Friaries: The house of White Friars

26. THE HOUSE OF WHITE FRIARS

Nicholas de Meules or de Molis, formerly custodian of Oxford Castle, granted the Carmelite Friars a place near the hospital in Stockwell Street, in the parish of St. George, in 1256, and on 21 August the provincial prior sent Friar John of Rochester to take possession of the site and make arrangements for the new friary. (fn. 1) Before the following February they obtained from Nicholas de Stockwell, sometime mayor of Oxford, an adjacent plot towards the highway. Having secured licence from the Bishop of Lincoln to build an oratory, they came to an agreement with the convent of Oseney, to whom the parish church was appropriated, on 5 February, 1356-7. (fn. 2) The friars engaged that they would not admit the parishioners of the abbot and convent to any sacraments nor do anything to prejudice their rights, without their consent. On certain specified festivals they were to announce publicly in their oratory these conditions. They were to pay yearly 10s. to the said abbot and convent in lieu of tithes, and every five years the prior of the friars was to come to the abbey and swear to observe the terms then set forth. The houses standing between their area and the high road were to remain as before, and if at any time the friars enlarged their site they were to give due compensation to the abbot and convent. The Bishop of Lincoln was empowered to enforce the agreement by ecclesiastical censure. Friar John of Rochester was authorized by the provincial prior to swear to observe these conditions, which he accordingly did before Richard the abbot and others at Oseney on 15 August, 1257, and there is evidence that his successors continued to take the oath. (fn. 3) The Carmelites, notwithstanding this agreement, did not refrain from hearing confessions, and paid no attention to Archbishop Peckham when he prohibited them from so doing in 1280. (fn. 4)

The next addition to their area was a piece of land with buildings on it extending from their place to the king's highway, lying between the land of Nicholas de Stockwell on either side. It had been held of the canons of Oseney by Nicholas the writer. (fn. 5) In 1269 they purchased from the canons of Oseney for 10 marks the annual rent of 10s. for tithes which they were wont to pay them 'from the ground on which their oratory was built, and from the adjacent plot towards the south, which is 40 ft. wide, and extends in length to the Thames.' (fn. 6) From the general inquisition made by Edward I in 1278 it appears that these friars had bought from Nicholas de Forsthull a house which used to render to the prioress of Littlemore 3s.; 'and they have appropriated several tenements, in what way and by what warrant is not known.' (fn. 7) In 1280 they obtained the royal licence to receive, from any persons willing to enfeoff them, as much of the adjoining land as they required for the enlargement of their place, and to hold the same in mortmain. (fn. 8) It was probably in virtue of this licence that they acquired from Richard, 'called Maydeloc,' a piece of ground, 60 ft. by 30 ft., lying between the land formerly of William de Eynsham, and that formerly of Richard Lekam, on which they built their gateway. For this they agreed in 1282 to pay the convent of Oseney 16s. yearly as composition for all tithes and offerings due to the church of St. George in the Castle. (fn. 9)

Meantime the friars had been building their church and houses. For their church they received gifts of oaks from Henry III in 1258, 1266, 1267, 1268, and for their houses in 1259. (fn. 10) Edward I gave them oaks for the church in 1276 and 1286. (fn. 11) A commission of oyer and terminer was issued to R. Fulconis and W. of Amersham, in 1283, touching the evil-doers who broke the door of the Carmelite Friars, beat, wounded, and ill-treated some of the friars and perpetrated other crimes. (fn. 12) This alleged attack may have been connected with the foundation of Gloucester College in 1283 on land claimed by the Carmelites. The prior of the Carmelites brought an assize of novel disseisin against the abbot of St. Peter's, Gloucester, in 1288, the result of which is unknown. (fn. 13)

A chapter of the province was held here on 15 August, 1264, for which the king granted a pittance, (fn. 14) and another in 1289, to the expenses of which Edward I contributed £6 13s. 4d. (fn. 15) The friars received an alms of 4 marks in 1291 from the executors of Queen Eleanor. (fn. 16) Towards the end of the reign of Edward I Nicholas de Cateby was charged with having received books and other goods stolen from the house of the Carmelites at Oxford; he was outlawed for not appearing to answer the charge, and pardoned by Edward II in 1307. (fn. 17)

