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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 June 2012
Though a variety of circumstances have deprived me of the pleasure of being for some time so useful a member of the Society of Antiquaries as I could desire, I venture once more to appear before them, through your kind intervention, with some Observations upon a singular Relic of antiquity in my neighbourhood, which has of late excited much curiosity among visitors and tourists; and I hope that some account of it miy prove not uninteresting to our Society.
page 184 note a Dugdale, Monast. vol. vi. pt. ii. p. 838.
page 184 note b MS. Harl. 6726, f. 53.
page 185 note c Dugdale, ut supra, p. 800.
page 185 note d In a lease of Temple Balsall, co. Warwick (MSS. Cotton. Claud. E. b. f. 259, b.) granted by the Hospitallers to Martin Docwra, dated May 1, 1526, it is called throughout a commandery; and yet in the margin is preceptoria de Balsall Martino Docwra generoso. Again, in a lease of a later date in the same volume, it is styled a preceptory only.
page 185 note e Two individuals of the order, resident here at the time of the general arrest, are in the list of those who were sent to the Tower of London, Philip de Mewes, who had been five, and William de Pokelington three years initiated. Among the members at the suppression are also to be recognised two of ancient Herefordshire families, William de Hereford and Michael de Baskevile, attached to the establishment in London. The latter had been preceptor there for five year; and Hereford, who was a serving brother, had been admitted at Garway ten years before. Wilkins Concilia, vol. ii. pp. 346, 347. To these may perhaps be added the name of the Grand Master, De la More.
page 186 note f The bull of Pope Alexander, “Omne datum optimum,” allowed them to admit within their fraternity as many honest and godly clerks and priests as they conscientiously required. These were to be subject to no person, power, or other authority, except their own chapter; but to pay perfect obedience in all matters and upon all occasions only to the Grand Master at Jerusalem, as their Master and Bishop. Like other monastic establishments, they obtained from pious and charitable people all the advowsons within their reach, and frequently retained the tithe and glebe in their own hands, deputing a priest of the order to perform divine service and administer the sacraments. Addison, Hist, of the Templars, pp. 73, 74, 109. Bishop Swynfeild was here in April 1288, but not, it seems, on an episcopal visitation. Reg. Ric. de Swynfeild, Ep. Hereford, f. lxiv. a. and in the ensuing year; Archæolog. vol. xviii. p. 430. The farmers under the Hospitallers resisted the visitation of Bishop Mayo in the early part of the 16th century, as appears by his Register.
page 187 note g Wilkins, ut supra, pp. 344, 364, 390.
page 187 note h This is probably the John de Stoke who, with Henry de Garden, appeared before Bishop Swynfeild, in the hall of his manor of Bosbury, on behalf of themselves as executors, and Master Walter Thorp, dean of the Arches, co-executor, of the will of Master W. de Garden, sometime official of Canterbury and Prebendary of Berton-nigh-Colwall, in the church of Hereford; and swore to make a faithful inventory of all the goods of the deceased in the diocese, and render an account thereof when required, xvj. kal. January, A.D. M.ccc. tertio. Keg. Swynfeild, f. cxli. a. He gives as a reason why he was not admitted to the general Chapter of the Templars, that he was lame. Wilkins, ut supra, p. 357.
page 188 note i Wilkins, ut supra, pp. 387, 388.
