RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



the hermit of Seaford obtained royal protection for five years, 8 and not long 

 afterwards his cell was the scene of a tragedy, for in 1287 one William Potel 

 hanged himself ' in the hermitage of Seford.' 9 Certain caves at Buxted are 

 traditionally ascribed to hermits, and there was certainly a hermitage near 

 Winchelsea, for in December, 1536, 'the men of the admiral of Sluys burnt 

 the hermitage of the Camber in despite and hewed an image of St. Anthony 

 with their swords, bidding it call upon St. George for help.' 10 



Of the stricter order of anchorites or recluses a good many examples 

 are found in Sussex. An inscription built into the wall of St. John's- sub- 

 Castro in Lewes commemorates an early anchorite, Magnus by name, of 

 noble Danish birth, 11 and there are considerable remains of an ' anker-hold ' or 

 recluse's cell in the south wall of Hardham church. 12 The Pipe Roll of 

 I Richard I mentions the recluse of Stedham, and St. Richard in his will 

 bequeathed money to the anchorites of Paghani and Hardham, and the 

 female recluses of Houghton, Stopham and Westout. 13 About 1402 one of 

 the Dominican friars of Arundel had himself walled up as an anchorite in a 

 cell of his priory, 14 and in the same year Dom. William Bolle, rector of 

 Aldrington, was allowed to retire from the world into a cell on the north side 

 of the Lady Chapel of Chichester Cathedral ; 15 he was probably the ' Dom. 

 William the recluse of Chichester ' to whom William Neel left half a mark 



in 1414 



16 



THE CATHEDRAL OF CHICHESTER 17 



The history of the South Saxon cathedral 

 establishment during the time that the bishop's 

 seat was at Selsey is virtually a blank. A num- 

 ber of charters 18 of doubtful authenticity record 

 the gifts by Saxon nobles during the seventh, 

 eighth, and ninth centuries, by which the bishop 

 and canons came to hold those possessions which 

 are found in their hands at the time of the 

 Domesday Survey. 19 From these charters, more- 

 over, we may gather that the Selsey foundation 

 was originally one of monks following the Bene- 

 dictine rule, under an abbot who was also bishop, 

 but that subsequently the regulars were replaced 

 by secular canons. As a result of the recom- 

 mendations of the council of 1075, the South 



'Suss. Arch. Coll. xvii, 144. 

 ' Assize R. 924, m. 52 d. 



10 L. and P. Hen. nil, xii (l), 718 (4). A seal 

 of a preceptor/ of St. Anthony was discovered in 

 Winchelsea, and may possibly have been connected 

 with this chapel ; Cooper's Hist, of Winchelsea. 



11 Suss. Arch. Coll. xii, 133. 



"Ibid. xliv,78. "Ibid, i, 167. 



14 Cal. Papal Let. iv, 352. 



" Chich. Epis. Reg. Reade, fol. 105. 



" Cant. Archiepisc. Reg. Chicheley, pt. i, fol. 3 1 6. 



17 Dugdale, Man. viii, 1159-71; Stephens, Mem. of 

 the See of Chichester ; Swainson, Hist, and Constitution of 

 a Cath. of the Old Foundation; Mackenzie Walcott, ' Sta- 

 tutes of Chich. Cath.' (in Archaeologia,^, 143-235). 



18 Man. Angl. viii, 1163-70. 

 " See V.C.H. Suss. i. 389-91. 



Saxon cathedral was removed from the insignifi- 

 cant village of Selsey to the important town of 

 Chichester, where the nuns of St. Peter's Church 

 were displaced to accommodate the canons, 20 the 

 memory of the old church being perpetuated by 

 the circumstance that the nave of the cathedral 

 church of Holy Trinity was considered to be the 

 parochial church of St. Peter the Great. 



The church begun by Bishop Stigand was 

 either remodelled or entirely rebuilt by Ralph 

 LurFa, who was consecrated in 1091 ; but 

 hardly was the new building complete before it 

 was seriously injured by a great fire in 1114. 

 Bishop Ralph, however, with the king's assist- 

 ance, at once restored the cathedral, as did Bishop 

 Seffrid II when a similar disaster befell it in 1187. 

 Nor did Ralph confine his attention to the fabric 

 of his cathedral, for he is said to have established 

 the offices of dean, precentor, chancellor, and 

 treasurer. These officials, however, do not seem 

 to have possessed any definite endowments, or 

 but slight ones, until the time of Hilary, nearly 

 half a century later, for Pope Eugenius III, when 

 he took the church of Chichester and its posses- 

 sions under the papal protection, about 115? 

 confirmed Hilary's ' foundation ' of a treasurer, 21 

 and Alexander III, in 1163, similarly confirmed 

 the chancellorship, here said to have been founded 

 by the same bishop. 23 Besides these four digrti- 



10 Will, of Malmesbury, Gfsfa Pontif. (Rolls Ser.),2O5- 

 " Swainson, No. 6. " Ibid. No. 8. 



47 



