Gleanings among the Castles and Convents of Norfolk

Front matter

INTERIOR OF ANTE-CHAPEL, CASTLE ACRE PRIORY GLEANINGS AMONG THE CASTLES AND CONVENTS OF NORFOLK. BY HENRY HAEROD, F.S.A. LOCAL SECRETARY FOR NORFOLK OF THE SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES AND OF THE ARCHÆOLOGICAL INSTITUTE; CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE NEW ENGLAND HISTORIC-GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY AND LATE HONORARY' SECRETARY OF THE NORFOLK AND NORWICH ARCHÆOLOGICAL SOCIETY. " I do love these ancient ruins We never tread upon them but we set Our foot upon some reverend history."' $arlrjid) : PUBLISHED BY SUBSCRIPTION. M.DCCC.LVII. Norwich : Printed by C. Mi.-sk.ett, Uld Haymarket.

Preface

From the year 1845 to the beginning of the present year I held the office of Honorary Secretary to the Norfolk and Norwich Archæological Society, the General Meetings of which were held either in Norwich or some town in the county, from which an excursion could be made to one or other of the most interesting of the Antiquities of the district. In the arrangement of these meetings I took a somewhat active part; and with the view of making our gatherings as useful as possible, I " gleaned " all the information I could, as well from the buildings and remains themselves, as from all the public and private records to which I was permitted access. The result was the accumulation of a large mass of notes and a series of careful surveys, made on the spot and usually aided by excavations. These surveys have been reduced and placed with my gleanings of history in this volume, which I had intended to mark the first stage of my Archæological researches, to be succeeded in after years by more worthy contributions

PREFACE.

. to the History of the County. But it has been otherwise ordered, and my first volume will, in all probability, be my last. I cannot hope that my plans are faultless, but I have taken ail possible pains to verify them, feeling conscious that their chief value must be in their fidelity ; and to ensure accuracy to the best of my power, the colouring of the Monastic Plans has been chiefly done either by my own hand or under my own eye. I must most gratefully acknowledge the ready assistance afforded me on almost every hand. More particularly am I indebted to the Committee of the Archæological Institute for the loan of the Walsingham woodcuts, and that of St. Ethelbert's Gate, Norwich; to the Committee of the Norfolk Society for most of those of Thetford ; and to Mr. Enfield, of Norwich, for the plate of the Prior of Walsingham's door.

In one particular I have failed in my promise to my Sub scribers, for which I must apologise : I had proposed to in clude a Plan and Notes on Yarmouth Priory in this volume, but, unfortunately, my measurements and notes have been mislaid and are now nowhere to be found. As I am now bringing my active connection with Archæ ology to a conclusion, I may be pardoned for recurring to one subject on which I have felt very strongly, and which I should rejoice to see taken up with more spirit and deter mination by Antiquaries than it has hitherto been. I allude to what is usually called Restoration — particularly Church Restoration. I say it is so called, because it generally is no such thing — it is Destruction.

PREFACE.

. V When we are engaged in preparing such extensive and admirable repositories for our written records, it is most strange that the public feeling is so supine about our an cient monuments. The public is fully alive to the importance of preserving our ancient manuscripts intact : the value of an original over a facsimile, be the latter ever so good, is at once seen and appreciated ; but our more material records in wood and stone are suffered to be destroyed and replaced by at best poor imitations of ancient art, not only without censure, but in many cases with approbation. Meanwhile the evil goes on increasing, and in the course of another half cen tury, unless public opinion can be brought to bear upon the matter, there will scarcely be any ancient buildings left in the land. In dealing with an increasing evil like this, nothing is to be done except by earnest, steady, uncompromising energy ; any other course only serves to produce irritation, without any compensating results.

I had hoped, with many others, that the Society of Antiquaries was about to rouse itself and to deal energetically with the giant evil. But, alas ! the Council having delivered itself in the year 1855 of a strong Resolution, has apparently ceased to trouble itself with the difficult task. This Resolution, I submit, with all due deference, ought to have been followed up by strong representations in every quarter where the matter could have been dealt with, and some feasible plan suggested for a supervision and conserva tion of our ancient monuments; and I still hope, although much valuable time has been lost, that the Council will yet VI

PREFACE.

