Royal presentations to ecclesiastical benefices in late medieval Scotland

Abstract

The fortunes of most rulers in the Middle Ages were heavily influenced by the use they made of the limited supply of lands, offices and other rights at their disposal, and this facet of kingship has been emphasised in recent works on political relationships in late medieval Scotland. Relatively little attention has, however, been paid to the Scottish monarchs’ use of patronage within the church, at least below the level of bishoprics and abbeys. Under the terms of the celebrated papal indult of 1487, Innocent VIII gave James III eight months in which to suggest candidates for vacant sees and the more valuable monasteries, but in the case of lesser benefices, most of which remained in the gift of local patrons despite the heavy incidence of papal provision and reservation, the crown’s rights of presentation were much more limited and intermittent. This article seeks to explore the ways in which later medieval Scottish monarchs exercised their rights in connection with such benefices, and will concentrate on the early sixteenth century, when the privy seal registers provide a wealth of detail which is lacking for earlier periods. A number of benefices were in the king’s patronage by full right (pleno iure), and to these he was entitled to make a presentation on the occasion of each vacancy. It is noteworthy that many of these benefices were of relatively recent foundation, such as the prebends and offices in the chapel royal of Stirling, founded by James IV. Moreover, a considerable proportion of the benefices and offices in direct royal patronage were minor chaplainries and even parish clerkships, whose endowments were generally modest. Examples include the chapel of St Roche near Stirling bridge, granted to William Hag in February 1500 even though the infeftment was not yet completed, the two new chaplainries created with papal consent in the collegiate church of Methven, to which presentations were first made in 1516, the altar of St Ninian and the aisle of the Scottish nation in the Carmelite church in Bruges, to which William Thomson was nominated in September