CHAPTER II THE CRENELLATION It is, indeed, only when we come on to the period of those bishops' registers which are now surviving that we are able to make sure of the place filled by Hartlebury in the life of the diocesan. Fortunately that period begins with a great and notable reign which set the type of the Worcester episcopate, and by its length, its strenuousness, its very quarrels, helps us to realise what it meant at the end of the thirteenth century to be lord of a dozen manors, of which this was not the least important. There is no need here to give a biography of Godfrey Giffard, who was consecrated to the see of Worcester by Archbishop Boniface on September 23, 12681; for the biography is already available in Mr. Bund's well-known edition of the bishop's register. He succeeded Nicholas of Ely, promoted to Winchester, who was chancellor of England in the baronial interest, and was the first holder of the office to receive the newly instituted "chancellor's fee." Godfrey Giffard was chancellor likewise, but was a king's man through and through. His brother Walter, who became Archbishop of York in 1266, laid down the chancellorship and was succeeded in it by Godfrey. But it does not convey the whole story to say that the appointment was due to Walter's influence with the king, for in 1268 the king is found praising Godfrey as one who had done good service in the royal household since his boyhood. John Giffard, of Brimsfield, the 1 Ann. London, p. 78. 2 J. W. Willis Bund, Reg. Godfrey Giffard (Worc. Hist. Soc.). 3 A.D. 1260; cf. T. F. Tout, Chapters in Mediaeval Administrative History, i. 297 4 Bund, op. cit., Introd. xxvj. 5 Tout, op. cit., i. 313, n. 1; Cal. Pat. Rolls, 1266–72, 238. head of the family, joined himself to the king's cause at Evesham and never lost the king's trust thereafter. Hugh Giffard, Godfrey's father, is said to have sided with the barons, but had been some years dead; and anyhow his sons entered the royal service. Training and tradition alike moved Godfrey to stand by the king. There is even reference to ties of kinship between him and his royal master, but the kinship cannot be pressed, and Giffard's rise to the episcopate is natural enough without such a reason. But the choice affected Hartlebury to a considerable extent. The baronial wars had served to emphasise the strategic importance of the manor, and if, as we have tried to see, the position was originally recommended as a defensive post against Danish invasion, the thirteenth century still found the Welsh danger a real one, and it laid upon the Bishop of Worcester the task of being to no small extent the king's generalissimo in the western midlands. His duties went further in this respect than the mere record of the "knights' fees" held of him, of which Giffard made a careful entry. So the loyalty of the bishop meant much to the Crown, and in Henry III's later years the defection of Bishop Cantilupe, after a failure in mediation, to the side of Simon de Montfort, provided the great leader at once with a prison for the king and a residence for himself on the episcopal manor of Kempsey; and the battle of Evesham was fought not only in the bishop's presence, but amidst his fervid encouragement of the barons' soldiery. So it was not less ominous for the king's cause that Cantilupe should take up the task of turning Hartlebury manor into Hartlebury castle. We know the fact, not from any contemporary licence issued for the purpose, but because Henry, being relieved to have in the see of Worcester a prelate whose loyalty was as sure as Giffard's, lost no time in permitting him to complete what Cantilupe (perhaps from quite other motives) had begun. The process 1 Habington, Survey (Worc. Hist. Soc.), ii. 241; Godwin, de Praesul. (ed. 1616), 514: "regi sanguine propinquus." 2 Register (ed. Willis Bund), 470. went by the name of crenellation, a word of some interest, which Skeat arranges under "cranny." 1 French word derived from the Latin 66 Cran" is a crena," for which Lewis and Short" decline to give a meaning, saying only that it is a "corrupted word"; but Skeat has no doubt that it signifies " a notch." a notch." As we should expect, the verb takes many forms, "carnellare," " kernellare,' crenellare," and the like. But it is plain enough that we are dealing with battlements, and battlements are only the topmost completion of a fortifying process; it is also plain that the task was one about which Giffard was anxious to lose no time. The actual dates of his process towards the full episcopate are not very clear. Nicholas of Ely was translated to Winchester on February 24, 1268.2 Godfrey Giffard's election followed, but at what date? 3 Then there occurred some weeks of delay during which the Archbishop of Canterbury objected, as the clergy of the archdeaconry of York had objected, to Giffard's lack of learning, while the Archbishop of York, his brother, supported his cause at the Roman Court. So it is not till June 8th that we come to a clear point of time which we can trust. For on that day Henry III, being then at Windsor, in the presence of Archbishop Walter Giffard, back from his bribings of the Pope, issued what the White Book of the Bishops of Worcester calls a carta de castro de Hertlebure kernellando." It states that whereas Walter, sometime Bishop of Worcester, began to fortify with a moat and a wall of stone and lime a castle at his manor of Hartlebury, the king has granted leave to Godfrey, the elect of Worcester, his chancellor, by special favour, to enclose, strengthen, crenellate, repair, and fortify the said castle at his will and to hold it for himself and his successors 1 Concise Etymolog. Dict. (1887), 99; see also Ducange and the New English Dictionary; the latter quotes R. Brunne, Chron. (Rolls Series), ii. 508, 1. 