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NORWICH.

PART I

REV, W. HUDSON

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ST. PETER PERMOUNTERGATE,
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PERMOUNTERQATE , NORWICH.
About the Year 1500

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HISTORY

PAEISH OP

S)t* Peter Permntintergate,

NOEWICH.

EEV. W. HUDSON,
VICAR,
And Hon. Sec. of the Norfolk and Norwich Archceological Societi/.

Past I.

^ SEalft rounU i^z Mistxitt Six fl^unKreU
ifears aso.

NOEWICH :
AOAS H. 0008E, BAUPANT HORSE STREET,
1889.

PREFACE.

npHE following Sketch of the Early History
-*- of a City Parish was commenced, and
is still being issued, on the cover of a Parish
Magazine which circulates among . all classes
of a mixed population. This fact will readily
be accepted as a sufficient reason for the use of
popular instead of technical language, and for
the absence, in most cases, of any definite
reference to authorities. At the same time,
although from the nature of the case it would
be impossible to vouch for the strict accuracy
of every statement made, I can assure my
readers that the conclusions I have arrived at
have never been formed except on fairly
substantial evidence. In dealing with so many
rather intricate details of property, no doubt
mistakes might be found to have crept in, but
I do not think they are numerous.
The greater part of my information has
been derived from the documents in the
Guildhall, and I have to express my obligation
to the Town Clerk for free access to them at

all times ; and also to Mr. T. R. Tallack for
his ready assistance in finding anything I was
searching for. I have also been frequently
indebted to Dr. Bensly for similar help in
obtaining information from the Cathedral
documents, and I should like to add my
thanks to the Rev. 0. W. Tancock for help
in ascertaining the meamng of obsolete words
and phrases. The materials, with many others
which have not yet been used, have been
gathered together at various times during the
past few years. It is only necessary here to
mention the principal classes of documents
on which the statements in this " Part I." of
the History are founded.
1. — Original Deeds, in the possession of the
Corporation. These are kept in the Guildhall
Record- room in drawers, and are arranged
parochially. They date from the middle of
the thirteenth century. I have given a speci
men of an early one in the Appendix.
2. — Unrolled Deeds, also in possession of the
Corporation, and kept in the Guildhall Record-
room. These rolls are called "Court Rolls"
in the " Repertory of the Corporation Muni
ments." They contain Enrolments of Deeds
of Conveyance of Property in the City of
Norwich, made on skins of parchment fastened

together in bundles of different sizes. They
begin in the year 1285. I have given a
specimen of one of these Enrolled Deeds in
the Appendix.
3. — Leet Rolls, in the same place. They are
Eecords on parchment Rolls ofthe Presentments
made and Fines inflicted for offences against
the public peace or the customs of the city,
nuisances, encroachments, &c. The Court was
held every year in Lent, the various portions
of the city appearing in sub-divisions of
groups of parishes. I have sometimes, for
the sake of avoiding pedantry, called it the
Court Leet, by which name it is commonly
known ; but in these early times it was
called simply "The Lete." The Leet Rolls
commence in 1288, and seven exist prior to
1300. 4. — Next to these may be mentioned two
bound volumes in the Guildhall ; the " Book
of Pleas," containing copies of documents
of a miscellaneous character from the date of
King Henry III. downwards, and the " City
Domesday," chiefly relating to the property of
the city in the time of King Richard II. , but
containing copies of earlier deeds not found
elsewhere. Some few other documents are
referred to by name, when they are quoted.

6. — From the documents in the possession
of the Dean and Chapter I have not obtained
more than a few isolated pieces of information
for this early period of parochial history.
Their sources are indicated at the places where
they occur.
I have only to add that of the documents
numbered 1, 2, and 3, I have a Calendar of all
the Deeds and a transcript of all the Leet
Rolls down to the year 1300, with Indexes of
Places and Names. Until they are published,
as the Committee of the Norfolk and Norwich
Archseological Society desire them to be, I am
willing to place them at the disposal of any
one who has a mind to make a survey of any
other district of the city such as I have
attempted for that with which I am best
acquainted. A very little study would be
suflicient for the mastery of the technicalities.
The one requisite is to have an intimate
knowledge of the particular locality, and a fair
acquaintance with the changes which have
taken place in it.
W. H.
Norwich, June, 1889.

CONTENTS.

PAGE
The Locality in the Earliest Times . . . i
The Church and Parish of St. Vedast . . 3
St. Vedast and St. Faith . . . .4
The Parish of St. Peter Permountergate . 7
The name " Permountergate " . . .8
Four Periods of Parochial History . . . 11
The District Six Hundred Years ago . . -14
Upper King Street ..... 18
The North Side of Rose Lane . . .21
King Street, from Rose Lane Corner to Mountergate
Street ...... 26
Down Mountergate Street to Rose Lane . . 28
Up the South Side of Rose Lane . 30
" Margaret la Tanneresse " . . -31
" Master Henry Sampson " . . -33
How to find out some of the Residents . . 36
The Tanners ..... 38
The Riverside . . . . . .40
" John de Berstrete " . . .43
Up Mountergate Street . . . . -47
King Street, from Mountergate Street to St. Ann's
Lane ..... 48
King Street  S3
" John, son of Adam Page " . . -53
Site of Messrs. Morgan's Brewery . . 55
King Street— Stepping Lane ... 58
" Adam de Toftes " and " John de Morlee " . . 61
St. Peter Permountergate Church . . 65
The " Clerk of the Church " . . .66
The Church BeUs .... 68
King Street from the Churchyard, and Cattle Market
Street . . , . . -70
General Observations . . . • 73 ,
Style of Living . . . . .76
Appendix — Specimens of an Original Deed and an
EnroUed Deed of Conveyance, vrith Translations . 79

PARISH OP

^1. "^dtx '^txmaxxnttXQKtt

The Locality in the Earliest Times.
The district which is comprised within the
Parish of St. Peter Permountergate has no
slight claim to be considered as the site of the
earliest settlement of Norwich by the Saxons,
probably more than 1200 years ago. It forms
the northern part of what was anciently called
Conisford, the district traversed by King Street
and for various reasons acknowledged to be the
earliest inhabited portion of the city. Conisford
is a Saxon word meaning " The King's Ford,"
that is the public or common ford, as we still
call a public road the "King's Highway." This
ford must, of course, have been somewhere within
the district to which it gave its name, but where
we have no means of knowing. It seems, how
ever, reasonable to suppose that it cannot have
been very far from the site of the Foundry
Bridge, because lower down the river a ford
would have led only to marshes, which, at that
early date must have been impassable at all
times of the tide, for the tidal water flowed

freely over them; while higher up the river
beyond Pull's Ferry the name Conisford was
never used. A ford somewhere near the Foundry
Bridge would have been well within the limits
of the locality so called, and would have led
directly to rising ground on the Thorpe side of
the river.
The whole district between the river and King
Street, and between the wall of the Close and
St. Ann's Lane, was till recently meadow and
orchard ground. It had a special name. Nether
or Lower Conisford, to distinguish it from the
higher ground further from the river, which was
called Over or Upper Conisford. The street
which traverses it, now called Mountergate
Street — but for several hundred years St. Faith's
Lane — was originally called the Street of Nether
Conisford, King Street being called the Street of
Over Conisford.
A great deal of Nether Conisford was not
originally in the Parish of St. Peter Permounter
gate, which is made up of four ancient parishes.
Beginning at the north by the Close was the
parish of St. Vedast, which extended along the
river from near Pulls' Ferry to Mr. Hotblack's
garden, and went about half-way up Prince of
Wales' Road and Rose Lane. At the top of
Rose Lane was a small parish of St. John the
Evangelist. Then came St. Peter Permounter
gate, extending from the Castle Meadow and
Castle Hill across King Street by the church
and down to the river ; and further down King
Street was another small parish of St. Michael-
in- Conisford, the greater part of which is now
occupied by Messrs. Morgan's premises on both
sides of the street.

mit Cfjurcl) ant Parislj of St. VtU&t.
Of these four Parishes the most interesting
in its earliest history is that of St. Vedast. It
contained the spot where I have suggested that
the ford was most probably situated which gave
its name to Conisford, and I believe there are
indications that its church was first founded at
a very early date indeed. It stood in Rose Lane
behind Cook's Hospital, and the churchyard
extended from Rose Lane to about the middle
of the road where Cathedral Street now crosses
the Prince of Wales' Road. It is supposed to
be mentioned, though not by name, in the
Domesday Book of William the Conqueror,
where we are told that in the time of King
Edward the Confessor a certain Edstan held the
sixth part of a church in Norwich. That means
that a sixth part of the endowment was in his
hands. About fifty years later the sixth part
of St. Vedast's Church was transferred to the
Almoner of the Cathedral Priory, so it is
thought that St. Vedast's was the church of
which Edstan held a portion. The name of
the saint to which it was dedicated seems to
indicate a still earlier foundation. St. Vedast
was Bishop of Arras, in Flanders, in the north
of France; he died in 539, and in the following
century a very famous monastery was dedicated
to his memory. About the time of King Alfred
the Great there was considerable intercourse
between England and Flanders, and when Alfred
left the Danish king Guthrum in peaceable pos
session of Eastern England on condition of his
embracing Christianity, and, not finding scholars
B 1

in England to instruct him, sent for some to
France, a distinguished monk named Grimbald
came over from St. Omer, quite close to Arras.
He settled at Winchester and set up a school
there. It is almost certain that among the
books he brought with him was a Life of St.
Vedast, who was much thought of and whose
life had heen written by the celebrated scholar
Alcuin in the time of Charlemagne. In a
Benedictional or service book used at Winchester
not long after, the name of St. Vedast is specially
mentioned. There is therefore nothing im
probable in supposing that some of Grimbald's
pupils may have come here from Winchester to
assist in the instruction of the Danes, and caused
the dedication of a church to St. Vedast, whom
their master had taught them to honour. This
would make the original foundation of the
church about the year a.d. 900.

St. Vtiinst anb St. Mtfi.
Though the Church and Parish of St. Vedast
have long ceased to exist, the name of St.
Vedast still lingers amongst us ; but in a form
not easily recognizable. " St. Faith's Lane " is
a corruption of "St. Vedast's Lane." The
change has come about in the following way.
The word "Vedast" was popularly written
"Vaast," and pronounced differently according
to different dialects. Here in Norwich the people

pronounced it almost like "Vaist." The lane
which was near it (the Street of Nether
Conisford) was called by the inhabitants, " St.
Vaist's Lane." Now, it happened that at
Horsham, about six miles from Norwich, a
Norman knight had founded a monastery
dedicated to St. Faith, a very popular virgin
martyr. A village sprang up round it, which
also took the name of St. Faith's. Here the
founder's family got licence to establish a fair,
and for many ages " St. Faith's Fair " for horses
and cattle was one of the great events of the
year. So it came to pass that in course of time,
as "St. Vaist" became forgotten and "St. Faith"
was a familiar name, the virgin-martyr ousted
the bishop from his rightful inheritance ; St.
Vaist's Lane became St. Faith's Lane ; and
St. Vaist's Church became St. Faith's Church,
the change arising solely from a confusion
between two words which sounded very much
alike. It Is interesting to observe that in
London, where a church was also dedicated to
St. Vedast, a similar confusion has taken place
with a very different result. There the people
pronounced "Vaast" like "Vorst," and so came
at last to confuse it with the word " Forster," a
forester ; so we have to this day in London
St. Vedast's Charch in Foster Lane. It is
strange that " Foster " in London and " Faith "
in Norwich should have grown, by confusion
of sounds, out of the same word.
Within the last few years the name of St. Faith
has also been displaced in favour of a still more
unfortunate corruption. The residents in that
part of St. Faith's Lane which lies between
King Street and Rose Lane complained that

letters and parcels addressed to them found their
way to Horsham St. Faith's. Leave was there
fore obtained to alter the name of that part of
the Street, and the new name chosen was
Mountergate Street, a word which will be
explained in connection with Permountergate,
of which It is a corruption. The remainder of
the lane still retains its old title, and it may be
hoped that no convenience will require the
complete destruction of so interesting a link with
the far-off past, for in its correct and incorrect
form, the same name has clung to the spot for,
perhaps, not far short of 1000 years.
One other existing relic of St. Vedast's
Church must not be passed over without notice.
In the wall of the house attached to Sillett's
Stableyard, at the corner of Cathedral Street
and Rose Lane, is a large stone with curious
markings on it. I have been told that this
stone was built into the Churchyard wall. The
supposition is that it had at some time or other
been taken from the ruins of the church which
stood at the back of the stableyard. I cannot
vouch for the truth of this theory, but the stone
bears every appearance of having belonged to
some such building.
The two small parishes of St. John the
Evangelist and St. Michael in Conesford, which
have been mentioned as formerly existing within
this district, have no special points of interest
attaching to them. There is nothing to shew
when or by whom either of the churches was
founded, and both the parishes were dissolved at
an early period. The Church of St. John the
Evangelist stood near the spot now occupied by
the Rose Tavem. By the year 1300 nearly the

whole Parish had passed into the hands of the
Grey Friars, and the church was pulled down.
The Church of St. Michael in Conisford stood
immediately opposite to the Of&ce of Messrs.
Morgan's Brewery. It was sold about 1360 to
the Austin Friars, who had already obtained
possession of all the Parish on that side of
King Street.