The early history of the Carmelite school is obscure. Peter de Swaynton is said to have been the first member of the order to receive the doctor's degree at Oxford; (fn. 18) and perhaps John Chelmeston, William of Littlington and William de Paul or Pagham studied there before the end of the thirteenth century. (fn. 19)

In the general chapter of the order held at London in 1312, 'many statutes were enacted especially with reference to the studium at Oxford.' (fn. 20) It would seem that the Carmelites did not support the Friars Preachers in their controversy with the university at this time; for the Friars Preachers complained that Friar Robert of Walsingham, master of the White Friars, entered the schools to dispute at the time when Hugh of Sutton, master of the Black Friars, ought to have disputed; and John de Kerhamfrede, a Carmelite, had licence to incept, while licence was refused to several Dominicans. (fn. 21) Among Robert of Walsingham's pupils was John Baconthorpe, 'the resolute doctor,' 'prince of the Averroists,' who became the doctor of the Carmelite order as Thomas Aquinas was the doctor of the Dominicans, and Duns Scotus of the Franciscan order. Baconthorpe, after studying in Paris, returned to Oxford, where he seems to have influenced Richard FitzRalph and to have propounded views on the subordination of the ecclesiastical to the royal power, which are associated with the names of FitzRalph's contemporary Ockham and his follower Wiclif. Baconthorpe was provincial prior 1329-33; and died 1346. His writings were very numerous and various; as an exponent and defender of Averroes he seems to have had more influence in Italy than in England. (fn. 22)

When Edward II was put to flight at Bannockburn he invoked the Virgin and vowed to found a monastery for the poor Carmelites if he escaped in safety. (fn. 23) The king appears first to have provided 120 marks a year from the exchequer for the support of twenty-four friars of this order at his manor of Shene, (fn. 24) and to have negotiated with the Holy See through the provincial and the prior of the Carmelites at Oxford for the foundation of twelve friaries; (fn. 25) but on 1 February, 1317-18, in fulfilment of his vow, with the assent of the prelates and magnates of the council, in spite of the dissuasions of Hugh le Despenser, he granted to the Carmelites of Oxford the dwellingplace of his manor by the north gate of Oxford beyond the walls, generally known as the palace of Beaumont, with its closes and buildings to hold in frankalmoin to them and their successors celebrating divine service for the souls of the king's progenitors, his own soul, and the souls of all Christians. (fn. 26) On 10 February he removed the friars from Shene to Oxford, and transferred the grant of 120 marks a year to the new house. (fn. 27) The friars seem to have taken possession at once, for about Whitsuntide a scribe named Edward, asserting that he was heir to the throne, came to the royal palace of Beaumont and ordered the Carmelites to depart. (fn. 28) The gift of the manor or palace of Beaumont was confirmed by the pope (May, 1318) and by the Parliament of York (18 October, 1318), the friars being bound to celebrate for the good estate of the king, Queen Isabella, and their children. (fn. 29) The king further gave them, on 28 June, 1318, a small piece of vacant ground lying between their house and the high road—probably Stockwell Street—and permitted them to make a passage, 50 ft. in length and 10 ft. in width, under the high road connecting their new place with their old. (fn. 30) On the same day the king conferred on them two messuages on the east side of Stockwell Street, in the parish of St. Mary Magdalen, which he had acquired from the abbot and convent in Oseney in exchange for a tenement in the parish of St. Peter's in the East. (fn. 31) John XXII, when confirming their new seat, authorized them to sell or exchange their former dwelling-place (May, 1318). (fn. 32) At the king's request the canons of Oseney, as patrons of the church of St. Mary Magdalen, gave them permission to celebrate divine service, and the right of free sepulture for themselves, their servants, and those who elect to be buried there. Robert de Carsington, perpetual vicar of the same church, granted them similar privileges. And all these rights were confirmed by the Bishop of Lincoln 25 February, 1311-12, who shortly afterwards gave the friars leave to have their new place consecrated. (fn. 33)

