XIV.] 
OF SELBORNE. 
509 
LETTEE XIV. 
" In the year 1373 Wykeliam, Bishop of Winchester, held a 
visitation of his whole diocese ; not only of the secular clergy 
through the several deaneries, but also of the monasteries, and 
religious houses of all sorts, Avhich he visited in person. The 
next year he sent his commissioners with power to correct and 
reform the several irregularities and abuses which he had dis- 
covered in the course of his visitation. 
" Some years afterward, the bishop having visited three 
severed times all the religious houses throughout his diocese, 
and being well informed of the state and condition of each, 
and of tlie particular abuses which required correction and 
reformation, besides the orders which he had already given, 
and the remedies which he had occasionally applied by his 
commissioners, now issued his injunctions to each of them. 
They w^ere accommodated to their several exigencies, and 
intended to correct the abuses introduced, and to recall them 
all to a strict observation of the rules of their respective orders. 
Many of these injunctions are still extant, and are evident 
monuments of the care and attention with which he discharged 
this part of his episcopal duty." ^ 
Some of these injunctions I shall here produce; and they 
are such as will not fail, I think, to give satisfaction to the 
antiquary, both as never liaving been published before, and 
as they are a curious picture of monastic irregularities at 
that time. 
The documents that I allude to are contained in the ISTotabilis 
Visitatio de Selebourne, held at the Priory of that place, by 
Wykeham in person, in the year 1387. 
This evidence, in the original, is written on two skins of 
parchment; the one large, and the other smaller, and consists 
of a preamble, thirty-six items, and a conclusion, which alto- 
gether evince the patient investigation of the visitor, for which 
he had always been so remarkable in all matters of moment, 
^ See Lowth's " Life of Wykeham." 
