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MARLBOROUGH CHANTRIES AND THE SUPPLY OF 

 CLERGY IN OLDEN DAYS. 



By the Rev. Che. Wordsworth. 



Part I. — Wiltshire Chantries. 



It is with great satisfaction that we hail the announcement 

 made in the current number (part xx.) of the Canterbury and York 

 Society's publications, containing a second instalment of Abp, 

 Matt. Parker's Registrum, that the Council of the same society 

 " has in hand the transcription of the Registers of Simon of Ghent, 

 Bishop of Salisbury." The transcript is being made, I understand, 

 by the Rev. E. R. Nevill, B.A., who has done editorial work for 

 the Marriage Registers of portions of the diocese of Salisbury, and 

 ha,s since June, 1907, given us in the Wilts Notes and Queries 

 several instalments of the very remarkable " Chrysom Book of St. 

 Thomas, New Sarum (1569 — 92)," where he is assistant curate. 

 He has in his antiquarian research an ideal coadjutor in Mr. A. R. 

 Maiden, M.A., F.S.A., Librarian, Chapter-Clerk, and Registrar of 

 the Diocese. 



The Register of Simon " de Gandavo " contains, I believe, records 

 of certain vicarages " ordained," or established, and private oratories 

 licensed in the course of his episcopate, 1297 — 1315. I (for one) 

 shall look forward with interest to see whether there is any account 

 of Chantries founded at that early date. Simon's immediate pre- 

 decessor (1291-2 to 1297), Nic. Longespe'e, certainly had a chantry 

 in the Cathedral Church, as had his noble father, the Earl William, 

 who (in 1226) was the first to be buried in the Lady Chapel, of 

 which he and the Lady Ela (countess in her own right, and after- 

 wards foundress and abbess of Lacock) had laid foundation stones, 

 28th April 1220. Their chantry was at St. Stephen's Altar, and 

 was founded probably in 1270, (many years before Nicholas 

 became bishop), when an indulgence was granted in connexion 