On 1 June, 1325, licence was granted for the alienation in mortmain to the same friars of the following lands in the suburb of Oxford adjoining their dwelling-place; (fn. 34) by Adam de Brom, king's clerk (founder of Oriel College), 3 acres; by William de Burcestre of Oxford, 2 acres; by the abbot and convent of Oseney, ½ acre; by John de Shirbourn, 1 acre. Further during this reign they acquired from John de Croxford, Philip de Ewe, Richard le Grasier, Isolda de Weston, and John Culvered, divers plots in Oxford containing 1 acre; in 1337 they received pardon for entering on these without licence. (fn. 35) In 1342 the king relieved them from the rent of 3s. 4d., due from cottages acquired by them with licence of Edward II. (fn. 36)

The prior of this house came before the king on 16 October, 1325, and sought to replevy his lands which had been taken into the king's hands for his default before the justices of the bench against Richard Damory, the steward of the royal household. (fn. 37) Richard, as tenant of the fee farm of the hundred without the north gate, (fn. 38) had probably claimed that the friars owed suit at the hundred court. They obtained exemption from this duty in 1342. (fn. 39)

The possession of the royal palace was confirmed to the friars on the accession of Edward III, but the money grant of 5 marks a year for each of the twenty-four friars was withdrawn; the friars petitioned for its renewal in 1330, apparently without success. (fn. 40)

The purlieus of a royal palace were not altogether suitable for a religious house. In 1328 the mayor and bailiffs of Oxford and the bailiffs without the north gate were commanded to remove harlots and other women of bad character from the neighbourhood of the house of the Carmelite Friars, and to prevent houses being let to such persons in future—the friars being hindered in the performance of divine service by the clamour, night and day, caused by the resort of men thither. (fn. 41)

The statutes of the general chapter of the order contain a number of regulations concerning the student friars at Oxford. In 1324 it was enacted at Barcelona (fn. 42) that masters in England, when reading the act, should receive in addition to the board and lodging provided by the convent 100 grossi antiqui; bachelors reading the act, 80; bachelors not reading but residing in the university, 50; other students in the English universities, 30 grossi antiqui. (fn. 43) Each province provided for its students by means of an annual tax. (fn. 44)

In 1336 it was ordained (fn. 45) that no friar of the English province should be sent to Oxford or Cambridge unless six brethren, some of whom must be priors, testified from personal knowledge to his good character; that no friar should keep a servant, except the masters of Paris, the regent masters in the English universities and the English masters lecturing outside their own province (these were allowed to keep one servant each, to be fed at the expense of the convent); that no master at Paris or in England should at his inception spend more than 200 'black solidi of Tours' on feasting and drinking; (fn. 46) further, that every bachelor at Oxford and Cambridge should continue his lectures on the Sentences for two years on pain of losing his place and being incapacitated from proceeding to the degree of master. By a subsequent decree the provincial prior and diffinitores of the provincial chapter had power to dispense with this rule. (fn. 47) The English masters, also, were not bound to take their meals in the common refectory, (fn. 48) and were ex officio members of the provincial chapter. (fn. 49)

In the latter part of the fourteenth century the province was divided into four 'distinctions' or sections—those of London, York, Norwich, and Oxford—and to avoid local rivalries it was arranged that a friar should be chosen from each of these sections in turn to proceed to the degrees of bachelor and master in theology. (fn. 50)

In 1396 Cardinal Landulph, protector of the order, in reply to the complaints of the English friars that some members of the order in England obtained the degree of D.D. without being fit for it, decreed (fn. 51) that every candidate should (1) study arts for seven years, (2) study theology for seven years, (3) lecture on the Sentences for a year in a university, (4) as principal lecturer, lecture on the Sentences for two years, (5) lecture in the next year on the Bible, and (6) respond to the doctors in the wonted manner and afterwards proceed to the degree of master as is customary. These decrees were confirmed by Boniface IX in 1397. They are substantially in agreement with the university statutes, except that the latter demanded from the religious a preliminary study of arts for eight years, of theology for six years. (fn. 52)

Magnates often brought pressure to bear on the university in order to obtain degrees for friars of their household. Thus in 1353 Henry duke of Lancaster petitioned the pope for a faculty for his confessor, William de Reynham, a Carmelite, to incept in theology at Oxford, and after inception to resign at will, any statutes of the university and of the order of Friars Preachers notwithstanding. (fn. 53)

In 1360, when the opposition to the Medicant orders roused by Richard FitzRalph was still at its height, John de Norton, a Carmelite, was summoned before the chancellor's court for some breaches of the peace, and refusing to appear, was punished. With the support of his order, he appealed to the pope; Edward III then came to the help of the university and ordered the provincial prior to stop all appeals against the chancellor's jurisdiction. (fn. 54)

The Mendicant Friars were accused of stirring up the Peasant Revolt in 1381, and the prior of the Oxford Carmelites joined with the heads of the other Mendicant convents at Oxford in an appeal for protection to John of Gaunt; (fn. 55) their letter appears to have been drawn up by Friar Stephen Patrington.

