London, Volume 3
Knight, Charles
1842
LI. Bermondsey: The Abbey.
LI. Bermondsey: The Abbey.
It is a curious circumstance, and in which the history of many changes of opinion may be read, that within years after what remained of the magnificent ecclesiastical foundation of the Abbey of had been swept away, a new conventual establishment has risen up, amidst the surrounding desecration of factories and warehouses, in a large and picturesque pile, with its stately church, fitted in every way for the residence and accommodation of or inmates--the Convent of the Sisters of Mercy. We read in the records of our own immediate time, that [n.1.1] Subsequently When the sermon was concluded the took place. The novices, attired in the | |
2 | declared in the usual formula that This ceremony over, they retired and assumed the sober garb of
of the nuns The remaining nuns were Miss Ponsonby (a convert), now Sister Vincent; Miss Conner, now Sister Ursula; Miss Laleham, now Sister Xaiver; and Sister Theresa, and Sister Joseph, whose worldly designations are not mentioned. |
With the abstract utility of such institutions we have here nothing to do, but we may observe that the building, &c., of the Sisters of Mercy, as well as the order to which they belong, are of an interesting character. The church is really a fine edifice, in the plain but noble pointed architecture of a very early period. The confessionals, the gilt altar-piece, with the tapers on each side, and the square black board on the wall in the aisle, covered with small printed papers, desiring the prayers of the faithful for the souls of ,the different deceased persons mentioned in them, beginning with the touching motto from Job, and ending with the phrase, all remind you of the ancient religion, here again established on the spot where it flourished so many centuries ago. | |
The names of ancient places form a fruitful subject for the display of learning and ingenuity, and if the results are not generally so satisfactory--as might be desired in the way of producing conviction, they are seldom destitute of interest, and are sometimes positively entertaining. In the instance of , the oldest known explanation of the name is, that was in very ancient times the Saxon proprietor of the place or , which in Saxon signifies water, and is here supposed to denote the nature of the soil. Wilkinson, in his account of the Abbey,[n.2.1] adds that the words , or , If true, this explanation may apply to other places in and near London as well as . Battersea, for instance, is very similarly situated with regard to the Thames. But a more fanciful explanation of the name is given by the writer already mentioned in a note, where he says that
| |
Looking, then, upon the original as a kind of marshy island when the tide was out, and a wide expanse of water when it was in, till gradually reclaimed and made useful, cannot help being struck with the many indications of the old state of things yet remaining, although the be densely covered with habitations and warehouses. The descent down that long flight of steps at the foot of tells you how low lie the | |
3 | territories you are about to explore; the numerous wharfs, and docks, and
watercourses, and ditches, which bound and intersect so considerable a portion of it, seem but
so many memorials of the once potent element; the very streets have a damp about them, and in the part known as Jacob's Island the overhanging houses, and the
little wooden bridges that span the stream, have, notwithstanding their forlorn look, something
of a Dutch expression. In short, persons familiar with the history of the place may everywhere
see that Beormund's Ea still exists, but that it has been embanked and drained--that it has
grown populous, busy, commercial. Its manufacturing prosperity, however, strikingly contrasts
with the general aspect of . Its
streets generally are but dreary-looking places; where, with the exception of a picturesque old
tenement, projecting its story beyond story regularly upwards, and fast or the name of a street suggestive of some agreeable reflections, there is little to gratify the delicate eye. The alleys and courts in particular with which this extensive neighbourhood abounds are of the most wretched-looking character, and inhabited by an equally wretched race, if we may judge by the squalid aspect of the shivering, half-clad, and frequently shoeless creatures we see going in and out. In this circumstance the site of the once-famous Priory of reminds us of the site of St. Bartholomew, which is still, to a certain extent, and was a few years ago much more so, occupied by houses and a population presenting similar aspects. It were perhaps a bold speculation to ask if there be not something of cause and effect in this; yet, when we remember the magnificent hospitalities of the old and wealthier monasteries, there seems nothing improbable in the supposition that a large number of the poorer classes of the people would gather around them, as it were, for shelter; and, once there, we need not wonder to find them