SCfje Parief) of St. pettr Permountergate.
We may now pass on to the Parish of
St. Peter Permountergate, to which the other
three have long since been united. Its original
foundation is assigned to a somewhat later period
than that of St. Vedast, and to quite a different
cause. The Church of St. Vedast, as we have
seen, was almost certainly founded in Saxon
times, for the spiritual benefit of the settlers in
the locality. The original foundation of the
Church of St. Peter Permountergate was the
work of one of those Norman knights who, in
a remarkable degree, combined warlike ardour
with religious zeal, and who, out of their vast
possessions, covered the land with monasteries
and churches more for the satisfying of their
own consciences than to supply the spiritual
needs of the locality where they were es
tablished. The first founder of St. Peter
Permountergate Church was Roger Bigod, one
of the wealthiest and most powerful of the
companions of William the Conqueror, who had
charge of the Castle, perhaps at the close of the

Conqueror's reign, and certainly at the beginning
of the reign of William Rufus. Soon after that
time he assisted in the building of the Cathedral,
and he gave the endowment and patronage of
the Church to the monastery to which the
Cathedral belonged. From that day to this the
connection between the Cathedral and the
Church has never ceased.
It has already been said that the original
Parish was only a portion of the present one.
It extended along King Street no further
than from Rose Lane to Mountergate Street.
Towards the east it' reached as far as the river,
and towards the west to the top of Stepping
Lane as it does now. It did not, however,
include any part of the Castle Meadow, which
was all then enclosed within the Castle earth
works. The church must have been built
immediately outside what was called the Castle
Baily, a small district belonging to the Governor
of the Castle. This skirted the upper side of
the Churchyard, and was afterwards united to
St. Michael at Thorn, to which Parish therefore
Messrs. Holmes' Works belong, though they
adjoin the Churchyard ; and so do the Shirehall
Tavern and the houses next to it.

2Elie Name " ^etmonntetgate."
The name of the Parish has given rise to
even greater confusion than that of St. Vedast.
For a long time back it has been the custom to
write it St. Peter per Mountergate, under a

misapprehension as to the meaning of the
word. Blomefield in his History of Norwich
says it was "so called from a gate anciently
placed by the churchyard at the foot ofthe mount
or hill," as though the name meant " St. Peter
by the gate of the mount." This explanation
has of course been copied by most local writers,
but it is certainly incorrect, there being not the
least doubt as to what the word really is. In
the earliest documents the name of the Church
is invariably written in one way and only one,
St. Peter de Parmentergate. ' Now the ter
mination " gate " in old Norwich names never
means what we now call a gate, with bolts and
bars, but is always the Danish word for a
" way " or " street." " Parmenter " was a very
old name for an occupation, meaning " tailor "
or perhaps "skinner." St. Peter de Par
mentergate therefore meant "the Church of St.
Peter in the street of the tailors or skinners."
It might seem to follow as a matter of ijecessity
that this part of King Street must have been
called " Parmentergate " at the time when the
Church was first founded, and this is maintained
by the well-known antiquary, Kirkpatrick, in a
manuscript which has lately been found. But
although I have seen large numbers of deeds in
which this part of the street is mentioned,
dating as far back as 1250, I have never once
found the street called by this name, but always
Conesford. Possibly an examination of some of
the earlier documents in the Cathedral may
some day throw some light on this point.
The full title, St. Peter Permountergate, is
certainly inconveniently long and does not easily
fit into the space allowed for the purpose in the

10
many of&cial returns required in these days. It
is not, therefore, surprising to find that not only
popular but also official practice has of late
adopted a shorter form, calling the Church " St.
Peter Mountergate," and the parish " Mounter-
gate " alone. As already mentioned, this short
form of the word has been assigned as a new
name to a large part of St. Faith's Lane. Nor
can we be surprised that strangers should take
" Mountergate " for the name of a district, and
address their letters to " St. Peter's, Mounter-
gate, Norwich," in three separate lines. But
no one has yet, so far as I know, equalled the
inventiveness of a clerk in the office of the
Ecclesiastical Commission, whose imagination
has converted the supposed district into a saint
by addressing an official letter a few months ago
to " St. Mountergate Vicarage, Norwich." The
" parmenters " from whom the Church first
took its name would hardly recognise themselves
in such an altered guise.

11

Four Periods of Parochial History.

Having now given some account of the original
condition of the Parish, or rather of the dis
trict which is now included in it, I will briefly
sketch the plan on which I propose to write its
history. The various changes which the district has
passed through may be conveniently divided into
four distinct periods with well-marked charac
teristics. The first, which may be called the
Primitive Period, is the one of which I have
already spoken, beginning at some unknown
time and going down to about 1250 ; this was
the time when there were four separate parishes.
During this period the population must have
resided almost entirely between King Street and
the river. The second or Mediaeval Period
extended over about 300 years, from 1260 to
1550, and was marked by a shifting of the
locality where the inhabitants were settled. On
the one hand the population was displaced from
the greater part of the district between the
river and King Street, a large portion on the
north being enclosed by the Grey Friars, and
another portion on the south by the Austin
Friars. Meanwhile, however, when King
Edward III. and his successors, no longer
needing the Castle Earthworks, permitted the
citizens to encroach upon them, and even to
level and build over them, a great part of the

12
Castle Meadow and part of the Castle Hill
were thrown into the Parish of St. Peter Per
mountergate, and a new population arose there.
It was towards the close of this period that our
present Parish Church was built, in place of
the earlier one founded by Roger Bigod. The
third period cannot be quite so appropriately
summed up in a single expression. Perhaps it
may be best described as the Post- Reformation
Period, and be said to extend from 1550 to 1800.
The population remained as before, increasing
largely on the Castle side of the parish, in the
somewhat notorious locality of Pump Street and
Market Lane. On the other side of King Street the
great enclosure of the Grey Friars was parcelled
out into a number of separate holdings, with
only a house here and there ; the Austin Friars'
grounds remained undivided in private hands ;
almost the whole riverside passed into the pos
session of the Great Hospital, and nearly all the
land between Rose Lane and Mountergate Street,
now intersected by John Street, was orchard and
garden ground. Throughout this period the
history of the Parish is illustrated by the
Registers of Baptisms, Marriages and Burials,
which begin in the year 1538, and are preserved
without a break to the present day. The
Churchwardens' Books begin in 1735. The
fourth and last period of our Parochial History,
most fitly called the Modern Period, I have
fixed as coinciding with the present century.
Its chief characteristic has been the entire
reversal of the changes effected in the two
previous periods, and a return to something
more like the condition of the locality in the
first period. The extension of Rose Lane to the

13
river, and the construction of Foundry Bridge,
were the first in the series of changes which
have resulted in the shifting back again of the
population from the slope of the Castle Hill to
the meadows of Nether Conisford. Pump Street
and its inhabitants have been swept away for the
improvement of the Cattle Market, while the
precincts of the Grey Friars and the Austin
Friars, and the orchards which lay between,
have all been cut through by roads and streets
lined with houses, shops, cottages, factories and
workshops, so that there scarcely remains any
more ground available for building.

14

The District 600 Years ago.

It is a fortunate circumstance that there is
still existing sufficient evidence to enable us to
draw a tolerably faithful picture of the district
at the commencement of the second of these
periods, before the alterations effected by the
Friars. Our forefathers managed some things
quite as well as we do now. When a citizen of
Norwich, 600 years ago, sold or leased a piece
of land or a house or shop to someone else, the
vendor and purchaser, and ten or twelve wit
nesses (generally neighbours), went to the Court
of the four Bailiffs who then governed the city ;
there the deed of conveyance was produced and
acknowledged. It was a neat little piece of parch
ment (scarcely larger than one of these pages),
and on it was inscribed in beautiful handwriting
the date, the names and often the occupations
of the two parties, the description of the pro
perty, the name of the parish and frequently
the name of the street it was situated in, what was
on each side of it, north, south, east, and west ;
then a few other details, and lastly the names of
the witnesses. It was then endorsed by the
Sworn Clerk of the Bailiffs, and handed over to
the purchaser. Numbers of these early deeds
are still preserved in the Guildhall. Moreover,
by the ancient customs or privileges of the city,
the purchaser, for the greater security of his
title, had the right to demand that the deed

16
should be enrolled on a parchment roll kept for
that purpose. This was accordingly done, except
that* the names of the witnesses were omitted.
Thoso rolls, or copies of deeds of conveyance,
preserved in the Guildhall, commence in tho
yoar 1285 ; and contain on an average about
seventy dt-cds in a year, relating to all parts of
tho city. From a careful examination of those
relating to this locality I am able to give the
following information of its condition when
Edward I. was king just 600 years ago.
I havo already mentioned that the Castle
Meadow was onclosod with a bank and ditch,
passing from whore tho Agricultural Hall now
stands to op[)osito tho top of Rose Lane. It
approached so close to King Street that I find
no nioutiou of anyone having houses or lands
on that sido of the street, between those points.
Tho Castlo Hill or Cattle Market was also
enclosed, and the lino of houses from Cooper's
shop to Qlobo Lano probably follows tho line
of the highway whioh then skirted tho Castle
ditch. The main streat was King Street, whioh, of
course, was iho samo theu as now. It was
called tho Street of Conesford, or frequently
Over- Conesford, to distinguish it from St. Faith's
Lane, which followed tho samo direction as it
doos now, and was called tho Street of Nether
or Lower Conesford. A certain amount of con
fusion is caused to a student now (ihough,
perhaps, it did not matter then) by the fact
that Koi--o Lnno was called the Strt-ot of Nether
(•onesford as woll os tho parallel street running
down by tho sido of Quinton's shop. The
laud now occupied by that shop, and the land

16
occupied by the Rose Tavern, are both referred
to several times. Both are described as having
"the King's Highway of Over Conesford
towards the west, and the King's Highway
of Nether Conesford towards the south," and
it is not always easy to say which of the two
corners is meant. Stepping Lane was there,
but it is only spoken of as " a certain common
lane." Thorn Lane was also there, and was
called the "King's Highway of Sandgate"
(i.e. Sandy Way). St. Ann's Lane had no
special name, and I am not quite sure of its
existence then. These are all the streets and
lanes which have remained from that time to
this, for I need scarcely remind my readers that
Prince of Wales' Road, Cathedral Street, John
Street, and Synagogue Street, are all quite
new. There were, however, several streets or lanes
then which have long since disappeared.
There was one which went down to the river
from the Horse Fair by Mr. Anthony's house,
and led to a landing stage for goods called
Level's Staithe, from Roger Lovel who owned
it in Henry III.'s reign, and two or three more
from St. Faith's Lane to the river. Then
there was another which went out of Rose
Lane about opposite to John Street, and
perhaps joined St. Faith's Lane at its first
turn beyond the Horse Fair and the Boys'
Home. Another seems to have issued from
this and followed the present line of the Prince
of Wales' Road as far as St. Faith's Lane by
the postal pillar box, for a piece of land is
described as having on the east St. Vedast's
churchyard (which ran parallel to Cathedral

17
Street South) and "the King's Highway on
every other side." There was also, I think,
a lane out of King Street, going up the hill
between Stepping Lane and Thorn Lane, and
another a little lower down on the other side of
King Street, leading to the river. The existence
of these various thoroughfares in the district
between King Street and the river, seems to
indicate that there was a much larger population
there than there was after the settlement of the
Friars, for several hundred years, and this
impression is confirmed by what we may gather
in respect to the inhabitants.
In the period of about twenty years be
ginning with the year 1285, almost all the land
in the district formed the subject of transactions
the records of which are preserved in the
GuildhaU, and it is possible to take a mental
walk along the various streets and lanes about
the year 1300, and except in a few places, to say
who were the owners or occupiers on each side.
As there are very few places where materials
exist for such a survey to be made at so early a
date, and still fewer where such a thing has
ever been attempted, I wiU endeavour, at the
risk of somewhat trying the patience of my
readers, to give what I believe to be a tolerably
accurate account of who and what the principal
inhabitants of this part of Norwich were at that
time.

Upper King Street.

It will be convenient for the _ purpose of
making our survey, to take the district in blocks,
and to begin with the northernmost block,
bordered by Upper King Street, Rose Lane,
and St. Faith's Lane, to the Horse Fair. A
line drawn from Grey Friars' Lane to the
Horse Fair would form the northern boundary
of this block, and on this side it joined the
parishes of St. Cuthbert and of St. Mary in
the Marsh.
To begin then in Upper King Street. Where
Grey Friars' Lane is now, the land was held
by Roger le Marescal (the farrier.) He rather
belonged to St. George Tombland, where he had a
farrier's shop. Next to him came John the gold
smith, ofwhom I know nothing more, except that
his mother's name was Johanna de Lenn. Who
joined on to him I cannot say ; but a little
further towards Rose Lane came a certain
Adam son of Gervase the tanner, who, as we
shall see, belonged to a family partjr who owned
a good deal of property in this immediate
neighbourhood. His next neighbour was a man
of some importance. Soman the Nedler. His
name occurs very frequently in deeds at this
time, and is a curious illustration of the times
in which he lived. There were then three
languages in use. The language of writing
was Latin, the nobility and gentry used Norman-

19
French, and the common people spoke English.
So when a person was distinguished by his
occupation, he was sometimes described in one
language, sometimes in another. Thus, Soman
is sometimes called Soman Acuarius in Latin,
sometimes Seman le Agulyer in French, some
times Soman le Nedler in English ; all three
words having the same meaning. By way of a
little further variety he appears also as Soman
Wrinel (a surname which probably had some
meaning), and Seman de Blyburgh, from the
place whence his family had first come to
Norwich. There had been another Seman
Wrinel who was dead before 1286, and a
Thomas Wrinel had some land in St. Vedast's
parish, which his widow, Amanda, sold to
Gervase Kempe of Irstede (the tanner just
mentioned) in 1258. Seman's place of business
was in ,the Market, where he had a stall
in the Nedeler-rowe, and there I suppose
he did a brisk trade in the sale of needles
to the ladies, who were famous for their
embroidery, as well as to the tailors and
other makers of articles of clothing, and to
the workers in leather, which was a material
in extensive use. I think his place of resi
dence was here in Conesford, because at the
annual Leet in 1290, he was one of those who
presented the offences of his neighbours ; or
rather he ought to have done so, but he
declined to be sworn, and was fined " for
extreme contempt." However, he pleaded some
good excuse, and his fine was remitted. Seman's
land extended to some distance from the street,
and possibly covered some part of the field at
the back of the house formerly Mr. Thomas
c 2

