Harrold Priory
Encyclopedia
Harrold Priory was a priory in Harrold
, Bedfordshire
, England
. It was established in 1138 and disestablished in 1536.
, with a few canons, to protect or guide the sisters 'according to the institutions of St. Nicholas of Arrouaise.' The priory has some distinguished names amongst its earlier benefactors. Sampson le Fort's charter was probably confirmed first by David I of Scotland
and his son Henry, Earl of Huntingdon
, and certainly afterwards by Malcolm IV
, William the Lion
, Simon, Earl of Northampton
, and Robert Bruce; while Baldwin des Ardres, Count of Guisnes, granted to the nuns the church of Stevington
before 1153, and the name of Roger de Quincy
, constable of Scotland, appears later.
Before the year 1181 however the prior and canons had ceased to exist, and the nuns were making efforts to free themselves from immediate subjection to the abbot of Arrouaise; and after appeals from both parties to Pope Alexander III
the matter was finally referred to the arbitration of Hugh of Lincoln
. Robert of Bedford, the precentor
of the cathedral, was sent to treat with the abbot of Missenden
, who was acting as proctor to the abbot of Arrouaise; and the result of his negotiations was that Gervase set the nuns free for ever from subjection to the parent abbey, and yielded to them the two churches of Harrold and Brayfield
, with all the other gifts of Sampson le Fort, on condition that they paid half a mark yearly to the abbot of Missenden. Thenceforward until the dissolution
the convent was ruled by a prioress, having sometimes a warden or master, like other small houses of nuns, and at one time a few lay brothers. Of the number of the nuns there is no indication until the very end, when there were only six at the outside. Nor is it easy to discover whether in giving up their direct connection with the abbey of Arrouaise, they ceased at once to observe the Arrouasian rule and to wear the habit of that order; or whether, as seems more likely, the change was later. At the dissolution they were reckoned as ordinary Austin canonesses
. The house has very little history of any kind. The chartulary in the British Museum
, which contains an abstract of the charters in the possession of the priory in the reign of Henry V
, shows various small grants of lands and tenements in Bedfordshire, and a few suits concerning churches. The latest item of importance is an account of the impropriation
of the church of Shakerstone
in 1416. Early in the thirteenth century the advowson
of the priory was probably held by Ralf Morin of Harrold and his son John, and in 1279 certainly by Sir John de Grey. The name of Sir Gerard Braybrook occurs frequently in some later charters. The last patron of all was Lord Mordaunt of Turvey, one of whose ancestors had witnessed a foundation charter of the priory. The house was probably never very rich, though no exact statement of its income can be made earlier than the dissolution.
During the time of Bishop Sutton
, in 1298, a nun of Harrold was found guilty of a breach of her vow of chastity; and in 1311 Bishop Dalderby
issued a commission for the visitation
and correction of this house amongst others. No account of this visitation is preserved, nor are any others recorded; only in 1369 Bishop Gynwell
appointed Dame Katherine of Tutbury (afterwards prioress) to administer the revenues of the priory during vacancy, and to reform excesses. It may be that during her term of office the house was well governed, and had a better reputation; but this is of course mere conjecture. The name of this prioress and her successor, Emma Drakelowe, are found in many of the charters relating to tenements and leases in the chartulary. Nothing further is known of the state of the priory, internal or external, until it was visited by Richard Layton
in 1535, with other houses in Bedfordshire. If the accusations contained in his letter to Thomas Cromwell
were true, the priory had certainly ceased to be in any real sense a religious house. He declared that he found there a prioress and four or five nuns, of whom one had 'two fair children' and another 'one child and no more'; and also describes how Lord Mordaunt had induced the prioress and her 'foolish young flock' to break open the coffer containing the charters of the priory, and to seal a writing in Latin of which they did not understand a word, but were told it was merely the lease of an impropriate benefice. 'All say they durst not say him nay,' he adds; 'and the prioress saith plainly that she would never consent thereto.'
