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An English Archbishop and the Cerberus of War
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016
Extract
For much of his political life John Stratford was to be actively engaged either in unleashing or in muzzling the dogs of war. On occasion he seemed to be endeavouring to combine these disparate functions. Here I propose briefly to examine his involvement in and his attitude to the three-headed monster represented by the perennial Anglo-Scottish conflict, civil strife within England, and the initial phase of the Hundred Years’ War. I am, of course, appreciative of the fact that in the fourteenth century it is difficult to determine the originators of particular policies and equally hard to discern the attitude of prominent men to such policies when formed. Much is known about the course and outcome of diplomatic negotiations; remarkably little about the thinking of those at the heart of policy making.
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References
1 For which see in particular, Jenkins, H., Papal Efforts for Peace under Benedict XII, 1334-42 (London/Philadelphia 1933)Google Scholar; E. Déprez, ‘La conférence d’Avignon (1344)’ in Essays in Medieval History presented to T.F. Tout, eds A.G. Little and F.M. Powicke (Manchester 1925) pp 301-20.
2 Jones, W.R., ‘The English Church and Royal Propaganda during the Hundred Years War’ JBS 19 (1979), pp 18–30 Google Scholar; Wright, J.R., The Church and the English Crown 1305-1334 (Toronto 1980) app 11 ‘Prayers for the Crown’.Google Scholar
3 H.M. Chew, The English Ecclesiastical Tenants-in-Chief and Knight Service, especially in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries (Oxford 1932). Only later than Stratford’s time was there an attempt to array both secular and regular clergy. In 1418, in response to a writ for that purpose, Bishop Lacy of Hereford returned that he had found 43 men-at-arms and 200 archers in Hereford archdeaconry, 36 and 233 respectively in that of Shropshire. The Register of Edmund Lacy, bishop of Hereford a.d. 1417-1420 ed A.T. Bannister (Hereford 1917) pp 32-4. In general, B. McNab, ‘Obligations of the Church in English Society; Military Arrays of the Clergy, 1369-1418’ in Order and Innovation in the Middle Ages; Essays in Honor of Joseph R. Strayer edd W. C. Jordan, B. McNab and T.R. Ruiz (Princeton 1976) pp 293-314.
4 Foedera (3 edn, The Hague 1739-45) 2, ii pp 90 seq. Politically speaking Edward’s contention was not unreasonable, since the Scottish clergy tended to oppose English pretensions. See [P.A.] Linehan, ‘A Fourteenth Century History [of Anglo-Scottish Relations in a Spanish manuscript]’ BIHR 48 (1975) p 110 n 5.
5 Haines, [R.M.], [The] Church and Politics [in Fourteenth-Century England] (Cambridge 1978) pp 109–10 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Stratford was at the parliament which met at York in Feburary 1328. There the young Edward acknowledged Scotland to be a separate kingdom. The arrangements were concluded at Edinburgh and ratified at Northampton: Barrow, G.W.S., Robert Bruce and the Community of the Realm of Scotland (London 1965) pp 360–9 Google Scholar; Stones, E.L.G., ‘The Treaty of Northampton, 1328’ History ns 38 (1953) pp 54-61Google Scholar; Linehan, ‘A Fourteenth Century History’ pp 106-22.
6 ‘This statement is said to have been made by Stratford at the time of the Salisbury parliament (1328): Calendar of Plea and Memoranda Rolls . . . of the City of London 1323-1364 ed A.H. Thomas (Cambridge 1926) p 80.
7 CalPL 1305-42 p 313. Cf Vat[ican] Arch[ives], Reg Aven 36, fols 393v-4r; Reg Vat 94, fol 154r. This is a licence for Stratford, as bishop of Winchester, to appoint two notaries, issued at the petition of the earl of Lancaster and dated 13 June 1330.
8 H[ereford] C[athedral] L[ibrary] MS P.5 XII. The ‘Sermo pro salute regis’ begins at fol 79v. For background to the sermons: Macray, W.D., ‘Sermons for the Festivals of St. Thomas Becket’ EHR 8 (1893) pp 85–91 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kemp, E.W., ‘History and Action in the Sermons of a Medieval Archbishop’ in The Writing of History in the Middle Ages edd Davis, R.H.C. and Wallace-Hadrill, J.M. (Oxford 1981) pp 349–65 Google Scholar. For the 1327 sermon see Haines, Church and Politics p 169. The text (Eccles 10.3) was said to have been Bishop Orleton’s.