The last quarter of the fourteenth century was evidently a period of great intellectual activity among these friars. At this time Richard of Maidstone, confessor to John of Gaunt, was writing numerous commentaries, translating the Seven Penitential Psalms, taking part in the controversy on evangelical poverty, determining against John Ashwardby, the Wicliffite vicar of St. Mary's. Robert Ormeskirk was writing in defence of his order; Nicholas of Lynn composing his calendar, which Chaucer used in his treatise on the Astrolabe. Richard Lavenham, confessor to Richard II, was writing on logic and physics, the revelations of St. Brigit, and Wicliffite heresies; and John Kynyngham was engaged in controversies with Wiclif and his followers from 1363 till his death in 1399. (fn. 56)

The Carmelites took a prominent part in the opposition to Wiclif and his followers. The following members of their convent at Oxford joined in condemning his doctrines in the council of London: John Kynyngham, John Lovey, Peter Stokes, doctors; John Cheselden, Stephen Patrington, Thomas Legat, bachelors of theology; and John Wrotham, regent of Oxford, was one of the Carmelites at the council of Stamford. (fn. 57) The archbishop commissioned Peter Stokes, whom he knew to have laboured more than all the others against the Lollards, to publish the condemnation of Wiclif's doctrine at Oxford, 28 May, 1382. (fn. 58) The general feeling there was strong in Wiclif's favour; Stokes and his brethren went in fear of their lives, and when the Carmelite doctor 'determined' against Philip Repingdon on 10 June, men were seen in the school with arms concealed under their clothes. (fn. 59) Stephen Patrington, who was chosen twentysecond provincial prior in 1399, was employed as commissary at Oxford against the Lollards in 1414, and was perhaps the original author of the narrative which formed the basis of the Fasciculi Zizaniorum. (fn. 60) This is generally ascribed to the more famous friar, Thomas Netter of Walden, who was a pupil of the Franciscan William Woodford at Oxford, c. 1390, and later (c. 1410?) was engaged in controversies with Peter Payne, the Lollard, at that time principal of St. Edmund Hall. Netter was confessor to both Henry V and Henry VI, and succeeded Patrington as provincial prior in 1417. (fn. 61)

Friar William Clerk of the diocese of Exeter, being deputed lecturer in theology at Oxford, was licensed by Pope Martin V in 1427 to hold a benefice in commendam. (fn. 62)

When Eugenius IV called a general chapter at Rome for the reformation of the Carmelite Order in 1446, the following friars were chosen to represent the 'distinctio' of Oxford—masters John Walton, Walter Hunt, John Stanbery, and the prior of Oxford. (fn. 63) The prior was probably John Milverton (fn. 64) who was provincial 1456-65 and again from 1469 till 1482; he wrote against Reginald Pecock, and was himself accused of heresy and imprisoned by Pope Paul II for three years. Walter Hunt is said to have been one of the chief exponents of the Latin view in the negotiations with the Greek church at the council of Florence, 1439. After this he returned to Oxford, where he spent the remaining forty years of his life. Stanbery was also a theologian of some distinction, confessor to Henry VI, and bishop of Hereford 1453. (fn. 65) Friar Thomas Gloucester was degraded and banished in 1462 for slandering two honourable bachelors of theology in a sermon in the Carmelites' church, to the great disturbance of the university. (fn. 66)

In 1401 Henry IV granted to these friars the land which he had of the grant of John Bokeland, abbot of Oseney, without the north gate of Oxford, between the friars' land on either side, for the enlargement of their dwelling place, which was strait and narrow. (fn. 67)

