A HISTORY OF YORKSHIRE 



The buildings immediately adjoined those of 

 the small Benedictine nunnery of St. Clement. 

 Although the original intention of the founder 

 was that there were to be twelve canons in the 

 house, the probability is that their number was 

 much less. In 1380-1 there were three canons 

 besides the prior, and at the dissolution only two 

 canons in addition to the prior. 



On 20 August 1280° the Prior and con- 

 vent of St. Andrew addressed a formal letter 

 to Archbishop Wickwane, reporting that Richard 

 de Kyrkeby and Alan de Thorpe, their brothers 

 and fellow canons, relinquishing the habit of 

 their religion, had by night furtively departed, to 

 the contempt of religion and the peril of souls. 

 The prior and convent had unanimously 

 denounced them, in chapter and convent, as 

 excommunicate, and they asked the archbishop 

 to do so throughout the diocese, and after forty 

 days to invoke the secular arm. The letter is 

 followed in the register by the archbishop's 

 denunciation of Richard de Kyrkeby and Alan de 

 Thorpe as excommunicate, with a notification 

 addressed to the Bishops of Durham, Carlisle, and 

 Whithern {Candida Casa),^ and all archdeacons 

 and officials in the diocese and province of York. 

 On 30 January 1486-7 ' Archbishop Rotherham 

 issued a monition to [John] Beysby, John Shaw, 

 Sheriffs of York, and others, citing them to 



appear before him for having gone to the priory 

 of St. Andrew and seized certain persons by 

 violence who had sought sanctuary within the 

 precincts of the monastery, the churches of the 

 order of Sempringham having the right of 

 sanctuary granted them by Pope Clement III. 



According to the f'^a/or Ecc/esiasticus ' the total 

 revenue was at that time jT^j 51. gd., and the 

 clear income £4.y 141. 3^(3'. At the Dissolution 

 there were a prior and three canons, all of them 

 priests.' The prior, John Lepington,'" was 

 awarded a pension of ;^io (altered from £8), the 

 three canons £4. each. They surrendered on 

 28 November 1538." 



Priors of St. Andrew's 



Bartholomew, occurs 1208 *^ 



Robert, occurs 1210" 



John, occurs 1214'^ 



Baldwin, occurs 1219" 



William, occurs 1225,"* 1230-40,^° 1254"^ 



Robert, occurs 1262 ** 



Adam de Aghton, c. 1278 '*" 



Robert de Scalleby, c. 1288"" 



Ralph, occurs 1335 ^° 



Robert, occurs 1354 '"* 



John Hawkcsworth, occurs 1481 ^^ 



William Beseet (Bisset), occurs 1506^^ 



John Lepington (surrendered 1538)" 



HOUSES OF KNIGHTS TEMPLARS 



67. THE PRECEPTORY OF YORKSHIRE 



The Order of Knights of the Temple of 

 Jerusalem was founded in 1 1 1 9, but it was not 

 until the middle of the I2th century that they 

 began to acquire possessions in Yorkshire, where 

 they eventually established at least ten precep- 



' York Archiepis. Reg. Wickwane, fol. Sir. 



' The diocese of Whithern, or Galloway, was at this 

 period included in the province of York. 



'York Achiepis. Reg. Rotherham, i, fol. 73. The 

 Christian name of Beysby is left blank. 



' ra/or Eccl. v, 126. 



' Z)ir/. Keeper's Rep. viii, App. 2. 



'" L. and P. Hen. Fill, xiv (i), 185. 



" Graham, St. Gilbert of Sempringham and the 

 Giibertines, 194. 



" Torks. Fines, John (Surt. Soc), 1 47. 



" Ibid. 162. 



" Dep. Keeper's Rep. xxx\'iii, App. 1 82. 



" Feet of F. file 13, no. 17 (Hil. 3 Hen. III). 



"'' Cott. MS. Nero D. iii, fol. 5 i. 



" Ibid, file 33, no. 132 ; Baildon, Mot. Sotes, i, 237. 



" Whitby Chartul. (Surt. Soc), ii, 468. 



" Baildon, loc. cit. 



'** Assize R. I loi, m. 84 ; 1098, m. 62 d. 



""Ibid. "Cj/. Close, 1333-7, P- 465- 



"» Cal. of Papal Letters, m, 532. 



" Reg. Corpus Christi Guild, York, 109. " Ibid. 1 64. 



" L. and P. Hen. VIII, xiv (i), 185. 



tories. Their prosperity was brought loan abrupt 

 close early in the 14th century ; in 1308 Sir John 

 Crepping, Sheriff of Yorkshire, received the 

 king's writ to arrest the Templars within the 

 county and sequester all their property.' 

 Twenty-five Templars were placed in custody 

 in York Castle and examined on the charge or 

 heresy, idolatry, and other crimes, brought against 

 the order by Pope Clement V and Philip IV of 

 France. After a long-drawn-out trial, in which 

 the evidence adduced against the knights was too 

 flimsy to secure the desired conviction, a com- 

 promise was arrived at by which the brethren, 

 without admitting their guilt, acknowledged that 

 their order was strongly suspected of heresy and 

 other charges from which they could not clear 

 themselves. They then received absolution at 

 the hands of the Bishop of Whithern on 29 Jul\- 

 131 1, were released from prison, and were 

 distributed amongst the various monasteries.- 

 Next year the suppression of the order was 

 decreed by the pope, and a large portion ot 

 their estates was made over to the order of tiie 

 Knights Hospitallers. 



' Kenrick, Papers on Arch, and Hist. 44. A list of 

 documents of the reign of Edward II relat ng to the 

 Yorks. Templars, and now in the Public Record 

 Office, is given on p. 63. 



' Rec.ofthe Northern Convocation (Surt. Soc.), 19-60. 



256 



