6. THE PRIORY OF SWAFFHAM BULBECK
The priory at Swaffham Bulbeck was probably
founded in the second half of the 12th century,
either by that Isabel de Bolebec who became the
wife of the 3rd Earl of Oxford c. 1209, (fn. 1) or by her
parents, who by this marriage became the
'ancestors of the Earls of Oxford' described as its
founders in the Hundred Rolls. (fn. 2) The first contemporary mention of a Prioress of Swaffham is
a reference to land held by her in Silverley in
1199. (fn. 3) At its foundation the priory was endowed
with the church of Swaffham Bulbeck and 4 virgates of land there; (fn. 4) later more land was acquired
in the parish. In 1375 the then prioress brought
a suit against Giles Crakesloth and others for
disseising her of a tenement in Norwich, of which
she alleged her predecessor, Agnes, to have been
seised in King John's time, and another prioress,
named Sybil, to have been seised in that of Henry
III. She won her case, and, if the facts were as
stated, this house in the Drapery at Norwich must
have been given to the nunnery soon after its
foundation. (fn. 5) In 1234-5 Walter Marescall and
his wife Amabel gave 6 acres of land and a croft
in Swaffham Bulbeck to the prioress for a rent of
1s. 6d., and on condition of being remembered in
the prayers of the nuns: (fn. 6) in 1242-3 Robert de
Valoignes made the substantial gift of a carucate
of land in Ditton Valence on a similar condition, (fn. 7)
and in 1252-3 Roger Lambert and Isabel his wife
gave a further 4 acres in Swaffham. (fn. 8) A little later
various gifts of rents were made to them: as of
10s. in Livermere in 1269, (fn. 9) of 7s. in Babraham
in 1285-6, (fn. 10) and of a mark in Ashley and Silverley, from Geoffrey Arsyk, in the same year. (fn. 11) In
1279 land was held in Burwell of Thomas de
Burgh by the payment of a pair of gilt spurs to the
lord and of a mark to the Prioress of Swaffham; (fn. 12)
the convent held 60 acres in Toft (fn. 13) and as much
in Hardwick, (fn. 14) as well as small properties in the
town of Cambridge, producing £2 11s. 8d. in
rents. (fn. 15) The priory, although small, and never
rich, had distinguished friends, and at her death
in 1360 Elizabeth de Burgh, Lady Clare, left 12
dishes (esqueles) of silver and 11 pieces of cloth of
gold to the ladies of Swaffham. (fn. 16)
Archbishop Kilwardby sent his clerks to visit
the priory on Saturday, 18 December 1277, while
he held an ordination in Bottisham Church. (fn. 17) He
was on his way from Anglesey to Ely, and Swaffham lay slightly off the route. The nuns were,
however, by no means out of the world, for within
50 yards of their gatehouse lay the wharf communicating with Swaffham Lode, by which until
about 1870 a brisk ship-borne trade was carried
on with London, Newcastle-on-Tyne, the east
coast ports, and Amsterdam. The nuns, as ladies
of the manor, had an active interest in the traffic
by this waterway, and some of the commodities
which appear in the compotus of Margaret Ratcliff
in the 15th century figure in the accounts of the
company which owned the sea-going barges of the
last century.
