A note on the vicarage of Wellington

The Somerset County archaeological assessment of Wellington, published in 2003, states: “The creation of the borough [in 1215] was accompanied by other reorganisations, including the establishment of a vicarage for Wellington (though the vicar was to reside at the linked centre of West Buckland for most of the medieval period) … ” ¹

No source is given as evidence that the vicar of Wellington (and West Buckland) lived in the village of West Buckland (unmentioned in Domesday) rather than the town of Wellington, then one of the largest settlements. There may be evidence which is not noted but I wonder whether the explanation lies in an error in one of the general sources mentioned in the Somerset paper, FT Elworthy’s ‘Notes on Wellington.’² Elworthy gives a translation of Bishop Jocelin’s Declaration of 1234 (Kemp no 154) as follows:

There is also assigned to the same vicarage a certain house, with a sufficient space on the eastern side of the church of Buckland.

But the original manuscript reads:

[A]ssignata est etiam ipsi vicarie domus quedam cum area competenti ex australi parte ecclesie de Wellinton’ et alia domus cum area competenti ex orientali parte ecclesie de Bokeland.

Did Elworthy (or someone else) make the common scribal mistake of homœoteleuton (similar ending)? The phrase ‘cum area competenti’ appearing twice in close proximity, the eye passed from the first occurrence to the second and omitted the entire phrase that came in between. The translation of the manuscript is:

There is also assigned to the same vicarage a certain house, with appropriate land [glebe?], on the southern side of the church of Wellington and another house, with appropriate land, on the eastern side of the church of Buckland.

Lacking any other picture – this is the south side of Wellington church

If the vicarage included residences in both Wellington and West Buckland, why would the vicar not have lived in the Wellington residence? However, it may be just a coincidence that Elworthy’s translation, by omitting to mention the Wellington residence, gave the impression that the vicar’s only residence was in West Buckland.

It should be added that the 1234 Declaration is clear that the vicar of Wellington was to receive all the small (vicarial) tithes, legacies and revenues of the altar of both Wellington and Buckland:

Ita quod in eadem ecclesia de Welynton’ sit imperpetuum perpetuus vicarius cuius vicaria consistat in omnibus minutis  decimis, legatis et obventionibus altarium tam de Bokeland’ quam de Wellinton’ …

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¹ English Heritage Extensive Urban Survey. An archaeological assessment of Wellington, 2003, p. 4.

² FT Elworthy, ‘Notes on Wellington’, Proceedings of the Somerset Archaeological and Natural History Society, Part II, vol 38, 1892, p 307

Wellington manor and the bishops

The bishops successively had the title of Bishop of Wells, of Bath, of Bath & Glastonbury and finally of Bath & Wells; and they held the manor of Wellington, as tenant-in-chief and lord of the manor, from before Domesday. As far as the building of the Longforth manor house in Wellington is concerned, there are four areas of interest which come together during the episcopate of Jocelin of Wells:

Reconstruction based on Wessex Archaeology’s visualisation of the north side of the manor house

A. Wellington references: Studying the published acta of the bishops 1061-1247, the references to either the church of Wellington or the lands of the bishops’ manorial demesne are:

1061-1205 – 2 mentions in 144 years:¹
1206-1233 – 1 mention in 17 years:²
1234-1240 – 7 mentions inside 5 years:³
1244-1247 – 1 mention inside 3 years:⁴

During the period 1234-40, the seven mentions were in December 1234, October 1236, May, 1238, October 1238,  April 1239, August 1239, January 1240.

[Footnote reference numbers refer to the Actum numbers in Ramsey EEA X, 1061-1205 and Kemp EEA 45, 1206-1247]

B. Jocelin’s episcopate and his royal service, 1206-1242:

1206-1209 Early years in Somerset and at court
1209-1213 In exile in France during the Interdict
1213-1216 In service of King John until John’s death
1216-1227 In service of Henry III during his minority
1227-1232 King’s minority ends; turbulence of regime of Hubert de Burgh
1232-1234 Hubert replaced by Peter des Roches; more turbulence
1234 May: The king takes personal control of government

In December 1234, 7 months after the 26-year-old king finally broke with his advisers, Jocelin began to spend time in his diocese, and by 1238 predominantly so; partly one may conclude that his close supervision and advice were no longer needed by the king, and partly because by this time Jocelin was getting old, perhaps into his seventies. But these years also show an increased involvement with diocesan business as he travelled less to London and about the country on the king’s affairs.

