A HISTORY OF GLOUCESTERSHIRE 



The next instrument was a licence in mortmain of 12 March, 1290-1 l 

 to Giffard to grant 4 messuages and a toft to the prior and convent of the 

 order of St. Benedict of Oxford, as if it was already established. 



The third was a conveyance by which John Giffard, for the health of 

 his soul and that of Matilda Longespee formerly his wife (she was widow 

 of the earl of Salisbury's son when he had, it was alleged, raped her some 

 thirty years before, and paid a fine to the king of 300 marks for doing so), 

 granted to the prior and convent of St. Benedict of Oxford and the com- 

 munity of monks of the province of Canterbury sent there to study (causa 

 studii), as governed by statutes of the order, the lands and tenements he had 

 bought of John Hanvill, the prior of St. John of Jerusalem, of John of 

 Hangenport, burgess of Oxford, of his washerwoman, 8 of John Watson and 

 his wife Jdonea, and of Stephen Cove and Alice his wife, for the foundation, 

 constitution, and perpetual maintenance s of the priory aforesaid, to receive all 

 monks from the monasteries of the province of Canterbury there sent or to 

 be sent to study, in pure and perpetual alms. Warranty of title was given on 

 condition that (ita quod) the prior elected by the convent should be presented 

 to Giffard and his heirs as patrons of the same, and the sub-prior and con- 

 vent were to be permitted to take all rents and profits during the vacancy of 

 the priory. 



Next came another deed of Gloucester Abbey, repelling the false accusa- 

 tion brought by rivals that they claimed any special right in the property 

 conveyed, and declaring that if any sufficient letter or charter of Abbot 

 Reginald should be found differing from the grant to the community of the 

 order, it was void and of no effect. Lastly, by a fifth instrument Henry 

 Helm, prior of the house of St. Benedict in the suburb of Oxford and the 

 convent of the same, declared that the priory was subject immediately to the 

 presidents of the general chapter of Benedictines in the province of Canter- 

 bury, and that the student monks there should have the sole election of the 

 prior, though bound to present him to the presidents or their representatives 

 for approval. 



It is a curious testimony to the permanence of a name once acquired, 

 that in spite of these elaborate renunciations of the Gloucester rights, instead 

 of the house being called St. Benedict's Priory, as it was evidently intended 

 to be, it continued to be called Gloucester College till the dissolution of 

 monasteries ; and afterwards when it belonged to St. John's College, who 

 tried to call it St. John the Baptist's Hall, was called Gloucester Hall till 

 1715, when it was refounded as Worcester College. 



In 1298,* on the morrow of St. Barnabas (i.e. 12 June), 



brother William of Brok incepted in theology (i.e. took his D.D. degree) under 8 Mr. Richard 

 of Clyve, chancellor of the university, and was the first of the Black Monks in England who 

 arose in that science ; 



1 Reiner, op. cit. 55, printed in Dugdale, Moil, iv, 407 ; Pat. 19 Edw. I. 



' Wore. Epis. Reg. Giffard, 429. This appears in Reiner, and thence in Dugdale and Worcester Coll. as 

 Eve Lotteris. The words in the Wore. Reg. are sue lotricis, i.e. the washerwoman or laundress of John 

 of Hangenport, who presumably had a small piece of ground on which to hang out her washing. 



3 Misprinted Intentlonem in Reiner. 



4 Hist. Man. Glouc. i, 34. 



* This can hardly mean, as interpreted in Worcester College, that Clyve was the doctor lent by the univer- 

 sity. For Richard of Clyve was much too big a person for that purpose, being Warden of Merton. ' Under' 

 means under him as chancellor, not as teacher. 



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