still clinging to the place centuries after their benefactors disappeared from it. Inhabitants of this kind are slow to move, and still slower is the process of effacing the character which they have impressed upon it, when they do leave. Noble arches here and there bestride the streets of , bearing up a railway, with its engines puffing like so many overworked giants, and its rapid trains of passengers; lofty and handsome piles of warehouses are occasionally passed; an elegant free-school enriches part, and a picturesque church another: but they all serve by contrast to show more vividly the unpleasant features of the neighbourhood, and, whilst they cannot but command the spectator's admiration, make him at the same time wonder how they got there. The answer is at hand. There is great industry in , and the wretchedness is more on the surface than in the depths of this quarter of the town. What modern is, we shall describe in our next paper. |
The earliest mention of the Priory occurs in the account of in Domesday; and it is interesting to notice the comparative solitude of the place at that time, when could be afforded for so near the city. From the Conqueror's record it appears that he, the king, was then lord of the manor, as Harold had been before him. It was then rated, including , to the land-tax at hides, which, according to the computation usual in the midland counties, of acres to a hide or carucate, would amount to above acres. The same computation would make the arable | |
4 | land
amount to acres. There was also , with acres of meadow, and as much woodland as
yielded pannage for a number of hogs, the lord receiving by way of
payment from the owners. The demesne land was carucate occupied by the
lord himself, and carucates in the tenure of villains, and bordars.[n.4.1] burgage tenements in London were also held of this manor, at the
rent of , and
the Earl of Moriton (Morton) possessed a hide of land, on which, it appears from another part
of the record, he had a mansion-house. The here mentioned was that belonging to the Priory. |
In the (a manuscript preserved among the Harleian collection, to which we are indebted for the greater part of what information we possess as to this once-famous monastery) we find the writer, most probably a monk of , before noticing the foundation of his own house, referring in the following terms to an event which had occurred years before, in connexion with another establishment: and if we look into the charter of that priory we see very clearly his reasons for so doing: for we have there recorded the circumstances which brought about the introduction of the order, to which both Lewes and belonged, into this country; and very interesting circumstances they are. The charter in question was granted by William Earl of Warren, who came over with the Conqueror; and in it that nobleman gives us the following history. It appears that he, with the Lady Gunfreda, his wife, were going on a pilgrimage to at Rome, and in their passage through France and Burgundy visited divers monasteries to make their orisons; but understanding in Burgundy that they could not in safety proceed with their purpose, on account of the war which was then carrying on between the Pope and the Emperor, they took up their abode in the great monastery of St. Peter at Cluny in that country, and there paid their devotions to the saint. The appearances of sanctity, religion, and charity which they met with in that abbey were great beyond their expectation; and these, together with the special respect shown to them by the prior, in the abbot's absence, and the whole convent, who admitted them to their fraternity, charmed them, and raised their esteem both for the order and the House of Cluny above all others. And because, long before that time, the earl and his lady had determined, by the advice of Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, to found some religious house to make atonement for their sins, and for the welfare of their souls, they forthwith resolved that it should be rather of the Cluniac than of any other order. They therefore, soon after, sent over their request to Abbot Hugh, and the convent of Cluny, that they would favour them with , , or monks out of their flock; and the intention was to give them a church, anciently dedicated to , under the castle of Lewes, and which the earl and countess purposed at the | |
5 | setting out to endow with
lands and possessions sufficient for the maintenance of monks. The
abbot at made great difficulty in the affair, and seemed unwilling
to comply, as the proposed place of abode for his monks was to be a long way off, in another
land, and especially as the sea would be between them and the parent convent; but understanding
that the earl had obtained licence from King William to introduce monks of their order into
England, and being satisfied of his approbation thereof, he became reconciled to the proposal,
