ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



Gloucester agreed with Nicholas FitzRobert that he and his successors might 

 have a resident chaplain to serve the chapel of Nympsfield, provided that he 

 paid i a year to the rector of Frocester, to whom the right of nominating 

 a clerk as perpetual vicar of Nympsfield was reserved. 1 The vicar had the 

 right of baptizing the children of his parish, and of burying persons who held 

 less than half a virgate of land ; but if through the inclemency of the 

 weather it was not possible for the funeral of richer persons to take place at 

 Frocester, the offerings were reserved to the mother-church. Architectural 

 evidence shows that many of the Cotswold churches were built within a 

 hundred years of the Norman Conquest. 2 



Advowsons of churches, as in France, 8 were lavishly granted to religious 

 houses, with the laudable intention of putting patronage into the possession of 

 those who might use it better than laymen. The churches of Dymock and 

 Beckford were given to Newent ; * the parish church of Brimpsfield to the 

 monastery of St. Wandrille ; * Thornbury, Old Sodbury, St. Peter at Bristol, 

 Stanway, and others to Tewkesbury.' However, with the consent of the 

 bishops, the new patrons charged the churches with the payment of a pension, 

 or secured the greater part of the revenues by appropriating them to their 

 own use. In iioo Samson, bishop of Worcester, granted to the abbot and 

 convent of Gloucester pensions of 2 marks each from Quenington and Nymps- 

 field, i from St. John's, Gloucester, and i os. each from Matson and Eycote. 7 

 Bishop Roger (i 164-79) confirmed a pension of 5 marks from St. Mary de 

 Lode, besides the tithes paid to the dependent churches of Maisemore, Barn- 

 wood, and Upton St. Leonard, which they might convert to their own use. 8 

 About 1 1 94 Henry de Soilli, bishop of Worcester, allowed the abbot and 

 convent of Winchcombe to draw a pension of 5 marks from Sherborne for the 

 building and maintenance of the monastic church.* As early as iioo the 

 churches of Northleach, Standish, Hartpury, Brookthorpe, Churcham and 

 Taynton, with dependent chapels, were appropriated by the bishops of Wor- 

 cester and Hereford to the needs of the abbot and convent of Gloucester. 10 

 In 1184 Driffield and Preston were appropriated to the sacristy of Ciren- 

 cester. 11 



The use by monasteries of the revenues of parish churches was not 

 perhaps at that time the greatest evil of the system. The spiritual needs of 

 the parishioners were neglected. The churches were served either by monks 

 who from their training and life could have but little sympathy with the 

 parishioners, or by a poorly paid chaplain who was removable at the will of 

 the patrons. At the synod of Westminster in 1102 it was decreed that 

 monks should not possess themselves of parish churches without the leave of 

 the bishop, nor take so much of the profits as to impoverish the priests who 

 served them. 19 It was, however, not until towards the end of the century 

 that a decree of the Lateran Council of 1 179 empowered the bishops to 



1 Hist, tt Cart. Mm. Glouc. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 42-43. 



' Taylor, Domesday Survey of Gloucestershire, 105. 



1 Cutts, op. cit. 95-96. ' V. C. H. Glouc. ReRg. Houses, Newent, 105. 



* Ibid. BrimpsfielJ, 102. * Journ. Arch. Asm. 1875, p. 289. 

 ' Hiit. et Carl. Glouc. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 41. 



* Ibid, i, 328. The church of St. Mary and its dependencies were assigned to the office of the 'sacrist 

 by Abbot Gilbert Foliot ' (i 1 39-48), cf. Reg. Frocester B. fol. 28 </., MSS. of Dean and Chapter of Gloucester. 



Royce, op. cit. ii, 275. " Hist, tt Cart. Glouc. (Rolls Ser.), i, 251 ; ii, 40. 



" Fuller, Cirencester Parish Church, 72. " Wilkins, Concilia, i, 383, cap. xxii. 



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