. bestir itself on a subject of such national importance. For our Churches are not only records of the History of English Architecture, but also of the History of the Church itself; and I would myself deal as gently with works of the Eliza bethan and Jacobean periods as with the works of earlier times, except where they are undoubted obstructions to Public Worship. In one of our Norfolk churches, a few years ago, the chancel remained as arranged during the period of the Com monwealth : the table was in the centre, and seats round it. I believe there is scarcely another example in the kingdom. This arrangement offered no obstruction to the decent per formance of our present ceremonies ; and I confess I cannot enter into the feelings of those who could view it as offensive, and would insist on the table being placed close to the east wall and the rest of the chancel re-arranged.

Before I close my observations on this subject, an instance or two may be named of the proceedings of Restorers. A large and fine church in the county has an able and energetic minister. It was cumbered from end to end with ugly pews. A large sum of money was raised, the pews were removed and their place supplied by oaken benches. Now if there be one feature of the arrangements of our Norfolk churches which may be called a prevailing charac teristic, it is in the use of the poppy-head benching. I know none, where the slightest remains of early benching have been left, where it was otherwise. This church has now benching, of a pattern common, I am told, in Somersetshire, although large remains of the bench ends among the pews shewed it to have been arranged originally after the Norfolk

PREFACE.

. VII fashion. And this is called Restoration, and was done under the supervision of an eminent architect ! I will name another instance which came under my notice of a projected Restoration. It is of a small, but beautiful, country church, to which much has been judiciously done of late years, the fabric being sound in every part, and cal culated, with occasional repairs, to last for centuries; and there is ample accommodation for any congregation likely to be gathered there. But the incumbent has become an "Ec clesiologist," and now proposes to destroy a screen dividing the church from the chancel, having figures of saints painted on the panels, and to erect in lieu thereof a fine, open iron work screen, nearly filling the arch. An arch is to be made in the north wall of the chancel, and a vestry — I beg pardon, a "Sacristy" — built.

Within the arch an organ is to be placed. Chancel seats, of approved mediæval design, are to be constructed, from one of which the incumbent is to read or intone the service, the reading-desk — sad relic of Puri tanism ! — being already done away with; an ancient and curious family pew is also doomed to destruction. The east window is to be renovated and filled with stained glass ; and silken hangings are to adorn the walls around the altar ! And this is Restoration ! Restoration to what ? It should be stated, too, that in the instances I have named and in a vast number of others, there is no pretence that the space is inadequate for the wants of the congregation : the plea advanced is simply that of a desire to restore. That a feasible plan of church conservation might be adopted, I have no doubt. Meanwhile, much might be done if appointments to Deaneries and Archdeaconries were made

PREFACE.

. with some reference to the fitness of the persons appointed to undertake one of the most important duties of those offices. Among the present holders of such offices, and I say it with all possible respect, a knowledge of architecture and a re vcreuce for ancient art is the exception, and not the rule. It has been thought that much might be done by the Archæological Societies. My experience has convinced me that it is not so. The manner in which, during my official career, the most respectful representations, the mildest observations, in opposition to the views of the Restorers were received, would, I feel sure, if made public, amply confirm me in that assertion. I have now done with this subject, and remit it to the consideration of those who have the power and the desire to deal with it as its importance deserves.

May a large measure of success crown their efforts ! ILLUSTRATIONS. Interior of Ante-Chapel, Castle Acre Priory . . . Frontispiece Plan of Thetford Priory Page 1 Gate-house, ditto 1 Hollar's View of Thetford Priory . , 11 Martin's Plan of ditto 12 Interior, North-west Tower of ditto, looking East . . ' . . 14 Interior, West End of ditto 16 Base in Choir of ditto 19 Triforium Window in Apse, ditto 20 Mouldings found near the Chapter-house, ditto ..... 22 Gate-house, Rising Castle 25 Plan of Rising Castle 43 Interior of ditto, with Chapel, Gate, &c. 44 Plans of Hedingham Castle 46 Plan of Chapel, Rising Castle 51 Great Tower, ditto, from the South-east 53 Ground-Plan of Great Tower, ditto 54 Plan of Upper Floor of ditto 56 North Window, ditto ... 57 Great Tower of ditto, from the North-west 60 Plan of Black Friars, Norwich 71 Central Tower of ditto, from King's View 71 South Door of St. Andrew's Hall 77 South Walk of Cloister, Black Friars, Norwich .... 91 Chapel of St. Thomas a Becket, ditto 94 Door in Chapel, ditto 95 Gateway, Castle Acre 97 Plan of Earthworks and Castle, Castle Acre ..... 100 Kerrich's Sketch of ditto, from the East X ILLUSTRATIONS.