and agreed to send them monks of his convent, being chief .... says the earl, [n.5.1] The difficulty got over, other establishments of Cluniacs were soon formed in England; Wenlock was founded in , and years later. A citizen was the chief benefactor in the present instance; his name, Aylwin Child; who, through the favour of the eminent churchman Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, obtained Cluniac monks from another of the great Cluniac houses--the monastery of La Charite in Normandy. The Cluniacs, it may be necessary to observe, were the offshoot of the Benedictine branch of monachism, and had their origin, like the parent tree, in the desire to improve upon the previous discipline. The reformation desired by the sterner Benedictines was begun by Bernon, abbot of Gigni, in Burgundy, but consummated by Odo, abbot of Cluny, about : he, therefore, is chiefly looked on as the founder of the order of Cluniacs. |
A brief view of their customs may be acceptable. The following extract is from Stevens's translation of the French history of the Monastic Orders, given in his continuation of Dugdale, and transcribed in the great edition of the
The sites of the mill and the bakehouse of Abbey are both yet traceable. | |
The rapidity with which the new order spread was most extraordinary; before any very great length of time had elapsed there were at least religious houses looking up to the Abbot of Cluny as their spiritual head. We may | |
6 |
judge of the wealth and influence of the House of Cluny by the fact, that in it was able to entertain within its walls, and without disarranging the habits of
the monks resident in it, the reigning Pope, cardinals, a patriarch, archbishops, the
King of France, his mother, and of his sons, the Emperor of
Constantinople, and dukes and lords too many to enumerate. The other chief foreign houses at
that time were those of St. Martin des Champs, at Paris, and La Charite. The building belonging
to the latter was considered the finest in the kingdom. No doubt the Priory of must have been here similarly distinguished for
its architectural grandeur; for although no portion of the chief feature, the church, has been
preserved to us even in engravings, the long list of benefactors, occupying several folio pages
of the is of itself a sufficient testimony. Among those benefactors we find the names of William Rufus, who gave to the monks the manor and manor-house, or palace, then standing there; Robert Bloet, Bishop of Lincoln, and Chancellor of England; Mary, sister to Maud (good quoteueen Maud), the wife of Henry I.; Henry I. himself; King Stephen; John, son of Hubert de Burgh; and a host of other distinguished persons. Some of the gifts are sufficiently curious. Thus in |
Alan Pirot gave herrings and acre of land. The Prior of was Peter, of the monks of La Charite. Among his successors we need only mention Richard, elected prior in , who built an almshouse or hospital adjoining the monastery for poor children and converts, called Hospital, to which Agnes, sister of Thomas a Becket. was also a benefactor; John de Causancia, during whose rule the Priory became involved in trouble, Causancia and several monks being arrested on account of their having received some rebels into their house for shelter, supposed to be adherents of the Earl of Lancaster, who had been defeated at Boroughbridge; and Richard Dunton (), the English prior, the previous heads of the monastery having all been appointed by the Abbot of Cluny. This last-mentioned change was in consequence of the priory having been restored, after its sequestration with the other alien houses in the previous reign, by Richard II., who released it from its subjection to Cluny, made a instead of an monastery of it, and at the same time raised it to the rank of an abbey. was the price of this favour. This was not the only benefit conferred on the house by Prior Dunton : he rebuilt the cloister and refectory, and in covered the nave with lead, made new glass windows in the presbytery, and gilt tables for the high and morning altars. Why he did not stay to enjoy the honours of the abbacy, so peculiarly his own, we know not; just at the period in question he resigned, and John Attilburg was created abbot by Pope Boniface IX., at the request of Richard II. | |
The few brief and incidental notices of the conventual buildings, included in the foregoing pages, are in effect all that have been preserved. The records of incidents connected with the history of the monastery are not much more numerous; but what may be wanting in this respect through the loss of the records, &c. in the general wreck at the dissolution, is more than compensated for by the interest which attaches to those which do exist. The least important we shall dismiss . Provincial Chapters it appears were frequently held here; and the King occasionally used it for important state councils. Thus during the | |