C. Wellington place names: Jocelin’s acta show that he, or more likely someone in his entourage, had a close familiarity with the manor of Wellington judging by the specific place names mentioned: Stodham appeared first in Bp Reginald’s actum (148) and again in Jocelin’s (156); also mentioned are land and alder-grove Presteleg’ and a meadow Spurtemed’ (154 and 158); a croft at Gatteweye (155); land at Stodham and Kaggebere, a cotland held by William de Rewe and a croft at Baggeleg’ (157); the bishop’s demesne of Schipland and the church’s demesne of Stodham (162); ploughlands called Middelland, Langeland, Brecheland and Buckewell (209). [The ploughlands references date to Bp Roger’s episcopate]

Looking north from the new housing development in 2016: ‘Hobby pond’ copse on the right

D. William of Wheathampstead: of whom more anon

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¹   i) c. 1151 – Oct 1158 Bp Robert of Lewes (1136-1166 – episcopate 30 years): No 45 grant of 2½ hides of (unidentified) land in Wellington and Chard to Philip of Wellington, a knight of the bishop’s fee.
ii) June 1174 – c. 1184 Bp Reginald fitzJocelin (1174-1191 – episcopate 17 years): No 148 Grant to the church of St Mary, Wellington, of a ferling of land and a wood at ‘Stodham’.

² Nov 1215 Bp Jocelin (1206-1242 – 26 years): No 141 Ten marks annually to be paid to the church of Wells for the service of the Virgin Mary from the church of St Mary, Wellington. (The same from the church of Chew Magna).

³ i) Dec 1234 Bp Jocelin: No 154 The church of Wellington, together with the churches of Combe and Chard, and the manor of Combe, to form a single provostry with the church and manor of Winsham (formerly a separate provostry) added to make a single provostry, the bp to retain the land and alder-grove called Presteleg’, and the meadow called Spurtemed’ for his own use.
ii) Oct 1236 Bp Jocelin: No 155 Grant of a croft of land at Gatteweye in the manor of Wellington to be held by William of Wheathampstead and his successors holding the church of Wellington.
iii) May 1238 Bp Jocelin: No 156 Inspeximus and confirmation of Bp Reginald’s grant (above No 148) of c. 1174 x c. 1184
iv) Oct 1238 Bp Jocelin: No 157 Gift of 18 acres of land in Wellington, 12 at Stodham to the west of the church’s demesne, 6 at Kaggebere, plus a cotland held by William de Rewe and a croft at Baggeleg’ to William of Wheathampstead and his successors holding the church of Wellington
v) April 1239 Bp Jocelin: No 158 Restoration to St Mary’s church, Wellington, of alder grove and meadow, Spurtemed’, withheld as in No 154 above.
vi) Aug 1239 Bp Jocelin: No 159 The provost of Combe, then William of Wheathampstead, to have the advowson of Wellington church
vii) Jan 1240 Bp Jocelin: No 162 Grant to the provost of Combe, then William of Wheathampstead, of a share of land between the bp’s demesne of Sheepland (Schipland) and the church’s demesne of Stodham and between the bp’s fishpond and the land of Geoffrey of Wellington, to be held by succeeding rectors of Wellington

⁴  i) Jan 1247 Bp Roger (1244-1247 – episcopate 3 years); No 209 Gift to William de Wrangheye and his heirs of four ploughland strips in the manor of Wellington:  Middelland’, Langeland’, Brecheland’ and Buckewell.

How important was Wellington?

At the time the Longforth manor house was built (the ‘late 12th-early13th century’), the bishops of Bath had not only an episcopal interest in the parish and church in Wellington but also, as tenant-in-chief and lord of the manor, in the land and its administration (and productivity!). What evidence is there that successive bishops showed any interest, spiritual or temporal, in Wellington?

Victorian restoration: church of St John the Baptist, Wellington; formerly of St Mary the Virgin

According to Domesday (and of course over 100 or so years the situation may have changed) Taunton was the biggest settlement in the archdeaconry by some distance, but this very wealthy manor belonged to the bishop of Winchester, not the bishop of Bath.

Apart from Taunton, Wellington was then one of the most important settlements in the archdeaconry of Taunton: it was of greatest annual value to the lord and had by far the highest number of households (158 – Winsford with 84 was the second biggest), and therefore ‘souls to be cured’.

Looking at roughly 140 acta of Bishop Reginald fitzJocelin (1174-1191), just one related to Wellington; of about 85 of Bishop Savaric (1192-1205), there were none.

Under Bishop Jocelin (1206-1242), Wellington was elevated to town status by a charter of King John in 1215 (one might suppose the bishop played some part in this). Of Jocelin’s 177 acta, ten refer to the church, vicarage, manor or lands.

These merit closer attention; the majority date from the latter part of Jocelin’s episcopate – 1234 onwards. Would this still rank as ‘early in the 13th century’? Is anything known which might have prompted the building of a new manor house?