page 189 note j There is such an evident contradiction in the statements of Stoke as, unless the account be confused on the part of the notary who took down his depositions, tends in no slight degree to invalidate them. When he makes his abject submission, with his hands clasped, and on his knees, in the Bishop of London's hall, 5 non. July, 1311, and signs his testimony as true, previous to his absolution, he affirms that this offence of denying his Redeemer was committed at his admission. “Fateor me abnegâsse Jesum Christum in receptione rnea, ore tantum, sed non corde.” He had before asserted with some minuteness that his admission took place a year and fifteen months prior to his abjuration. He did not even know that such had been the mode of admission till the Grand Master told him of it at Garway; but then he believed it to be true. He was received at Temple Balsall by Guido de Forestâ. These inconsistencies are not unworthy of observation on the question of the guilt or innocence of the Templars as a body, because his testimony is produced with some parade. So far as can be discovered through the stiffness of the report, he was under paroxysms of alarm in the presence of the inquisitors. This conduct may fairly be contrasted with that of the brave veteran Hymbert de Blank. Of all the knights apprehended and examined in England none behaved before the commissioners with more genuine heroism. He had served in the Holy Land, and was a member of the Order of 37 or 38 years’ standing, having been admitted to it at Sur, (Tyre,) in the presence of full thirty brethren, who were all deceased. Unmoved by threats or severities, he met the whole of their charges with a flat denial, was consistent from first to last, and resolutely refused to abjure errors that he had never committed. His examination is very striking, and his indignant denials are characteristic of a frank, stout-hearted soldier. As to the secrecy observed at their admissions, he affirmed that there was nothing in them that all the world might not know; and, being asked how to account for their being held in secret, bluntly replied, that it was a piece of folly. Him, after repeated examinations, the commissioners, to their disgrace, left at the close of the enquiry double-ironed to perish in one of the filthiest of their dungeons, as the notaries have, with apparent satisfaction, thus coolly recorded: “Concilium nondum ordinavit executionem de corpore ipsius faciendam, sed in vilissimo carcere ferro duplici constrictus jussus est recludi, et ibidem, donee aliud ordinatum extiterit, reservari, et interim visitari, ad videndum, si vellet ulterius aliqua confiteri.” Wllkins, ut supra, p. 393.
page 189 note k The tower of that church is a very singular structure, and of ample dimensions, standing at an angle to the rest of the building, apart from it, but connected with it by a passage or gallery. There was formerly a tradition that the church had been used as a prison during the Border contests, and the belfry for condemned malefactors. (Roberts, MSS. Collections for Herefordshire.) A beautiful Norman arch, bearing a peculiar, and very ornamental moulding, divides the nave from the chancel.
page 190 note m Dugdale, ut supra, p. 849. The Archbishop in the ensuing month wrote to his suffragans upon the subject. Wilkins, ut supra, p. 499.
page 191 note n The three under-dotted words in the last line are supplied from very frequent examination of the little that remains of that part of the inscription under a variety of the strongest and most favourable lights. Of the remainder there is little room to doubt.
page 192 note o Dove-cotes and fish-pools were attended to by the monasteries in an especial manner. Thus by the prior and convent of Bath, in a lease to Thomas Bradley and others of the farm of Fforde, co. Somerset, dated March 15, 29 Hen. VIII., reservation is made of “our dovehouses, with the doves or colvers therin, and our accustomed weye to the same.” MS. Harl. 3970, 317 f. 17 b.; and in their lease of Lyncombe, in the said county, to John Gaye and others, Jan. 22,.. Hen. VIII., exception is made in favour of their “free comyng to and goyng fro oure fysshe pond there to ffysche, or other thyng to doo at our pleasure.” Id. f. 22, b. Warrens were also excepted. In the lease of William Pole, of tne manor of Combe, in the said county, dated Nov. 11, 20 Hen. VIII., reservation is made as to “the pasture or fedyng of cc. female conyes there brede, goyng, restyng, and fedyng yerely.” Id. f. 20 a.
page 193 note p One of the oldest families in Herefordshire, seated at Treago (or Tre-Iago), in the parish of Saint Weonard's, from the Norman conquest, and still continuing there. They were lessees of the preceptory of Garway from the Hospitallers before the Reformation, and were deprived of it after the Civil War between Charles I. and the Parliament.
page 194 note q The two upper courses inclosing the aperture are said to be travertine.
page 196 note r A previous lease to the same Richard Mynors and Thomas David Lea of Garway of the lands appertaining to that preceptory in the diocese of Llandaff, dated July 15, 1508, occurs at f. lix. b. and another to both Mynors, father and son, dated May 1, 1526, at f. ccclxx. a.
page 197 note s Neither Upleden nor Garway now contained resident Brethren; but there was a Preceptor with others of the society at Dinmore.