Henry VI used to stay in the Carmelites' house at Oxford 'as in his own palace.' (fn. 68) The place seems to have had a reputation as a health resort, and persons of distinction took lodgings there when in search of health. Thus John Twynning, abbot of Winchcombe, 'coming to this place to obtain health died among these brethren,' in 1488. (fn. 69) Reginald Pole, when a student at Oxford, lodged at the White Friars, perhaps in right of his royal blood. (fn. 70) It is possible, however, that secular students had rooms in the friary. (fn. 71) One 'Katherine Newcome, widow, living within the house of the Carmelites' is mentioned incidentally in the records of the chancellor's court in 1527. (fn. 72)

Among those buried in the church were Friars John Broxham, thirteenth provincial (1335), Robert Ormskirk (c. 1382), Walter Hunt, (1478), John Spyne (1484), Peter Keninghale, who was prior of the convent 1466, and died 1494; Richard Ferys, who was provincial 1514. (fn. 73) The name of only one secular person buried here seems to have been preserved—William Hampton, burgess of Oxford, 1336. (fn. 74)

Among the benefactors of the house was Thomas Heathfield, mechanic of Oxford, who left to the friars by will in 1373 the tenement in the parish of St. Peter's in the Bailey, after the death of his wife, to the intent that it should be sold and the money paid to the friars for his soul's health. (fn. 75) Robert Mascall, a Carmelite friar and bishop of Hereford, 1404-16, gave lands to the abbeys of Westminster and Eynsham subject to a pension of £4 and £3 respectively to the White Friars of Oxford. (fn. 76) From Durham College, Oxford, they received 10s. a year. (fn. 77) From Oseney Abbey they had 4d. a week and the price of a quarter of an ox at Christmas; (fn. 78) from Godstow nunnery, 3s. 4d. a year and a bushel of oatmeal and a bushel of pease in Lent. (fn. 79) Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford and Essex, left them £10 in 1361, (fn. 80) and they received a large number of small legacies: e.g. 3s. 4d. from John Malden, provost of Oriel in 1401; (fn. 81) 20s. from John Claymond, president of Corpus Christi College in 1537. (fn. 82) Henry VIII gave them £13 6s. 8d. in 1512 for the repair of their church. (fn. 83) The Cordwainers at Oxford kept their light at the White Friars—the payments towards the maintenance of the light appear to have been derived from voluntary subscriptions and to have varied greatly. (fn. 84)

Leland noted several books in the Carmelite library; namely William de St. Amour's treatise against the Mendicant Friars; William Woodford's treatise against the eighteen conclusions of Wiclif, and his three determinations; Dr. Lavenham on the Physics of Aristotle; Robert Walsingham's Quodlibeta, Quaestiones ordinariae and commentaries on the Sentences; Dr. Robert Greystone, a monk of Durham, on the Sentences; the Epistles of Candidus the Arian to Marius Victorinus; Baconthorpe's Commentaries on St. Augustine's De Civitate Dei; the Moniloquium of John of Wales; Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons, Adversus omnes Haereses, in five books; and Thomas Walden's Doctrinale antiquitatum ecclesiae in two volumes. (fn. 85) A volume in the library of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, containing a Latin translation of an Arabic astronomical treatise, was written by order of Peter of Beccles, a Carmelite at Oxford in 1380, (fn. 86) and a copy of St. Jerome's commentaries in the Cambridge University Library seems to have been given to the convent by Friar Walter Hunt. (fn. 87)

On the eve of the dissolution the moral, intellectual, and material condition of the White Friars was far from satisfactory. In 1502 a Carmelite was imprisoned by the proctor for incontinence. (fn. 88) In 1533 a girl of thirteen disguised as a boy was found by the proctors at the White Friars 'in the cubicle of one Browne scholar,' perhaps a secular student having rooms in the friary. (fn. 89)

The long-standing hostility between the White Friars and the monks of Gloucester College broke out 1534-5, and both were bound over to keep the peace. (fn. 90) Of the twenty-four Carmelite Friars whose names appear in the university register between 1505 and 1538, three were D.D.'s of Cambridge and merely supplicated for incorporation at Oxford. The last who proceeded to a degree was John Hurlyston, B.D., of Cologne, who supplicated for the degree of D.D. in December, 1534. From that time no Carmelite appears in the register. (fn. 91)