 

The archdeaconry of Taunton, ‘beyond the Parrett’

This second map takes a closer look at the Taunton archdeaconry, designated in earlier times ‘the archdeaconry beyond the Parrett’ (‘de ultra Paret’):

In the two archdeaconries of Bath and Wells, all 12 of the identified episcopal residences lay on lands which the bishops had held since the beginning of the 12th century. It could be supposed that if the bishops had substantial residences in the Taunton archdeaconry, they would have been on one of his episcopal manors.

The deanery of Taunton had four episcopal manors (Ash Priors, Bishop’s Lydeard, Wellington and Wiveliscombe); and the deanery of Cricket St Thomas, or Crewkerne, also had four – Chard, Combe St Nicholas, Kingsbury Episcopi and Winsham.

Of these eight episcopal manors, Chard, Kingsbury Episcopi and Wellington have been identified as possibly having episcopal houses/residences. I would consider Chard as a definite based on surviving documents.¹

(Litnes (otherwise known as Litelande or Littlelaneia) has been marked on the map, but it was a very small manor as close to the Cricket deanery as possible without being in it: it was in fact in Huish Episcopi, just outside Langport, in the hundred of Somerton). No significant archaeological remains have been found there.)

At the time of Domesday, there were no episcopal lands at all in the two most northerly deaneries, those of Dunster (the largest of the four by land area) and Bridgwater even though there were substantial settlements there, and many parishes.

In the Dunster deanery, Winsford had 84 Domesday households, Crowcombe and Brompton Regis 48 each, Minehead had 61 and Cutcombe 45. There is no way that they could have been visited in a single day from Chard. MInehead at 40 miles away could hardly even be reached in one day, and a return journey the same day would have been impossible.² Any official visitor would have needed accommodation in this most desolate part of Somerset.

The northern coast of Somerset on the edge of Exmoor

Chard was in the extreme south of the archdeaconry. This leaves Wiveliscombe and Wellington as possible stopping places. Without definitively discounting Wiveliscombe, the recently uncovered palace has been credited to Bishop John Drokensford, 1309-1329. Unless there was an earlier palace there, Drokensford’s palace would have post-dated the Longforth manor house at Wellington by 100 years; or by 50 years if the granting of hunting rights at Wiveliscombe to Bishop William of Bitton I in 1256 indicated the enclosure of the park and the start of construction on an earlier palace. This might only have been a hunting lodge.³

The town of Taunton (which gave its name to the archdeaconry, the deanery and the hundred in which it was situated) had a 1086 population of 479 households making it the biggest settlement in the entire area. However, it was the property of the bishop of Winchester. It is questionable whether it could have been resorted to routinely by an episcopal retinue of the bishops of Bath for diocesan business.

This seems to show that the bishops would have needed regular accommodation for visitations to the northern part of the archdeaconry, regardless of who was appointed to visit (probably the archdeacon). So far, the Longforth manor house seems to be the earliest manor house discovered on episcopal lands. Even so, that would only have eased the situation, not made the most distant parishes accessible in a single day.

(More follows)

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¹ The bishop certainly had a ‘house’ in Chard in the twelfth century and it was actively maintained. It might conceivably have been used for accommodation, if not for the bishop himself at least for the archdeacon or a representative on an official visit. For Kingsbury Episcopi there is only documentary evidence of episcopal visits to the town, but not that he stayed there. With Chard being so close there was perhaps no need for a separate residence.

“The b[isho]ps also had houses at Wells, Winchester, Dogmersfield, Chard and Chew Magna, and probably on most of the other episcopal manors. Those at Wells, Chard and Chew Magna are mentioned in the vacancy accounts following Robert [of Lewes]’s death … During the vacancy of 1166-74 a custos was appointed to manage the houses and some individual repair bills were submitted: 10s. to repair the houses in Wells in 1169-70, 45s. the following year for the houses in Wells and Chard …”, FMR Ramsey, English Episcopal Acta X, Bath and Wells 1061-1205, p xxxvii, n2, Oxford, 1995.

² There has been much discussion as to the possible distance that could be covered in a day on horseback. Clerics would not have galloped hard, changing horses at intervals, as a messenger would have done. The larger the group, the slower the progress and an episcopal retinue might have up to 20 or 30 horses. “In an effort to prevent archbishops and bishops placing large burdens on their monastic hosts during visitations, canon four promulgated at the Third Lateran Council in 1179 capped the size of travelling retinues: archbishops were limited to either forty or fifty horses (depending upon the size of their province), bishops to twenty or thirty (depending upon the size of their diocese)”, James Richardson,  A Bishop and his Diocese: politics, government, and careers in Hereford and Winchester dioceses, 1282-1317, PhD thesis, University of York, p. 91.

