ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



Church,"' Altham,"' Downham,"" and Haslingden,"" to Whalley; Dids- 

 bury,"> to Manchester ; Deane,"" to Eccles ; Rokeden, or Newton,"' to Win- 

 wick ; Farnworth,""" to Prescot ; Knowsley,"* to Huyton ; Garston,'" and 

 Hale,"' to Childwall ; and Liverpool, St. Mary at Key (Quay) "' to Walton. 



Some of the chapels which are first mentioned in the fourteenth century, 

 such as RufFord in Croston parish, and Melling and MaghuU in the parish of 

 Halsall, may go back to a considerably earlier date. 



The cost of up-keep of parochial chapels and their services was in some 

 cases borne entirely by the locality, in others it was divided with the mother 

 church. The nature of the division varied. At Saddleworth, Whalley Abbey, 

 which held the tithes of Rochdale, found the chaplain and the necessary books 

 and vestments, and repaired the chancel, the maintenance of the rest of the 

 fabric being thrown upon the parishioners."' On the other hand the 

 parishioners of Church in Whalley parish were bound to repair the chancel 

 of their chapel, and though here, as in its sister chapels, the chaplain was 

 found by the abbey (from 1330 by the vicar of Whalley) they had to provide 

 a clerk to take his place if necessary. These obligations were affirmed in 

 ^335 by the bishop of Lichfield," the chancel having been allowed to become 

 ruinous and the people having sometimes to leave without mass for want of 

 a clerk."' 



There is little more to be said as to the ecclesiastical history of the 

 county until the closing years of the thirteenth century are reached. The 

 Lichfield episcopal registers do not begin until 1298, and the scanty extracts 

 from the lost registers of the archdeaconry of Richmond extend only (with 

 gaps) from 1361 to 1484."' 



For North Lancashire we have, however, one important document in 

 the Constitution of Archbishop Walter de Gray (1215-55) fixing for the 

 province of York the portions of the church fabrics and furniture to be 

 maintained and repaired by the parishioners and by the rectors and vicars 



'" Prior to 1202 ; Lanes. Fines, i, 14. 



"' Supposed to have been founded temp. Ric. I ; Whalley Coucher, 301. 



'" Probably before 1147 ; ibid. 76, 92. 



"° Mentioned in 1296 ; ibid. 214. With the exception of the castle chapel at Clitheroe the chapels of 

 Whalley seem to have had rights of baptism and burial ; ibid. 227. 



"' Said by HoUingworth {Mancuniensis, p. 26 [ed. 1839]), on what authority does not appear, to have 

 been built before 1235. 1° 1352, when a cemetery was granted, the chapel was said to be of antiquity beyond 

 memory ; Lich. Epis. Reg. Northburgh, ii, fol. 127. 



'" Earliest mention in 1234 ; Whalley Coucher, 44. Graveyard mentioned in 1276 ; ibid. 60. 



'" For the identification of Newton chapel with the chapel of Rokeden, in which Sir Robert Banaster 

 had licence in 1284 to have a chantry owing to his distance from the mother church, see Not. Cestr. (Chet. 

 Soc), 271. It is possible, however, that the licence was only for himself and his household and Newton as yet 

 merely a private chapel. 



^' V.C.H. Lanes, iii, 391. 



'" Earliest mention in 1 190 ; Lanes. Pipe R. 350. This chapel, called also apparently the Ridding Chapel 

 (Reg. Burscough, fol. [4]), soon disappeared. 



"' Earliest mention in 1261 ; Trans. Lanes, and Ches. Hist. Soe. (New Ser.), xvii, 54. 



'" Mentioned before 1257; ibid, xviii, 77. A larger chapel (St. Nicholas) was built close by about 1350. 



"' Whalley Coueher, 150. "» Ibid. 236-45. 



"' The Richmond Registers have shared the fate of the archdeacon's special powers. One of them, 

 extending from 1442 to 1484, was still extant about fifty years ago {Riehtnondshire Wills, Surtees Soc. p. xx.), 

 but my inquiries have failed to discover its present place of deposit. Extracts from Canon Raine's trans- 

 cript of it are in Raine's Lancashire MSS. (vol. xxii, p. 373, sqq.) in the Chetham Library. They are 

 followed by a reproduction of extracts from three earlier registers, those of Charlton (1359-82), Dalby 

 (i 388-1400), and Bowet (1418-42) made by Dr. Matthew Hutton in 1686 and preserved among 

 the Harleian MSS. (Nos. 6969-78). Some fragments of what appears to be a fifteenth-century register are 

 at Somerset House. 



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