A HISTORY OF YORKSHIRE 



By Christmas 1195 Geoffrey reached the ebb of his fortunes. He failed 

 to appear at Rome, and was suspended. But in i 196, coming to Rome in 

 person, he procured the removal of the suspension. The king, however, 

 would not restore his temporalities. In 11 98, Geoffrey was summoned to 

 meet the chapter in Normandy before the king. He arrived first, and was 

 quickly reconciled to his brother, who sent him on a mission to Rome.'* 

 Shortly after, the canons arrived, and persuaded the king to resume the 

 temporalities. Richard, anxious to make peace, found Simon and the canons 

 as obstinate as Geoffrey." Innocent III favoured Geoffrey, and when John 

 came to the throne he was at last able to return to England." He entered 

 into a bond with the chapter to accept the decision of a new commission ; 

 and in 1200 he gave the kiss of peace to Dean Simon and two other 

 members of the chapter at Westminster." Before the end of the year, he 

 quarrelled with John, and was once more deprived of his temporahties and 

 had to buy back his peace at York in Lent, 1201.'' The kiss of peace had 

 healed no disputes with the chapter. Nominations to the chantership, the 

 archdeaconries of York" and Cleveland,'" and the provostship of Beverley," 

 were fruitful in strife. Honorius, Archdeacon of Richmond, who had been 

 the friend and nominee of Geoffrey, became his enemy ; and the last recorded 

 dispute of this pontificate arose from Geoffrey's claim to the privileges of the 

 archdeacon. On this occasion he received a severe letter from Innocent III.'* 

 Bickerings with John continued until 1207, when Geoffrey refused to levy a 

 thirteenth in his province, and left the kingdom." He died abroad in 1212.'* 

 No more serious fault can be charged against Geoffrey than intractable 

 temper and wilfulness, which were met by equal obstinacy in his opponents.'* 



" He did not go there, but apparently returned to argue with the chapter at Les Andelys. He appealed 

 personally to Innocent III in 1 198. 



" The chapter refused the three prelates appointed as judges by Richard, and demanded to be tried by a 

 commission of secular canons. 



" Geoffrey did not return for the coronation of John ; and he was with the king in Normandy after- 

 wards. Hubert Walter and the justiciary, Geoffrey Fitz Peter, entered a protest to the king against his return. 



" The commissioners present at this scene were the Bishop of Salisbury and the Abbot of Tewkesbury. 



" Geoffrey had excommunicated his unruly subjects at Beverley. John was at Beverley on 25 Jan. 1 200-1, 

 and stayed, for a consideration, with John le Gros, one of the excommunicated. He came to York at 

 Mid-Lent. 



" The archdeaconry of York had been disputed in 1 195. An agreement had been come to, by which 

 Geoffrey's nominee was put in possession of the title and 60 marks annual pension, while his rival took actual 

 possession of the office as his deputy. In 1 1 99, when Peter of Dinant had become Bishop of Rennes, Geoffrey 

 tried to introduce another nominee of his own, but was opposed by Adamof Thorner, who held that the office 

 and title were now in his sole occupation. 



^ The dispute as to the archdeaconry of Cleveland was mixed up with that relating to the vacant chanter- 

 ship in 1 20 1. Geoffrey tried to instal Ralph of Kyme in the first office, and being unsuccessful, claimed the 

 chantership for him. 



" Geoffrey nominated his brother Morgan to the provostship. Morgan was one of the candidates elected 

 to the bishopric of Durham in the vacancy following Bishop Peytevin's death. His election was quashed at 

 Rome (Coldingham, His/. Dunilm. Scriptores Ires. [Surt. Soc], 31 ; Graystanes, ibid. 35). 



*^ Geoffrey gave the archdeaconry on this occasion to Roger of St. Edmunds, whose presentation to it by 

 the king had been a source of contention in 1 1 96. 



^ Stubbs, Hht. Ch. York (Rolls Ser.), ii, 400, 401 ; Wendover (Matt. Paris, Chron. Maj. [Rolls Ser.], ii,52o). 



" Godwin, quoted by Dixon and Raine, op, cit. 278, is the only authority for the statement that 

 Geoffrey died at Grosmont in Normandy. 



" The dying confession of Ralph of Wigtoft, one of his clerks, disclosed a plot to poison Dean Simon 

 (Hoveden, op. cit. iv, 15-16). Doubtless, Simon believed Geoffrey guilty of complicity ; but his connivance 

 was not mentioned or implied by the chief culprits. So much of Stubbs' praise of the archbishops is conven- 

 tional that one cannot put much value on his character of Geoffrey {Hist. Ch. York [Rolls Ser.], ii, 100) as ' vir . . . 

 magnae abstinentiae et summae puritatis ' ; but there is no evidence to the contrary apart from one or two 

 phrases in an abusive poem quoted, Dixon and Raine, op. cit. 278 n. 



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