RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



The behaviour of the members of the collegiate churches was far less 

 satisfactory. In spite of vigorous efforts at reformation on the part of 

 Bishop Kellaw in the early fourteenth century, and of Bishop Langley a 

 hundred years later, the canons neglected their duties, both spiritual and 

 temporal, to a disgraceful extent. This was probably due to the fact that 

 they were pluralists on a large scale, many of them holding five, six, or even 

 ten ecclesiastical preferments in various parts of England. 



A striking feature of religious life in the county of Durham was the 

 number of hermits, notably in the fourteenth century, who found a home 

 there. At first, no doubt, their existence was wild and solitary enough ; 

 but after a time it became a much more formal matter, and persons were 

 admitted to the profession of an anchoret, and collated to their hermitages, 

 just as in the case of any other order. 



In the time of Bishop Bek the Templars held lands, rents, &c., in 

 Barnard Castle and Summerhouse, besides various places in the bishopric, but 

 not in the county of Durham. 1 In 1313 the pope directed an inquiry to be 

 made as to what lands the Knights Hospitallers held in the Northern Pro- 

 vince. The bishop of Durham replied that in his diocese they had nothing 

 but the house of Chibburn in Northumberland.* The pope then commanded 

 the bishop to hand over to the Hospitallers all possessions whatsoever lately 

 belonging to the then dissolved order of the Templars in his diocese. 8 



Durham was rich in historians; Bede, Simeon, Reginald, Geoffrey of 

 Coldingham, Robert of Graystanes, and William Chambre, were all inmates 

 of one or other of her religious houses. 



SAXON MONASTERIES 



i THE MONASTERY OF t ' on ^ Aidan and other learned men, established 



HARTLEPOOL a re S u ' ar anc ^ orderly monastic life at Hartlepool 



(Heorthu). 6 It seems probable that she had 



The ancient monastery at Hartlepool was under her rule men as well as women ; Bede 



founded about A.D. 640 by Hieu, a native of speaks of male students in the monasteries of the 



Ireland, under the auspices of St. Aidan. Hieu Abbess Hilda,' and on the tombstones in the 



was the first of the saintly female recluses of little cemetery of Hartlepool Monastery, which 



Northumbria, 1 and the first also of the specially we re excavated early in the nineteenth century, 



gifted women whom St. Aidan placed in charge some names of men were found. 8 



of double religious houses for men and women.' J n 655 King Oswi, in fulfilment of a vow 



Nothing is known of her parentage, but her made before the battle in which he defeated 



ability as organizer and administrator is vouched Penda, gave his daughter Elfleda, who had 



for by St. Aidan 's selection. 1 barely completed her first year,' to be conse- 



After ruling the new monastery for a few crated to God in perpetual virginity, 10 and sent 



years Hieu* retired in 649 to Tadcaster, and her to Hartlepool to the care of Hilda. Two 



was succeeded by Hilda, 6 who, under the direc- years later (A.D. 657 or 658) Hilda, by Aidan's 



' Reg. Ptlat. Dun. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 857-8. desire > H went ^'^/TuV^ h( 



i j bi( i j , 8 _ -g_ so renowned as Whitby Abbey, and took 



1 Close, '7 Ed'w. II, m. 16 Sched. This order was with her. 18 

 repeated in 13*4 ; Close, 17 Edw. II, m. 7, 4. 



1 Bede, Hilt. Ecclei. lib. iv, c. 23. * Ibid. ' Ibid. 



'Arch. Aeriana,,^. 'Ibid. ' Journ. of Brit. Arch. Assoc. i, 185; 



4 Hieu has frequently been confused, by Leland Dur. i, z 1 2. 



(Coll. iii, 39) and subsequent writers, with S. Bega 'In Fitat Sanctorum it is stated that Elfleda was 



or Begu ; but there are strong reasons for thinking born in 654 and died in 713. 



that they were distinct persons ; see Arch. Aeliana, " Bede, Hist. Ecclet. lib. iii, c. 24. 



xvii, 202, note. " Matt. Paris, Cbrm. Maj. (Rolls Ser.), i, 302. 



5 Bede, Hut. Eccles. lib. iv, c. 23. u Bede, Hist. Ecclti. lib. iii, c. 24. 



79 