A distance of 25 miles a day seemed to be near the top end of possibility; in other words, perhaps 10-12 miles there and the same back to do a journey in one day, leaving little time for any business to be carried out. These were documented journeys in the 14th century: 15 July 1321: Aschaffenburg to Frankfurt (28 miles), 16 July: Frankfurt to Mainz (25 miles), 17 July: Mainz to Bacharach (31 miles), 21 August: Arlon to Luxembourg (17 miles).

³ It may have been only a temporary structure for use by the park keeper, as suggested for the contemporary Bradney Park lodge, p 172 (“The presence of a moated site within the confines of the medieval park at Bradgate has long been recognised as an earthwork enclosing an area c.50m × 40m,with a moat c.5m wide and c.1m deep. The site has been repeatedly interpreted as a candidate for the location of a park keeper’s lodge (Hartley 1989, 10; Stevenson and Squires 1999, 12; Hartley and Squires 2014, 4), but the function and date have remained speculative”). This site was later abandoned in the 14th century, whereas Wiveliscombe had a new palace built in the 14th century.

The bishops and their lands

I’m not sure what I’m trying (after several weeks of cogitation) to demonstrate here about the manor house at Wellington: it’s all a bit circuitous. However, I’ve produced two maps which provoke some ideas.

The first shows where there were definitely, or possibly, episcopal residences within the diocese of Bath, and here I include the established palaces and residential manor houses, as well as the manor houses with possible accommodation if or when needed¹:

Definite and possible episcopal residences in Bath, Wells and Taunton archdeaconries

I don’t know exactly where the boundary was between the archdeaconry of Bath and that of Wells at that time (12th-13th centuries), but for the present purpose² it doesn’t matter so these are lumped together. There are 16 residences within Somerset  – I’ve excluded the residences at Pucklechurch (Gloucestershire), Dogmersfield (Hampshire) and Bath Inn in London.

Twelve of the 16 are shared probably equally, depending on the boundary, between Bath and Wells: eight definites (Banwell, Bath, Chew Magna, and Claverton in Bath; Evercreech, Wells, Wookey and Blackford, which was part of the Wedmore estate, in Wells); and four possibles (Congresbury and Yatton in Bath, Cheddar and Weston-sub-Mendip in Wells).

Eleven of these were situated on lands held by the bishop in 1086, either as tenant-in-chief or simply as lord; and Claverton was acquired in 1106 by Bishop John of Tours who had already moved the seat of the diocese from Wells to Bath. So all 12 were on episcopal lands by the late 12th century.

The isolation of the archdeaconry of Taunton, ‘beyond the Parrett’ to the west and adjoining Devon, is accentuated by the fact that of these 12 residences, only one – Blackford – comes within the low-lying central belt. So, it is not merely the river Parrett itself, but also the wide expanse of the Somerset Levels to the north, that cuts off this western part of the diocese from the episcopal seats at Bath, later also at Wells, and their ancillary residences.

Of the four residences in the Taunton archdeaconry, three (Chard, Kingsbury Episcopi and Wellington) were only conjectural based on documents; the fourth, Wiveliscombe, is definite though more needs to be said about that one.

(To be continued with second map)

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¹ The definite/probable designations are based on N. Payne, The Medieval Residences of the bishops of Bath and Salisbury, PhD thesis for the University of Bristol, 2003. This thesis was completed before the discovery of the Longforth manor house at Wellington.

² The present purpose being to focus on Wellington and the archdeaconry of Taunton where the earlier name of ‘beyond the Parrett’ suggests that the river did form the boundary. The boundaries of the hundreds tend to support the assumption.

Stodham (2)

When you leave no stone unturned, you’re apt to find that there isn’t anything at all under most of them: this stone is probably one of them. But soldiering on: the map below adds to the present-day landscape relevant landmarks – tithe map field boundaries, lanes, watercourses, some of which are still detectable, others not.

The Stedhams, Stidhams and Studhams convince me that this area is the ‘Stodham’ of which Bishop Reginald granted a ferling of land to the church of St Mary, Wellington. In exchange, the rector, whosoever he might be, undertook to take care of the upkeep of the chapel of St Lawrence (which chapel of St Lawrence this was I don’t know).

… quicumque fuerit rector ecclesie de Welinton’ debebit in perpetuum cappellam beati Laurencii sustentare et reedeificationem et emendationem eiusdem capelle necessaria exhibere.

Landscape surrounding the manor house

How much was a ferling? More or less anything: a piece of land of limited but unspecified amount. The word means a fourth of something, but the two definitions in the OED are a) a fourth of a hide – maybe 30 acres; or b) a fourth of an acre which is considerably less. It could also be a fourth of a virgate which was either a fourth or a half of a hide.

So there’s really no knowing whether the ferling given to the church included the land on which the Longforth manor house was built. Tantalisingly, the grant was made at the end of the 12th century, which was the earlier date from which the archaeologists estimate the construction of the manor house might have been started.

