By Rev. C. 8. Ruddle. 



31 



It seems to me impossible that a man living in Amesbury should 

 make such a will, full of references to his Parish Church services, 

 if the Church itself were being monstrously dilapidated. 



Look again at this : in the account of the Abbey Church mention 

 is made of only two chapels — the Chapel of our Lady and St. 

 John's Chapel. There is no Jesus Chapel. But in 1549 Michael 

 Skotte, mercer of Amesbury, desires to be buried in Jesus Chapel 

 in the Parish Church of Amesbury. Apparently it was a family 

 burying-place, for seven years later John Skott, yeo., desires to be 

 buried in the same Jesus Chapel. 



I am bold enough to suggest that the Abbey Church was Christ 

 Church : and on this ground. A parishioner of Durrington, 

 probably the chief tenant of Winchester College — Robt. Matyn — 

 made his will in 1509. He was on good terms with the Convent 

 of Amesbury, for he bequeathed to my lady prioress 3s. 4d., and to 

 every lady householder of the same place 8d., and to every lady 

 veiled 4d. To every Church in this bourne from Upavon to 

 Salisbury he left two sheep. But he heads his bequest to Churches 

 "I bequethe to Christ's Churche, 3s. M. Also I bequeth to 

 the Pisshe Churche of Ambresbury 4 sheepe." If Christchurch, 

 Hants, had been intended, the county would have been given. It 

 could not be Christ Church, Oxford, for it had not been founded. 

 I submit that it was the Priory Church. 



There was, it seems to me, a Parish Church here at a very early 

 date. There is nothing unreasonable in supposing that when the 

 King met his witan here at Easter, 995, and chose the Bishop of 

 Wiltshire to be Archbishop of Canterbury, it was because it was a 

 comparatively populous place, as well as because the King's manor 

 was great. It was at Domesday twelve times as big as the other 

 four manors of Amesbury put together. 



And the seven thanes, eight millers, eighty-five villeins, fifty-six 

 bordars, with their families, to say nothing of their serfs, must have 

 required a good-sized Parish Church. Apparently the Abbey then 

 had no land in the parish : the only ecclesiastical holding was a 

 small one of the Abbess of Wilton. 



How came the dedication to St. Melore, a Welsh or British saint 



