Mr. Wilson on Brinhhurn Priori/. 141 



In the reign of Henry I., William Bertram, Baron of Mitford, 

 gave tlie site of these buildings to Osbertus Cohxtarius for the 

 purpose of founding a priory of Black Canons. With the consent 

 of his wife and son he endowed it richly with lands and woods. 

 Subsequently his grandson made additional grants of land, with 

 permission to cut timber out of his woods for the use of the Priory -, 

 besides allowing the Canons the privilege of killing game — a 

 liberty there is no doubt they highly valued. This was the age 

 when princes and nobles vied with each other in their zealous 

 liberality to the chin-ch. It was a time also of unbounded 

 superstition, when men's minds easily received the conviction, that 

 the founding of a church to the glory of God must infallibly secure 

 permanent and hereditary absolution for the founder and his heirs. 

 Hence the profuse gifts, the ample endowments, and the liberties 

 of taking fish and kilHng game so hberally granted to the religious 

 communities of this period. Farther on in the march of time, it 

 is recorded, that Prince Henry, afterwards King of Scotland,, 

 being created Earl of Northumberland by King Stephen, gave the 

 proj^erty of a salt pan at Warkworth. He and his son William 

 de Warren (so called from his mother's family) confirmed all 

 previous privileges and possessions ; the same being again 

 confirmed more than once in those turbulent times by royal 

 charter. Gifts flowed freely in from all quarters. The Canons 

 sometimes made droll bargains to suit the wants of their Convent. 

 Among others they granted two tofts at the east end of Newbig- 

 gen to Simon son of Mangur, jun., in consideration of the yearly 

 rent of 500 herrings ! Edibles must have been a most pressing 

 necessity in an age when every traveller made a convent his inn ; 

 when passing regiments laid the community under contributions ; 

 and when foraging parties of Scots often stripped the priory of its 

 stores. About this time, in the 8th year of the reign of Pichard 

 the Second, the Lady Johanna induced her son Palph Lord 

 Guystocke to give the impropriation and advowson of Long 

 Horsley to the priory. The Canons of Brinkburn agreed, in 

 return for this ^iower vested in their hands, that the said Johanna 

 and her heirs. Lords of Morpeth, shouJd for ever have the power 

 of nominating one Canon there ; in virtue of which agreement we 

 find Allen, son of John de Prestwick, soon afterwards nominated. 

 Alas ! for the heirs of the pious lady Johanna ! The power vested 

 in them forever was confined to very few generations. About a 

 hundred and fifty years from this time Thomas Cromwell, whilome 

 a hanger on at a Surrey blacksmith's forge, afterwards Secretary 

 of State to Henry YIII. sent his fire-brand of a commission across 

 the length and breadth of the country, which resulted in the 

 dissolution of six hundred and forty-five monasteries, including^ 

 this priory. 



Many are the Brinkburn legends of foes and fays ; and historical 

 facts are scarcely less numerous. In the year 1414 the Prior of 

 Brinkburn was deputed to attend a congress at " The City of 

 Constance," when no less a subject was in agitation than the 

 claims of three rival Popes to be the rightful occupiers of the 



