RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



FRIARIES 



20. THE BLACK FRIARS, 

 BRISTOL 



The house of the Black Friars of Bristol was 

 founded in the parish of the priory of St. James 

 in 1227 or 1228, by Maurice de Gaunt, great- 

 grandson of Robert Fitzharding, and Matthew de 

 Gurnay. 1 In 1 230, at the request of the friars, 

 William of Blois, bishop of Worcester, came to 

 dedicate their altar and burial-ground. 1 In 1232 

 Henry III granted a licence to the friars to 

 enlarge their burial-ground,* and many of the 

 Bristol citizens in the thirteenth, fourteenth, and 

 fifteenth centuries willed their bodies to be buried 

 in the cemetery of the Black Friars. 4 Henry III 

 was a most generous benefactor of the friars. The 

 church and priory were over forty years in build- 

 ing, and the timber came from the Forest of 

 Dean, as the gift of the king,* and John de Ples- 

 setis earl of Warwick.* In 1232 Henry III 

 allowed the friars to make a conduit to their 

 house. 7 On several occasions he granted oaks 

 for fuel.* In 1251, to enable them to pay their 

 debts, he granted them 2 1 marks out of the ex- 

 chequer.* He also granted them in perpetuity a 

 moiety of the prisage of fresh fish which came 

 into the port of Bristol. Gifts to friars are a 

 regular feature of the bounty of later kings ; in 

 1293 Edward I gave six oaks for fuel, 10 and when 

 the provincial chapter met at Bristol on the 

 Feast of the Assumption in 1302 he gave ten 

 oaks for fuel. 11 On the next occasion, in 1323, 

 Edward II gave 15 for the food of the fathers," 

 and in 1343 Edward III also gave 15 for the 

 same object. 1 * The evidence of the wills which 

 are now extant shows that it was usual to re- 



1 RfKfuarj, 1888, p. 71 (Palmer, The Black friars 

 ef Bristol), from which most of the references are 

 taken. 



' Ann. Mon. (Rolls Scr.), i. 78 ; cf. St. James'i 

 Priory, Bristol, p. 74. 



Pat. 17 Hen. Ill, m. 8. 



'Bickley, Cal. of Bristol DeeJi, No. 114, &c. ; 

 Rehquarj, 77. 



* Reliquary, 72-73: Four oaks for shingles, 1233 ; 

 ten oaks out of Furchcs wood, 1240; ten oaks for tim- 

 ber, 1241; ten oaks, 1242; seven oaks, 1242; six oaks 

 for the fabric of the church, 1 245 ; six oaks for the 

 work of the church, 1 249 ; four oaks for timber, 1 2 50; 

 thirty oaks for timber, 1252 ; six oaks for timber, 

 1255; five oaks for timber, 1 2 $6; four oaks for 

 timber, 1259 ; four oaks for timber, 1269 ; six oaks 

 for timber, 1263. These were fi-lled and delivered 

 at the king's expense. 



* Ibid. 72, 73. ' Ibid. 74. 



Ibid. 75. 

 " Ibid. 

 " Ibid. 76. 



Ibid. 75. 

 11 Ibid. 

 u Ibid. 



member the friars. 14 As late as 1532 Thomas V 

 of Berkeley left jio towards repairing the cloister 

 of the Black Friars in Bristol. 1 ' 



In 1532 or 1533 Hugh Latimer preached 

 against purgatory and other hitherto accepted 

 doctrines in the church of the Black Friars, 1 * and 

 the prior, John Hilsey, preached in reply. In 

 1534 Hilsey became provincial of the order in 

 England, and was appointed by Henry VIII to- 

 gether with George Brown, prior of a house of 

 Augustinians, to visit the houses of the orders of 

 friars throughout England. 17 The object was to 

 force the acceptance of the royal supremacy upon 

 them, and to compel them to preach it to the 

 people. On 9 June Hilsey secured the sub- 

 mission of the Black Friars at Bristol. 18 The 

 greater part of them abandoned the convent and 

 fled from England, leaving only the prior, William 

 Oliver, and four brethren. 1 * William Oliver's 

 preaching got him into trouble in 1537," and 

 though he escaped condemnation he lost his office 

 and probably fled J1 to the continent. 



The houses of the friars were not included 

 under the Act of 1536 for the suppression of 

 the lesser monasteries. However, in 1537 the 

 dissolution of the friaries was clearly contem- 

 plated. 1 * On 9 December Richard Ingworth, 

 formerly prior of the Dominican house of King's 

 Langley, was consecrated suffragan bishop of 

 Dover, and soon afterwards he received two com- 

 missions to visit the friars. 83 He was ordered to 

 depose or suspend heads of houses against whom 

 any charge was brought and to appoint others, 

 and also to visit the convents, take possession of 

 the keys, sequestrate goods, and make indentures 

 and inventories. The friars were very largely 

 dependent on private charity, which diminished 

 as the result of the suppression of the lesser mon- 

 asteries.* 4 Accordingly they were reduced to 

 great poverty which forced them to surrender 

 their houses.** On 28 August, 1538, Richard 

 Ingworth wrote to Cromwell that the Black 

 Friars of Bristol were ready to give up their 



14 Notes on Bristol Wills (1382-1595); ReRquarj, 



75- 



" Smyth, Lives of the Berkelejs (ed. Maclean), ii, 669. 

 ' Reliquary, 79. 

 " Gasquet, Hen. Fill and the Engl. Mon. (ed. 1899), 



5'. 5*- 



" Refijuarj, 1888, p. 79. 



" Ibid. 



10 L. and P. Hen. fill, xii, pt. i, Nos. 508, 1 147. 

 " Rtflftiary, 1888, p. 79. 

 " Gasquet, op. cit. 3 1 3. 

 " Ibid. ; WUkins, ConciRa, iii, 829, 835. 

 N Gasquet, op. cit. 3 1 7. 

 " Wright, Stiff, tf the Mon. (Camd. Soc.), 196 ; 

 L. and P. Hen. fill, xiii, pt. i, No. 1456. 



109 



