A HISTORY OF NORFOLK 



According to confessions made by one John 

 Tumour of Old Buckenham on 2+ May, 1537, 

 before Richard Southwell and others, a week 

 before the previous Palm Sunday, lie had been 

 told by John Lok that Hugh Wilkinson had 

 offered him an angel noble to kill the king's visitors 

 in their beds that night at Buckenham Abbey. 

 Other confessions made at the same time seem 

 to show that there was no plot of the kind, but 

 merely some vague talk reflecting a certain 

 amount of popular indignation at the suppression.' 



Immediately on its suppression. Sir Edmund 

 Knevett, of Buckenham Castle, obtained a lease 

 of the priory site and demesne lands.^ 



Priors of Old Buckenham 



William,' occurs 12 16 



Walter,^ elected 1 22 I 



Hugh,' elected 1269 



Richard de Otteley,* elected 1286 



John de Multon,' elected 1307 



Nicholas de Cotton,' elected 1327 



Hugh de Brom,' elected 1329 



William de Spykeworth,'" elected 1354 



William de Bonham," elected 13S1 



Roger Carleton,'- elected 1402 



John Norwich,'' elected 1437 



"Bartholomew Melles," elected 145 I 



John Whalley," elected 1458 



John Bukenham,^^ 1480 



John Plattynge,*' elected 1493 



John Millgate,'* occurs 1514, last prior 



25. THE PRIORY OF COXFORD 



William Cheney founded a priory of Austin 

 Canons, temp. Stephen, in the church of St. Mary, 

 East Rudham. About the beginning of the reign 

 of Henry III the priory was removed to the 

 eastern boundary of the parish at a place called 

 Cotesford or Coxford. John Cheney, the nephew 

 of the original founder, granted to the canons the 

 churches of East and West Rudham, together 

 with land, mills, fishponds, &c., in those parishes. 

 This charter is undated ; but the witnesses prove 

 that it was between 1 1 46 and 1 149." 



Hervey Beleth, lord of East Rudham, whose 

 mother was the daughter of John Cheney, gave 

 the manor of East Rudham and lands in several 



other townships, about 1215, to these canons, 

 and placed the maintenance of the hospital for 

 poor folk of his founding at Boycodeswade in 

 their hands.^ 



In 1227 Henry III granted the prior a fair on 

 the feast of the Translation of St. Thomas of 

 Canterbury and the two following days.-' A 

 yearly fair was also granted to the priory in 1 25 I 

 on their manor at Rudham, on the vigil, morrow 

 and feast of St. Barnabas."^ 



The hundred rolls of 1273-4 show that the 

 prior of Coxford claimed a lete in Rudham, and 

 held certain tenements in both East and West 

 Rudham, together with the churches and the 

 church of Houghton in free alms, as the gift of 

 Hervey Beleth. He also held thirty acres of land, 

 the gift of Nicholas de Beriner, which had been 

 alienated to him in the time of Henry III." 



The taxation of 1291 showed that this priory 

 had rents, &c., in forty-two Norfolk parishes, 

 which were reckoned at the annual value of 

 j^i44 1 9 J. i,\d. 



In 1293 William de Say, son and heir of 

 Geoffrey Lord Say and Alice his wife (who was 

 one of the daughters and co-heirs of Sir John 

 Cheney), died seised of the patronage of the 

 priory. Geoffrey Lord Say had confirmed to the 

 canons all the gifts of William and John Cheney, 

 and William de Say added to them the church of 

 St. Margaret at Thorpe Market." 



Licence was granted in 1326 for the aliena- 

 tion by Maud de Tony to Coxford Priory of 

 3 messuages, 100 acres of land, 100 acres of 

 pasture, and ioj. rent in Grimston, Congham, 

 Roydon, Weavling, and Appleton, to find a 

 chaplain to celebrate daily in the chapel of 

 St. Katherine, lately built by her in the church- 

 yard of Appleton for the souls of Maud, Robert 

 her husband, and all the faithful ; in lieu of a 

 licence granted her in 1320 to assign the same 

 to West Acre priory.-' 



The Valor of 1535 gives the gross anniail 

 value of the priory as ;^I53 "Js. iti., and the 

 clear annual value ;^I2I i8j. io|^i^. 



Archbishop Peckham visited the priory in 

 January, 1 28 1, and found so lax a state of dis- 

 cipline that he subsequently sent the prior a long 

 letter,-^ in which he says that he had found him 

 lacking in religious zeal, not attending divine 

 service regularly, and failing to control his sub- 

 ordinates, so that by his negligence the canons go 

 out coursing with hounds, attend banquets, chat 

 with girls, and bring the house into contempt, 

 causing it to be a scandal and a jest to the neigh- 

 bourhood. Nor did he show care or diligence 



" Blomefield, Hiit. o/Norf. vii, 153. 



" Chart. R. 1 1 Hen. Ill, pt. i, m. 7. 



" Ibid. 35 Hen. Ill, m. 10. 



" Hund. R. (Rec. Com.), i, 452-3, 535. 



" Dugdale, Baronage, i, 5 1 1 . 



" Pat. 19 Edw. II, pt. ii, m. 22. 



'* Reg. Efts. Peckham (Rolls Scr.), i, 162-5. 



378 



