A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 



the building of their houses, the city again rose to its ancient dignity 

 and importance. 1 



It was fortunate that a prelate of the courage and resource of 

 Bishop Halton ruled the diocese at the close of the thirteenth century. 

 His election took place about the time of the calamity which laid the 

 cathedral in ashes. 2 Four years afterwards the war with Scotland broke 

 out with all its attendant miseries and disasters to the inhabitants of the 

 Border counties. For almost three centuries from this date the history 

 of the diocese, owing to Scottish invasions, is coloured by the troubles 

 and devastations arising from its geographical position. The bishops of 

 the period in question were sometimes military commanders, mostly 

 north-country born, often natives of the county, not unfrequently cadets 

 of great feudal families. Some of them, like Halton and Kirkby, con- 

 trolled the garrison of Carlisle Castle, and, not content with acting on 

 the defensive, went into Scotland more or less in a military capacity, at 

 one time as diplomatists to effect a peace, and at another to carry fire 

 and sword into the enemy's territory. Bishop Kirkby was held in 

 particular detestation (summo odio) by the Scots for commanding in person 

 on various expeditions in 1 337, and the enemy was not slow in retaliating 

 on the bishop and all his belongings. 3 A visit to the bishop was a 

 feature of almost every Scottish invasion. They sacked Rose Castle 

 again and again, killed his deer, and emptied his fishponds. 4 Nearly all 

 the bishops before the Reformation were employed in the adjustment of 

 diplomatic relations and the arrangement of truces between the two 

 kingdoms, and sometimes little thanks they got for their pains. After 

 nearly thirty years of conspicuous service to the State, Bishop Halton 

 on one occasion in 1321, after a period of unexampled suffering among 

 his tenants and dependants, petitioned the Crown for relief, and asked 

 that his expenses should be allowed for the nine weeks he spent at New- 

 castle-upon-Tyne with other magnates on an embassy to the Scots, but 

 it seemed to the King and the council that since the bishop went for 

 the good of the realm in general and his own diocese in particular, and 

 since his journey from Carlisle to Newcastle was not far, he must bear 

 his own expenses." 



1 On the petition of the citizens of Carlisle in 1304, the King granted leave to take stone without 

 hindrance in the forest of ' Inglewode ' for the building of their houses and the restoration of the same 

 vill after the late fire (Rot. Parl. [Rec. Com.], i. i66b ; Ryley, Placita Parliamentaria, p. 255). In their 

 petition for a new charter with all their former privileges, the citizens stated ' quod carte sue per quas 

 eandem villam tenuerunt combuste fuerunt ' (ibid. i. 166-7). A new charter was granted in 1293, 

 wherein it is testified that their late charters were burned by misadventure in a fire in the city of Carlisle 

 (Pat. 21 Edw. I. m. 8). This confirmatory charter has been printed (Royal Charters of Carlisle, ed. R. S. 

 Ferguson, pp. 10-11). 



3 Hemingburgh states that Bishop Ralf de Ireton died on the last day of February and the burning 

 of the cathedral took place on the feast of St. Dunstan the archbishop (May 19) 1292 (Chronicon, [Eng. 

 Hist. Soc.], ii. 40). Another account of the fire fixes the date on 30 May (Chron. de Lanercost [Maitland 

 Club], 144). As the election of John de ' Halghton,' canon of Carlisle, to the vacant see was made on 

 9 May, and the King's confirmation was given on 26 May (Nicolson and Burn, Hist, of Cumberland, ii. 262 ; 

 Pat. 20 Edw. I. m. 12), it may be taken that the calamity to the cathedral church had no influence on 

 the choice of the canons. 



3 Chron. de Lanercost, pp. 291-3. Close, 13 Edw. II. m. 19, m. 21. 



Ancient Petition, No. 5117. 



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