20
Clabburn's. He seems to have held it for
nearly twenty years, and then it passed into the
hands of the Grey Friars. If he or his
neighbours had houses in the street they would
not have looked out upon other houses, but on
the bank and ditch of the Castle Meadow, and
beyond that on the steep height of the Castle
Hill, surrounded with a wall and towers enclos
ing the great square Keep.
The land which came next to Seman's is
described as being at the corner of the streets
of Over and Nether Conesford (Upper King
Street and Rose Lane). It was for some time
t in the occupation of William de Sessuns, and
partly belonged to the Prior of Norwich, for on
a portion of it had been the Church and Church
yard of St. John the Evangelist, as we leayn
from the second Register of the Priory still
preserved in the Cathedral. This Chnrch is
mentioned among the possessions of the Prior
and Convent in the reign of King Henry I.,
under the name of St. John de Conesford ; but
it had already been demolished in 1255, for in the
Ecclesiastical Taxation made at that date by
Walter Suffield, Bishop of Norwich, it is stated
that, "Where the Church of St. John the
Evangelist stood, now stands a tavern." An old
Coroner's Roll in the Guildhall supplies us with
the information that William de Sessuns held
a tavern. When the King's Justices were here
in 1286, he was fined for encroaching on
the King's highway, "before the door of his
tavern." A taverner's trade consisted in
providing lodging as well as refreshment, and
William's business so far prospered that ho.
was able to enlarge his accommodation. In

21
January, 1293, he sold the house and ground
to Robert de Wylteshire of Kirkeby for £20,
charged with a payment of 2s. to the Prior,
and it is specified that the house had a " new
solar." A solar was an upper story. In
those days people were content to sit and
feed and sleep in a common hall, with,
perhaps, one small chamber attached to
it ; and to have a " solar " was a mark of
wealth and gentility only surpassed by the
Abbots and rich Jews and such like grand folk
who could afford to build houses of stone. No
one in this parish could reach that standard.
The Abbot of Wouburn had a stone house just
out of the parish, in St. Julian's, and there was
another on Tombland. There were only a few
in the city.

SClje Nort^ StUe of J^oae ^ane.
The land adjoining that of William de
Sessuns (going down Rose Lane) was conveyed
in 1291 by John son of Adam de Norwich, to
William de Bedingham his nephew. This
John was a man of large property, whom we
shall meet with again at the corner of Thorn
Lane. Next to this land, down the street, came
that of Master John de Bures. The title
implies that he was an ecclesiastic, but I have
no further information about him. Next was a
large piece sold in 1289 by William de Beccles,
merchant, and Alice his wife, daughter of
William de Tybenham, to John de Morlee,

22
tanner. John de Morlee was quite one of the
leading citizens of his day, and owned a large
amount of property in this district, including
the whole of Stepping Lane, where more can be
said about him.
At the back of all the holdings already
mentioned (both in King Street and Rose Lane)
the land was in the hands of two persons,
9 William de Tybenham of Great Yarmouth and
IO Geoffrey le Mercer. They both illustrate a
practice not peculiar to those times, the inter
marriage of near neighbours. We have just seen
that the former was father-in-law to his neigh
bour, William de Beccles. The marriage of
Geoffrey le Mercer affords us a glimpse of how
some matters were managed then. A certain
Gervase de Irstede, a tanner, had settled ih
this neighbourhood, and died leaving a widow,
Margaret; a son Adam, already mentioned in
Over Conesford ; and a daughter Beatrix, mar
ried to Nicholas- Godwyne de Irstede, also a
tanner. By the customs of the city, Margaret,
the widow, was entitled at her husband's death to
one-third of his property, which was called her
dower, but she did not get it. After a time she
married Geoffrey le Mercer. Then her new hus
band joined her in claiming her right in the Court
of the Bailiffs. After two ineffectual attempts to
fix the responsibility on other parties, the claim
was made good against the daughter Beatrix and
her husband Nicholas, and finally it was
arranged that for her share Margaret should
have for her lifetime a stall in the Butchery and
the rent of a house in St. Peter Southgate, both
of which had belonged to Gervase. It will be
observed that Gervase had combined the trades

23
of butcher and tanner, and doubtless his widow
chose the butcher's stall for convenience, making
the butchery business supply hides for the tan
yard. To retum to Rose Lane. Next below the last-
mentioned land was a highway which was a
parish boundary. All above it was at this time
in the parish of St. Peter de Parmentergate.
If the Church of St. John the Evangelist had
foi-merly had a parish attached to it, it had
been disused, and is not mentioned at this date.
Below the highway was the parish of St. Vedast.
Beyond it was the land of Hugo de Rokelund, 1 1
which included the present site of Cook's
Hospital, and had on its eastern or lower side
the churchyard of St. Vedast, and three high
ways on the other three sides, viz., the Street of
Nether Conesford (Rose Lane), the highway just
mentioned, and another which must have run
parallel to Rose Lane.
This brings us to St. Vedast's Church, which
stood on the low ground of Sillett's stableyard.
It belonged, like those of St. Peter de Parmen
tergate and St. John the Evangelist, to the
Cathedral Monastery. I have already given
some account of its probable origin, and how, in
the time of King Edward the Confessor, one of
the principal burgesses named Edstan is supposed
to have held one-sixth part of its endowment.
In the time of King Henry I. the Monastery
held half of the endowment. Somewhat later
Geoffrey de St. Vedast gave the monks a sixth
part which then belonged to him, and so by
degrees they got the whole. It was the custom
in a large monastic establishment to divide the
business of the monastery into separate depart-

24
ments, each presided over by its own officer,
and to appropriate different portions of their
possessions to the different departments. In
this way the endowment of St. Vedast was
appropriated to the Almoner of the Monastery,
whose duty it was to provide for the charities
dispensed by the monks, and the endowment of
St. Peter de Parmentergate was appropriated to
the Infirmarer, who was expected to provide for
the wants of the monks when they were ill.
Of course the monks were bound to find priests
or chaplains to conduct the services. The
Churchyard included a good deal of the ground
now occupied by South Cathedral Street, and
extended as far as the middle of Prince of
Wales' Road.
On the other side of the Churchyard (between
Cathedral Street and the bottom of Rose
Lane) the land changed hands several times
12 about this period. Before 1278 Ralph de
St. Vedast, chaplain, was living next to the
Churchyard, and in 1287 Richard the chap
lain. These were, no doubt, both attached
13 to the Church. In 1278 the Master of
St. GUes' Hospital conveyed some of this land
to Robert de Coventre, who held the ground
adjoining. In 1287 Robert's widow, Matilda,
14 granted a house and ground and a garden
to Roger de Morlee, most likely the father
of John de Morlee, and if so, one of the prin
cipal citizens. Between the house and the
15 garden was the land of William de Irstede, a
tanner. This is the third person we have met
with already wdth that surname, and all tanners.
Gervase, Nicholas, and William de Irstede must
all have derived their origin from the village of

25
that name; but it does not follow that they
were members of one family. The fact that
Nicholas married the daughter of Gervase
rather points to their being friends, and not near
relations. A long strip from the northern end
of the Churchyard to the Highway (from where
Cathedral Street crosses Prince of Wales' Road i6
down to the house and ground lately Miss
Robinson's) was conveyed in 1288 by John de
Saham to Walter son of Richard Asscheman of
Yarmouth. All the land from there round by
the Horse Fair, including what is now North 17
Cathedral Street, and overlapping the north end of
St. Vedast's Churchyard, was already in possession
of the Grey Friars before the year 1290.
This completes the circuit of the block marked
out on the north of Rose Lane.

26

King Street from Rose Corner
to Mountergate Street.

We will now cross over to the other side of
Rose Lane, and take a portion of the district
marked off by the same streets now as it was
then ; down King Street from Rose Corner to
Mountergate Street, and round by Mountergate
Street to Rose Lane.
Of Rose Corner for some little way down
King Street, and somewhat further down Rose
Lane, I find no- mention. My information with
respect to this part of King Street begins at a
point I have no means of determining, but
probably somewhere about Murrell's yard.
Either about there or a little further down the
street was one of the numerous possessions of
1 8 the Prior of Norwich. His tenants here were
Richard Attedam and his wife Margaret, who
19 also held the adjoining land under Geoffrey le
Mercer, having a meadow of his at the back.
20 It was a peculiarity of Geoffrey that he held
land here at the back of the premises which
fronted the street, just as he did on the other
side of Rose Lane. In 1288 Richard and
Margaret transferred their holding under
Geoffrey to Roger de Byttering, merchant.
21 The next holding was occupied by Alexander
Pouel, chaplain, for some time, and the next by
22 several tenants in quick succession. The first

27
was Master Philip de Wangford ; then Ranulph
de Morlee, who in the midst of the Latin deed
is described by the English word " surgyon " — I
believe a very early use of the word; after him
in 1289 Roger de Tybenham, chaplain, and in
1290 Thomas de Hemsby, chaplain. As this
must have been nearly opposite to St. Peter
Permountergate Church, it looks as if these
chaplains might have been connected with the
Church. A great many persons are so described
in the city at this time. They would find their
occupation not only in conducting the public ser
vices, but also in carrying out the wills of deceased
persons, who almost invariably directed that
money should be laid out for the recital of
masses for the repose of their souls. In the
conveyances from which most of this information
is derived it is not uncommon to find executors
selling a considerable amount of property " for
the benefit of the deceased."
Still proceeding down the street we come again
upon a party of tanners, of which trade we have
already met with several followers. The first
was John de Hakeford, tanner, who was married 23
to Lucy, daughter of Roger de Morlee, and
therefore was brother-in-law to John de Morlee, 24
also a tanner, who, amongst his numerous
holdings in this neighbourhood, held the adjoin
ing land. Some twenty years later, this latter
piece stood in the name of Thomas, son of John
de Morlee. At that date the piece next down
the street was conveyed by Stephen de Poswyk, 25
another tanner, to Henry the chaplain, son of
Alan de Morlee, I suppose another member of
the same large fanuly, or perhaps another settler
from the same country place. At the back of

28
these three holdings was a buUding described in
26 the spelling of that time as " le ffyschhus," the
fish-house ; used, no doubt, for drying and curing
fish; especially herrings. From it a path and a
little stream caUed " Watergong " ran down to
a "eokeye," which wiU be mentioned more par
ticularly presently. Next to Stephen de Poswyk
27 the land was held partly by Adam de Toftes and
28 partly by Laurence de Birlingham, tanner, who
in 1289 also obtained the next land adjoining,
29 which was at the corner of King Street and
Mountergate Street. This corner-piece came to
Laurence in this way. On 17th September,
1289, It was conveyed by Rosa, daughter of
Simon le Pundreys, and widow of Roger the
tanner, son of Walter de Meuton, to Robert
of Newcastle-under-Lyme, stonemason. Ap
parently Rosa the widow was herself part of the
bargain and went with the land, for in the
following March she and Robert of Newcastle,
conjointly as husband and wife, conveyed it to
Laurence de Birlingham. It may be noticed
that this conveyance of the land from a tanner's
widow to another tanner seems a clear indication
that it was suppHed with the apparatus for
carrying on that business.

Waian ilHountergatc Street to Eose 3Lane.
30 Turning down Mountergate Street, the land
next to BirUngham's was partly held by Roger
31 de Morlee and partly by John de Lek, whose
occupation is not given. How far down
Mountergate Street these two went I cannot

29
say, but I suspect that the Morlee family
amongst them held most of the land about here,
as appears from the next names I have, which
belong to a spot past the bend in the street. In
1311 Nicholas de Plumstede, tanner, conveyed
to Walter le Claver of Plumstede, chaplain, a 32
piece of land which fronted the street, looking
towards the river, and had the "eokeye" already
mentioned at the back. On the north was the
messuage of Roger de Morlee, and on the south 32 a
that of Thomas de Morlee. This was in the 32 b
parish of St. Peter de Parmentergate, and could
not have been far from where it joined the
parish of St. Vedast, nearly opposite Mr.
Hotblack's, entrance gate.
Of the frontage of the street from that point
to Rose Lane I have no exact information, but
it can hardly be doubtful that the greater part
of it was comprised in a deed of conveyance in
1293 from Master Henry Sampson to John de 33
Colevyle. It related to an extensive property
in this immediate neighbourhood purchased by
Henry Sampson some few years before from
John de Berstrete and others, executors of
Margaret le Barkere, widow of Walter le
Barkere (or le Tanur). The property was in
St. Vedast, in the street of Nether Conesford,
and consisted of "houses, lands, and buUdings
with a garden," and included " rents, cottages,
and all rights, &c., belonging to the said houses."
It is plain from other deeds that it lay behind
the premises fronting the lower part of Rose
Lane, and therefore most likely itself formed the
frontage of Mountergate Street towards its Rose
Lane end. About three of the persons here
mentioned. Master Henry Sampson, John de

30

Berstrete, and Margaret Ie Barkere, I am able
to give some interesting information. It will,
however, be convenient first to complete the
circuit of this portion of the district.

5Efi tl&e SontJ Sifie of Ease 1-ane.
Passing round the comer ftom Mountergate
Street into Rose Lane, a very little way up the
lane must have been a messuage held in 1287 by
34 a leading citizen named Odo de la Bothe. The
one adjoining was conveyed at the same date by
35 Henry de Bradewell of Luthinglond, a tanner, to
WiUiam, parson of Stanhowe. Next up the
street at this time was another tanner, whom we
36 have met wdth already, Laurence de Birlingham.
Before him the ground had been held by
Nicholas le Tanur. In 1290 Laurence de
Birlingham sold it to Goda, a granddaughter of
Margaret la Tanneresse, and a few months
afterwards Margaret's daughter Goda and her
husband sold it to Robert de Nekton, parson of
Tivetsale. I think that only one person named
Goda can be intended here. She was Margaret's
granddaughter, and her marriage with a man
who was perhaps not in the tanning business
may have accounted for their parting with the
land. Further up the lane was a messuage
37 obtained by the Prior of Norwich in 1287 from
38 Robert de Wymondham, and then came Geofirey
de Brundale. At the back of these two last
was the meadow of Geoffrey le Mercer, which,
as we have seen, lay also at the back of the
lands in King Street, not far from Rose Corner.

