ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



His reluctance to accept the archbishopric, his intervention on behalf of 

 his enemies during the riot at York in 1189-90, are points in his favour. 

 In 1 20 1 he was at York to receive the missionary Abbot of Flay, whose 

 exhortations on the hallowing of the Lord's Day had a profound effect in 

 Yorkshire.*' Documents are preserved in the registers of later archbishops, 

 which throw light on Geoffrey as a diocesan. Among these is an ordination 

 of a vicarage in Kirkby-in-Malhamdale Church, appropriated to the convent 

 of West Dereham. This, the first recorded ordination of a vicarage in the 

 diocese, is dated from Patrington, 5 July 1205.'' 



No election to the see was made till 12 15, when the canons chose 

 Simon Langton, brother of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The election was 

 quashed by the pope, on appeal from John.°^ The chapter then elected the 

 king's nominee, Walter Gray, Bishop of Worcester.*' He received his pall 

 from Innocent III at Rome, where he had gone to the Lateran Council, and 

 to take part in the appeal against Langton's election. Gray had been 

 Chancellor of England ; and during his long pontificate his relations with 

 the Crown were consistently friendly. He was employed in positions of high 

 trust, as in 1242, when he was regent of the kingdom during the king's 

 absence in Gascony.^" The dispute with Canterbury was less actively 

 pursued by him. Honorius III forbade him, in 1218, to carry his cross in 

 the southern province." In 1223, when the king ordered him to join in 

 receiving the King of Jerusalem in London, Gray, reflecting that this 

 appearance might lead to a quarrel with Stephen Langton, went out of his 

 way to his manor of Churchdown, and wrote for advice to the justiciar of 

 England.^^ At the synod of London (1237), Gray and Edmund Rich abode 

 by the legate's decision that the Archbishop of Canterbury should sit on his 

 right hand, the Archbishop of York on his left.''^ Gray acted with similar 

 judgement towards his suffragans. Although, after the death of Bishop Marsh 

 (1226), he delayed the consecration of the nominee of the Prior and convent of 

 Durham,^* he consecrated three Bishops of Durham and three of Carlisle, and 

 received written professions from at least one bishop of each see. Gilbert, whom 

 he consecrated to Whithorn in 1235, ^cted as his deputy at the dedication of 

 Yedingham Priory Church (1241) and of the chapel in Helmsley Castle. ^° 



Gray is the first archbishop of whose register we possess any part. 

 From this we can gain a clear idea of his diocesan work. The chief abuse 

 with which he had to contend was the marriage of the secular clergy. 

 Sons of parochial clergy had even obtained several benefices without a 

 dispensation. Honorius III issued a bull at his request (122 1) condemning 



** Some of the miraculous punishments of Sabbath breaking at Beverley, NafFerton, and Wakefield, are 

 noted by Hoveden, op. cit. iv, 170-1. 



" l^ork Reg. Giffarti (Suit. Soc. cix), 255, 256. Whitaker, Rkhmondshire, i, 252, notices an institution 

 by Archdeacon Honorius in 1 198 to the vicarage of Langton-on-Swale from the Coucher book of Easby Abbey. 

 No ordination is extant. 



•* Wendover (Matt. Paris, Chron. Maj. [Rolls Ser.], ii, 628, 629). 



'' The date of his consecration to Worcester was 5 Oct. 1 2 14. He was chancellor 1205-14. 



'" See Dixon and Raine, op. cit. 284 seq. for a summary of Gray's public charges. 



" Hist. Ch. York (Rolls Ser.), iii, 113. 



" York Reg. Gray (Surt. Soc), i, App. no, xxi, 145-6. 



" Matthew Paris, Chron. Maj. (Rolls Ser.), iii, 417. 



'* The see was left vacant for two years and four months, until the translation of Poore from Salisbury. 



" York Reg. Gray (Surt. Soc), 90 n. 1 19 n. 



23 