In the case of Chicksand, which is charged with similar misdoings in the same letter, the very form and content of the accusation challenge criticism at once. But if the charges laid against Harrold are denied, it can only be on the simple ground that Layton is a discredited witness. There is no actual evidence for or against his statements. But unhappily there is nothing at all improbable in the story of Lord Mordaunt and the charters. The patron of a house so small and so poor would be in a position to take a very high hand with the little convent, especially as one or two of the nuns would very likely be members of his own family. However this may be, the house was certainly dissolved under the Act of 1536
, and a pension of £7 assigned to the prioress, Elinor Warren.
The priory was endowed by Sampson le Fort with the churches of St. Peter, Harrold, and Brayfield, Northants, with their appurtenances
, and a few acres of land besides. The church of Stevington was added soon after, and that of Shakerstone (Leicester) in the fifteenth century. No statement can be made as to the value of its lands in the thirteenth century, as it is not mentioned at all in the Taxatio of Pope Nicholas
, nor in the Feudal Aids
. The total income of the priory in 1535 was £40 18s. 2d.; the first valuation after the dissolution, in 1536, amounted to £57 10s., including the four rectories mentioned above, with small parcel of land, rents and tenements in the counties of Bedford, Huntingdon and Buckingham.
Harrold Hall was built on the site by Francis Farrar between 1608 and 1610.
, standing, in mitre
and chasuble
, two keys in the right hand and a crosier
in the left. The legend is very indistinct, only the last two words being legible . . . PETRI CATENAS.
Harrold, Bedfordshire
Harrold is a civil parish and electoral ward in the Borough of Bedford within Bedfordshire, England, around nine miles north-west of Bedford. The village is on the north bank of the River Great Ouse, and is the site of an ancient bridge, linking the village with Carlton with Chellington on the...
, Bedfordshire
Bedfordshire
Bedfordshire is a ceremonial county of historic origin in England that forms part of the East of England region.It borders Cambridgeshire to the north-east, Northamptonshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the west and Hertfordshire to the south-east....
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. It was established in 1138 and disestablished in 1536.
History
The priory of Harrold was probably founded on land which was then a part of the honour of Huntingdon, and held by Sampson le Fort of the Scottish kings. The site of the priory with the churches of St. Peter, Harrold, and Brayfield (Northants) was originally granted to Gervase, abbot of St. Nicholas of Arrouaise, that he might send there some nuns of his order: they were at first governed by a priorPrior
Prior is an ecclesiastical title, derived from the Latin adjective for 'earlier, first', with several notable uses.-Monastic superiors:A Prior is a monastic superior, usually lower in rank than an Abbot. In the Rule of St...
, with a few canons, to protect or guide the sisters 'according to the institutions of St. Nicholas of Arrouaise.' The priory has some distinguished names amongst its earlier benefactors. Sampson le Fort's charter was probably confirmed first by David I of Scotland
David I of Scotland
David I or Dabíd mac Maíl Choluim was a 12th-century ruler who was Prince of the Cumbrians and later King of the Scots...
and his son Henry, Earl of Huntingdon
Earl of Huntingdon
Earl of Huntingdon is a title which has been created several times in the Peerage of England. The title is associated with the ruling house of Scotland, and latterly with the Hastings family.-Early history:...
, and certainly afterwards by Malcolm IV
Malcolm IV of Scotland
Malcolm IV , nicknamed Virgo, "the Maiden" , King of Scots, was the eldest son of Earl Henry and Ada de Warenne...
, William the Lion
William I of Scotland
William the Lion , sometimes styled William I, also known by the nickname Garbh, "the Rough", reigned as King of the Scots from 1165 to 1214...
, Simon, Earl of Northampton
Earl of Northampton
Earl of Northampton is a title that has been created five times.-Earls in for the Honour of Huntingdon, first Creation :*Waltheof *Maud, Countess of Huntingdon** m. Simon I de Senlis** m...