7 | Christmas of , Henry II., immediately after his coronation, held an important meeting here of his nobles, to consult with them on the general state of the country, and the measures it was advisable to adopt. In the reign of Henry III., many of the nobility having determined upon an expedition to the Holy Land, met at , to arrange the order of their journey. Many eminent and noticeable persons were buried in the church; among whom may be mentioned Mary, sister of good quoteueen Maud, before mentioned; Leofstane, provost, shrive (sheriff), or domesman of London, ; and Margaret de la Pole, . In the body of the murdered Duke of Gloucester, (murdered at Calais, there is little doubt, by the order of Richard II., his nephew,) was brought to , and placed in the church, where it remained till the interment in . |
Hospitality was of the duties enjoined upon the inmates of religious houses, and to the last it appears to have been the duty they most constantly and willingly fulfilled. In the cases of persons of high rank the reception of visitors was an affair of great ceremony and importance. had at different times visitors, to whom we may be sure every possible honour was done: the of these was Katherine, the wife of Henry V., the French Princess whom Shakspere has made so familiar to us in connexion with the blunt wooing of her gallant lover, and by her own pleasant attempts as a student of the English language, and who alone perhaps of all her country's children could have so quickly reconquered France from the conqueror, as she now did, by throwing around him the nuptial tie. Few marriages promising so much of state convenience have ended in giving so much individual happiness, as Henry enjoyed with his young and beautiful bride. His early death was grieved by all; his courtiers and nobles wept and sobbed round his death-bed: what, then, must have been feelings at his loss? Fortunately, perhaps, Katherine was not present at the last moment, nor did she learn the dreadful tidings for some days afterwards. It was to receive this distinguished visitor that some years later the monks of were suddenly summoned from all parts of the monastery by the stroke on of the great bells, twice repeated, who, hurrying into the church, robed themselves, and prepared everything for the reception of the new comer. Upon the quoteueen's near approach, of the great bells would ring out a peal of welcome, and then the abbot would advance to meet her, saluting her with his blessing, and sprinkling holy water over her. The procession then entered the church, and made a stand before the crucifix, where the visitor prayed. Service in honour of the Saviour as the patron saint followed; the singing-boys in the choir sang, the organ played, and at the termination of the whole the quoteueen would find the best accommodation the Abbey could furnish provided for her use. She appears to have found all she desired, for she remained at till her death. little incident has been recorded on the subject of her residence here, which is supposed to have been caused in some way by the dissatisfaction of the court at her marriage, with Owen Tudor, a gentleman of Wales, and, through this match, the founder of the Tudor dynasty. On the , her son, the young Henry VI., sent to her at a token of his affectionate remembrance, in the shape of a tablet of gold, weighing ounces, on which was a crucifix set with sapphires and pearls. She was then, no doubt, very ill, | |
8 | for days later she died. There is a striking connexion between this and the next distinguished visitor, Elizabeth of York, a lady who, if not of the most interesting of female characters in herself, is unquestionably so from the circumstances of her strange and eventful history. She came to quite as much a prisoner as a visitor, and she owed that imprisonment to the man whom she herself had been to a considerable extent the means of placing on the throne, |
| Henry VII., the grandson of the widow of Henry V., and of her husband, Owen Tudor. That such women should meet in the same place, to spend the last years of their lives, forms, in our opinion, no ordinary coincidence. The history of Elizabeth of York, though but an episode of that of , is so full of romance, and so closely connected with it, by her imprisonment and death within its walls, that the ancient priory may not improbably be freshly remembered through those circumstances, when all others might have else failed to preserve more than the barest and driest recollections of the great house of the Cluniacs. Her history is, indeed, from to last a romance, but a romance of a stern and melancholy nature; not destitute of sweet passages on which the imagination would love to rest but cannot, for there is always to be seen, through the opening vista of the future, ghastly and monstrous shapes, from which there is no averting the eye. It was on a visit to Jaquenetta, Duchess of Bedford, then married to a husband, Sir Richard Woodville, that Edward IV., the handsomest, most accomplished, and most licentious man of his time, beheld the duchess's daughter, Elizabeth Gray, the widow of Sir John Gray, a Lancastrian, slain at the battle of St. Alban's. The knight's estates had been forfeited to Edward, and the young widow, who is said to have been as eloquent as she | |