The two fields marked on the tithe map as ‘Studhams’ measure almost exactly 25 modern acres, which would be a fourth of a 100-acre hide (and almost a fourth of a 120-acre hide). It would be tidy to conclude that Stodham was limited to those fields, plus the adjacent Stedhams Covert. It would also save having to puzzle out why a rector of St Mary’s thought he would build a prestigious manor house on it – unlikely since he only held a ferling.

Since the grant of ‘Stodham’ seems to be the sole actum involving Wellington during the episcopates of Reginald and Savaric, I’m inclined to think the place didn’t figure in the episcopal plans of either of them; nor did they see any need to build a large manor house there. It has been surmised that there was probably a small earlier manor house somewhere in Wellington which could have served as an adequate base for the steward and other manorial officials.

One feature I mention because it intrigues though I don’t want to pursue it very far as it’s a bit inconvenient. It seems there was a tributary (or distributary?) just south of the river Tone. I don’t think it exists now, though there are signs still in the landscape. What the early OS maps seem to show is a perpendicular channel dropping down from it straight into Hobby Pond – the manorial fishpond adjoining the manor house.

I read somewhere that where there was a straight water course like that it was often a sign that an artificial millstream, or leat, had been constructed from a river to a mill.¹ Annoyingly, Reginald’s grant said that Stodham had been held by ‘Edricus molendinarius’. As this complicates matters I shall not pursue it. Perhaps it was simply built to feed into the fishpond.

As to the identity of the Longforth manor house builder, I have ruled out Bishop Reginald, Bishop Savaric and John the Usher’s descendant (William the Usher), the only named individuals to have been either tenant-in-chief or lord in ‘Walintona’ during the latter part of the 12th century. Failing any happy discovery, I shall move on to consider whether Bishop Jocelin of Wells might have been the builder.

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1. “Examples of watermills are known from the Romano-British period onwards. Five sites with Romano-British watermills have been identified (see below) and many others have been inferred from evidence such as artificial channels … ” Historic England.

Stodham (1)

The charter of Bishop Reginald that I wanted to go back to is Ramsey 148,¹ in which the bishop makes a grant to the church of St Mary, Wellington, of a ferling² of land at ‘Stodham’ (unidentified) and nearby woodland .

Noverit universitas vestra nos dedisse in perpetuam elemosinam ecclesie beate Marie de Welinton’ unum ferlingum terre, scilicet terram de Stodham quam Edricus molendinarius tenuit, et boscum similiter qui est iuxta terram illam …

The charter was drawn up between 23 June 1174 and c. 1184.³ The grantee was the church in Wellington, but where was the grant?

Looking at the possible etymology of the name, there is a Studham in Bedfordshire, which appears as Stodham in 1053-66 and Estodham in 1086, explained as ‘homestead or enclosure where a herd of horses is kept’.⁴ This contrasts with Stedham in W. Sussex with forms Steddenham 960 and Stedeham 1086, which could be an ‘enclosure of the stallions’ – in which case it is an alternative form of Studham – or perhaps simply the homestead of *Stedda, in which case it has a separate origin.

One late 19th-c. source⁵ includes a list of the farms and field names in Wellington, recording a Studham [Farm] which on the analogy of the Bedfordshire Studham would be Stodham. Unfortunately, there are no other details, no indication as to where Studham Farm was. I found no sign of it on any of the contemporary OS maps of the 19th century, so I assumed it was on a tithe map or remained a local tradition long after the farm had disappeared.

Longforth Farm is also on the list and is followed by six field names (I think that means that the fields belonged to Longforth, but that isn’t made clear): Higher Stidham, Middle Stidham, Yonder Stidham, Coods Close, Rew, Old Lane.

It now appears that the tithe map of 1839 names a field close to the manor house, slightly north west, as ‘Studhams’,⁶ with ‘Rew’ just below the manor house to the south east. Old Lane runs north between the two. This looks like ‘a place of interest’.

About 250 meters to the north of Longforth there is also Stedhams Covert. If, from a phonetics point of view, Stidham and Studham aren’t quite the same,  Stidham and Stedham are closely related.⁷

Based on the map of Wessex Archaeology

Coincidences often turn out not to be quite as fortuitous as they look. Mishearings, misrememberings, misreadings don’t respect the rules of phonetics. We have Stedhams, Stidhams and Studhams: are we to suppose they are quite unrelated and none of them is related to ‘Stodham’? Studhams marked as a field name is all but definite, the Stidhams too good to be untrue, and Stedhams Covert might even be the boscus iuxta ‘Stodham’.

The rest is deferred until next time: Stodham (2).

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1. English Episcopal Acta X, Bath and Wells, 1174-1205, ed. FMR Ramsey, Oxford, 1995.