31
One would suppose, therefore, that the land held
by Geoffrey de Brundale must have been near
Rose Corner ; but it is puzzling to find that all
these holdings, from Odo de la Bothe's to the
Prior's, are described as in the. parish of
St. Vedast. When that parish was joined to
St. Peter Permountergate in Queen Elizabeth's
time it only extended up the lane on this side to
a point short of Bloomsbury Place, not including
all the ground then belonging to Peter Peterson
(now Rust's Stoneyard). It is impossible that
five or more different holdings could have been
crowded into this small space, and we seem
driven to conclude that at this early time the
parish of St. Vedast was reckoned as extending
a good deal further up the lane.

"JHargaret la SCanneresse."
I will now return to speak of the persons
mentioned as holding lands and houses at the
corner of the lane and in Mountergate Street.
And first of the person there described as
Margaret le Barkere. Like Seman the Nedler
she is variously described, according to the
caprice of the scribe. At one time she is
" Margaret Tannator," at another " Margaret la
Tannere," or again " Margaret le Barkere ; "
but most expressively, "Margaret la Tanneresse."-
She must have been a well-known personage for
a good many years. She was the wife of
Walter le Tanur, or le Barkere.- Tanners were
called Barkers, from the use of bark in the

32
process of tanning. She must have been left a
widow comparatively young, for as early as 1258
she was holding land in her own name, or rather
in the name of "Tanner," derived from her
deceased husband's occupation. She had two
sons, John and Walter. The former had a
daughter Goda, to whom her father and
Katherine her mother made a grant of some
land near St. Vedast's Church in 1285, and who
in 1290, as mentioned above, purchased a piece
of land from Laurence de Birlingham on the
other side of Rose Lane, and sold it shortly
afterwards as the wife of Ralph de Estgate of
Heylesdon. Margaret appears to have been a
lady of an independent spirit, capable of choosing
a line of her own. After her husband's death
she remained a widow for the rest of her life.
This was a most unusual thing. The manners
of the age were rough, and perhaps it was
almost a matter of necessity for a widow to
seek the protection of another husband. But
Margaret was quite able to manage for herself,
and evidently not only acted as a householder
liable to be called upon for her share of the
burdens of the community, but had her own
ideas about doing business. Wken the Itinerant
Justices of King Henry III. came to Norwich
in 1269, and enquired into all the matters that
affected the king's revenue, they admitted, as it
is recorded in the "Book of Pleas" in the
Guildhall, that " Margaret la Tanneresse has
raade a fine (agreement) with our lord the
King for £10 to be free from all taUages for
the term of her life." This was clearly a
speculation on Margaret's part, and I find
no mention of anyone else doing the same.

33
TaUages were uncertain demands made by
the king whenever he wanted money, and it
would be interesting to know how the
calculation was made, a,nd who got the best of
the bargain. I do not know whether the
agreement was first made then, or how long
afterwards Margaret lived. She was dead
in 1287. The fact of her venturing to make
such an agreement at all seems to say a
good deal for the just administration of the
affairs of the city. When the king demanded a
tallage, the sum to be paid by the city was
assessed by the officers of his Exchequer, and the
Bailiffs of the city were answerable for the
payment. Margaret must have had confidence
that on such occasions her Deed of Exemption
would be respected when she produced it, and
must also have known that the collector would
not much like the look of it. Similar exemp
tions from all kinds of claims were frequently
obtained by religious bodies, to the great
aunoyance of the city authorities. Margaret's
is the only case I know of here where a private
person secured the same privilege.

"jKagter f^enrg Sampson."
Master Henry Sampson, who purchased
Margaret's property from her executors, was an
ecclesiastic of considerable importance. He held
the office of Dean of the City of Norwich, an
office, however, which differed from that which
the title now describes. He had jurisdiction in
certain matters which were partly spiritual and

34
partly secular. He presided over a Court caUed
the Court of Christianity, to which all questions
had to be brought relating to marriages and wUls.
This Court was regarded with great jealousy
by the city authorities, and people were con
stantly fined in the City Court for " dragging "
their neighbours into the Court of Christianity
in matters which did not belong to it. When
it is added that the coUection of certain
obnoxious tolls was also a part of the Dean's
business, it is plain that the office required no
little exercise of discretion on the part of the
holder. Discretion, however, was not a virtue
which Master Henry Sampson possessed, and he
more than once got into great trouble both with
the king and the citizens. The iU-feeling thus
caused will help to explain an occurrence which
otherwise would read like mere lawless violence.
At the Court Leet of 1288 the Capital Pledges
of Conesford presented "that John de Morie,
son of Roger de Morie, and Hubert his brother,
by night broke open the chest of John, formerly
Dean of Norwich, and carried off from his housc
gold and silver to the value of more than £40."
This John was called John le Den or John de
Berstrete, and was Sub-Dean to Henry Sampson,
and had been employed by him to collect tolls.
He lived on Tombland, but had some land in
St. Vedast by the river, opposite to that of
Margaret la Tanneresse, for whom he acted as
executor. The parties therefore were all mixed
up together as neighbours, and we need not look
upon John de Morie and his brother as common
burglars. The money they carried off in such a
summary fashion was, no doubt, the tolls and
dues which they thought had been unjustly

35
exacted. Henry Sampson, who was also Rector
of North Walsham, retained the office of Dean
tiU nearly the close of the century, but perhaps
for some years he ceased to reside in Norwich.
As we have seen, he parted with his property in
Nether Conesford in 1293 : the deed of con
veyance was dated at Stamford. This makes it
the more probable that he was the same person
as one mentioned in The Gentleman's Magazine
for 1848, in an account of the parish of Easton,
Northamptonshire. It is there stated that a
certain " Master Henry Sampson, Sub-deacon,"
was presented to the Rectory of Easton in 1251;
that he founded a chantry there in 1295, and
died about 1299. The names and dates so
exactly correspond that I think the Rector of
Easton must have been also the Dean of the
City of Norwich. \

36

How to flnd out some of
the Residents.

Before proceeding further in our peram
bulation, I would make one or two remarks
about the locality of which we have already
made the circuit. Though I have been able to
associate almost every part of it with some one
or more names, and in many cases to add some
few details of the persons or their families, my
readers must not be misled into supposing that
they all lived on the spots with which their
names have been connected. Except in certain
cases where the facts speak for themselves, as in
the case of William de Sessuns and his tavern,
it is not easy to determine whether the parties
who bought and sold were actually residents or
not. Nor is it clear generally whether the
property was a single house with a little ground
about it, or an out-lying field, or a large piece of
ground like that of Margaret la Tanneresse and
Henry Sampson, occupied by several houses and
cottages. The terms used in the deeds to
describe the sort of property conveyed in this
district are vague; such as simply "land" or
" land with buUdings," or a " messuage " (a
house, garden, ground, &c.) or a "messuage
with houses and buildings," and so on. I
must therefore confine myself to a few general
conclusions, except where I can speak more
particularly. There is, indeed, one reasonable

37
indication of a person's residence which is
amusingly characteristic of the times. It is
to be gathered from the Rolls of the Court
Leet, a Court at which people were annually
called to account an^ fined by the Bailiffs for
various offences of a public character. Among
the offenders by far the most numerous were
those who were fined for " breaking the Assize
of Beer." At that period and long afterwards
it was thought that the good of the community
was best provided for by a number of minute
regulations with regard to the making and sale
of bread and beer. These regulations were
called the Assize of Bread or Beer. Beer was
the universal drink. It was home-brewed, and
the brewing was one of the duties of the
housewife. A great many of the wives of the
better-to-do citizens appeared to have brewed
beer, and for some reason or other sold beer
to their neighbours. Perhaps the poorer
classes had not the means of brewing. All
these ladles, as a matter of course, broke the
regulations by selling above the appointed
price (which I suppose was too low to pay) ;
they were all duly presented at the next Court
Leet, and were all duly fined, including some
times the wives of the Bailiffs presiding in the
Court, who, as a mark of respect, were not
kept waiting, but fined before the rest. They
all went away and did exactly the same as
before, and passed through the same process
the following year. It was plainly the practice
to take the offending ladies according to their
place of residence, so that in the lists neigh
bours come near one another. When, therefore,
we find several ladies' names coupled together

38
on two or three occasions, we may be certain
that they lived in the same neighbourhood.
In this way we may conclude that John de
Morie, John de Hakeford, Richard de Melton,
William de Irstede, Laurence de Burlingham,
David de Couteshale, Stephen de Poswyk, and
others, were certainly resident in this locality.

3Cfje scanners.
Almost all these were tanners, and although
no mention is made of tanyards or pits, yet it
seems to be beyond doubt that the greater part
of the land on both sides of Rose Lane and as
far as Mountergate Street was at this period
devoted to tanning. The locality was well
suited for the purpose. From King Street the
ground fell away very rapidly into flat meadow-
land, which was traversed by two streams, one
on each side of Rose Lane. The one on the
north ¦ of the lane passed between the Boys'
Home and the Prince of Wales Road, crossed
St. Faith's Lane near the Horse Fair, and so
went down to the river. It wUl come more
especially to our notice when we speak of
the Grey Friars. It is mentioned as the
39 "brook called Dallingflete." The one on the
other side of Rose Lane was generally called
40 "the Cokeye," a word which seems to have
been used in the city at that time and earlier
to describe a natural stream, and not an
artificial drain. It is several times mentioned
all along its course. It started somewhere
near where Boulton and Paul's works now

39
stand, and ran parallel to King Street in the
direction of St. Faith's Terrace, where it
crossed the road by the present Synagogue.
Several of the premises in this part of King
Street reached down at the back to this
" Cokeye," and some of those in Mountergate
Street opposite Mr. Hotblack's also extended to
it. I think it is referred to in one of these
latter cases as " the water running under
Nether Conesford."
Tanning at that time was a very important
trade, for leather was used for a great variety
of purposes, and very largely for clothing, as
in leather doublets and gaiters. The tanners
employed themselves in the preparation of
heavy hides, and the material used in the
preparation was the bark of trees. OccasionaUy
the term "barker" is used instead of "tanner."
As with brewing and baking, so strict regu
lations were laid down with respect to tanning.
The tanners were often fined for using ash
bark. It is not said what they ought to have
used. I imagine oak ; but probably ash was
cheaper. They also got into trouble for doing
up old cloths and selling them for new. But
their most serious offence was that about this
time they presumed to form themselves into a
private association or guUd of their own, and
charare a fee to those who were admitted into
the trade, which fees for being permitted to
trade in the city had hitherto been paid by aU
trades alike to the bailiffs, for the common
benefit of the whole community.

40

The Riverside.

We wiU now make a fresh start from the
wall of the Cathedral Close by the Horse Fair,
and take the strip of land between St. Faith's
Lane or Mountergate Street and the river. I
cannot say whether the present waU of the
Close from the Horse Fair to the river stands
where the wall of the Monastery did at the
time I am speaking of. The walls and lanes
about here were a good deal altered at a later
date. It may have been nearer to the Ferry.
41 WTiere Mr. Anthony's house is now Sir Peter
Roscelyn held a messuage in 1288. His famUy
held a manor at Edgefield. Both his father
and his son were named Thomas. One Sir
Thomas (I think it must have been the father)
had a daughter Beatrix, who married Thomas
de Morie of Norwich, I suppose one of the
family we have met with so often. Sir
Thomas, the son of Sir Peter, built a house on
this spot in the reign of Edward IL, and, after
forfeiting his possessions for rebellion and
having them restored, he died about 1340
without children, and his sisters inherited his
42 property. A |)iece of ground nearer to the
river, which haJj. on the north a lane and on
the south a stredm of water, was conveyed in
1288 to Sir Peter by Stephen del Gerner, a
man whose curious title "is, I fancy, the same
as the still odder description of another man
who before this had held a messuage in
St. Peter de Parmentergate, and is spoken of
in the Second Register of the Cathedral

41
as TurkiU le Gornirman. I believe in both
these cases the word intended is " Garner," or
Granary, for I find mention in the Eighth
Register of a William de Granario and a
Roger de Granario his brother. The persons
so called would derive their name from some
connection, either on their own part or that of
some ancestor, with the monastic granary
which stood on this side of the Close nearer to
King Street. The stream which bounded Sir
Peter's land on the south has already been
mentioned as the " brook called Dalling
flete." It crossed the meadow at the back of
Messrs. Hills and Underwood's Works, between
Mr. Anthony's house and Mr. Sutton's, where
a line of trees now stands. (In my " Plan of
the District about the year 1300," the space
between the brook and the lane should be
larger). The lane on the north ran down to
the river by Level's Stathe, which by this time
had ceased to be used. Roger Lovel, from
whom it was named, appears to have been
living there in 1250. Between Sir Peter's
land and' the river was the messuage of the
Abbot of Sibton in Suffolk, a small holding for 43
which he was assessed at Is. in 1288.
The brook called Dallingflete continued to
exist in the form of a ditch into the present
century. There also existed until this century
another ditch rather further south (on the 44
other side of the Prince of Wales' Road)
between what used to be Ketton's Oil Cake
Mills and Mr. Ranson's Timber Yard. This
must be the ditch which is mentioned in a
deed of 1290 as the "common fleet called
Fresflet." (A fleet was a ditch filled and

42
eraptied by the tide. The well-known Fleet
Street in London was named after a stream
which was thus affected by the tide at its
mouth). Of the owners or occupiers of the
land between these two ditches about the year
1300 I have no information to give. Judging
from the names just mentioned to the north of
"Dallingflete," and those to be mentioned
presently to the south of " Fresflet," the space
between them might be expected to have some
well-to-do occupants. It was a spot which
plainly had its attractions, for not very long
afterwards it passed into the hands of a
succession of very aristocratic owners. It lay
in the parish of St. Vedast, and as it is almost
the only portion of that parish which I have
been unable to associate with any holder, I
may here observe that there was one very
important owner of property at this time in
the parish of St. Vedast whom I cannot assign
to any place at all. This was the Abbot of
Combe in Warwickshire. In 1286 he is
mentioned, with the Abbot of Gernedon and
several other abbots, as holding "free tenements
in Norwich," and failing to appear before the
King's Judges. The importance of his holding
and the parish where it was situated appear
from the Ecclesiastical Taxation of Pope
Nicholas in 1288, already more than once
referred to. In that document, under the
heading of the parish of St. Vedast, the Abbot
of Sibton is assessed at Is. for what he held,
while the Abbot of Combe is set down at the
very large sum of £1. 6s. Sd. for property held
in the same parish. There was scarcely another
piece of ecclesiastical property in the whole

43

city assessed at so high a value. It seems
strange, therefore, that there should be no
reference to it at all in any of the numerous
deeds relating to this parish.

