ANTIQUITIES OF SELBORNE. 
227 
Templars shall be in arrears for one year, that then the prior shall be 
empowered to distrain upon their live stock in Bradeseth. The next 
matter was a grant from Robert de Sunford to the priory for ever, of 
a good and sufficient road, " cheminum," capable of admitting carriages, 
and proper for the drift of their larger cattle, from the way which 
extends from Sudington towards Blakemere, on to the lands which the 
convent possesses in Bradeseth. 
The third transaction (though for want of dates we cannot say which 
happened first and which last) was a grant from Robert Samford to the 
priory of a tenement and its appurtenances in the village of Selborne, 
given to the Templars by Americus de Yasci."^ This property, by the 
manner of describing it, — ^^totum tenementum cum omnibus perti- 
nentiis suis, scilicet in terris, & hominibus, in pratis & pascuis, & 
nemoribus," &c., seems to have been no inconsiderable purchase, and 
was sold for two hundred marks sterling, to be applied for the buying 
of more land for the support of the holy war. 
Prior John is mentioned as the person to whom Yasci's land is con- 
veyed. But in Willis's list there is no Prior John till 1339, several 
years after the dissolution of the order of the Templars in 1312, so 
that, unless Willis is wrong, and has omitted a prior John since 
1262 (that being the date of his first prior), these transactions must 
have fallen out before that date. 
I find not the least traces of any concerns between Gurdon and the 
Knight Templars ; but probably after his death his daughter Johanna 
might have, and might bestow. Temple on that order in support of 
the holy land; and, moreover, she seems to have been removing 
from Selborne, when she sold her goods and chattels to the priory, as 
mentioned above. 
Temple, no doubt, did belong to the knights, as may be asserted, not 
only from its name, but also from another corroborating circumstance 
of its being still a manor, tithe-free ; " for, by virtue of their order," 
says Blackstone, " the lands of the Knights Templars were privileged 
by the pope with a discharge from tithes." 
Antiquaries have been much puzzled about the terms preceptores 
and preceptorium, not being able to determine what officer or edifice 
was meant. But perhaps all the while the passage quoted above from one 
of my papers, "per manum preceptoris vel hallivi nostri, qui pro 
tempore fuerit, ibidem," may help to explain the difficulty. For if it 
be allowed here that preceptor and hallivus are synonymous words, 
then the brother who took on him that office resided in the house of 
the Templars at Sudington, a preceptory ; where he was their preceptor, 
superintended their affairs, received their money, and, as in the 
instance there mentioned, paid from their chamber, camera" as 
directed ; so that, according to this explanation, a preceptor was no 
other than a steward, and 2i preceptorium was his residence. I am 
well aware that, according to strict Latin, the vel should have been seu 
or sive, and the order of the words "preceptoris nostri, vel ballivi, 
* Americus Vasci, by his name, must have been an Italian, and had been 
probably a soldier of fortune, and one of Gurdon's captains. Americus Vespucio, 
the person who gave name to the new world, was a riorentinSo 
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