Plan of Castle Acre Priory Page 107 Mouldings of West Door, ditto . ' 107 Interior of West End, ditto 112 Chapter-house and Dormitory, ditto, from the Cloister . . . .115 West Side of Priory, 1786 123 Wilkins' Plan of Norwich Castle 126 Cleer's Plan, 1696, ditto 128 Restoration of Earthworks, ditto 133 Braun's View of Norwich Castle, 1581 146 Norwich Castle and Sessions House, 1786 149 from an Engraving of the Eighteenth Century . . 154 Plan of Walsingham Priory I55 Arms of Walsingham Priory, impaling Vowel 155 Interior of Refectory, ditto 159 Excavations at the West End of Walsingham Priory Church . . 171 Well in Common Place, Walsingham 174 Stone Drinking Pot, Walsingham 176 Seal of Walsingham Priory 177 Door of the Prior of Walsingham's Norwich House .... 179 Walsingham Badges 180 Plan of Binham Priory 198 Interior, West End of North Aisle, Binham Priory . . . .205 Details of ditto 206 South Transept, Binham Priory 207 Plan of Buckenham Priory 213 Plan of New Buckenham Castle 215 Plan of Bromholm Priory 220 Interior of Chapter-house and Dormitory, ditto 226 General View from the South-east, ditto 229 Chapter-house, from the North-east, ditto 232 Plan of Norwich Cathedral Priory 233 St. Ethelhert's Gate, ditto 233 Section of one Compartment of the Nave, Norwich Cathedral . . 271 Miserere (No. 32) Norwich Cathedral 280 (No. 41) ditto 282 (No. 12) ditto 285 Arch beneath the Bishop's Throne, East End of Choir, ditto . . 288 East End of Easter Sepulchre, ditto 290 West End of ditto PRELIMINARY NOTE.

The Plans of Monastic Buildings have all been made to one uniform scale, and the different styles of the various parts of them indicated by the like colours in each. Thus in all — Norman is Black Early English „ Blue Decorated ,, Green Perpendicular ,, Red ; and where, as in one or two instances, I have been obliged to complete my plans from former surveys, the additions so made are indicated by a brown colour. The Monastic Buildings are all laid down to one scale, the Castles and Earthworks to another, the latter being much the smaller. No advantage seemed likely to accrue from having them uniform ; but the size of the Monasteries can be readily compared, and the relative proportions of the Castles seen at a glance. THETFORD PRIORY. • %//o)-rnan. m ÆarlyÆnglish. ■ I'erpendxtu.la.r. f&uy Cfjetforti $rtorp.

The plan on the opposite page is reduced from an accurate survey of the remains of the Benedic tine Priory of Thetford, after extensive excavations made in 1849. The materials for a History of this Priory are not very extensive, but sufficient information may be gathered from various sources to enable us to judge of its original extent, and to fix the period of most of the subsequent alterations and additions to the buildings. A fragment of a History of the Priory, by Geoffrey de Rocherio, Prior from 1355 to 1370, is very full and particular about the foundation of it, and is amply confirmed by other documents of early date. He relates, and the foundation deed confirms him, that Roger Bigod was the founder; and that twelve Cluniac B monks, with Malgod the Prior, were first placed in the church of Saint Mary the Great, which church had been, during the arrangements for the removal of the see to Nor wich, the Cathedral Church of the Diocese.

