ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



cathedral, which like Gloucester was dedicated to the Holy Trinity, and 

 was served by a dean and six canons. The bishopric of Gloucester was 

 united to Worcester in 1552, when Bishop Hooper was transferred to 

 Worcester, 1 but after his deprivation in 1555 they were again separated. 



Having endowed two sees in the county with a scanty portion of 

 monastic lands, Henry VIII diminished the pension list by making choice 

 of the late religious in his appointments. John Wakeman, abbot of 

 Tewkesbury, became bishop of Gloucester ; William Jennings, prior of 

 St. Oswald's, Gloucester, was the first dean, and two or three of the monks 

 of St. Peter's became prebendaries.' Paul Bush, prior of Edington, became 

 bishop of Bristol ; the dean was William Snowe, prior of Bradenstock. 8 

 Neither Wakeman nor Bush exercised any strong influence on the progress 

 of the reformation in the county. 



Early in the fifteenth century the poverty of the parochial clergy was 

 recognized as a serious question, and at convocation in 14*39 ll was decided 

 that all vicarages should be augmented to ten marks.* There were at that 

 time sixty-two beneficed cures in Gloucestershire which did not exceed that 

 sum.' The Valor Ecc/esiasticus illustrates the small provision for the clergy 

 in a considerable number of parishes. In the deanery of Stowe out of thirty 

 livings ten were vicarages, in three other cases the rectories were appro- 

 priated to religious houses, and there was no separate endowment of a vicar- 

 age ; thirteen livings were of the value of >io a d under, three only 

 reached between 20 and 30.' Out of twenty-five livings in the deanery 

 of Winchcombe, nine were under >Tio, and four churches were served by 

 paid chaplains who usually received a stipend of 5 6s. 8</. 7 There were 

 a considerable number of chantries which had been founded in many 

 town and country parishes of the county from the thirteenth century on- 

 wards. 8 The chantry priests often helped the parish clergy, and sometimes 

 they acted as schoolmasters. The chantry of ' Our Ladie Service ' in 

 St. Nicholas, Bristol, was founded to maintain a priest ' to be at all divine 

 service and assistance to the curate and other in ministration of the sacra- 

 ments to the great multitude of people in the parish,' and in 1548 there 

 were 800 houseling people.' The chapel of the Assumption in the same 

 parish was endowed to find certain priests and clerks, who amongst other 

 duties distributed money to the poor and to prisoners. In seventeen 

 parishes in Bristol there were in all thirty chantries. At Henbury-in-the- 

 Salt-Marsh the parishioners had purchased lands and tenements for the main- 

 tenance of a priest to help the curate in a scattered parish with 600 house- 

 ling people. 10 At Tewkesbury the parishioners formerly maintained three 

 priests out of certain rents, making up the residue of their own devotion. 11 

 The priest of Grendor's chantry in the church of Newland was bound to 

 keep a grammar school ' half free,' charging scholars learning grammar 8</. 

 a quarter, and those learning to read only 4</. 1J At Campden the priest 



1 Cal. ofS.P. Dom. 1547-80, p. 39. ' Fosbrooke, Hist. of Glouc. (ed. 1819), 219-28. 



1 Nicholls and Taylor, Bristol, Past and Present, 67-68. ' Wore. Epis. Reg. Bourchier, fol. 63. 



1 Ibid. fol. 87 ; Hercf. Epis. Reg. Spoffbrd, i, fol. 197 d. 



* Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.), ii, 436-40. ' Ibid. 440-4. 



* Wore. Epis. Reg. passim; Glouc. Chant. Cert. Nos. 21 and 22, P. R. O. ; 22 has been printed in 

 Bnst. and Glouc. Arch. Sof. Trans, viii, 232-308. 



* Bnst. and Clone. Arch. Soc. Trans, viii, 237-9: " Ibid. 252. " Ibid. " Ibid. 292. 



2? 



