The Churches of Coventry | Page 4

the mid-thirteenth century the Monastery had become the landlord of the city; shortly before this it had been so impoverished with ceaseless quarrels with the King and the Lichfield Chapter, involving costly appeals to Rome, that the Prior was reduced to asking the hospitality of the monks of Derley for some of the brethren. A period of prosperity followed and many benefactions flowed in, including the gift of various churches by the king. It was after twenty-six years of quarrelling that the Pope, in 1224, had appointed to the bishopric Walter de Stavenby, an able and learned man. During his episcopacy the friars made their appearance in England, and by him the Franciscans were introduced at Lichfield, while at Coventry Ranulph, Earl of Chester, gave them land in Cheylesmore on which to build their oratory and house.
They were not generally welcomed by the monks. A Benedictine laments their first appearance thus "Oh shame! oh worse than shame! oh barbarous pestilence! the Minor Brethren are come into England!" and at Bury they were obliged to build outside a mile radius from the Abbey. The parish priests also soon found out that they were undersold in the exercise of their spiritual offices and although no doubt many badly needed awakening they were not, on that account, the more likely to welcome the intruders.
Another innovation, affecting the fortunes of the parish priest, had its beginning under the rule of Bishop Stavenby though its greatest development occurred in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. This was the foundation of Chantries designed primarily for the maintenance of a priest or priests to say mass daily or otherwise for the soul's health of the founder, his family and forbears. The earliest we hear of are one at Lincoln, and one at Hatherton in Coventry Archdeaconry while the Bishop himself endowed one in Lichfield Cathedral. Many were perpetual endowments (_￡_5 per annum being the average stipend), others were temporary, according to the means of those who paid for the masses--for a term of years or for a fixed number of masses, Although chantry priests were often required to give regular help in the church services or taught such scholars as came to them or served outlying chapelries, the system permitted a great number to live on occasional engagements and was doubtless productive of abuses. Chaucer tells us that his poor parson was not such an one as
...left his sheep encumbered in the mire, And ran unto London, unto Saint Foul's, To seek? him a chantery for souls.
The number of chantries in the different cathedrals varied very greatly, Lichfield had eighty-seven, St. Paul's thirty-seven, York only three. Monks' churches had few or none while in town churches they were numerous, London having one hundred and eighty, York forty-two, Coventry at least fifteen besides the twelve gild priests of the chapel of Babelake. Most were founded in connection with an existing altar, some had a special altar, at Winchester, Tewkesbury and elsewhere they were enclosed in screens between the pillars of the nave, or a special chapel was added to the church.
It was in the thirteenth century also (1267) that the monastery obtained the grant of a Merchants' Gild; with all the privileges thereto belonging, the earliest of those which contributed so much to the renown of Coventry. These were Benefit Societies, insuring help to the "Brethren and sistren" in old age, sickness or poverty, securing to them the services of the church after death and in all cases established on a strictly religious basis and placed under the protection of a Saint, or of the Holy Trinity. The regulation and protection of trade interests, generally aiming at monopoly and the exclusion of outsiders, were later developments. But without doubt they were public-spirited bodies according to their lights, maintaining schools (as at Stratford-on-Avon) hospitals and almshouses, and giving freely on all occasions of public importance. By pageants too, they contributed to the happiness and amusement of the people as well as by the presentation of Mysteries and Moralities, to their instruction and edification. But in the eyes of the Reformers, or of grasping courtiers, all this went for nothing when weighed against the heinous offence of supporting chaplains to pray for deceased members and so (6 Edward VI) they were suppressed along with the chantries, and their property confiscated, "the very meanest and most inexcusable of the plunderings which threw discredit on the Reformation."
Here, the city bought back everything which had belonged to the Trinity and Corpus Christi Gilds, with various almshouses and the possessions of the majority of the Chantries; while previously at the Dissolution it had bought the abbey-orchard, and mill, and the house and church of the Grey Friars.
In 1340 Edward III granted Licence to the Coventry men to form a Merchants' Gild with leave "to make