" 3ai\n tst Bersttete."
On the other or southern side of " Fresflet "
two adjoining messuages were conveyed at the 45
close of the year 1290 by Hamo, son of Simon 46
atte HoUegate and Anice his wife, to Sir
William de Valeyns. Both of them had
formerly belonged to John, son of John de
Berstrete. This John (the son of John) was
the same of whom we have already made
mention as Sub-Dean to Henry Sampson, and
executor to Margaret la Tanneresse, the
property which he dealt with as executor being
on the opposite side of the street. From this
deed it appears that he had the name of John
de Berstrete from his father. The practice of
calling people by various names prevents us
from recognizing the connection which existed
between him and Simon atte HoUegate. They
were, in fact, brothers. HoUegate was at this
time the name of Mariners' Lane, which runs
from Ber Street to King Street, and Simon
is elsewhere called Simon de Berstrete. The
relationship of the two brothers comes out in
this way. When Geoffrey le Mercer, having
married the widow of Gervase le Tanur, as
related in the neighbourhood of Upper King
Street and Rose Lane, set to work to get her
dower, she and Geoffrey first impleaded Adam

44
de Stirston, who was living in a house formerly
belonging to Gervase. Adam had the right to
call upon the person from whom he obtained
it to warrant or defend his title, and he
therefore " called to warrant " Hamo, son of
Simon de Berstrete. Hamo in like manner
passed on the responsibility to Nicholas de
Irstede, who had married the daughter of
Gervase. In recording this legal proceeding,
the writer describes Hamo not only as " son of
Simon de Berstrete," but also as " nephew and
heir of John le Den," and so it appears that
Simon and John were brothers, and were there
fore both sons of John de Berstrete, from
whom they took their surname. There is
frequent mention about this time of a certain
" John son of Simon le Mercer," in St. Etheldred
by HoUegate, and it is just possible that he
may be the same as the elder John de Berstrete,
father of the Sub-Dean. If so, it would
account for the curious fact that on one
occasion the Sub-Dean is described as John " le
Mercer," Dean of Norwich, a surname which
may have been applied at times to all his
grandfather's family. These Deans or Sub-
Deans seem to have been quite at liberty to
marry, and John left a widow named Katarine.
He also had a sister Margaret, who must have
given up housekeeping about the year 1288,
for she parted with her windows. Glass was
an article of luxury in those daj's, and
" windows " were what we should call wooden
shutters, and they flapped about as outside
shutters do now, to the annoyance of passers
by ; and at that time the streets were very
narrow, and there was no footpath, so that not

45
only walkers but riders were inconvenienced.
Consequently Roger de Penteneye, who bought
Margaret's windows and fixed them up in his
house somewhere in Westwick, was presented
at the Court Leet for creating a nuisance.
Why the scribe was so ill-natured as to write
down for the benefit ' of posterity that the
offending shutters had been bought from
Margaret, I do not understand. It could
hardly be that Roger thought to escape a fine
by pleading that he was only following so
eminent an example as that of " the sister of
John le Mercer, Dean of Norwich."
Sir William de Valeyns, to whom these
two messuages were conveyed, belonged to a
knightly Norman family who had come over
with William the Conqueror. He was not,
however, the head of the family. He held the
manor of West Hall in Cockley Cley, not far
from S waff ham. He purchased this property
for forty-two marks (£28). It lay in the
parish of St. Vedast, between the street of
Nether Conesford (Mountergate Street) on the
west, and the river on the east. On the north
was a common footpath and the common fleet
called Fresflet, and on the south a messuage of
Geoffrey le Mercer, the third of his holdings 47
which we have met with.
This brings us to the end of St. Vedast's
parish along the river. Very likely Geoffrey le
Mercer's messuage would correspond with some
portion of the ground where Mr. Hotblack's
house and garden are now.
The next holding I find mentioned is in the
parish of St. Peter de Parmentergate, and I
cannot say whether it exactly joined on to the

46
last or not. It could not have been far off.
If I ara not mistaken, the ground now occupied
by Wright and Turner's Timber Yard, or
perhaps part of the Corporation Yard, lately
48 the Hop Pole Gardens, belonged at this time
to the Abbot of Gernedon or Gernedene. This
is the way the word is spelled in the GuUdhall
documents. The Abbey of Garendon in
Leicestershire is the one meant. It retained
the property till the Dissolution of the Monas
teries, at which time it is described as a
garden. One mention of the connection of the
Abbey with this land is worth noticing.
As a rule the various abbots or priors who are
spoken of as holding lands or houses in the
city were simply landlords receiving the rents,
rather expensive rents to collect, one would
suppose, from such a distance as Warwickshire
or Leicestershire. But in the case of this
ground it is described in 1307 as the messuage
not of the abbot, but of the "monks of
Gernedene." This seems to imply that there
were actually some monks connected with the
abbey residing on the spot. Perhaps, however,
it was merely a fancy of the clerk to write
" monks " instead of the usual " abbot." It is
also noticeable, though it may have been
accidental, that the three abbeys just mentioned,
those of Sibton, Combe, and Garendon all
belonged to the same monastic order, the
Cistercians, as also did Wouburn, the abbot
of which monastery had a valuable holding a
little further down the river, as will be
mentioned presently.

47

SSp JKountergate Street.
Adjoining to the messuage of the Abbot of
Garendon was another which, at the date 49
mentioned above, 1307, is thus described in a
conveyance from Catarina, widow of Richard
de Morie, to Matthew de Buston. It had on
the north the .king's highway of Nether
Conesford, on the east the messuage of the
monks of Gernedene, and on the west and
south the "ditch called Cokeye." This de
scription I thought at one time must apply to
Rose Lane, and to a cockeye which I imagined
communicated with the ditch called "Fresflet,"
for I supposed that the south side of Mounter-
gate Street from King Street to the Hop Pole
Gardens must have been in the parish of
St. Michael in Conesford, and not in St. Peter
de Parmentergate (in which parish this property
was situated). I find, however, that both sides
of Mountergate Street at the King Street end
were in the latter parish, and moreover I find
that on two occasions the Abbot of Gernedon
was fined for encroaching on the river. It is
plain, therefore, that the abbot's ground must
have been by the riverside, and the street of
Nether Conesford must mean Mountergate
Street where it bends round towards King
Street. The "Cokeye" would be the same
which we have already traced from near
Messrs. Boulton and Paul's Works tUl it crossed
Mountergate Street under the Synagogue. I
have been told by Alderman Underwood of
Chapel Field, a native of this parish, that in

48
the construction of the Synagogue in 1845 the
builders found a very large ancient drain,
which, no doubt, was this very cockey. After
running a little way in the same direction as
when it crossed the road, it must have taken a
turn to the left, and fallen into the river at
some little distance above St. Ann's Lane.
We have now come upon the ground which
in the course of the next hundred years fell
entirely into the hands of the Austin Friars.
Before 1300 they had already obtained pos
session of a good deal between the cockey just
raentioned and King Street. Before 1292 they
50 had obtained from a certain. Gregory Croyde a
piece fronting Mountergate Street, which
probably was next to the cockey, for in 1293
they were fined for encroaching on the
" cokeye " by building a wall. Another piece
5 1 not far from this, having its frontage in King
Street, was given to them by Bartholomew
de Acre, of whom we shall speak presently.
A third piece at the back of these two was
52 acquired from Hugo de Fornsete.

Ufns Street (from J5lounter|jate Street to
St. Inn's 3Lane.)
The Friars had not yet, however, obtained
the corner of Mountergate Street and King
Street, where Mr. Riley now lives. The
53 occupant of the actual corner does not appear.
It had belonged previously to Geoffrey do

49
Betellee (Beetley). Adjoining it in Mounter-
gate Street was a messuage of Adam de Toftes, 54
occupied apparently by his daughter Olive and
her husband, Hubert de Magna Neuton, and in
King Street one conveyed in 1292 by Hugo de 5 5
Fornsete to John the clerk, "le Mercer." This
John, as we learn from another deed relating
to this same piece of ground, was the same as
John the son of Simon le Mercer, whom I have
suggested might have been the father of John
de Berstrete, the Sub-Dean.
Next to this holding, going down King
Street, came the ground mentioned above as 51
obtained by the Austin Friars from Bar
tholomew de Acre, and next, or very close to
it, must have been the Church and Churchyard
of St. Michael in Conesford, which stood, as I
have observed before, opposite to the Office of
Messrs. Morgan's Brewery. This Church, un
like the other three in the district, did not
belong to the Cathedral Priory. In 1183 it
had been in the possession of the Abbot of
St. Bennet's at Holme, but his successors must
have parted with the patronage, for at this
time it was In the hands of two families living
on the opposite side of King Street, first the
Pagraves and then the Thorps. There was a
parish of St. Michael attached to it, a very
sraall one.
On the other side of the churchyard there
was a littlo lano loading from King Street to
the river, and reaching it, I should imagine,
near the mouth of the cockey described above.
(It must be observed that the lane would in
reality be much sraaller than it is represented
in the plan, and perhaps should be nearer to

50
St. Michael's Church and to the mouth of the
cockey). The greater part of the land on the
south side of this lane from the street to the
river was held by an interesting group of
persons who, like the tanners from Irstede^ had
all migrated to Norwich from the same neigh
bourhood. Castle Acre. The principal one
56 amongst them was Bartholomew de Acre, a
merchant, who had been one of the four balHffs
in 1272. He had brought with him a
"servant" (meaning, perhaps, an apprentice)
called Andrew de Acre. Bartholomew
evidently thought well of Andrew, for he gave
57 him a part of his property fronting King
Street, " for his advancement." Bartholomew's
own house seems to have been behind this on
the river bank, and he endeavoured to improve
the situation by building a quay and con
structing some other buildings, which brought
down upon him a fine for encroaching on the
river. It may here be observed that while
from this point down the river to Conesford
Gates nearly all the owners built themselves
quays or stathes, above this point as far as Fye
Bridge there was nothing of the kind except
Level's Stathe, which had fallen into disuse,
and seems to have been a relic of an earlier
period. The reason, no doubt, was that from
here at least as far as Bishop's Bridge the
river bank was in a very unsettled condition
for several centuries after this time. There
were bits of land (the name given to them
was " bitmays,") which were sometimes islands
and sometimes joined to the bank, and the
Prior and other riverside owners were constantly
being complained of for appropriating these

51
bits of land which, being in the river, were
supposed to belong to the king.
Next to Bartholomew's land, between it and
the lane above mentioned by the riverside, was
a messuage conveyed in 1290 to Andrew de 58
Acre by Ralph, son of Robert le Orfevre
(aurifaber, goldsmith) of Castel Acre, and Alice
his wife, daughter of Richard Perteshir of
Westacre. Here we plainly have an illus
tration of the way in which at this time, not
only individuals, but groups of emigrants were
leaving the country places, where feudalism
was in full operation, to seek freedom and
wealth as traders in the towns.
The messuage given by Bartholomew to
Andrew fronting King Street might have been
expected to have St. Ann's Lane on its south
side. Instead of that it had the messuage of
the Abbot of Wouburn. Now this was in the
parish of St. Julian. It seems, therefore,
almost certain that St. Ann's Lane was
not there. Its site appears to have been
included in the ground of the Abbot of
Wouburn, for in letting a piece of land in his
King Street frontage to John Page in 1290,
the abbot reserves to himself a space of 10
ft. broad " between the said piece of land and
the wall of Bartholomew de Acre." It is,
however, somewhat perplexing to find no lane
there, because a lane seems wanted for an
approach to St. Ann's Chapel, which was down
by the river. The accounts of this Church are
very meagre. In Blomefield's Map it is placed
at the bottom of St. Ann's Lane on the north
or St. Peter Permountergate side. But it is
never said to have been inclosed by the Austin
E 2

52

Friars, as that spot was, and it was united to
St. Clement in Conesford, which was united to
St. Julian. I am unable at present to solve
this difficulty. It had no parish, and was
demolished by 1370.