When Dr. London visited the Oxford friaries in 1538, he wrote (7 July) (fn. 92) that the White and Austin Friars were most out of order, and in such poverty that 'if they do not forsake their houses, their houses will forsake them.' The White Friars' house was ruinous. The prior had already sold the annuity of £3 which the friary received from the abbey of Eynsham to the abbot for £40 and divided the money, and he was now in London trying to make a similar bargain with the abbot of Westminster about the annuity of £4 paid by that abbey. Their land was let for thirty years, and they had begun to sell the elms which grew about their house. Two priors had sold nearly all the jewels and plate, and apart from copes and vestments the rest of their stuff was not worth £5. They petitioned Cromwell on 6 July for licence to change their habits and surrender their house 'in consideration of their poverty, which compels them to sell their jewels, plate, and wood; and will, if they continue, compel them to sell the stones and slates of their house.' (fn. 93) They only waited for the return of the prior to make their formal surrender.

The names of those desiring capacities (31 August, 1538) were (fn. 94) Richard Chesse the prior, John Tyndall and Lawrence Semar, B.D.'s; Thomas Sydall, Bartholomew Blythman, Robert Churleys, John Haynes, and John Bacon, priests; Anthony Fozton and Robert Eston, not in orders. They had not received their capacities on 6 November, 1538, and had to be found in meat and drink. (fn. 95)

The plate sent to London by the visitor consisted of three chalices, a silver ship, two silver cruets, a silver-gilt pax, and a silver-gilt censer. (fn. 96) There was little or no lead. (fn. 97)

Dr. London asked that Mr. Banaster, who though mayor of Oxford had nothing but 4d. a day of the king, might have the site of the White Friars during his lifetime (he was now growing old), and that after his decease it might go to the town. (fn. 98)

This plan was not carried out. The site was let at a rent of £3 4s., (fn. 99) until 1541, when it was granted with the other lands to Edmund Powell of Sandford, county Oxford, gent., for £388 5s. and for certain lands in New Windsor which Powell had given to the king. The site included, besides the house itself, a tenement and garden adjoining the gate, another tenement and garden within the precincts of the friary, a way called the Entry which led from Magdalen parish church to the friary, a stable, a close called the timber-yard containing about 1 acre, 3½ acres of land called Gloucester College close, another close containing 2 acres lying to the south side of the church. (fn. 100)

The greater part of the buildings was pulled down by Powell and his children, much of the stone being carried to St. Frideswide's in 1546; the refectory remained standing till about 1596, and was used as a poor-house for the parish of St. Mary Magdalen; it was then demolished and the materials used to enlarge the library of St. John's College. (fn. 101)

Priors

John of Rochester, (fn. 102) 1256

Roger de Crostweyte, (fn. 103) 1278

Henry, (fn. 104) 1284

William, (fn. 105) temp. Edward I

Hugh de Riseberge, (fn. 106) 1301

William, (fn. 107) 1317

William de Geyton, (fn. 108) 1338

William, (fn. 109) 1416

John Manning, (fn. 110) 1434

John Milverton, (fn. 111) c. 1449

William Stapleherst, (fn. 112) c. 1452

Peter Keninghale, (fn. 113) 1466, 1481

Richard Tertney, (fn. 114) 1499

Peter Nicholas, (fn. 115) 1510

Richard Feris, (fn. 116) 1511

Robert Lawe or Low, (fn. 117) 1521

Richard Chesse or Cheyfe, (fn. 118) 1532, 1538

The seal of the convent in the thirteenth century represents on the right Henry III in a tabard of the royal arms of England, crowned, in the left hand a sceptre, in the right hand a church, which he is delivering to two friars; on the left the Virgin, standing, crowned, the Child on the left arm. Over her head an estoile of six points, at her right side a flowering tree. In base under an arch with carved spandrels an ox passing a ford, to the right. Legend:—

S' COMVNE FRATRE ORDĪI BĒ MARIE DE CARMELO OXONIE (fn. 119)

The seal of the prior, also of the thirteenth century, is pointed oval, and shows the Virgin seated in a canopied niche with trefoiled arch, pinnacled and crocketed, with tabernacle work at the sides; holding the Child on the seat, standing on the right. At the left, the prior kneeling in prayer. In base, under a round-headed arch, an ox couchant, to the right. Legend:—

S' PRIORIS OXONIE ORDINIS CARMELI (fn. 120)