9 | was beautiful, availing herself of the opportunity, threw herself at the king's feet, and implored him, for the sake of her innocent and helpless children, to reverse the attainder. The irresistible petitioner rose with more than the grant of what she had asked--the king's heart was hers. Edward, perhaps for the time, was seriously touched; and, to the astonishment of the nation generally, and to the rage of no small portion of the King's own partisans, the Yorkists, the King, some months after, at a solemn assembly of prelates and nobles, in the ancient abbey of Reading, announced his marriage with the widow of the fallen Lancastrian knight; and, amid the surprise which prevailed throughout the assemblage, the King's brother, the Duke of Clarence, and the Earl of Warwick, led the into the hall, and caused her in that character to be welcomed by all present. Thus ends- phase of her history. In the next we behold her again as a widow: but this time her widowhood has brought her new and more anxious public duties; she is not merely a mother, but the mother of the young King Edward V. and of his brother the Duke of York. Into the particulars of the momentous period which includes the death of the young princes in the Tower, of course we are not about to enter; but it may be permitted to us to observe, that few parents ever have endured keener agonies for their children than this unfortunate lady. The wild rumours that so quickly floated about as to the intentions of the Duke of Gloucester, the sudden shedding of the blood of her son and brother at Pomfret (Lords Gray and Rivers), the messages and deputations to and fro between the Protector and at , |
| where she had taken refuge with her youngest son, distracting her with conflicting thoughts- moment fearing to give the young prince up to destruction, the next fearing to bring that destruction on him by indiscreet jealousy, or by thwarting Gloucester's views-all this must have been terrible to the lately-made | |
10 | widow, had nothing remained behind. But when at last, calling for her child, she delivered him up to the Cardinal Archbishop; and, as soon as she had done so, burst into an uncontrollable fit of anguish, she but too rightly felt she had lost both her children. |
In the interval between the death of the princes and that of their murderer, Richard, occurs the most unromantic, and in every way most unsatisfactory, part of the history of whose misfortunes, so unexampled for their severity, make us regret to meet with any incidents that tend to deprive her of our sympathy through the lessening of our respect. Suffice it to say, that whilst at period we find her eagerly engaging in the scheme proposed of marrying the Earl of Richmond to her daughter Elizabeth; at another, when the prospect looked less bright for the exile, she appears to have listened to Richard's overtures, of marrying her daughter Elizabeth to his son, and when that son died, of giving her to himself. Whether there may not have been some dissimulation practised, in the hope of silencing the fears of Richard, who was aware of the project with regard to Richmond, cannot now be known, but the circumstances render such a supposition not improbable. Whatever her conduct at this period, there is, unhappily, no doubt as to her subsequent misfortunes. The king, Henry VII., certainly did redeem the promise as to the marriage made by the Earl of Richmond, but it was done so tardily and so ungraciously, that the very people were disgusted at his conduct; and by their sentiments we may judge of the mother's. But this was not all. In the month of , an extensive insurrection broke out in Ireland, at the head of which was, nominally, a youth who it was pretended was the Earl of Warwick (then in reality confined in the Tower), the son of the late Duke of Clarence, brother to Edward IV. A great council was immediately held at the near Richmond, where, , a general pardon was resolved on, free from all exceptions, and the resolution was (a curious commentary on the ) to arrest Elizabeth Woodville, the quoteueen Dowager. This is altogether of the most inexplicable of those many and subtle strokes of policy that mark the history of the English king, whose it has been well observed, [n.10.1] The queen was immediately arrested, deprived of all her property, and placed a close prisoner in the monastery of . Henry's historian, Bacon, may well observe, for such it appears was the motive for this arrest set forth by the king. No , however, believed in the truth of the allegation; and Bacon, following the chronicler Hall, gives a remarkable explanation of the affair. Having observed that the prompter of the young counterfeit of the Earl of Warwick, a priest, had never seen the latter, he continues, In the words of the old proverb, misfortunes never came single to the unhappy queen: the Marquis of Dorset, her son by her husband, was arrested soon after and thrown into the Tower. At the coronation of the queen, his half-sister, in the following year, he was however released; and was, we believe, present at the ceremony. The mother appears to have been still left to pine away in her enforced solitude at , where she lingered till , when a fatal illness seized her. On her death-bed she dictated the following pathetic will, which is of itself a decisive answer as to the doubts that have been raised concerning the penury of her latest days. It is dated , :-- And thus closes the eventful life of Elizabeth of York. Some years ago, when the workmen were busy in the vaults of Windsor, preparing a place of sepulture for the family of George III., they lighted upon a stone coffin buried feet below the surface. It contained the remains of quoteueen Elizabeth Woodville. | |