, and Robert Bruce; while Baldwin des Ardres, Count of Guisnes, granted to the nuns the church of Stevington
Stevington
Stevington is a village in the Borough of Bedford in the northern part of Bedfordshire, England, and forms the civil parish of Stevington. It is on the River Ouse four to five miles north west of Bedford. Nearby villages include Bromham, Oakley, Pavenham and Turvey...
before 1153, and the name of Roger de Quincy
Roger de Quincy, 2nd Earl of Winchester
Roger de Quincy, 2nd Earl of Winchester was a medieval nobleman who was prominent on both sides of the Anglo-Scottish border, as Earl of Winchester and Constable of Scotland....
, constable of Scotland, appears later.
Before the year 1181 however the prior and canons had ceased to exist, and the nuns were making efforts to free themselves from immediate subjection to the abbot of Arrouaise; and after appeals from both parties to Pope Alexander III
Pope Alexander III
Pope Alexander III , born Rolando of Siena, was Pope from 1159 to 1181. He is noted in history for laying the foundation stone for the Notre Dame de Paris.-Church career:...
the matter was finally referred to the arbitration of Hugh of Lincoln
Hugh of Lincoln
Hugh of Lincoln was at the time of the Reformation the best-known English saint after Thomas Becket.-Life:...
. Robert of Bedford, the precentor
Precentor
A precentor is a person who helps facilitate worship. The details vary depending on the religion, denomination, and era in question. The Latin derivation is "præcentor", from cantor, meaning "the one who sings before" ....
of the cathedral, was sent to treat with the abbot of Missenden
Missenden Abbey
Missenden Abbey was an Augustinian monastery founded in 1133 in Great Missenden, Buckinghamshire, United Kingdom. It was ruined in the Dissolution of the Monasteries and the ruins later incorporated into a Georgian mansion.The abbey has been owned by Buckinghamshire New University since the mid...
, who was acting as proctor to the abbot of Arrouaise; and the result of his negotiations was that Gervase set the nuns free for ever from subjection to the parent abbey, and yielded to them the two churches of Harrold and Brayfield
Cold Brayfield
Cold Brayfield is a village and civil parish in the Borough of Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. It is about three miles east of Olney, on the Bedfordshire border. Nearby places are Lavendon and Turvey .Cold Brayfield is probably the place named as 'Bragenfelda' in a charter of 967...
, with all the other gifts of Sampson le Fort, on condition that they paid half a mark yearly to the abbot of Missenden. Thenceforward until the dissolution
Dissolution of the Monasteries
The Dissolution of the Monasteries, sometimes referred to as the Suppression of the Monasteries, was the set of administrative and legal processes between 1536 and 1541 by which Henry VIII disbanded monasteries, priories, convents and friaries in England, Wales and Ireland; appropriated their...
the convent was ruled by a prioress, having sometimes a warden or master, like other small houses of nuns, and at one time a few lay brothers. Of the number of the nuns there is no indication until the very end, when there were only six at the outside. Nor is it easy to discover whether in giving up their direct connection with the abbey of Arrouaise, they ceased at once to observe the Arrouasian rule and to wear the habit of that order; or whether, as seems more likely, the change was later. At the dissolution they were reckoned as ordinary Austin canonesses
Augustinians
The term Augustinians, named after Saint Augustine of Hippo , applies to two separate and unrelated types of Catholic religious orders:...
. The house has very little history of any kind. The chartulary in the British Museum
British Museum
The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture in London. Its collections, which number more than seven million objects, are amongst the largest and most comprehensive in the world and originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its...
, which contains an abstract of the charters in the possession of the priory in the reign of Henry V
Henry V of England
Henry V was King of England from 1413 until his death at the age of 35 in 1422. He was the second monarch belonging to the House of Lancaster....