53

King Street,

" 3of)n, son of a^iam Page."
We must now cross over to the other side
of King Street. A square piece of ground
at the south-eastern corner of Thorn Lane
(then called Sandgate) was in the parish of
St. Michael in Conesford, and is still in the
parish of St. Peter Permountergate. But who
held it or any part of it at this time I am not
able to say. A little higher up Sandgate, in
St. Julian's parish, on the upper side of the
lane which leads to St. Julian's Church, was
one of the many holdings of John Page. On 59
the other side of Sandgate, now occupied by
Messrs. Morgan's Brewery, I can name several
of the owners who had a frontage in King
Street. First, at the corner a piece of land
with buildings was conveyed in 1289 to John 60
Page. I have observed when we first met
with this owner in Rose Lane, that he was
possessed of a great deal of property. Besides
the holdings already mentioned in the parishes
I am writing about, he had a messuage further
down King Street, on the other side, in the
parish of St. Julian, which was, perhaps, where
he lived. It was certainly a piece of property
of some value, for when his right to it was
disputed in 1278 by Margaret de Walton,
daughter of Hugo de Bromholm, Constable of
the Leet of Conesford, who had formerly

64
owned it, John bought off Margaret's opposition
by an agreement to pay her twenty marks
(£13. 6s. 8d.), and provide her immediately
with a handsome new robe of the value of 20s.
At the time of the trial King Edward himself
was in Norwich together with Queen Eleanor
and a number of bishops and knights. They
came to re-consecrate the Cathedral after the
repair of the damage done by the rioters in
1272. Margaret evidently wanted to make as
good a show as her neighbours on so important
an occasion. For eight years after this her
husband kept her quiet, but then he died, and
John Page heard rumours that Margaret meant
to try her luck again. So he took the record
of the proceedings at the trial, and the deed
which Margaret had executed in his favour in
return for her robe and her twenty marks, and
another deed which her sister Faith had signed,
and he went to the Bailiffs' Court and de
manded, according to the customs of the city,
that they should all be entered on the rolls,
that so a stop might for ever be put to
Margaret's attempts. The enrolment was
made, recording the whole transaction from
beginning to end, and it may be read in the
Guildhall to the present day. John held
various other houses, shops, and lands in the
city, and must have been a man of leading
position. In spite of this, however, he is
rather a disappointing personage. His name
does not occur among those who held the office of
bailiff. He is never described as following any
occupation except that of a clerk. His usual
name is John the Clerk, son of Adam Page of
Norwich. Though he was a clerk he was not

65
an ecclesiastic, for he was married, and on one
occasion he is described as " Dominus John," a
title which I think implies that a person was
of sufficient property to be under the obligation
of taking upon himself the honour and the
burdens of knighthood. The records are
equally silent about his father, Adam Page.
He is once or twice called Adam "de Norwich,"
which was the name of a noble family who
lived down the street in the parish of
St. Etheldred. He may possibly have be
longed to that family.

SUe of JHessrs. Plorgan's 33retoerg.
John did not retain in his own hands his
land at the corner of Thorn Lane, but
transferred it almost immediately to John
Slabbard and Juliana his wife, and they passed
it three years later to Hugo de Fornsete.
Hugo had to make an acknowledgment to
each of his predecessors ; to John and Juliana
one pair of gloves of the value of Id. every
Christmas Day, and to John the Clerk a
chaplet of roses on the Feast of St. John the
Baptist (Midsummer Day). To the King's
Landgable (a kind of tax) he had to pay one
farthing per annum. John Slabbard held the
adjoining ground, where he succeeded Alexander 6 1
Teppay, from whom a staith on the other side
of the street was long called Teppaystathe.
The next messuage to this was held about 62
this time by two families of importance. First
was Paul de Pagrave. He took his name from

56
the vUlage of Pagrave (now called Palgrave)
not far from Swaffham, where a family of that
name had been settled for many generations.
This Paul was one of the four bailiffs of the
city in 1284. He held the patronage of the
Church of St. Michael in Conesford. He may
have been a draper, for he built some shops in
the Market, and owned a shed in the Drapery.
In 1307 he parted with this property in King
Street and also the patronage of the Church
to Sir John de Thorp of Ashwelthorpe near
Wymondham, a man of considerable eminence
in the reigns of Kings Edward I. and II.
The land of Paul de Pagrave overlapped
that of the next messuage higher up King
Street, which changed hands more than once
63 in the course of a few years. In 1287 Ingelger
le Grys (Grey), lyndraper, and Cristlana his
wife, conveyed it to Peter de Bumstede.
Peter was a merchant, who several times filled
the office of bailiff, and who, , like others we
have already met with, owned lands and shops
in half the parishes in the city. He sold this
messuage to William de Bedingham, whose
name we had near the Rose Tavern, where he
was described as nephew of John son of Adam
Page. In the conveyance of this property in
King Street it appears that he was married to
Margaret daughter of Thomas de Hekingham,
who had a messuage on the other side of
St. Peter Permountergate Church. It is
curious to observe how the people were related
to their neighbours. It would be idle to
speculate whether they came to live near one
another because they were related, or feU into
relationship because they were neighbours.

57
Probably both causes operated at the same
time. In 1306 William de Bedingham sold it
to a lady who went by the name of Avelina
la Dene. I suppose she belonged to the family
of one of the Deans or Sub-Deans.
Paul de Pagrave's land also extended behind
another messuage which fronted the street, and
was held in 1298 by Thomas de Hargham and 64
his wife Cecilia. In that year they sold it to
Master Thomas de Burne, parson of the
Church of St. Mary of Long Stratton.
These five holdings last mentioned may be
supposed to have corresponded with the ground
now occupied by Messrs. Morgan's Brewery,
having King Street on the east. Thorn Lane
on the south, and Market Lane on the west.
On the north at this time was a lane or
highway which ran up the hill side parallel to
Stepping Lane. (I have no evidence at
present to shew whether there was any lane
corresponding with Market Lane).

58

King Street— Stepping Lane.

This lane just mentioned, which formed the
boundary between the parishes of St. Michael
in Conesford and St. Peter de Parmentergate,
brings us in contact with the two owners who
may justly be styled the two principal in
habitants of the parish at this time, Adaih de
Toftes and John de Morie. First one and then
the other held the whole of both sides of
Stepping Lane. Before Adam 'de Toftes
acquired entire possession of it, it had been
broken up into a variety of small holdings,
all of which are described in the deeds of
conveyance. Beginning where we left off by the side of
65 the lane mentioned above, Adam had a garden
and a house where Richard le Co (generally
spelled "le Cauz") used to live. This was
against the street. Behind it up the hill was
66 a piece of land which had formerly belonged
to Adam de Langhale (Langley), and still
6'J higher up some land which Adam held under
the Hospital of St. Giles (now Allen the
dyer's). By the side of these, beginning at
the street and at the corner of Stepping Lane
(now the Steampacket Public-house) was a
68 messuage which had belonged to David le Tanur,
I suppose David de Couteshale, whom we
found by St. Vedast's Church. Behind that,
up Stepping Lane, was a piece of land

59
belonging to Adam and formerly to Richard 68a
le Co, with a house which Adam had lately
bought of Meliscent daughter of Walter de
Melton, whom we have also met with before
across the road in King Street. These were
between the lane and the garden just mentioned. 69
Still further up between the lane and the land
which had been Adam de Langley's, was the
messuage of Meliscent which apparently she
retained in our own possession, being the only
part of the lane which Adam did not get
into his hands. In 1293 he conveyed the
whole to John de Morlee for 60s. sterling. John
was to pay to Adam one clove at Easter, and
the due services to the lords of the fee, viz.,
to the prior and convent of Bukenham 12d.,
and to the prioress and nuns of Caumpesse 6d.,
both charges being in respect of the tenement
formerly of Richard le Co.
This was about May. Towards the close of
the same year, perhaps in the beginning of
November, Adam granted to John de Morlee
the whole of the other or northern side of
Stepping Lane. It was all conveyed at the
same time, but in two lots. Beginning at the
lower corner (where Raven Yard lately stood) 70
was the capital messuage of Adam, that is the
place of his residence. This fronted the street,
and had previously belonged to Robert de
Welles. It was separated from St. Peter
Permountergate Churchyard by the messuage
of Roger Mynyot, which also belonged to 71
Adam. This was one lot. The other lot was
up the lane, and had been acquired by Adam
in four portions. First behind his house was 72
land which had formerly been John de Fleg's.

60
71 Then the land that had been Simon le
Tanuter's (? tanner) ; then land with buildings
74 that had belonged to Adam Page. These
three plots reached nearly as far as Norman's
75 Buildings, being all in the parish of St. Peter
de Parmentergate, and having the cemetery of
the Church (the churchyard) on the north.
The fourth, which consisted of land with
buildings, and had belonged to Richard
Ascheman, was partly in the parish of
St. Martin de Bailey, and therefore close upon
Scoles Green. For the capital messuage
fronting the street John gave Adam £13
sterling. The price of the other lot is not
raentioned. Both were charged with payments
to the House of Carhowe, the first, with 2s. Qd. ;
the other with Is. for John de Fleg's and
6c?. for Richard Ascheman's. This piece of
Richard Ascheman's had been acquired by
Adam on Easter Eve (5th April) 1287. It
fronted the lane and had behind it the land of
jQ John Balle. From a later deed it appears that
John Balle's land lay between the churchyard
of St. Peter de Parmentergate towards the east
and the king's highway to the west. It
therefore occupied the same position as Messrs.
Holmes' Works.

61

" Adam de Toftes " and " John
de Morlee."

I wiU now give such information as I can
with respect to these two leading citizens.
There was a singular correspondence in their
career. Both of them owned property in all
parts of the city. Both held the office of
bailiff many times. Both of them were
evidently among the foremost citizens of their
day. An interesting document, shewing the
esteem in which Adam de Toftes was held, has
been preserved in the book called the "Domesday
of the City." It is a Commission appointing
him " Alderman of the Hanse," to protect the
interests of the citizens of Norwich at certain
fairs and markets. It is dated in the year
1285, and recites how the Kings of England
for a long time back had granted licence to
the citizens of Norwich to choose one of their
number to be Alderman of their Hanse. The
former Alderman, Symon le Palmer, had
become incapable of executing the office. The
bailiffs and citizens therefore in the exercise of
their right had removed him, and in his place
had appointed their " beloved feUow-citizen,
Adam de Toftes ; " and they pray the
authorities of the towns he visited to receive
him favourably. This document is valuable
as containing the only reference in aU the
numerous documents relating to this period to

62
the existence of any mercantile association in
the city. A "hanse" was a guild or association
for mercantile purposes. It is commonly
stated in histories of England that in all
towns the merchants were associated in such
a guild for the internal control of their trade,
and it is also assumed that suoh merchant
guilds exercised authority for trade purposes
independently of the authority in civil and
municipal matters exercised by the mayors or
bailiffs or commonalty. This was certainly not
the case in Norwich in the reign of King
Edward I. The entire control of trade as well
as of every other department of city business
was in the hands of the bailiffs and the general
body of the citizens. It was this body and
not the merchants who appointed Adam de
Toftes, and the word " hanse " here must mean
simply the citizens as a mercantile body.
"Alderman" was an old Saxon word in
common use for the head or "warden" of a
guild. The office Adam was appointed to was
one of great trust and responsibility. The
charters granted by the Norman kings to
wealthy burghs not only freed the citizens
from burdens on their own trade, but gave
them the same rights everywhere throughout
the kingdom. If their merchants went to
another town to trade they raight not be
burdene'd with tolls or restrictions as strangers,
but were to be allowed to trade as freely as in
their own city. If anyone tried to deprive
them of these rights it would be Adam's
business to protect them in their lawful
privileges. A great part of the exchange of
commodities on a large scale took place in

63
those days at certain largely-frequented fairs.
Three fairs in particular are mentioned in this
commission as requiring the presence of the
Alderman of the Hanse, those of St. Botulph
(Boston in Lincolnshire), Lenn (Lynn), and
Jernemuth (Yarmouth).
This was a high honour, but a still higher
was afterwards conferred on Adam, at least in
the estimation of the nineteenth century. In
1295 King Edward summoned to his Par
liament two burgesses from every leading
town. The names of the first two sent from
Norwich have not come down to us, but when,
two years later, two more were summoned, the
first of the names is that of Adam de Toftes.
The parish of St. Peter Permountergate might
therefore claim the distinction of having
provided the first recorded " Member for
Norwich," but Adam had already parted with
his Stepping Lane property. Still I do not
know any other place of residence which he
occupied. Perhaps he was mostly away on his
business as Alderman of the Hanse. And I
do not think he quite resigned the ownership
of this estate, for I find a son of his owning
part in the next generation, and for some long
time afterwards Stepping Lane was caUed
" Toftes' Lane " after him.
At all events the parish provided a Member
soon after this, for John de Morlee succeeded
to the same honour five years later. I rather
doubt whether either of them altogether cared
for the honour. A journey to London was an
adventurous and expensive affair, and some
times the king summoned his parliament to
meet elsewhere. Adam de Toftes had to go to

64
York. And I dare say the proud Norman
nobles, whose ancestors had come over with
the Conqueror, did not receive these upstart
burghers very cordially ; and to crown all, the
chief information they had to bring back to
their constituents was that they had agreed to
contribute towards the king's immediate wants
a certain sum of money from the city.
Adam de Toftes was a merchant, that is,
as I understand it, one who dealt in goods
which he had himself purchased from others,
especially such things as cloth and spices which
came from abroad. John de Morlee was a true
representative of native labour. As we have
seen several times already he was a tanner, and
the tanners were evidently a very influential
body at this time. Their trade, which was
that of tanning heavy hides by soaking them
in pits between layers of bark, was dis
tinguished from that of another branch of the
trade, viz., tawing or preparing lighter skins,
chiefly useful for shoe leather, by the action
of alum and other mineral substances. The
practisers of this latter branch of the trade were
called in Latin "allutarii," and in English
" cordwaners." A part of the Market, between
White Lion Street and Davey Place, was called
the "AUutaria" or " Cordwaneria." I think John
de Morlee took up both businesses, for amongst
other purchases he obtained a messuage in
Newgate (Surrey Street), which belonged to an
" allutarius," and whose father had been in the
same trade before him. John lived into the
reign of Edward II., and left several children.

65

St. Peter Permountergate Chureh.