2. On ferlings &c and my previous blog, it needs to be stressed that measurements were rough and ready. With no mass-produced measuring instruments, the terms were rule of thumb, how ploughable ploughlands were, how productive arable lands, and therefore their assessment for taxation. A furlong (not the same as a ferling) was a furrow long.

3. Ramsey, op. cit., p. 110, note.

4. AD Mills, A Dictionary of British Place Names, (1st edition revised), Oxford, 2011, p 442

5. Arthur L. Humphreys, The History of Wellington. The Materials for the History of the town of Wellington, co. Somerset, Henry Gray, London, 1889, p. 6.

6. A Medieval Manor House Rediscovered, Simon Flaherty, Phil Andrews and Matt Leivers, Wessex Archaeology Occasional Papers, 2016, p. 5.

7. Phonetically, Stedham and Stidham have close front vowels, Stodham and Studham have open back vowels.

Concluding the theory of the Ushers

It has been said that the river Parrett marked a distinct frontier: the lands to the north and east aligning with Wiltshire and Dorset; to the west and south west, with Devon and Cornwall. Not only that, but to the west of the river there was a fairly narrow gap, round Taunton, between the southern edge of the Quantocks and the northern tip of the Blackdowns, leaving the lands round Williton and the whole of Exmoor in the north, Wiveliscombe, Bishop’s Lydeard and Wellington in the south a quite isolated enclave.¹

Having cautiously suggested that neither Bishop Reginald nor Bishop Savaric demonstrated much interest in the Archdeaconry Beyond the Parrett, I thought they would therefore have been unlikely to have built a new ‘substantial, high status’ manor house in distant Wellington in the far west of their diocese.

On John the Usher, lord in 1086, I made one mistake earlier: two hides was a relatively small holding, a hide roughly representing about 120 acres (though it was an area designated for taxation assessment, rather than a precise measurement of extent). So on the generally accepted ‘long’ acre, John the Usher held 240 acres around Pinnechesmora and Paeton. Could that have stretched up (just) to the site of the manor house at Longforth? No, it couldn’t! But to satisfy my doubt, I constructed a rectangle on the map, just big enough to contain the farms of Pinksmoor and Payton:

Pinksmoor in the south, Payton in the north

Thanks to Google and a calculator, even that small rectangle is over two hides, though close enough to suggest that John’s holding amounted to the hamlets of Pinksmoor and Payton.

Yes, but if … NO! I constructed the smallest area I could manage to include Longforth as well:

Pinksmoor, Payton and Longforth

Even if it had been that peculiar shape, John’s land would have been 3.5 hides, slightly larger than the bishop’s own demesne which was 3 hides (the rest of Wellington, about 9 hides, was for the use of the villagers). End of theory.

Just a note on dating: could William the Usher, holder of Pinksmoor and Payton (Buckland Cartulary, 339), really have been Wellington Usher John’s son?

John held his land in 1086. Assuming he was about 26, he would have been about 40 in 1100 when he held it in the reign of Henry I (in line with Buckland Cartulary, 340). Son William could have been born in 1110, and would have been 52 in 1162, the latest possible date of his grant to Buckland; and 75 when he confirmed the grant in 1185 (Buckland, 339) and gave his body on his death ‘to the same venerable house’ (‘corpus etiam meum eidem venerabili domui dedi’ – Ramsey 101). At a stretch he could have been 85 (b. 1100), by no means unheard of even when the average ages were much lower.²

Here I propose to abandon my interest in the ushers, but will revert briefly to Bishop Reginald in my next.

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¹ “The Quantock and Blackdown Hills, rising up to the west of the river Parrett in the south and west of Somerset, form an important watershed within the landscape of Southern Britain. Physically, they separate the south-west peninsula from the rest of central southern England, and today mark the division between what are typically landscapes of villages and large arable fields to the east, and more dispersed settlement patterns with predominantly small pastoral fields to the west.” Stephen Rippon, Beyond the Medieval Village: The Diversification of Landscape Character in Southern Britain, Oxford, 2008, p 106

² Most notably and well supported by documents, Gilbert of Sempringham (1083-1190); Eleanor of Aquitaine lived into her 80s (c. 1122-1204, as did Robert Curthose (1051 x 1053 – 1134); and William the Usher could in any case just as easily have been 75-80.

Rise of the House of Ushers – a link

Looking through Bishop Reginald’s Acta,¹ I was struck by no. 101 which referred to a grant of a William Hostiarius to Buckland priory (to the Knights Hospitallers of Jerusalem). William the Usher reminded me – a passing thought – of John the Usher (Johannes Hostiarius) who held a lordship in Wellington, along with the Bishop of Wells, at the time of Domesday (1086).  The grant of William Hostiarius consisted of ‘totam terram de Paeton’ cum servitio de Pinnechesmora’ – the whole land of Paeton with the service of Pinnechesmora. This actum was included because it was one of Bishop Reginald’s, and Buckland priory was in the diocese.