, shows various small grants of lands and tenements in Bedfordshire, and a few suits concerning churches. The latest item of importance is an account of the impropriation
Impropriation
Impropriation, a term from English Ecclesiastical Law, refers to taking the profits from the sale of church property and placing them in the care of a layman or lay corporation for care and distribution...
of the church of Shakerstone
Shackerstone
Shackerstone is a village and civil parish in the Hinckley and Bosworth district of Leicestershire, England. It is situated on the Ashby-de-la-Zouch Canal and the River Sence. According to the 2001 census the parish, which also includes the village of Barton in the Beans, had a population of...
in 1416. Early in the thirteenth century the advowson
Advowson
Advowson is the right in English law of a patron to present or appoint a nominee to a vacant ecclesiastical benefice or church living, a process known as presentation. In effect this means the right to nominate a person to hold a church office in a parish...
of the priory was probably held by Ralf Morin of Harrold and his son John, and in 1279 certainly by Sir John de Grey. The name of Sir Gerard Braybrook occurs frequently in some later charters. The last patron of all was Lord Mordaunt of Turvey, one of whose ancestors had witnessed a foundation charter of the priory. The house was probably never very rich, though no exact statement of its income can be made earlier than the dissolution.
During the time of Bishop Sutton
Oliver Sutton
Oliver Sutton was a medieval Bishop of Lincoln, in England.Sutton was the nephew of Henry of Lexington, Bishop of Lincoln from 1253 to 1258. He was Dean of Lincoln before 30 June 1275....
, in 1298, a nun of Harrold was found guilty of a breach of her vow of chastity; and in 1311 Bishop Dalderby
John Dalderby
John Dalderby was a medieval Bishop of Lincoln.-Life:Dalderby was rector of Dalderby in Lincolnshire before holding the prebendary of North Kelsey in the diocese of Lincoln...
issued a commission for the visitation
Canonical Visitation
A canonical visitation is the act of an ecclesiastical superior who in the discharge of his office visits persons or places with a view of maintaining faith and discipline, and of correcting abuses by the application of proper remedies.-Catholic usage:...
and correction of this house amongst others. No account of this visitation is preserved, nor are any others recorded; only in 1369 Bishop Gynwell
John Gynwell
John Gynwell was a medieval Bishop of Lincoln. He was nominated on 23 March 1347 and consecrated on 23 September 1347. He died on 5 August 1362.-References:...
appointed Dame Katherine of Tutbury (afterwards prioress) to administer the revenues of the priory during vacancy, and to reform excesses. It may be that during her term of office the house was well governed, and had a better reputation; but this is of course mere conjecture. The name of this prioress and her successor, Emma Drakelowe, are found in many of the charters relating to tenements and leases in the chartulary. Nothing further is known of the state of the priory, internal or external, until it was visited by Richard Layton
Richard Layton
Richard Layton was an English churchman, jurist and diplomat, dean of York and a principal agent of Henry VIII and Thomas Cromwell in the Dissolution of the Monasteries.-Life:...
in 1535, with other houses in Bedfordshire. If the accusations contained in his letter to Thomas Cromwell
Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex
Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex, , was an English statesman who served as chief minister of King Henry VIII of England from 1532 to 1540....
were true, the priory had certainly ceased to be in any real sense a religious house. He declared that he found there a prioress and four or five nuns, of whom one had 'two fair children' and another 'one child and no more'; and also describes how Lord Mordaunt had induced the prioress and her 'foolish young flock' to break open the coffer containing the charters of the priory, and to seal a writing in Latin of which they did not understand a word, but were told it was merely the lease of an impropriate benefice. 'All say they durst not say him nay,' he adds; 'and the prioress saith plainly that she would never consent thereto.'
In the case of Chicksand, which is charged with similar misdoings in the same letter, the very form and content of the accusation challenge criticism at once. But if the charges laid against Harrold are denied, it can only be on the simple ground that Layton is a discredited witness. There is no actual evidence for or against his statements. But unhappily there is nothing at all improbable in the story of Lord Mordaunt and the charters. The patron of a house so small and so poor would be in a position to take a very high hand with the little convent, especially as one or two of the nuns would very likely be members of his own family. However this may be, the house was certainly dissolved under the Act of 1536
Dissolution of the Lesser Monasteries Act
The Act for the Dissolution of the Lesser Monasteries – was an Act of the English Reformation Parliament of 1535/36, the beginning of the legal process by which King Henry VIII set about the Dissolution of the Monasteries...
