ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



the parish church of Cirencester. Maurice of Arundel, archdeacon of Glou- 

 cester, complained to Gregory IX that the churches of Cheltenham and 

 Cirencester had been appropriated to his damage and without his consent. 1 

 The papal delegates heard the cause at Hereford in 1230, and decided against 

 the archdeacon. The case of the chapel of Wigwold, which was dependent 

 on Cirencester, shows a scandalous disregard of the spiritual needs of the 

 parishioners.* In 1236 the abbot and convent of Cirencester persuaded John 

 Bisset, then lord of Wigwold, to release them from the duty of serving the 

 chapel on condition that when he resided at Wigwold he could provide a 

 priest at his own cost to perform the services, and that all fees should be paid 

 over to the abbey. Bisset agreed to share expenses if the men of Wigwold 

 indicted the abbot, and the chapel of the hamlet was thus converted into a 

 private oratory. Bishop William of Blois prevented the abbot and convent 

 of Tewkesbury from appropriating Fairford in virtue of a privilege granted 

 by Honorius III in 1221.* On the death of the rector ten years afterwards 

 several of the monks went to Fairford and occupied the church, but with the 

 bishop's full knowledge they were expelled and so maltreated that they 

 scarcely escaped alive, and the whole convent was excommunicated.* Bishop 

 Cantilupe foiled a similar attempt at Thornbury. 1 



The endowment of the vicarages varied very much. Five marks was 

 fixed as a minimum at the synod of Oxford in 1222," the sum which had 

 been assigned to the vicar of Coin St. Aldwyn in 1217,* all burdens being 

 charged on the abbot and convent of Gloucester. In 1 247 Peter Aquablanca, 

 bishop of Hereford, ordered the abbot and convent of Cormeilles to find 

 fourteen marks for the vicar of Dymock, 8 but in 1291 his portion was not 

 worth six marks, while the rectorial dues amounted to thirty-nine.' William 

 of Blois assigned two-thirds of the whole tithe of Sherborne to the abbot and 

 convent of Winchcombe, and the remainder to the vicar, 10 and he seems to 

 have made the same arrangement for the parish church of Winchcombe. 11 In 

 both parishes there were serious quarrels between the collectors, which were 

 probably reported to Bishop Giffard by the archdeacon of Gloucester, for in 

 1276 he charged his archdeacons to inquire whether the portions of the 

 vicars were sufficient. 12 In 1298 he assigned the great tithes of Winchcombe 

 to the abbot and convent, the small tithes, the tithe of wool, and all oblations 

 and obventions to the vicar, but should his portion fall below 10 the 

 convent was bound to pay him the difference." In 1271 he gave the whole 

 tithe of Sherborne to the convent, reserving for the vicar the offerings at the 

 altar, his arable land, the right to put six beasts on the abbot's pasture, and the 

 moiety of the tithe of hay of the parishioners ; all sources of his revenue being 

 valued at fifteen marks. 1 * The vicar of Churcham had a bare maintenance : 

 he and the deacon who helped him, for there were dependent chapels at 

 Bulley and Highnam, lived at the expense of the abbot and convent of 

 Gloucester on their manor of Churcham, and his horse was stabled and fed." 



1 Fuller, Cirenteiter Parish Church, 75. ' Ibid. 74, 



1 Cal. Papal L. i, 8 1. ' Am. Mm. (Rolls Scr.), i, 82. Ibid, i, 97. 



* Wilkins, Concifia, i, 587, cap. xvi. ' Hist, tt Cart. Gltuc. (Rolls Scr.), i, 231. 



1 MS. Add. 18461, fol. 14. * Popt Nich. Tax. (Rec. Com.), 161. 



" Royce, op. cit. ii, 276. " Ibid, i, 269. 



u Wore. Epii. Reg. Giffard (Wore. Hist. Soc.), 90. " Royce, op. cit. i, 270, 271. 



14 Ibid, ii, 277, 278. " Hist, tt Cart. Clout. (Rolls Ser.), i, 267. 



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