A few months previously, I had been ruminating over the Domesday entry for Wellington, and wondering who this ‘John the Usher’  might have been. Might he, or rather one of his heirs/descendants as lord in Wellington, have built the manor house? I decided that this might not be likely, but who was John? Who was he usher to? Who were his descendants? Most importantly, where were his two Wellington hides located?

Then looking through the charters of Buckland priory,² some of the answers to these questions – and others I hadn’t thought of – emerged. In Weaver’s edition/translations, no 340 is a charter of King Henry II.

Henry II ‘FitzEmpress’, with his mother, the Empress Matilda

“Henry, King of England and Duke of Normandy and Acquitaine and Count of Anjou, to archbishops, bishops, abbots, justices, earls, sheriffs, barons, bailiffs, ministers and his faithful men French and English, greeting:

Know that I grant and by my present charter confirm to William, son of John Hostiarius, all the land which belonged to John, his father, in England and in Normandy, of whatsoever fee he held it, saving the right and service of his lord.

Wherefore I will and firmly order that the said William hold all that land well and in peace, freely and quietly and honourably and fully with all its appurtenances in wood and plain, in waters and mills, in ponds and fishponds, in meadows and pastures, in ways and paths, in burgh and without burgh, “cum sacha et socha et thol et them et infangenethef”³ with all liberties and free customs which John his father held in the time of King H, my grandfather, [as] his serjeant (et ejusdem serviens).” [dated 1155-1162]⁴

John Hostiarius of Wellington could have held his lands in the time of Henry II’s grandfather, Henry I (r. 1100-1135), 14 years after the 1086 Domesday record. Being a hostiarius (usher, porter, ostiary), he was a serviens or attendant.  All very possible that John father of William was this hostiarius regis. The hostiarius had some status as an official,  which would explain why he came by all his lands: tenant-in-chief of nine lands and lord of twelve, all in Somerset, Wiltshire and Dorset; and son William inherited all of them. Annoyingly, there is no clue as to what lands these were, nor where they were situated. So perhaps this isn’t  the same John … ? As the online Domesday reminds us, the same name doesn’t guarantee that it’s the same person.

However, two other related Buckland charters, nos. 339 and 341 (341 is Ramsey’s 101 and copies the wording of 339), include the two place names mentioned in William’s grant: ‘totam terram de Paeton’ cum servitio de Pinnechesmora’, both of which Ramsey marks as ‘unidentified’. I toyed briefly with ‘Paulton’ for Paeton (‘Palton’ in 1171) but was unconvinced. Pinnechesmora I conjectured might have meant something like Finchesmoor (Welsh pinc, OE finc – a finch) and, if it still existed, might be ‘Pinksmoor’. And …

… found the small settlement called Pinksmoor, now just a farm, a lane and a mill; and just over half a mile up Pinksmoor Lane …

…is another settlement, called Payton. Pinksmoor and Payton in close proximity is a coincidence. That the two farms are located just under two miles due west of Wellington town centre, I would suggest, is too much of a coincidence not to offer strong evidence that these are the Pinnechesmora and Paeton of the 12th-c. charters, the lands which William had inherited from his father; and that this broadly identifies the area of John the Usher’s holding in the manor.

More follows …

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¹ English Episcopal Acts X: Bath and Wells 1061-1205, ed. FMR Ramsey, Oxford 1995, p. 75 

² A Cartulary of Buckland Priory in the County of Somerset, ed. the Rev. FW Weaver, MA, FSA, Somerset Record Society xxv, subscribers only, 1909, p. 183, no. 340.

³ English legal terms were often included in early Norman documents and this is a common legal formula relating to the landowner’s rights and jurisdictions; ‘infangenethef’, for example, referred to the way thieves caught on the owner’s land could be tried and punished in the lord’s own court.

⁴ The dates given by Weaver are almost certainly correct, and may have been 1155, shortly after Henry II’s accession in 1154, the new king confirming an earlier grant. The witnesses are almost all identifiable, for instance, Willelmo meo fratre would be the king’s youngest brother, William FitzEmpress, died 1164; Thoma Cancellario was Henry’s ‘turbulent priest’, Thomas Becket, who was chancellor from 1155 until 1162. Four of the other five witnesses also witnessed charters of Henry II.