14465 (written c. 1330): "Castels aboute the toun dide make 2 Ann. Monast. (Rolls Ser.) ii. 106. 3 Ann. Wig. iv. 458. Liber alb. Episc. Wig. intitulat. Extenta et Chart., f. 456. 4.5 B without let or hindrance for ever. How speedily this licence was given may be gathered from the fact that at the moment Giffard was more than three months distant from his consecration, and that the temporalities of the see were not restored 1 till June 13th,2 five days after the date assigned to the grant for crenellation; such restoration was quite unusual before a bishop was consecrated; but Giffard was the king's chancellor and remained so till October. From all this we may conclude that he speedily got to work upon the erection of the episcopal fortress. Let us pass right on to nigh the end of his career. Robert of Winchelsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, is holding a visitation of Worcester-bishop, church, chapter, diocese-" tam in capite quam in membris." Winchelsey's letter declaring this intention to Giffard bore date at Burton, near Lincoln, February 10, 1301. Giffard, as we should expect, protested against the claim to visit, and said so, ill as he was, during the month of March. But the archbishop went on with his task. He visited the monks and he visited the sick bishop at Wick Episcopi; and at the end of Giffard's register 5 there is a series of articles referring to the charges levelled against the bishop by the monks and the bishop's replies to bishop's replies to those charges. The beginning of the document is missing, and the register starts with the seventh of the series. But the exordium of Robert de Winchelsey and the first six charges were known to Dr. Thomas; and the sixth happens to concern us closely. In it the monks asserted that the bishop had seized the goods of the church which 1 Prattinton Collection (Soc. Antiq.). It is in the edict for this restoration that we get the king's estimate of Giffard: Pensantes merita probitatis discreti viri Godefridi Giffarde Cancellarii nostri ad Wygorn. Ecclesiam electi qui per continuum suae familiaritatis obsequium quasi a pueritia gratum se nobis exhibere studuit et devotum." 5 Cf. ed. Willis Bund, 547-552. Wm. Thomas, Survey of the Cathedral Church of Worcester (1737), App. 63 f. existed in the sacristy, wherewith in great part he built his castle at Hartlebury and his houses at Worcester, Kempsey and Wick, in spite of the promise made at his appointment that he would not draw upon the sacrist's funds. The bishop denied the imputation. Hartlebury castle and the buildings at Kempsey and Wick had been constructed out of the episcopal income, canonically received. It was true that he had promised the sacrist to erect a see-house near the cathedral church and to provide the costs out of certain revenues belonging to the bishop in the church of Worcester, which he had set apart for the purpose three and thirty years ago.1 If any one asked what revenues, the answer was that they consisted of a moiety of the offerings made at the tomb and feretory of St. Wulstan, it having been agreed between Bishop William de Blois and the convent, in 1224, that the bishop and the prior and convent should each have a half. Here, then, is an accusation from within the monastery that Giffard spent his share of St. Wulstan's money on the erecting and strengthening of his houses, a better use of it, surely, than squandering it on himself or his relations. On the other hand, we have a private letter from John de Wyke, the prior, describing the old bishop as lying in extremis; so it must belong to the end of 1301 or the early weeks of 1302. It alleges that Giffard, having been granted power to collect first-fruits, had received large sums under that head, but had not used them, as he should, on the fabric of the cathedral. But it adds, as if to wipe out the accusation that he had expended St. Wulstan's offerings on the see-houses, that Giffard had not laid out sixty marks in that way. He had been bishop for thirty-three years, and the statement is ridiculous on the face of it. On the contrary, we are bound to conclude that a loyal and vigorous subject such as the Godfrey Giffard of 1268 undoubtedly was, having received permission to 1 The date, by itself, shows that these charges are not memoranda as to the contest in 1290" (Register, Giffard, ed. Willis Bund, 547, n. 4). 2 For a subsequent use of these funds cf. my Thomas de Cobham, 176. 3 The composition was copied into Giffard's Register, f. 44TM f.* 4 J. M. Wilson, Worcester Liber Albus (S.P.C.K.), 57; Lib. Alb., f. 6. |