They arrived, says Geoffrey, on the 4th of July, 1104,* amidst great re joicing, and for three succeeding years laboured hard at the buildings of the monastery adjacent to that church. At that period Malgod was recalled, and Stephen, who is much ex tolled by Geoffrey, was sent from Lewes to replace him. He no sooner reached Thetford than, disapproving the site, he stirred up the founder and the king (who was then at Thet ford), and it was agreed to remove the establishment forth with to a more open space on the Norfolk side of the river, to the site on which it now stands. The founder died in 1107; and as he had directed his body to be buried in this monastery, the prior was much perplexed on finding the bishop had possession of it, and had determined to bury it at Norwich; he made strong efforts to carry out the direction of the founder, but to no purpose, for the bishop insisted that he had directed to be interred at Norwich, he, his wife, children, and barons, before the monks came to Thetford ; and to the bishop's determination the Prior of Thetford was obliged to submit.

Geoffrey's narrative terminates in the midst of his relation of the dispute about the body, and it is from Bartholomew Cotton that we learn the bishop succeeded in his design and retained the founder's body. There was no great and dis interested affection for the deceased noble on the part of either bishop or prior : it is to be feared the lucre of gain was the great moving cause of the anxiety evinced to possess the * Blomefield adds in a note (8vo. edition, Vol. II. p. 102) " Most writers say 1103," but in Brame's "Chronology of Memorable Events to the year 1399," in the library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, is the following entry : " Anno gr'e M. C. & I. Constructs Mo'sterii S'te Marie de Thetford." Brame was a monk of this house. THETFORD PRIORA'. body. Herbert was anxious to secure so valuable a source of revenue as the celebration of masses, the offerings, and commemorations of so great and wealthy a man, would as suredly bring to his own foundation at Norwich, and the prior had similar designs for Thetford.

On Saint Martin's day, 1114, the monks removed to their new monastery, and it must about this time have been con secrated. The following characteristic letter from the bishop relates to it. Herbert to the Brethren at Thetford. Assuredly, Sirs, I would willingly consecrate the court of your new church ; but, my friends, that may not be done without the knowledge and permission of the king, lest perchance, after the completion of the consecration of the new cloister, some dispute should arise between us with re gard to the dues of the cloister of the old church. For if the king were to hear of any commotion, however trifling, occurring between us through any rash step on my part, he would have good grounds for feeling angry at my disturbing, by my imprudent precipitation, the order which he himself had appointed.

I beg you, therefore, wait until I shall have spoken with the king or his justices, since I cannot without this venture upon the consecration which you require, unless, the privileges being transferred to the new church, you ab solutely and without ambiguity of words restore us our an cient episcopal rights ; then without fear or hesitation I will obey you.* Whether his hesitation was got over by plain speaking, or by communication with the king or his justices, does not appear, but we have another letter fixing the day. * Epistolæ de Herberti de Losinga : Brussels, 1846. Epist. II. p. 5. B Herbert to Stephen the Prior. Certain business matters compel me to hasten the conse cration of your cloister, for I fear if I should again defer it you might impute it to inclination rather than necessity.

On Sunday, therefore, according to your desire, both your chapel and cloister shall be consecrated. Cause this to be generally made known in your vicinity during the four days preceding.* We learn no more of Prior Stephen further than that he fulfilled the promise of his earlier days and ruled his mon astery with vigour and judgment: he is said to have died about 1130, and to have been succeeded by a prior named Constantine. No regular list of the succeeding priors exists ; that given by the editors of the new edition of Dugdale's Monasticon seems to be carefully compiled, and is inserted at the end of this paper. It will be seen that a prior named Stephen occurs in 1240, and again in 1257. If a tale told by Mathew Paris be true, there must have been two of this name successively, for under the year 1248 he tells a sad story of the state of discipline here.

" In the month of December in this year (1248) the Prior of Thetford, a Savoyard by birth and a monk of Clugny, who declared himself to be a relation or kinsman of the queen, and had assumed airs of pride from that circumstance, invited his brothers, Bernard, a knight, and Guiscard, a clerk, to come to his house at Thetford. There he remained, according to custom, the Avhole night till cock-crow, indulging in immoderate eating and drinking with them, and, forgetting his matin devotions, seldom did he trouble himself to be present at mass, even at the little masses ; seldom did he ap pear at canonical hours. If the cry of the hungering poor sounded in his ears, this was a minor care in his breast ; and * Epistolæ de Herberti de Losinga. Epist. whenever Bernard, one of his said brothers, went away, Guiscard, the other, stayed longer Avith him and swallowed up all the food of the monks in the Charybdis of his belly, and afterwards, when well gorged, despised and loaded them with insults.