We must now return to King Street. It
has already been mentioned that on the south
side of St. Peter Permountergate Churchyard
was a messuage which in 1293 was held under
Adam de Toftes, by Roger Mynyot. This 71
Roger had some land on the other side of the
street, which he gave to the Austin Friars, and
he is sometimes spoken of as their founder in
Norwich. Apparently neither Adam nor Roger
was the actual owner of the tenement, for in
Blomefield's History of Norwich it is stated
that it was granted in 1267 by William,
nephew of William de Welles, to the Prior of
Norwich, subject to a payment of 2iM. per
annum to Hildebrond's Hospital, which was
further down King Street. It certainly was in
the possession of the Dean and Chapter at the
time of the Reformation.
Now, at last, we come to the Churchyard
of the present Parish Church of the whole
district, the only Church which has survived
out of the four which originaUy existed. The
actual fabric which was there at the time we
are speaking of was, no doubt, smaUer and
meaner in every way than the present one
which replaced it two hundred years later.
But there can be little doubt that it occupied
the same spot. I have already spoken of the
supposed original foiindation of the Church by
Boger Bigot, of its appropriation to the

66
Infirmary of the Cathedral Priory, and of
the meaning of the name St. Peter de Par
mentergate. I have not much further to add.
In one respect the Church appears to have
been more fortunate than the Churches in the
more central and busier parts of the city.
It was allowed to remain open to the
street. Churches like St. Peter Mancroft, St.
Laurence, and even St. Michael-at-Plea, were
at this time cut off from the street by houses,
and were approached by an entry or passage
between two houses or shops. The people of
King Street were not so crowded.

ariie " CCIerlt of ti&e eCljure]^."
Only two little scraps of information in
reference to the Church can be gathered from
the documents of this date in the Guildhall.
The first is that it was served by a clerk as
well as by a priest or chaplain. This may
seem a curious statement to make. The
"clerk" of the Church might naturally be
taken to mean the parson. It is commonly
supposed that " clerk" and " clergy " were the
same thing in former times. A study of any
old documents, however, will soon convince
anyone that there were plenty of clerks who
were not -clergy, such, for instance, as the
clerks who made the enrolments in the Bailiffs'
court. Everyone who could read tod write
was called a clerk. Still, when we come to
such an expression as " the clerk of a church,"
we should suppose at first that the parson was

67
meant. The entry in which it occurs is this.
Among the fines imposed at the Leet Court in
1291 we read "From Richard, clerk of the
Church of St. Peter de Parmentergate, because
he is not in a tything — 12d." The entry itself
suggests some questions. The obligation to be
in a "tything" was part of the law of the
land. Every male of twelve years old and
upwards was bound to associate himself with
others (originally in sets of ten persons) for
mutual responsibility. If one of the tything
was accused of an offence and was not forth
coming, the whole tything was fined. But
"clerks," who were supposed to be answerable
to ecclesiastical courts, were for that reason not
obliged to enrol themselves in a tything.
Hence it seems strange that in this entry a
"clerk" should be fined for not doing that
which he was not required to do. Further
Ught is thrown on the matter by another
entirely different entry, also relating to the
clerk of this church. In the " Book of Pleas"
is preserved a record of a will having been
proved in the Castle before the Constable of
the Castle. It was evidently recorded as
something unusual. It was on the Monday
week after Easter, 1304, and it was the will of
John de Bliburg, smith, of St. Peter de Par
mentergate. One would like to know whether
he was any relation to Seman de Blyburgh the
Nedler. Very little is said about the terms of
the wUl, only it is specified that he left " to the
parish priest 12d.; to the clerk of the said
church 2d." Here it is plain that the clerk is
distinguished from the priest, and held quite a
subordinate office. Exactly the same thing
F 2

68
occurs in another much earlier will, in which
an inhabitant of St. Peter Hungate leaves,
simUarly, 12d. to the chaplain and 2d. to -the
clerk. It appears, therefore, to have been the
custom, perhaps only in churches which could
afford it, to employ a clerk to do the business
work, not of the parish, but of the church.
The complicated arrangements of the mediasval
Church Calendar, the numerous masses for
deceased persons which had to be provided for,
and other matters, would require the services of
a scholar for book — or rather roll — keeping;
but one would certainly have supposed that
the clergy would have managed all this for
themselves, and not employed lay help except
for manual labour. Such, however, appears to
have been the case in some churches.

E^e dfiurcl) Bells.

The other scrap of information is that the
church was furnished with some bells, and so
were some of the neighbouring churches. We
learn this, from an account of sorae disorderly
doings which carae before the City Coroner,
and occurred in the forty-eighth year of the
reign of King Henry III. (1264). There was
sorae bad feeling between the citizens and the
people of the castle. A certain William le
Alblaster (? Archer) from the castle, after
threatening to burn the house of John le
LIndraper, placed some fire between his house
and that of John de Belaya (Belaugh), so that
John de Belaya's house was burned. We shall

69
see presently that these houses were not far
from the church, and the rioters took pre
cautions to prevent the neighbourhood being
roused in the following manner: — They stole
the clappers of the bells of St. Peter de
Parmentergate, and cut the ropes of the beUs
of St. Vedast and St. Cuthbert. The Coroner
gave an order to serve a summons on the said
malefactors; but as he would not be allowed
to serve it inside the bounds of the castle
jurisdiction, it is doubtful whether the rioters
were . ever brought to justice. I was puzzled
to know how the clappers of the bells could
have been stolen in a hurry, till I was informed
that it was the custom in those early times
merely to hang them by a leather thong from
a ring inside the bell. This would account for
their being stolen so easily ; but it. does not
appear why it was necessary to steal them at
all when cutting the ropes was thought
sufficient in the case of the other two churches.

70

King Street from the Churchyard,
and Cattle Market Street.

Adjoining the Churchyard on the north and
fronting the street was a messuage held about
•JJ 1300 by Gilbert le Mason, and next to it in
the street and also extending behind it to the
churchyard was one which had been held by
78 Master Roger Toke of Yarmouth. " Master "
is a term describing an ecclesiastic. Marriage
of the clergy was not unknown in those days,
though not sanctioned ; and after Roger's
death his three daughters, Sibilla, Agnes, and
Margaret, sold the messuage to John Duntynge,
merchant, and Gilbert his son, who seems to
be the same as Gilbert the Mason just
mentioned. This was in 1302, and they must
soon have parted with it, for four years later
I find the very sarae piece (lying north of
Gilbert le Mason's and the churchyard) conveyed
by Ranulph son of John le Clerk of Sax-
lingham Floteman to Robert de Lopham. At
the back of this (where the school is now) was
79 the land of Roger de Runham, chaplain, and
80 the land of the Alraoner of the Cathedral
Priory. The Almoner's land extended at the
back of the next messuage in the street, which
81 was conveyed in 1301 by Avelina, widow of
John Brid, to Margaret his younger daughter.
This John is also described as John le
LIndraper, and was son of another John le

71
LIndraper who, no doubt, was the one con
cerned in the outrage just referred to. Next
to this messuage came some land of Thomas de 82
Rekingham or Hekingham, whose daughter
Katherine inherited it, and also held the next
piece of land under Simon son of Seman 83
Wrinel. This piece was at the corner, so that
Simon, if he lived there, only had to cross the
road to reach his father's house in Upper King
Street. Simon was a wool merchant. At that
time wool was not made into cloth in England,
but exported to Flanders, and Flemish mer
chants brought back the cloth for sale.
The corner did not then project so far as
Cooper's shop, but turned up more where
Winter the draper's now stands. Passing
round the corner, the street (now called Cattle
Market Street) was described as the "King's
highway by which people go to the castle."
It is not certain what this means ; whether it
means that the road went straight on between
the embankments of the Castle Meadow and
Castle Hill to the foot of the bridge over the
moat, or whether people had to go up to
somewhere by Golden Ball Street, and enter
the enclosure by a small gate which is men
tioned there. Where the principal entrance to
the castle enclosure was, is still a matter of
doubt. Next to the land at the corner going
up the Hill was the land of Richard de Melton. 84
I have no other names here, but very little
space is left to account for. The land of the
Almoner, mentioned just now as lying at the
back of the premises in King Street (which, no
doubt, was the same as that held by the Dean
and Chapter from the Reformation till the

72
Hill was altered in 1862), included part of
the ground now occupied by Mr. Kitchin's,
lately Mr. Santy's, Veterinary Establishment,
which is at the boundary of St. Peter Per
mountergate parish, and also the adjoining
ground in St. Martin in the Bailey, nearly as
far as the present Shirehall Tavem. It thus
came very close to (if it did not touch) the
76 land of John BaUe, which we have seen
correspond with Messrs. Holmes' Works on the
west side of the churchyard.

73

General Observations.

T have thus accomplished my object of
making a circuit of the whole district now
comprised in the parish of St. Peter Per
mountergate, and giving as I went along such
information as I could gather from existing
documents of its condition about the year 1300,
or, to speak with more precision, between the
years 1285 and 1305, or a little later. With
an interval of 600 years from that time to the
present to bridge over, it was hardly to be
expected that we could learn all or any great
part of what we should be glad to know. It "
is something, however, to have recovered from
an age so far removed from our own, the
names and occupations of those who Hved and
moved about the spot so familiar to ourselves,
and even now and then to catch a glimpse,
however imperfect, of their ways and doings.
The picture I have been able to draw, though
necessarily wanting in details, is not without
some general distinguishing features.
It is plain that, except in one portion, the
district was not one of the busy parts of the
city, nor one of the most crowded. The
exception was the part lying, as it would have
been described then, between the streets of
Over and Nether Conesford. Here, as I
pointed out, there can be little doubt that the
trade of tanning was, or had been, in full
operation. Even this, I think, was beginning

74
to desert the locality. The Grey Friars had
already absorbed the greater part of the
ground which had been devoted to that purpose
on the north of Rose Lane ; and on the other
side of the lane it may be observed that more
than one piece of ground passed from the
hands of a tanner into those of an ecclesiastic,
or one who was not likely to carry on the
business. Possibly the tanners were beginning
to find It more convenient to be nearer to the
market, and settle on the river bank in
Westwick and Coslany.
In no one of the deeds I have referred to,
nor in some others which I have not mentioned,
is there any trace of a single shop, except
possibly once where some land (1 cannot
exactly say where) was conveyed from one
¦ baker to another. This is significant, because
when shops are conveyed they are apparently
always so called. The absence of shops in this
locality is partly accounted for by the fact that
in those days people did nearly all their
shopping in the market. But this does not
altogether account for there being no shops at
all here. There were shops on Tombland and
shops in Ber Street. It rather points to the
fact that, with the exception of the tanners,
the residents in this locality were (not persons
without occupation, but) persons who carried
on their business elsewhere, especially in the
market; merchants, mercers, linen drapers,
and others who lived here in their private
residences surrounded by a piece of ground.
We may judge to some extent by one instance.
The frontage of King Street, from St. Peter
Permountergate Churchyard to the corner of the

75
street leading up to the castle, was divided into
only five holdings, which are distinctly described
in the deeds as joining on to one another. These
could not all have been mere single houses. It
appears, indeed, from the story related of a
riotous outrage on that spot, that the house of
John le Lyndraper and the house of John de
Belaya were so close together, that in trying to
burn the house of one John the rioters burned
the house of the other. But this had been in
a previous generation, and if one or two of the
holdings were mere houses, that leaves all the
more space for the rest. Of course it is
possible that a holding conveyed as that of one
owner might have had its frontage built upon
with several houses. After all, we must confess
that we are rather groping about in the dark.
At all events, except where the tanners lived,
there was nowhere any clustering together of
persons following the same occupation, so as to
suggest that they lived together for that
purpose. It may be observed, too, that the names of
the persons mentioned are to a great extent
those of leading citizens. Not a few of them
held the office of bailiff, and scarcely any
belonged to the lower kinds of trades or
handicrafts who are found holding shops and
houses and pieces of land in the more central
parts of the city.

76

Stgle of Hitrins.
But although we may set down the general
character of the locality as decidedly genteel,
we are not to picture it to ourselves as dotted
about with a series of modern vUla residences.
Probably even Adam de Toftes, or Paul de
Pagrave, or Bartholomew de Acre lived only
in one-storied houses. "Solars" or upper
stories were sometiraes constructed, as in the
case of William de Sessuns at his tavern at
the top of Rose Lane ; but when they are
mentioned they are almost always described as
" new," and I believe were at this time coming
into use, not so rauch to add to personal comfort
and convenience, as for providing more business
accommodation. If a person was not satisfied
with the ordinary timber house such as his
neighbours had, he built one of stone. These,
as I have said, were rare, and there is no
mention of one in this district. The ordinary
houses were built of timber of one story.
Well-to-do merchants or people with a good
business, like (probably) some of the tanners,
who lived on their business premises, would
have their buildings ranged round a courtyard.
There is frequent mention of such courts in
other parts of the city, and very often of a
well in the middle of them.
Of comfort, as we understand it, there was
little either in public or private. Streets were
unpaved and undrained, and even a man like
Roger de Morlee, who was several times bailiff,
was fined for utilizing the king's highway as a
convenient place for a rubbish heap. And

77
there were occasionally rough goings on, as
when " William de Irstede drew blood from an
apprentice of his wdth a certain candlestick,"
for which he had to paj' 2s.; or when two
years later his wife, not taking warning from
her husband, "bit a maid servant of hers
through the fingeir," which cost her Is. But
these were exceptions as far as our special
locality is concerned, for the people whose
names we have met with were very seldom
presented for any more serious offences than
selling beer contrary to the assize, or encroach
ing on the king's highway or the river. And
we must remember that the industry, the
enterprize, the wisdom, and other qualities by
which Norwich had already been raised to a
foremost place amongst the burghs of England
are not written down. It is the personal
offences of our forefathers which alone have
been recorded, and preserved for us to read.
And it is no more fair to judge of them
entirely by such records than we should think
it fair for a student of antiquities some six
hundred years hence to judge of us and our
times solely by the records of our police courts.
Our forefathers were deficient in many
things which we think necessaries of life. They
managed many of their affairs in ways which
seem to us foolish and short-sighted, but
for all that they prospered; and although
historians have drawn a terribly dark picture
of the state of the towns of Europe, when the
founders of the Orders of Friars were seized
with a noble enthusiasm to raise them from
their degradation, I am persuaded that this
picture is only partially true of this city. I

78
believe that the inhabitants of Norwich of all
classes in the time of King Edward I. were in
possession of a very reasonable amount of
personal freedom ; had, on the whole, the
protection of just laws and customs, which were
at least intended to be fair all round ; and not
only lived but enjoyed life — after their own
fashion.

mm.