, and a pension of £7 assigned to the prioress, Elinor Warren.
The priory was endowed by Sampson le Fort with the churches of St. Peter, Harrold, and Brayfield, Northants, with their appurtenances
Appurtenance
Appurtenances is a term for what belongs to and goes with something else, with the appurtenance being less significant than what it belongs to. The word ultimately derives from Latin appertinere, "to appertain"....
, and a few acres of land besides. The church of Stevington was added soon after, and that of Shakerstone (Leicester) in the fifteenth century. No statement can be made as to the value of its lands in the thirteenth century, as it is not mentioned at all in the Taxatio of Pope Nicholas
Pope Nicholas IV
Pope Nicholas IV , born Girolamo Masci, was Pope from February 22, 1288 to April 4, 1292. A Franciscan friar, he had been legate to the Greeks under Pope Gregory X in 1272, succeeded Bonaventure as Minister General of his religious order in 1274, was made Cardinal Priest of Santa Prassede and...
, nor in the Feudal Aids
Feudal aid
Feudal aid, or just plain aid is the legal term for one of the financial duties required of a tenant or vassal to his lord. Variations on the feudal aid were collected in England, France, Germany and Italy during the Middle Ages, although the exact circumstances varied.-Origin:The term originated...
. The total income of the priory in 1535 was £40 18s. 2d.; the first valuation after the dissolution, in 1536, amounted to £57 10s., including the four rectories mentioned above, with small parcel of land, rents and tenements in the counties of Bedford, Huntingdon and Buckingham.
Harrold Hall was built on the site by Francis Farrar between 1608 and 1610.
Prioresses of Harrold
The prioresses of Harrold were:- Agnes died 1245
- Basile de la Legh, elected 1245, occurs 1252
- Juliane
- Amice, occurs 1264 and 1268
- Margery of Hereford, resigned 1304
- Cecily de Cantia, elected 1304
- Petronilla of Radwell, elected 1335, resigned 1354
- Christine Murdak, elected 1354, resigned 1357
- Maud de Tichemersh, elected 1357, occurs 1364
- Katherine of Tutbury, elected 1369, occurs 1384
- Emma Drakelowe, occurs 1405 and 1413
- Elizabeth Chiltern, resigned 1470
- Margaret Pycard, elected 1470
- Helen Crabbe, died 1501
- Eleanor Pygot, elected 1501, died 1509
- Agnes Gascoigne, elected 1509
- Elinor Warren, surrendered 1536
Common seal
The seal of the priory represented St. PeterSaint Peter
Saint Peter or Simon Peter was an early Christian leader, who is featured prominently in the New Testament Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. The son of John or of Jonah and from the village of Bethsaida in the province of Galilee, his brother Andrew was also an apostle...
, standing, in mitre
Mitre
The mitre , also spelled miter, is a type of headwear now known as the traditional, ceremonial head-dress of bishops and certain abbots in the Roman Catholic Church, as well as in the Anglican Communion, some Lutheran churches, and also bishops and certain other clergy in the Eastern Orthodox...
and chasuble
Chasuble
The chasuble is the outermost liturgical vestment worn by clergy for the celebration of the Eucharist in Western-tradition Christian Churches that use full vestments, primarily in the Roman Catholic, Anglican and Lutheran churches, as well as in some parts of the United Methodist Church...
, two keys in the right hand and a crosier
Crosier
A crosier is the stylized staff of office carried by high-ranking Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican, and some Lutheran and Pentecostal prelates...
in the left. The legend is very indistinct, only the last two words being legible . . . PETRI CATENAS.