Whilst the said prior, then, was thus enter taining his brothers, who had borne the toil and heat of the day, in a manner unbecoming to him, and was disgracefully wasting the substance of his little church, transgressing as was stated the bounds of all moderation in his gluttony, a dispute and strife arose between him and one of his monks, a Welshman by birth. This monk, whom he, the prior, had some little time before summoned from Ciugny, he was now endeavouring to send back thither against his will, not out of charity, but from hatred, although the said monk opposed the proceeding and excused himself on reasonable grounds. But when the prior, with a loud voice, swore horribly that the said monk should proceed on a pilgrimage with the scrip and wallet, this demoniac monk, inflamed Avith violent anger, or rather with madness, drew a knife and plunged it into the prior's belly, without the least hesitation at perpetrating such a crime within the precincts of the church.

The wounded prior, with the very death-rattle in his throat, endeavoured to call the monks to his aid by his cries, or at any rate to arouse them, but he was unable to do so, owing to the stop page of the arteries, whereon the said monk again rushed upon him, and with heavy blows, three or four times repeated, buried the knife up to the handle in his lifeless body. The author of this crime was seized by persons who came to the spot, and, being well secured, was committed to prison. When the circumstance came to the knowledge of the king, worried by the continual complaints of the queen, he ordered the murderer to be chained, and, after being deprived of his eyes, to be thrown into the lowest dungeon in the castle of Norwich. These occurrences having been mentioned by an enemy of the monks as an opprobrium to religious men, a CASTLES AND CONA'ENTS OF NORFOLK. certain person, a friend to them and a lover and special ad vocate of religion, said in reply, ' Amongst the angels the Lord found a rebel ; amongst the seven deacons, a deviator from the right path ; and amongst the apostles, a traitor ; God forbid that the sin of one or of a few should redound to the disgrace of such a numerous community.' This shows, if true, that the convent had fallen into a bad state.

Still, however, the Bigods remained stanch friends, and many of the family were buried there. About the middle of the thirteenth century an improve ment took place in the position and prospects of the monastery, brought about either by miraculous interposition or by the grossest imposture, acting upon the most degrading credulity and superstition. A Thetford mechanic, in an incurable state of disease, dreamt three times successively that the Blessed Virgin appeared to him and admonished him, if he desired to obtain his health, to tell the prior to build a chapel to the honor of her name on the north side of the church, near that which had been lately repaired. When the prior had heard the wonderful circumstance he was filled with astonishment, and, possibly, because the revelation had not been made in a direct manner to himself, he endeavoured to compromise matters by building a timber chapel.

The man persisted in his visits to the monastery, as the Virgin would have stone and cement and no timber. Whether he would have been successful or not, is not very certain ; but on one of these occasions, the prior being absent, he fell in with an ancient monk and treated him with a vision of a glorious cross upon a stone, where the principal column was to be placed. Still the prior delayed; other equally convincing revelations followed, and he set about the work in earnest. And then a new marvel appeared. There had been a wooden image of the Virgin in the old church, prior to the removal of the see, which the monks had brought with them to their new church, but in course of time this was removed to make way for one of greater beauty, and thrust into an obscure corner. The prior, who seems to have been an economist, bethought him of this old image for the new chapel, and it was put into the painter's hands to be new painted and ornamented.

The decayed paint being taken off the head, a silver plate was found, beneath which, being removed, the reliques of many saints appeared, wrapped in lead, with their names engraved thereon, and well it was so. For who would else have recognized relics of the purple robe of our Lord, of the Virgin's girdle, of the Lord's sepulchre, of the rock of Calvary, of the sepulchre of Saint Mary, of the Lord's manger, of the earth found in the sepulchre of Saint John the Evangelist, of Saint George, of the hair of Saint Agnes, of the wooden coffin of Saint Edmund, and also of Saint Etheldreda ? These particulars, Brame states, were contained in a letter addressed to Stephen the Prior, by William, minister of the church at Merlesham, who sent these relics at the request of Hugh Bigot and the devout application of a monk named Ralph.

