116 CKOXDEN ABBEY. 



with many books, and "purchased our house at London 

 for 20 off Fulco de Saint Edmund." In this year he died, 

 and was buried in the cloister of the monks, without the 

 church door, near the scamnum or exchange, the place 

 where traders were admitted to sell wares to the monks. 



Richard de Esseby, who had been prior since 1298, was 

 elected to the abbacy in 1308, on the day of St. Gregory 

 the Pope. In the year 1399, T. de Verdun, the patron, 

 died on the feast of St. Bartholomew the Apostle, at 

 Alveton, and was laid by the side of his fathers in this 

 church with great honour, concerning whom it was said, 

 " He died, and was as tho' he died not, for he left behind 

 him one like to himself both in name and reality." In 

 1312, Matilda de Verdun, Lady Alveton, gave birth to 

 her fourth daughter, Margaret. Lady Matilda dying within 

 a month of her birth was buried with great pomp in the 

 Abbey church, near the altar of St. Benedict, Gilbert, 

 bishop of Armadown, being the officiating minister, the 

 Earl of Lancaster, with all the nobility of the county, 

 attending the funeral. On the 23rd of May, 1313, Richard 

 de Esseby laid down his office, and Thomas de Castreton, 

 prior of the house, was canonically elected. At the same 

 time, in the presence of the visitors and the whole convent 

 in full assembly, the usual seal of the abbot of the house 

 was broken, and it was enacted that a common seal should 

 be made according to a royal statute, and that it should 

 be placed in the charge of four of the most worthy monks 

 of the house, and it was made accordingly. On the vigil 

 of Easter the great bell of the house was unfortunately 

 broken, and Master Henry Michel de Lichfield came to 

 cast another, and laboured at it with his youths from the 

 octave of the Trinity to the feast of the Nativity of the 

 Blessed Virgin ; and then failed in casting it, losing all 