has yet another memory in connexion with this unfortunate queen's persecutor, Henry VII., and that illustrates another remarkable trait of his | |
12 | character-his superstitious
piety. If we could trace the secret springs of action that were here at work, we should no
doubt find a close and striking connexion between the King's religious and political character;
the , indeed, being perhaps cherished as a kind of expiation for the
other. His masterly policy was not often a very upright and honourable policy; so, this stroke
was followed by the erection of a chapel, that, by the founding of masses to be said evermore
for his soul, he might keep a tolerably fair reckoning in the great account-book of his
conscience. He is not the only monarch who has endeavoured to keep an by the adoption of a similar kind of offset. Henry was in both the chief features of his character a not unworthy follower of the French Louis XI.; it was fortunate that he did not superadd the cruelty of his crafty original. It appears that an indenture was executed between the King, the city of London, and the abbots of and , some time after the death of his queen, the daughter of quoteueen Elizabeth Woodville, by which the abbot and monks of were to pay annually to those of , for the holding of an anniversary in the church on the in every year, to pray for the good and prosperous estate of the King during his life and the prosperity of his kingdom, also for the souls of his late queen and of their children, of his father, the Earl of Richmond, and his progenitors, and of his mother, the Countess of Richmond, after her decease. Full directions are contained in the indenture as to the mode of performing the ceremony. As a glimpse of what was sometimes doing in the old church, as well as of the old custom itself, the following extract will be found interesting:-- Why , with its reminiscences of his wife's mother, whose soul, be it observed, is not included in the list of souls to be prayed for, should have been chosen by Henry VII. for the solemnization of the anniversary, were a curious problem to solve. |
At the dissolution, the Abbot of had no tender scruples about conscience or principle, like so many of his brethren, but arranged everything in the pleasantest possible manner for the King; and he had his reward. While the poor monks had pensions varying from a-year to /. each allotted them, his amounted to The revenue of the abbey then amounted to . The monastery itself, with the manor, demesnes, &c., the were granted by Henry VIII. to Sir Robert Southwell, knight, Master of the Rolls, who sold them to Sir Thomas Pope, the founder of Trinity College, Oxford. It is to this gentleman that the antiquary's maledictions on the destroyer of the fine old Abbey of legitimately belong. He pulled down the conventual church and most of the other buildings, and erected a mansion on the site; and | |
13 | then, as if satisfied with what he had done, re-conveyed the
mansion with the orchards, gardens, &c., to Sir Robert. The manor he subsequently sold
to a of London. In the mansion built by Sir Thomas Pope afterwards resided the Earl of Sussex, Elizabeth's chamberlain; and here also, it appears from Stow, he died. The old chronicler's account of his funeral is picturesque, as usual. According to the earl's directions, his executors kept open house, as we should now say, for days after his interment. Altogether, this was a tolerably expensive funeral; the burial charges amounting to above , and the housekeeping to |
A walk over the site of the great Abbey of the Cluniacs can now afford little gratification, either to the lover of antiquities or to the man of taste generally. The remains spared till the present century have now mostly disappeared, including the gateway represented in our engraving at the end of this paper. The entire site is pretty well covered with modern houses and dirty streets and courts. The , once perhaps a fine shady avenue, where the abbot or his monks were accustomed to wile away the summer afternoon, is about of the last places that would now tempt the wandering footsteps of the stranger; the no longer leads to the pleasant farm or park of the abbey, and is in itself but a painful mockery of the associations roused by the name; the great or Base Court Yard is changed into , flanked on all sides by small tenements, the handiwork of the builders who completed a few years ago