There were many other relics of saints beside those named, whose names and merits, says Brame, " God knows, but we, out of regard for truth, should not presume to mention." * * Brame's manuscripts form a small volume in the library at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. By far the greater portion of it is taken up with the history styled by Nasmith (in his Catalogue of the manuscripts in that library) " porro fabulosa in qua tempore Britonum frequens Normanniæ et Saracenorum mentio"— the History of one " Waldeus, King of Norfolk and Suffolk." This is divided into six parts, and these parts into many chapters, and relates his adventures in England and Spain and divers countries. King AValdeus and his adventures may be fabulous : Brame states he translated them out of French and English into Latin ; and it does appear as if several distinct histories had been woven into one.

Still it is worthy of a more careful examination than it has hitherto received ; a good deal of truth may be extracted from the mass of fable. For instance, many places are named as places of strength and importance shortly after the departure of the Romans from Britain, which have for ages ceased to be so, although with regard to some a great deal of corroborative evidence Forthwith miracles began. A Thetford woman overlaid her child ; it was laid before the image, and the mother wept and scourged herself. When her prayers had ceased, the child revived, and seemed likely to live ! Another woman, to the joy possibly of her neighbours, lost the use of her tongue ; the Woolpit Virgin was recommended, and money given her to offer there. The Thetford image was preferred, and a cure effected. The third and last, and, as Brame affirms, the most remarkable one, was in the case of a child three years old, of Wm. Heddrick, jun., carpenter, and Isabell his wife, who lived at exists, whilst in others a floating shadow of a tradition alone remains.

The tale opens with a statement as to the building of Castor by the Romans, and how, after they abandoned Britain, the Britons began quarrelling and fight ing with each other, and how, ultimately, his hero, AValdeus, established himself as King of Norfolk and Suffolk. He then speaks of the building of the "City" of Attleburgh, which town, there is little doubt, did rise into importance then or shortly after. Narburgh is a strong place, where he gathers his host together to fight a Count Okenard. At Browncaster (Bran caster) he disposes of one Urry. Martin extracts (History of Thetford: Appendix, p. 128) the whole twenty-eighth chapter of the second part, which relates the fight between Thetford and Roudham ; certain kings, Roud, Knoud, and others, being the antagonists of AValdeus. It is described in a spirited manner.

In this battle Roud and Knoud are slain. The battle field is pointed out as about three miles from Thetford, not far from a certain marsh. The kings are buried there, and on this account the people of the province afterwards built a chapel on the spot ; and because one of them ■was Roud, some time king of Thetford, they called the next town Roudham. This locality abounds in Roman-British remains. As a matter almost of course, in a tale of this period, Merlin is introduced ; Uther Pendragon too. The relation of a reconciliation between AValdeus and " Sweyn," which occurs shortly after, certainly seems " porro fabulosa." Elvedon is the site of another battle. In the fourth part Waldeus goes, during a siege at Thet ford, to the church of Saint Martin, and thence to his palace. Saint Martin's was one of the oldest churches in Thetford, if not the very oldest, was on the Suffolk side of the river, and had ceased to exist in Brame's time.

Of the remainder of the volume, Martin has printed all but the " Chrono logia rerum memorabilium ab incarnatione verbi ad annum 1399," which contains nothing of local interest. Hockham. This child was run over by a cart and killed out right. Notwithstanding this confident assertion, however, some seem to have doubted, and the opinion of an eminent medical man of Hockham was requested. He observed no symptom of life. They therefore prepared for the funeral, praying and watching, and at length vowing to the Holy Mother of God, that if by her intercession the child should be restored, father and mother would go on a pilgrimage to the image of the Virgin at Thetford, and make the usual offering, but with a very unusual and indecorous casting off of garments. Strange to say, the child revived at midnight, and, stranger still, they were permitted to perform the obli gation they had laid themselves under.