9 HCL MS P.5 XII, fol 80v: ‘Certe credimus quod hodie dedit nohis Deus regent qui pugnai bella nostra pro nohis et Deus pro eo’ The tone of this sermon may be compared to that in Bodleian Library, Bodley MS 649. See Haines, “Our Master Mariner, Our Sovereign Lord”: a Contemporary Preacher’s view of King Henry V’ Mediaeval Studies 38 (1976) pp 85-96.
10 Ibid. For background to and discussion of such theories; Tooke, J.D., The Just War in Aquinas and Grolius (London 1965)Google Scholar; Russell, F.H., The Just War in the Middle Ages (Cambridge 1975)Google Scholar.
11 BL Cotton MS Faustina B. V (Historia Roffensis), fol 79v.
12 E.g. McKisack, M., The Fourteenth Century (Oxford 1959) p 82.Google Scholar
13 Haines, Church and Politics pp 157-8.
14 For the financial pressure on Stratford and a list of the recognisances see Fryde, N.M., ‘John Stratford, Bishop of Winchester, and the Crown, 1323-30’ BIHR 44 (1971) pp 153–9 Google Scholar. Stratford was appointed as deputy treasurer 6 November 1326.
15 Responsiones, cols 2765-6 in Twysden, R., Historiae Anglicanae Scriptores Decem (London 1652)Google Scholar. Lambeth MS 1213 pp 300-6, is the source used by Twysden.
16 This seems to have been the contemporary opinion, if this is correctly reflected in the chronicles. Some modern writers, e.g. Fryde, N.M., The Tyranny and Fall of Edward II 1321-1326 (Cambridge/New York 1979) cap 15, give a more favourable view of the Mortimer/Isabella regime.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
17 Hampshire Record Office, Winchester Reg Stratford, fol 110r (entry dated 11 Sept. 1328).
18 Hook, W.F., Lives of the Archbishops of Canterbury 4 (London 1865) p 16 Google Scholar. The circumstantial account of Stratford’s flight (with some inaccuracies) is in Vitae Arch[iepiscoporum] Cant[uariensium], Wharton 1. p 19. Wharton ascribed the authorship to Birchington, a Canterbury monk, but this is no longer accepted. Lambeth MS 99, fols 136r-46v provides Wharton’s source. See also n 6 above.
19 BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V, fol 52r-v. This particular chronicler, William Dene, is clearly prejudiced against Mepham.
20 Ibid.
21 Stratford received the seal 28 November 1330. He was elected archbishop by the Canterbury monks 3 November 1333 and translated by Pope John XXII 26 November.
22 [The] War of Saint Sardos ed P. Chaplais, Camden Soc 3rd ser 87 (1954) pp 68-9 (from) PRO C47/27/12/50), 192; Fodera 2, ii pp 118-19: 15 November 1324.
23 Lettres secrètes Jean XXII, nos 2407-9; CalPL 1305-42 p 468: 5 March 1325.
24 Foedera 2, ii pp 137-8; English Medieval Diplomatic Practice ed Chaplais, P. (London 1975) 2, p1 15–16.Google Scholar
25 E.g. Registrum Hamonis Hethe, diocesis Roffensis a.d. 1319-1352, ed C. Johnson (CYS 48-49 1948) pp 356-8.
26 Foedera 2, ii pp 185-6.
27 Vitae Arch Cant p 29 (Lambeth MS 99, fol 140v). Cf. Foedera 2, iii p. 13. For some modem discussion of the situation in 1328: John le Patourel, ‘Edward III and the Kingdom of France’ History 43 (1958), especially pp 174-6; [E.]Perroy [trans D.C. Douglas The] Hundred Years War (London 1951) pp 80-2; [E.] Déprez, Les préliminaires [de L• guerre de cent ans] Bibliothèque des Écoles Françaises d’Athènes et de Rome 96 (Paris 1902) pp 34-7 (on p 36 ‘Chichester’ should read ‘Chester’).
28 Vitae Arch Cant p. 29. ‘Qui [Bishops Orleton and Northburgh]juxta ordinationem hujusmodi eis legationem injunctam tune assumentes, gressus suos versus Franciam direxerunt: quae auidem legano maximam guerrae praesentis materiam ministravit. Cf. BL Cotton MS Faustina B. V, fol 79v.
29 Foedera 2, iii p 27. Déprez, Les préliminaires pp 42-6, 72-3, 227-9 discusses the implications. Cf Perroy, Hundred Years War, pp 83-4, 93.