what Sir Thomas Pope began; and though some trees are yet there, of so ancient appearance that for aught we know they may have witnessed the destruction of the very conventual church, yet they are dwindling and dwindling away, as though they felt themselves a part of the old Abbey, and had no business to survive its destruction. They will not have much longer to wait; little remains to be destroyed. In the is a part of the gate-house of the east gateway, with a portion of the rusted hinge of the monastic doors. In , on the right, is a small and filthy quadrangle (once called, from some tradition connected with the visits of the early English monarchs to , King John's Court, now Bear Yard), in which are the houses represented on our commencing page, where the stone-work, and form and antiquity of the windows, afford abundant evidence of their connexion with the monastery. Lastly, in the | |
14 | churchyard of the present church of are some pieces of the wall that surrounded the gardens and church of the Cluniacs. |
But there are other memorials of the Abbey, which are not likely to | |
| perish with the establishment to which they belonged. In the church of St. Mary, a handsome edifice, built on the site of a smaller erected by the monks at a very early period (it is supposed for the use of their servants and tenants), is a very curious ancient salver, of silver, now used for the collection of alms. On the centre is a beautifully chased representation of the gate of a castle or town, with figures, a knight kneeling before a lady, who is about to place his helmet on his head. The long-pointed solleretts of the feet, the ornaments of the arm-pits, and the form of the helmet, are supposed to mark the date of the salver as that of Edward II. The other memorial to which we have referred is of a much more interesting character. In the Chronicle of before mentioned we read at part as follows:-- | |
And again, under the date of , This Earl of Morton was a son of the nobleman mentioned in Domesday. It appears he had as much faith as the monks could have desired in the truth of the miracle, for the Chronicle subsequently states, Before we pursue the history of this Holy Cross, which we have no doubt was the Saxon cross found in the manner commemorated, we may observe that pilgrimages to churches and shrines were, according to Fosbroke, the most ancient and universal of all pilgrimages. If the Saxon cross had not been set up at | |
15 | before Earl Morton's release, it would
assuredly have been raised immediately after. These pilgrimages were remarkably profitable
things to a monastery. Sir David Lindsay, the old Scottish poet and church reformer, has given
us an agreeable account of the feelings and customs once universally prevalent with regard to
this kind of idolatrous worship of which, says the poet finely,--of the Sir David's doctrine obtained wide acceptance; and of the earliest popular manifestations of Protestant feeling was the destruction of all these including, no doubt, many an exquisite and matchless piece of workmanship that the Protestant world of the present day could well wish to have been spared. In the account of Cross is given a description of the striking circumstances that attended the destruction of the Rood of Grace from Kent. The degradation of the Rood of was, it appears, an appendix to that day's proceedings. In an ancient diary of a citizen, preserved among the Cottonian MSS., under the date of , occurs the following passage:--
are the words, not If the reader will turn to the engraving at the end of this paper, he will see, in the front of the building attached to the chief or north gate, the rude representation of a small cross, with some zigzag, ornaments, the whole being evidently something placed upon or let into the wall, not a part of the original building; and there it |
16 |
remained till the comparatively recent destruction of the pile. Going further back, we find the
same cross in the same situation in , when a drawing was made of the remains of the Abbey, which was afterwards
engraved by Wilkinson. There can then, we think, be no doubt, apart from the corroborative
evidence of tradition, that this is the old Saxon cross found near the Thames, or that it is a
part of the before which pilgrims used to congregate in the old conventual church. |
Footnotes: [n.1.1] From the History and Antiquities of Bermondsey, by G. W. Phillips, p. 101. [n.2.1] Londina Illustrata, [n.4.1] The original word villains appears to have meant simply the cultivators of the soil of a villa, or township. Their position was superior to the lowest class, the servi or serfs, for, although their lives and personal property were to a great extent at the disposal of the lord, they had a right of maintenance out of the land, from which they could not be separated; they formed, it is supposed, the origin of the present copyholders. The exact meaning of the word bordar, or bordarii, is unknown. Maitland calls them cottagers. [n.5.1] Monasticon, vol. v. p. 1. [n.10.1] Pictorial England, vol. ii. p. 318. |