A biographical note on Bishop Savaric

It’s easy to get sidetracked when you find things  you’re not looking for. I was skimming through what I could find out about Savaric that had made me dismiss him as a likely builder of the Wellington manor house at Longforth. I’m not sure ‘biographical’ is quite the right word here as this is not exactly about Savaric’s life. He died, according to the various sources I found, in Siena or Civitavecchia; but either way it was somewhere called Senes la Vieille or Scienes la Vieille. It sounds more like France than Italy, but I could find nowhere in my French gazetteer which looked at all likely (Estienville?). Having probed a bit further, there is still one question I can’t answer: why did anyone think this was Civitavecchia (other than that ‘la Vieille’ means ‘Vecchia’)? There may be a better answer but until I know for sure I can only be 99.9% certain that he died in Siena.

Ambrogio Lorenzetti,The Allegory of Good Government: Siena or metaphorical Siena

In 1205, Savaric set out on one of his frequent visits to Rome to lay some contentious issue before the Pope for settlement. On this occasion he was accompanying Peter des Roches, recently elected Bishop of Winchester whose election had been disputed (as Savaric’s own had been in 1192). Peter had supported Savaric in his battles with the monks of Glastonbury and now Savaric was supporting him when his election was opposed by the archdeacons of Winchester.

According to multiple sources, Savaric died on 8 August either in Civitavecchia or Siena. The original DNB article, written by William Hunt about 100 years ago, stated: “He died at Civita Vecchia (Senes la Vieille, said also to be Siena) on 8 Aug.” The current ODNB is non-committal as to the precise place: “Savaric died on 8 August 1205 at ‘Scienes la Vielle‘ …”. The tradition had been to offer the two alternatives: the Rev CM Church, subdean and Canon Residentiary of Wells, wrote in 1887: “We know nothing of his last years 1204-5, except his death in a foreign land – at Senes la Vieille – either Siena or Civita Vecchia – Aug. 8, 1205.”

I have two arguments for Siena:

• Siena was on the pilgrim route between Canterbury and Rome, known as the Via Francigena. Sigeric, archbishop of Canterbury, took this route in 990, and detailed it in the Itinerario Sigerici. From Lucca (XXVI Luca), key stages were to San Gimignano (XIX Sce Gemiani), to San Quirico d’Orcia (XII Sce Quiric.), Acquapendente (IX Aquapendente), Montefiascone (VII Sce Flaviane), thence close  to Viterbo (VI Sce Valentine). By the time they went through Vetralia and La Storta, Civita Vecchia had been left behind over on the coast, and Rome was in sight. Between San Gimignano and San Quirico was stage XV – Seocine, identified as Siena, the Roman Saena Iulia.
• Senes la Vieille would have been an Anglo-Norman form, probably found in contemporary records of Savaric’s death in England; and Senes la Vieille was the French name for Siena, certainly into the 15th century. Among the various redactions of the Grandes Chroniques, that of Nicole Gilles, published in 1536, records details of Charles VIII’s campaign in Italy. In 1496, he set out for Rome to meet with Pope Alexander VI. On his return: De Viterbe le roy passa a Senes la Vieille ou luy vindrent nouvelles que le duc dorleans avoit gaigne la ville de Novarre, & estoit dedans oultre le gre de Ludovic & ses alliez. De Senes la Vieille le roy alla a Pise, de Pise a Lucques …

The Via Francigena near San Quirico

Viterbo, Siena, Pisa, Lucca – that is the Via Francigena, and Senes la Vieille is Siena. When heading south, King Charles had come through Florence, thence to Senes la Vielle, sainct Clerico (San Quirico), Aigue Pendente (Acquapendente), Montflacon (Montefiascone) to Viterbe (Viterbo).

Why would travellers from England to Rome pass through Civitavecchia? Unless, of course, they decided to make the return journey by sea, leaving from Rome’s port – Civitavecchia … One could conjure up all sorts of reasons why they might do that – saddle soreness, invitation to travel in someone’s yacht, but sea travel was not particularly comfortable in those days, so that can probably be ruled out. The dates tend to suggest that Savaric died on his way to Rome, rather than on his way back, since Peter was confirmed and consecrated on September 25, and Savaric would surely have stayed in Rome for that, had he been alive.

PS But Ralph of Coggeshall wrote: Obiit Savarinus, Batoniensis episcopus, qui cum eodem Petro Romam perrexerat, et ejus consecrationem tam apud senatores quam apud cardinales multipliciter procuraverat: sed mox in ejus reditu a curia vitam illaudabiliter terminavit.

The verbs perrexerat and procuraverat suggest Savaric took charge of the whole matter in the curia on Peter’s behalf – but in that case he must have left Rome before the consecration which took place seven weeks after his death. I haven’t yet managed to identify the exact document(s) which give the place where he died as ‘Senes la Vieille’.

Anyway, Ralph gives Savaric’s epitaph as:

Notus eras mundo, per mundum semper eundo,
Et necis ista dies est tibi prima quies.

Very appropriate. I shall mention it again later.