A HISTORY OF GLOUCESTERSHIRE 



to the school but to the corporation, was the only one of the ' divers good 

 causes and considerations' which moved them to take this extraordinary 

 departure from the agreement of 1558. 



It was a fatal transaction, for Thome immediately proceeded to sell the 

 greater part of the property. Thus a farm and 82 acres of land at Wickwar 

 were sold by him in 1563 for 48, reserving the ancient and accustomed rent 

 of 4, which is all that is now received by the school for this valuable 

 property. Several farms and 153 acres of land in Stapleton and Horfield, 

 both now parts of the city, Kingswood and Almondsbury were sold by him 

 and his daughter and heiress for 138 6s. 8^., the ancient and accustomed 

 rent of 3 6s. %d. only being reserved. This property alone would in the 

 present day produce an income which would be riches even to Eton or 

 Winchester. Twenty acres in Clifton, now valued by the foot and worth 

 2,000 an acre, were sold by Alice Pykes, Thome's daughter, for 320 and 

 the school only gets from it a rent of 4 a year. 



The immediate result of the transaction was that we find for the first 

 time a payment from the corporation to the school. In the Mayor's Audit 

 Book for 1562-3 appears ' Mr. Dyconson, scolemaister for the free scole, j.' 

 This was a quarterly payment, making 28 in the whole. The accounts 

 for 1565-6 show that of this 28, 18 3^. 4^. was paid to the master 

 and () 6s. 8</. to the usher. From 1566-7 to 1601-2, however, the 

 whole rent of 30 a year was paid, 20 to the head master and 10 to 

 the usher. 



In 1569-70 we have evidence that at Bristol as elsewhere the school 

 supplied the public entertainments formerly found by the Corpus Christi and 

 other gilds. The Audit Book of 1569-70 records the payment of 2 to the 

 schoolmaster ' towards the painting of his pageant and charges for his plays 

 at Christmas,' while TOJ. lod. was paid 'for drawing the town arms 

 in a table set in the Grammar School, wherein be written on parchment 

 the Orders of the school, wherein be drawn the pictures of Mr. Robert 

 Thorne and Mr. Nicholas Thorne the founders of the said school.' So 

 careless has been the management of the school, that these Orders which 

 would have revealed the internal economy and curriculum of the school 

 have wholly disappeared. In 1576-7 other charges for ' playes ' in the 

 school appear. From 1581 to 1591 Nicholas Thorne was himself chamber- 

 lain ; and it is significant that though he had undertaken to keep the 

 school in repair, in 1590 repairs are entered as done by 'the Chamber/ 

 i.e. the corporation. 



In 1591 he died, leaving three daughters Alice, Katharine, and Mirabel, 

 co-heiresses. On 13 October, 1597, these three and the husbands of the two 

 elder ones, John Pykes or Picks and Samuel Neale of Berkeley, made a 

 partition of his estates, under which the Bartholomew lands were assigned as 

 Alice Pykes's portion, she granting annuities of 5 and 6 out of them for 

 equality of value to her sisters. 



It is remarkable that the earliest Council Minute Book now extant 

 begins in 1593, the year after Nicholas Thome's death. The explanation 

 appears to be that given by a later inquisition of charitable uses, that Thorne 

 had got the earlier documents into his hands as concerning his title to the 

 Bartholomew lands. They have never been recovered. 



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