.''^ 



Events in 1343 throw some light on a com- 

 mon enough feature of most dependent cells : 

 the state of subjection in which the house was 

 kept by the foreign superior. The bishop, we 

 may note, beyond instituting the prior appoint- 

 ed by the abbot and convent of Montebourg 

 and receiving official notification of his with- 

 drawal, neither exercised nor attempted to exer- 

 cise any jurisdiction in the priory ; the check 

 placed that year on the arbitrary methods of the 

 abbot came from the king, who in February 

 wrote to the sheriff that whereas he had com- 

 mitted to brother Roger, prior of Loders, an alien, 

 the custody of his house for a certain farm, the 

 abbot, his superior, on the false suggestion of 

 the death of the prior had committed the man- 

 agement to another monk, and was endeavouring 

 forcibly to remove the former contrary to the 

 appointment made by the king, who forbade 

 any such substitution to be allowed.'* The fol- 

 lowing year Roger Hariel, prior of Loders, 

 obtained from the pope an indult that he should 

 not be removed from the priory without reason- 

 able cause," and as the next presentation does 

 not occur until 1 36 1 he seems to have made 



" Close, 1 1 Edw. Ill, pt. 2, m. 37. 



" Mins. Accts. bdle. I 125, No. 9. An inventory 

 of the household goods of the cell, including beds or 

 rather iino lecto xx', is informing as to the internal 

 equipment of a small religious house. Ibid. 



" Rot. Aleman. 13 Edw. Ill.m. G d. On the other 

 hand the prior of Loders and the heads of other alien 

 cells as well as of native houses were ordered in 1338 

 to repair to manors nearer the sea in order to defend 

 the coast from attack. Rymer, Foedera (Rec. Com.), 

 ii (2), 1062. 



" Close, 17 Edw. Ill, pt. I, m. zj d. This order 

 was addressed to the escheator in the Isle of Wight for 

 the benefit of Roger Hariel, prior of Applcdurcombe, 

 as well as to the sheriff of Somerset and Devon for 

 Roger, prior of Loders, who appear to be one and the 

 same person, as Roger Hariel was certainly appointed 

 to Loders in I 320 and occurs here in 1344 and later. 



" Cal. Pap. Letters, iii, 116. In February, 1346, 

 he received as prior of Loders another indult to choose 

 a confessor. Ibid, iii, 210. 



17 