30 Vitae Arch Cant p 40 (Lambeth MS 99, fol 146r); W[inchester] C[athedral] Lfibrary], Winch[ester] Cart[ulary], no 518, printed (with a number of significant errors) in [G.L.] Harriss, King, Parliament, and Public Finance [in Medieval England to 1369] (Oxford 1975) app A pp 521-2.
31 Rot parl pp 60-1.
32 BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V. fol 60v.
33 Concern was expressed at the prospect by Bishop Hethe of Rochester: BL Cotton MS Faustina B. V, fol 65r-v.
34 Foedera 2, iii pp 108-11.
35 [The] Reg[ister of John de] Grandisson, [Bishop of Exeter a.d. 1327-1369] ed F. C. Hingeston-Randolph (London/Exeter 1894-9) p 274.
36 BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V, fol 75v. This must have been a conservative estimate. In 1334 Stratford himself accounted for more than ¿1000. PRO E101/311/6; E372/179/34.
37 BL Cotton MS B.V, fol 75v; Vitae Arch Cant p 20.
38 Chronicon [Galfridi le] Baker [Je Swynebrohe] ed E. Maunde Thompson (Oxford 1889) pp 55-6. Cf the supposed (undated) dictum ascribed to Philip in letters of William of Norwich (alias Bateman) of late 1340. Vat Arch, Reg Vat 135, fols 112v-14r, printed in Déprez, Les préliminaires pp 423-6; Registres de Benoît XII, Lettres Closes et Patentes no 2981.
39 Bishop Burghersh, who was frequently employed on embassies in the Low Countries, seems to have been particularly concerned, and also perhaps William Kilsby. It is true, however, that Stratford was alleged in 1341 (Libellus famosus) to have urged the German and other alliances ‘importuna instantia’: Vitae Arch Cant p 24 (Lambeth MS 99, fol 138r).
40 For Artois see Lucas, H.S., The Low Countries and the Hundred Years War, 1326-1347 (Ann Arbor 1929) pp 113–14, 176-81Google Scholar; Déprez, Les préliminaires pp 224-6; Whiting, B.J., ‘The Vows of the Heron’ Speculum 20 (1945) pp 261–78 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Diller, G.T., ‘Robert d’Artois et l’historicité des chroniques de Froissart’ Le Moyen Age 86 (1980) pp 217–31.Google Scholar
41 Foedera 2, iii pp 155-6. Cf the varying date and account of proceedings in BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V, fol 79r.
42 Vitae Arch Cant p 30 (Lambeth MS 99, fol 141r). Cf Harriss, King, Parliament, and Public Finance p 234.
43 Vitae Arch Cant p 30. ‘Et demum dicto pacis negotio tanąuam desperato totaliter derelicto (Stratford’s Recusaciones).
44 Déprez, Les préliminaires p 154 n 1.
45 Vat Arch, Reg Vat 132, fol 52r-v. A letter of the same tenor to the king is at fols 51r-2r. See Registres de Benoit XII, Lettres Closes et Patentes nos 1418-22; Déprez, Les préliminaires pp 415-7.
46 Foedera 2, iii pp 183-4, 187, Cf BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V. fols 80v-lr.
47 [Adae] Murimuth [Continuatio Chronicarum] ed E. Maunde Thompson (RS 1889) p 81; BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V, fol 81v; Chromcon Baker p 60.
48 Foedera 2, iii pp 198, 200; iv pp 3-4.
49 Foedera 2, iv p 10. A similar instruction to the archbishop of York follows, ibid pp 10-11.
50 Chronkon Baker p 61; PRO C49/46/8: undated letters [1338-9] of credence explaining continental developments to the duke of Cornwall and the ‘home council’.
51 These details are from Stratford’s expense account, PRO E101/311/35; E372/184/42.
52 Vat Arch, Reg Vat 133, fols 120r-3r; CalPL 1305-42 pp 569-70; Foedera 2, iv pp 37-9 seq; CalPatR 1338-40 pp 194, 196.
53 PRO C49/file 46/8. ‘Primerement ils deivent dire coment. . . lercevesque et levesque de Duresme sont venue au roi et ont bien dit qe par mediación des cardinaux non autre manere ils ne trouent pees. ’
54 BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V, fol 83r. ‘Insolita et inaudita onera, exacciones per partent regis sunt ptita. ’
55 As Stubbs remarked in Constitutional History of England (Oxford 1874-8) 2 p 381, ‘It was at the parliament of October 1339 that the first symptoms appeared of a disposition to make conditions before consenting to a grant.’
56 Ibid p 383; Statutes 1 pp 281-94. The (later) commons’ petitions, of March 1340, are in Harriss, King, Parliament, and Public Finance pp 518-20 (from WCL Winch Cart no 297).
