A HISTORY OF CUMBERLAND 



spoliation was not complete when that monarch died. 1 The new Act 

 (i Edw. VI. cap. 14) annexed their lands, goods and chattels to the 

 Crown on a pretext of the ' superstition and errors in the Christian re- 

 ligion, brought into the minds of men by devising and phan- 

 tasying vain opinions of purgatory and masses satisfactory to be 

 done for them which be departed, the which doctrine and vain 

 opinion by nothing more is maintained and upholden than by abuse 

 of trentals, chantries and other provisions made for the continuance of 

 the said blindness and ignorance.' In order to allay public apprehension, 

 there was a sort of promise held out that the money should be used for 

 founding grammar schools, helping the Universities and making pro- 

 vision for the poor ; but these pious intentions were never wholly 

 fulfilled. 2 



As the Act was passed on 4 November 1547, and the commission 

 to survey the spoils was issued on 14 February 15478, it cannot be 

 said that much time was lost in putting the new law in force. The 

 commissioners for Cumberland were authorized to survey and examine 

 all colleges, chantries, free chapels, fraternities, guilds, stipendiary 

 curacies, and other spiritual promotions within the county, the revenues 

 of which had been given and ought to come to the King. In a certi- 

 ficate 3 delivered into court on 6 December 1 548 by the hand of Allan 

 Bellingham, the surveyor, the commissioners reported on the religious 

 institutions of sixteen different places in Cumberland. Kirkoswald, a 



1 The commission for this survey, dated 14 February, 1546, consisted of Robert, bishop of Carlisle, 

 Thomas lord Wharton, Sir John Lowther, knight, and Edward Edgore, esquire. The survey for the 

 two counties was returned on six membranes written (save the last) on both sides, giving in detail the 

 possessions of each chantry with the names of tenants and annual rent. The first three membranes 

 comprise the chantries in the ' Countie of Cumbrelonde,' and the remaining three comprise those in 

 ' Westmerlonde.' The list for Cumberland begins with the ' Rood Chantry ' in the cathedral church 

 of Carlisle. It had a total yearly rent of 4 I$s. $d. from tenements, a sum which agrees exactly with 

 the subsequent survey of Edward VI. The ' goodes and cattalles belonginge to the same,' valued at 

 3 5/. zd. in the Edwardian survey, are here set forth in detail thus : ' Furst, one messe booke, 3*. \d. ; 

 foure aulter clothes, I2d. ; thre vestementes, 3^. q.d. ; two aubbes, izd. ; two candelstykes of brasse, zd. ; 

 and challes of silver (55*.) parcell gylte weynge 15 ounces at y. 8d. the ounce ; a corporal with case, 

 4<i. ; an olde chyste, lod, ; z crewettes, zd. (Total) 65 s. zd.' This survey, which is of considerable 

 local interest, will be found at the Public Record Office under the official description of ' Rentals and 

 Surveys, No. 846,' but formerly known as ' Exch. Q. R. Ancient Miscellanea, bundle - 7 / 1 -' In many parishes 

 there were various small endowments for the perpetuation of obits, lights before the sacrament and 

 other minor parochial institutions, which were plundered at this period. Among the ancient rentals of 

 the see of Carlisle there is a survey of the ' Terre luminarium beate Marie ' in the parish of Dalston, of 

 the time of Henry VII., which betokens an adequate provision for that purpose. The endowment con- 

 sisted of no fewer than seventeen separate parcels, each parcel varying in value from l%d. to "js. a year, 

 such as a messuage, a toft, a rood of meadow, an acre of land, a tenement, a cottage, and so forth, up and 

 down the parish. The total rental amounted to Z<)s. $d. It is evident that these small parcels were be- 

 queathed by the poorer tenants of the parish. 



2 Strype has given a list of free grammar schools founded by Edward VI. (Memorials, edition 1721, 

 ii. 535-7), but if this list be carefully scrutinized, it will be found that very few of them had their origin 

 in the reign of that monarch. The statement of J. R. Green that ' one noble measure, indeed, the foun- 

 dation of eighteen grammar schools, was destined to throw a lustre over the name of Edward ' (Short 

 History of the English People, edition 1891, p. 360), has been disputed by Mr. A. F. Leach in an article 

 on ' Edward VI. : Spoiler of Schools ' in the Contemporary Review, September, 1892. The preface to 

 the Yorkshire Chantry Surveys (Surtees Society) by Mr. Wm. Page should also be consulted. 



' This certificate, containing the survey of all the chantries in the county, is preserved in the Aug- 

 mentation Office, Chantry Certificates, No. 1 1, Cumberland. 



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