79

APri<:NDix.

Sprciinens o( an ©rtgiual Deelj anti an
(IPnroUeti Uccli of Conbeoirnce.

I. — An Ouiqinal Deed hhlating to the Pahish
01'' St. Vedast, i'Reseevmd in the Eecord-
itooM OK TUB City of Nonwiou.

Deed of St. Vedast's Parish.
Sciant psontos & futi quod ego Amanda
ri>lic(rii Thome Wrinol, filia Henrie le Waloys
do Swerdoston, concossi dedi T; hac psenti
carta moa pfirnuivi. In litia viduitate mea
Gervasio Kotupe de Irstede, ,p suicio suo T; p
SOX marcis argc(I quas m' dedit In Gorsumam
quoddam mosuagiu cum ptinen?, In parochia
Sei Vedasti in Norwioo quod jacet inter
mesungiu Rofeti psone de plumstede ex pte
aquilonari % mosuagiU Margarete Tannator
o.\ pto australi, 1 extedit se in longitudine

80
a via regali usq, ad aq""m currente sub
Nedercunesford. Tenend % habend illi T;
heredlbg suis T; cuicunqj vel q""ndocunqj dare
vel assignare vendere vel legare voluint,
^terq""m domui religionis T; Judeis libere
quiete bene '\ in pace. Reddendo inde an
nuatim capitali dno feodi qu""tor solidos
argenti ad duos anni tminos scilg ad
pascha duos solidos % ad festum Sei Michis
duos solid, T; scdm consuetudinem ciuitatis
Norwici . ad landgabulum q""ndo eueSit unii
obolum pro oini suico consuetudine T: ex-
actione. In hui" rei testimonium hnic presenti
scripto sigillum meii apposui. Hiis testibj.
Hug de Burnh""m, Johanne Scoth, Rogero de
Swerdeston, Adam le Graut tiic ballivis
Norwic, Adam Croyde, Rico de Lech, Rofeto
de Couentre, Huberto tannatore, Dauid tannur,
Galfrido Springald, Johe Sprlngald T. aliis.
Datii fuit coram Ballivis Norwic die Sabbi
pxima post festum Sei Cuthberti anno regni
r^ H. fit r^ J., XLII".
indorsement : — M' Quod ista carta lecta
T; t"'dita fuit p man' Amande fit Henr le
Waleys, in plena cuir Norwicy die sabbati
px"" post festum Sei Cuthfeti, anno regni
Regp Henr fil Reg* Johis xliii". Act p
manii Hamonis ctici.

Translation. — " Know (all) present and to
come that I Amanda, relict of Thomas Wrinel,
daughter of Henry le Waleys of Swerdeston,
have granted given and by this my present
deed confirmed in my free widowhood to
Gervase Kempe of Irstede for his service and
for six marks of silver which he has given to
me for a payment a certain messuage with
pertinents. In the parish of St. Vedast in
Norwich, which lies between the messuage
of Robert, parson of Plumstede, on the
part of the north, and the messuage of
Margaret the Tanner on the part of the south,
and extends in length from the King's High
way to the water running under Nedercunesford.
To hold and to have to him and his heirs and
to give or assign, to sell or bequeath to
whomsoever and whensoever they wUl except
to a house of religion and to Jews, freely
quietly well and in peace. Rendering
therefrom annually to the capital lord of
the fee four shillings of silver at the two
terms of the year, that is to say at Easter
two shillings and at the feast of St. Michael
two shillings, and according to the custom of
the City of Norwich (rendering) for landgable
whensoever it shall fall due one-halfpenny.
In witness of this thing I have set my seal to

82
the present writing. These (being) witnesses,
Hugo de Burnham, John Scoth, Roger de
Swerdeston, Adam le Graunt, then Bailiffs of
Norwich ; Adam Croyde, Richard de Lech,
Robert de Coventre, Hubert the tanner,
Geoffrey Springald, John Springald, and
others. It was given (or dated) in the
presence of the Bailiffs of Norwich on the
Saturday next after the feast of St. Cuthbert,
in the 42nd year of the reign of King Henry
son of King John."
Endorsement. — "Be it observed that this
deed was read and delivered by the hands of
Amanda, daughter of Henry le Waleys, in the
full court of Norwich, on the Saturday next
after the feast of St. Cuthbert, in the 43rd
year of the reign of King Henry son of King
John. Enrolled by the hand of Hamo the
clerk." The year of the King's reign is given
differently (by mistake) in the deed and the
endorsement. The latter is probably right.
The names of the bailiffs in Henry III.'s reign
are given very incorrectly in Blomefield's
History of Normch, and are not to be found
elsewhere. Another set of names has, how
ever, been assigned by the help of these

83
original deeds to his 42nd year, so that these
belong no doubt to his 43rd year, as the
endorsement has it. The date would be 22nd
March, 1259, or more correctly 1258, for
the new year at that time commenced on
March 25th.
This deed is one of the earUest relating to
this part of the city. It is of parchment
in wonderful preservation, with only one
place slightly damaged. The penmanship is
exceUent, and the ink as black as if used
quite recently. The size is 7 in. by 3^ in. It
originally had a seal, which is lost.
It is not clear to what exact spot it refers.
The mention of St. Vedast's parish, of
Margaret the tanner, and of Nether Conesford,
shews that it was somewhere in Mountergate
Street, p. 29. From Margaret's messuage
being on the south we may suppose that at
that early date she did not own aU she
did afterwards. She may have obtained it
subsequently, and when she died it would
form part of the extensive property conveyed
by her executors to Henry Sampson. The
water mentioned would be the "Cokeye," as
I have suggested on p. 39.

81

An Enrolled Deed relating to the Parish of
St. Peter de Parmentergate.
MP quod Ad. de Toftes cluls Noi;wyci &
Ka?ina uS sua vnanimi assensu concessef
deder & hac psenti carta sua confirmaverunt
Joh de Morlee tanatori ciui Norwyci &
Mrgarete v2 eius pro sexsagint solid
8tlingo| quos eis dedit in gsuma Totii
ortu SUU cu ptin suis in q° meg RicI le Co
quond stare solebat cu tota ilia placea tre cu
suis ptin que quond fuit Ade de Langhale
in Norwico in poch Sei Petri de PmCtgate
in vico de Cunesford & sunt 9iunctlm in una
clausura int q'^nd gmen veneUam usus austr
& meg SUU qd quond fuit Dauid le Tanur &
meg Milisen? fil Walti de Melton usus Aqlone
cui' capud orientale abutat sup via Regalem
de Cunesford, & capud occidentale sup tram
sua de feodo Hospital Sei Egidij, & q""nd
placeam tre sue cu suis ptin que quond fuit
pdci Rici le Co, cu qd domo cu fundo &
ptifi suis q""m ipe Ad nup erait de pdco
Millscenta & sunt cSlunctim in eadm poch
int pdcm meg suu qd fuit pdi Dauid usus
orient & meg pdce Miliscente usus occidntem
& pdcm ortu u austr & Qmune uenellam usus
aquilone in logitudie & latii.udie in orto

85

i>

supdro & ubiq, sicuii patet p bundas & metas
ibidui I'i~u8 & poitaa lliidum it ionond, &c.
Reddendo indo annuatim ipis & hc(lil)5 suis
vnu olaiim Gariophili ad Pasch. Et Driis
food 'Suioia dobita vidott Priori & couentui
do BukC'li^iu do deo tenomto quod fuit Rici
le Oo duodoc donar' annuatim videit ad sinod
Sei Mich SOX donar, & ad Pasch vi(/. Et
PorissG it monialibus do Ouumpesso de codm
tenonito sox denar' annuatim ad sinod soi
Mich p oni suicio, &c., ot jjds Ad & Ka?ina
& hed sui waranlizabunt adqetabunt ot de-
fondebunt totu ioncmct sup"'dem cu omibus
ptin suis put p\lem est pfato Johi & M""rgarete
& hedlbus eoji, &o., Et indo t""dider''"' onxtam
suam sigilt suis slng'^tam que quidni carta
inaotitata & iiulorsata ost p manus Thoiii
de Erlhui Clori.

The samo with tho contractions extended : —
" Momorandura quod Adam de Toftes civis
Norwyci et Ivatovinn uxor sua unanimi assensu
concesserunt dodovnnt ot hao presenti carta sua
confirmavoruut Johanni do IMorlco tiinatori civi
Norwyci et JJihirgarete uxori eius pro soxiiginta
solidis sterlingorum quos eis dodit in gersumam
Totum ortum suum cum pertinontiis suis in
quo messuagium Ricardi lo Co quondam stare

86
solebat cum tota ilia placea terre cum suis
pertinentils que quondam fuit Ade de Langhale
in Norwico in parochia Sancti Petri de
Parmentergate in vico de Cunesford et sunt
conjunctim in una clausura inter quandam
communem veneUam versus australem et
messuagium suum quod quondam fuit David
le Tanur et messuagium Melisente filie Walteri
de Melton versus aquilonem, cujus capud
orientale abuttat super viam Regalem de
Cunesford et capud occidentale super terram
suam de feodo Hospitalis Sancti Egidii Et
quandam placeam terre sue cum suis per
tinentils que quondam fuit predicti Ricardi
le Co cum quadam dorao cum fundo et
pertinentils suis quam ipse Adam nuper emit
de pr edicta Mellscenta et sunt conjunctim in
eadem parochia inter predietum messuagium
suum quod fuit predicti David versus orientem
et messuagium predicte Meliscente versus
occidentem et predietum ortum versus aus
tralem et communera veneUam versus aquilonem
in longitudine et latitudine in orto supradicto
et ubique sicuti patet per bundas et metas
ibidem factas et positas Habendum et tenendum
&c. Reddendo inde annuatim ipsis et heredibus
suis unum clavum gariophili ad Pascha. Et
Dominis feodi servicia debita videlicet Priori

87
et Conventui de Bukenham de dicto tenemento
quod fuit Ricardi le Co duodecim denarios
annuatim videlicet ad sinodum Sancti Michaelis
sex denarios et ad Pascha sex denarios Et
Priorisse et Monialibus de Caumpesse de eodem
tenemento sex denarios annuatim ad sinodum
Sancti MichaeUs pro omni servicio &c. Et
predictus Adam et Katerina et heredes sui
warrantizabunt adquietabunt et defendebunt
totum tenementum supradictum cum omnibus
pertinentils suis prout predietum est prefato
Johanni et Margarete et heredibus eorum &c.
Et inde tradiderunt cartam suam sigiUis suis
singatam que quidem carta inaotitata et
indorsata est per manus Thome de Erlham
clerici." Translation. — " Be it observed that Adam
de Toftes, citizen of Norwich, and Katerine
his wife, with their joint assent have granted,
given, and by this their present deed confirmed
to John de Morlee, tanner, citizen of Norwich,
and Margaret his wife, for 60 shiUings sterling
which he gave to them for payment AU that
their garden with its pertinents in which the
messuage of Richard le Co formerly used to
stand, with all that place (or piece) of land
with its pertinents which was sometime of
Adam de Langhale in Norwich, in the parish

of St. Peter de Parmentergate in the Street of
Cunesford, and they are together in one
enclosure between a certain common lane
towards the south, and their messuage which
was sometirae of David le Tanur and the
messuage of Meliscent daughter of Walter de
Melton towards the north, whose eastern head
abuts upon the king's highway of Cunesford
and its western head upon their land of the
fee of the Hospital of St. Giles. And a
certain place of their land with its pertinents
which was sometime of the aforesaid Richard
le Co with a certain house with its ground
and pertinents which the said Adam lately
purchased of the aforesaid Meliscent, and they
are together in the same parish between their
messuage aforesaid which was of David afore
said towards the east, and the messuage of the
aforesaid Meliscent towards the west, and the
aforesaid garden towards the south, and a
comraon lane towards the north, in length and
breadth in the garden abovesaid and every
where as is plain by bounds and metes (marks)
there made and placed. To have and to hold,
&c. Rendering therefrom annually to them
and their heirs one clove at Easter. And to
the lords of the fee due services, that is to say,
to the Prior and Convent of Bukenham from

89
tho said tenement which was of Richard lo Co
twelve pence annually, that is to say, at the
synod of St. Michael sixpence and at Easter
sixpciico. And to the Prioress and Nuns of
Caumposso from the same tenement sixpence
yearly at the synod of St. Michael for all
service, &o. And the aforesaid Adam and
Katerine and their heirs will warrant, acquit,
and defend tho whole tenement abovesaid with
nil its pertinents as is aforesaid, to the aforesaid
John and Margaret and thoir heirs, &c. And
thereupon they delivered their deed sealed with
thoir soals, which said deed was enrolled and
endorsed by the hands of Thomas the clerk."
This deed is not dated; but from its place
on tho Roll it must belong to about May, 1293.
It refers to tho south side of Stepping Lane,
and has furnished the information given on
pages 58 and 5!). It Is taken from the second
bundle of Conveyance RoUs in tho Guildhall
Record-room, which contains fifty-nine parch
ment membranes or skins fastened together at
the top. On them are enroUed 781 deeds,
commencing in IMari'li, 1287, and ending in
Noveniber, 1298. This deed is on the back
oL' membrano 41.

AQAS H. QOOSB,
RAIIPAXT HOKSK BTBBKT, JCOKWIOD,

YALE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY

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