Archbishops Of York Research Articles

St Mary’s, Southwell, and the archbishops of York, c. 1100–1540

Although there may have been contacts between Southwell and York from the seventh century onwards, it was a royal grant to Archbishop Oscytel in 956 AD that formalised the relationship and led to the creation within the archbishopric of the Peculiar of Southwell. This centred on an impressive minster church, described by A. Hamilton Thompson as ‘the greatest of all the medieval collegiate foundations of England’. This paper considers aspects of its institutional organisation, its place in the archdiocese of York and its long enduring relationship with the archbishops, for several of whom Southwell was a favoured place of residence and burial. It particularly concentrates on the period from c. 1100 to the Reformation, exploiting the Minster's recently published main medieval cartulcary, The White Book of Southwell, to follow developments. It pays particular attention to the Chapter and its personnel, whose careers are set in a wider context by comparison with the experience of canons and prebendaries elsewhere, particularly at Beverley and Ripon, the other two major Minsters of the archdiocese.

In Medio Chori: The Tomb of Thomas of Corbridge, Archbishop of York, in Southwell Minster

Four medieval archbishops of York died in their palace at Southwell in Nottinghamshire. Three archbishops were buried in Southwell Minster. Archbishop Thomas of Corbridge was buried in an important position in the middle of the choir. His tomb had a marble top with an inlaid brass memorial. Thus Corbridge was held in high esteem and there is some evidence that he may have been regarded as an unofficial saint.

‘The controversys betwixt the Chapter and the Vicars Chorall’: Property and Conflict at the Collegiate Church of Southwell, 1734–37

This article examines a dispute between the vicars choral and the Chapter at Southwell Minster in Nottinghamshire during the early eighteenth century. The vicars lost their endowments and had been relegated to an inferior status within the ecclesiastical hierarchy following the implementation of new statutes during the sixteenth century and subsequent injunctions issued by the archbishops of York. The article uses vivid accounts relating to the efforts of the vicars to overturn their position both by asserting their rights against the archiepiscopal injunctions and by reclaiming their former endowments of property; by assessing their motives alongside wider ecclesiastical and economic developments, it places the conflicts of 1734–37 within the context of ‘England’s Long Reformation’. The article demonstrates that the events at Southwell are highly significant to our broader understanding of the issues facing the Church of England during a period when the Church was considered ‘in danger’ and the rights and property of the clergy were attacked in anticlerical publications.

The Hospital of St Mary Magdalene and the Archbishops of York, c. 1150–1335

Although the hospital of St Mary Magdalene, Ripon, has sometimes been viewed as a hospital in decline by c. 1300, this was demonstrably not the case. A careful examination of the sources proves that the function of the hospital had been altered during the thirteenth century so that it cared mainly for corrodians and elderly priests instead of lepers. The hospital’s patrons, the archbishops of York, were responsible for this alteration and they supported it by increasing its resources. John le Waryner’s chantry foundation was not a response to the hospital’s ruin but an appreciation of its success and expression of his links to the archbishops. This article demonstrates the pitfalls of assuming that leper hospitals suffered decline before being refounded as other types of institutions. The article also highlights the patron’s agency in adapting hospitals. This approach to studying the hospital of St Mary Magdalene’s development reveals its significance in the town of Ripon and its place in the wider patterns of patronage and benefaction that affected English hospitals.

The Exercise of the Probate Jurisdiction of the Medieval Archbishops of York

The development of testamentary jurisdiction by the English Church authorities has already received considerable attention, and it is generally held that by the close of the thirteenth century the basic probate procedures had been well established, even if some administrative practices continued to be refined. This paper aims to look at the practical evidence of the York archiepiscopal records from the thirteenth century to the Reformation from an archival and administrative viewpoint - the concern is not so much with the canon law touching wills and testaments, or with the testamentary disputes and litigation in the archiepiscopal court, the Curia Eboracensis, or indeed with the contents of the wills proved before the ecclesiastical authorities, but with the routine practicalities of the exercise of probate and intestacy administrations.

Wulfsige and Ninth-Century Northumbrian Chronology

THE VIKING INVASIONS of the ninth century wrought havoc with, among other things, the record-keeping of the Anglo-Saxon church. In the archbishopric of York, the Northumbrian annals, which had scrupulously recorded the chief events in the lives of the archbishops of York, ceased with the year 802.1 This paper will attempt to reconstruct the chronology of these archbishops, and particularly to argue that the reign of Archbishop Wulfsige was a remarkably short one. The accepted chronology provides a convenient point of departure. 2

Some Observations on a Papal Privilege of 1120 for the Archbishops of York

The privilege Caritatis Bonum (JL 6831), addressed to Archbishop Tliurstan of York and his successors, was issued on 11 March 1120. By this privilege, Pope Calixtus 11 forbade the archbishops of Canterbury to demand a profession of obedience from the archbishops of York and the archbishops ol York to make any such profession. The object ol this paper is to consider the importance of the privilege and to examine (and reject) suggestions that the known text was forged or interpolated; in the course of this examination we shall consider an abbreviated text in a Rouen manuscript, which has been treated as a separate document of an earlier date. We shall also consider the brief account given twice over by Hugh the Chantor in slightly different terms, of the scene at the papal court when the privilege was brought before the pope for subscription, both because such accounts are rare, and because this account throws some light on the curious fact that one of the cardinals who subscribed was not at the curia at the appropriate time. No attempt will be made to tell yet again the story of the conflict between the two English archbishops, but it will be necessary to examine in detail some of the evidence relating to events in the winter of 1119-20. Some small amount of repetition has been unavoidable, as different aspects of the matter are considered in turn.

Archbishop Melton, his Neighbours, and his Kinsmen, 1317–1340

It was probably during the thirteen-eighties that the Dominican Thomas Stubbs wrote his short lives of the Archbishops of York. A Yorkshireman, from the forest of Knaresborough, Stubbs had been a close acquaintance of Bishop Bury and Bishop Hatfield of Durham, both of whom, in earlier years, were members of the York chapter. He is therefore likely to have been well informed about his subject. His life of William Melton, archbishop from 1317 to 1340—under whom Bury had been chancellor of York—though laconic, is no merely formal piece. Its phrases suggest a comprehensive knowledge. Stubbs apparently wished to leave a distinctive impression of Melton. He tells his reader that the archbishop was severe in correcting rebels; that he kept a great household, and clothed it in his livery twice a year; that he would often cancel the amercements imposed on his tenants by his bailiffs, and would remit to the needy the farms and debts they owed him. Above all, Stubbs goes on, he frequently assisted the two kings, Edward II and Edward III, and the noble men of the land in their business, both with loans and with gifts—‘tarn ex mutuo quam ex dono’. Finally, Melton was an ardent promoter of his servants and of all his kinsmen.

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Arms of the archbishops of york

Arms of the archbishops of york

Arms of the Archbishops of York

Arms of the Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

Archbishops of York

The promised lives of the archbishops of York

The promised lives of the archbishops of York

Fasti Eboracenses. Lives of the Archbishops of York

Fasti Eboracenses. Lives of the Archbishops of York