57 Haines, A Calendar of the Register of Wolstan de Bransford, Bishop of Worcester 1339-49 (Worc Hist Soc 1966) pp 67-8, 511-12. There is a very carefully written copy of the ‘charter’ (omitted from Bransford’s register) in Lincoln Record Office A/2/12 (portion of a Norwich register from Bishop Bek’s time). For Stratford’s mandates from the continent: Reg Grandisson pp 914-5; The Register of Ralph of Shrewsbury, Bishop of Bath and Wells 1329- 1363 ed T.S. Holmes (Som Ree Soc 1896) pp 357-8.
58 Déprez, Les préliminaires p 420 (from PRO C70/743 m3).
59 Foedera 2, iv p 78. The elaborate story of Stratford’s caution is in [Robertas de] Avesbury, [De Gestis Mirabilibus Regis Edwardi Tenu] ed E. Maunde Thompson (RS 1889) pp 310-12. Cf BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V, fol 84v.
60 Rot Parl 2 p 119 no 17.
61 See, for instance, Hughes, D., A Study of Constitutional Tendencies in the Early Years of Edward III (London 1915) caps 7-9Google Scholar; Lapsley, G.T., ‘Archbishop Stratford and the Parliamentary Crisis of 1341’ EHR 30 (1915) pp 6–18, 193-215CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Wilkinson, [B.], ‘[The] Protest of the Earls [of Arundel and Surrey in the Crisis of 1341]’ EHR 46 (1931) pp 181–93 Google Scholar; Harriss, King, Parliament, and Public Finance caps 12-13. The principal chronicle source is Vitae Arch Cant.
62 For the terms of the truce of Espléchin: Foedera 2, iv pp 83-4; A vesbury pp 317-23; BL Cotton MS Faustina B.V, fols 86v-7r.
63 For the Libellus famosus (as Stratford dubbed it), and for his Excusaciones, see Vitae Arch Cant pp 23-7, 27-36 (Lambeth MS 99, fols 138r-9v, 139v-44r).
64 The financial problems of the period 1339-43 are fully considered by Harriss, King, Parliament, and Public Finance caps 11-13. For Edward III’s attempts to raise money from wool: Lloyd, T.H., The English Wool Trade in the Middle Ages (Cambridge 1977) cap 5CrossRefGoogle Scholar. To the pope Edward suggested; ’Vere credo quod archiepiscopus voluit quod propter defectum pecunie perditus fuissem et interfectus’. Vat Arch, Reg Vat 135, fol 114r.
65 Vitat Arch Cant p 41 (Lambeth MS 99, fol 146v) gives 3 May 1341; Rot Parl 2 p 127 no 8 seemingly implies 7 May, but Wilkinson, ‘Protest of the Earls’ p 184 n 2, argues that ‘Meisme cesti jour’ in fact means 3 May. A further reconciliation took place on 23 October in Westminster Hall: see n 30 above.
66 Vat Arch, Reg Vat 139, fols 273v-4r; CalPL 1342-62 p 25: 24 April 1346.
67 E.g. Reg[istrum Johannis de] Trillek, [episcopi Herefordensis a.d. 1344-1361 ed J.H. Parry (Hereford 1910)] pp 272-3. Various papal letters exhorted Stratford to resist novelties and to emulate St. Thomas, his predecessor, e.g. Vat Arch, Reg Vat 137, fol 172v; 138, fol 100r.
68 Murimuth pp 205-12; Avesbury pp 363-7.
69 Wiltshire County Record Office, Salisbury Reg Wyville 1, has an original writ bound between fols 164 and 165. See also Reg Trilliek pp 308-9.
70 The biennial tenth of 1342 was followed by the triennial tenth of 1344 and another biennial tenth in 1346. For the last Stratford sent letters urging his suffragans to anticipate the dates of payment and to persuade their clergy to do likewise. See Reg. Triliek p 277; CUL Ely Reg Lisle, fol 72r.
71 Vitae Arch Cant pp 34-5 (Lambeth MS 99, fol 143r).
72 Vat Arch, Reg Vat 137, fol 172v. ‘Nosque a multis stimulati fuerimus ut propterea contra te procedere deberemus. ’
73 Stratford is by some considered to have weakly acquiesced in Edward’s repudiation of the 1341 statutes. However, some of his provincial legislation is a robust defence of church rights. The king continued to be wary of his minister where ecclesiastical liberties were concerned, but neither party wished to risk a further rupture like that of 1341.
74 Vitae Arch Cant p 41 (Lambeth MS 99, fol 146v).