In 1338 Swaffham is included in a list of religious houses from which nothing could be obtained, either because of their poverty or because
they were exempt. (fn. 18) During the vacancy of the
see of Ely in 1345 the house was visited by Hugh
Seton, official of the archbishop, who ordered that
novices must not be accepted in excess of the
ability of the house to maintain them and that at
Swaffham only two must be received. (fn. 19) On
23 May 1346 Bishop Lisle of Ely visited in person; (fn. 20) he noted the ruinous state of the buildings,
and, in spite of the Black Death three years later,
the nuns seem to have set about rebuilding, for
in 1352 after Lisle's return from abroad he came
to Swaffham again, blessed nuns, and consecrated
the conventual church. (fn. 21)
It was possibly partly to meet the expense of
repairing the church that the nuns in February
1353 obtained a licence to acquire in mortmain
property up to the yearly value of £10. (fn. 22) This
modest limit does not appear to have been reached;
in 1354 land and rents in Mildenhall to the value
of 30s. were obtained, (fn. 23) and in 1363 land worth
10s. in Swaffham Bulbeck was given to the
priory, (fn. 24) but no other additions of real estate can
be traced until 1379, when a further 20s. in land
and rent in Hardwick and Toft was acquired
under the same licence. (fn. 25)
Against these accessions of income must be put
the loss of their gatehouse in 1368 by the carelessness of a servant sleeping there, who left a candle
burning, which fell on his bed and burnt him and
the gatehouse. (fn. 26) A general process of decay alike
in buildings and finances towards the end of this
century is suggested by Bishop Fordham's action
in 1395 in granting 40 days' indulgence to any
who contributed to the repair of the church,
cloisters, and other buildings of Swaffham Priory
and to the maintenance of the nuns. (fn. 27)
Thomas de Wormenhale's visitation (fn. 28) of Swaffham Priory on 2 August 1373 produced a complaint not without interest for liturgical history,
in addition to mere grumbles about food and
financial troubles. It was stated that from the time
of their foundation it had been the custom of the
nuns to say the night and day offices according to
the Rule of St. Benedict as observed by the monks
of Ely, but that certain of the present and former
nuns had introduced antiphons, verses, and collects
of various saints into the services, so that the due
and accustomed order was either negligently performed or sometimes omitted. The community
was directed to return to the strict form of the
Benedictine use for all choir offices and to leave
the extra observances to private devotion.
The Poll-Tax returns in 1379 show that there
were then besides the prioress, the Lady Eve
Wastoneys, six nuns: the Lady Ellen de Ufford
(probably of the family of the Earl of Suffolk),
Margaret de Foxton, Margery de Rydon, Agnes
de Swaffham, Isabel Loche, and Elizabeth de
Teversham. (fn. 29) The priory was at this time said
to be worth 'under £40'; about a century earlier
its temporalities were valued at £26 0s. 5d. (fn. 30) and
during the 14th and 15th centuries it was usually
exempt from taxation because of its poverty. (fn. 31)
A detailed account of the revenues of the priory
for one year from 25 April 1481 (fn. 32) shows a total
of £66 2s. 8½d. Of this £22 15s. came from rents
and leases, £36 16s. 8d. from the sale of wood,
wheat, and other farm produce, and the remainder
from miscellaneous sources, including gifts and
bequests. Of the miscellaneous receipts the most
interesting are payments for boarders. These are
all calculated at 6d. a week and are for terms varying from 6 to 40 weeks; there are nine persons
named, and in seven cases the entry is 'for board
(mensa) of his son' or 'daughter'. Although in the
first two instances, Richard Potecary and John
Kele, both of Cambridge, the entry is only 'for
board' it is probable that all the boarders were
children; they can hardly have been a direct source
of profit, but their parents may have showed their
appreciation in some more substantial form. The
poverty of the house was no doubt partly relieved
by the fact that some of its inmates were connected
with families of wealth and distinction. In 1399
Bishop Fordham received the professions of three
nuns here, Margaret de Lisle, Cecily Brettenham,
and Cecily Pakenham, all names of well-known
families. (fn. 33) Bequests to the house and to individual
nuns were fairly frequent; in 1448 Alice Langham of Snailwell left to her daughter Agnes, a
professed nun of Swaffham, a set of bedclothes,
a chest, some pieces of plate, and 8 marks in
money, and to the prioress 3s. 4d. (fn. 34) Thomas
Fyncham of Cambridge in 1517 left 20s. a year
for life to Alice Wood, a nun in this priory. (fn. 35)
Nicholas Hughson left 20s. to the prioress and
convent in 1512, and Thomas Bentley in 1523
left 4s. to each nun there to pray for his soul. (fn. 36)
John Smith, vicar of Swaffham Bulbeck, in
1532 left 2s. to the prioress, 12d. to each nun,
and 12d. to Sir Christopher their priest. (fn. 37) In 1379
there were two chaplains in the priory. (fn. 38) These
mass priests were seculars, but the special confessors appointed for the nuns by the bishop were
usually regulars and often friars, though in 1377
Henry, vicar of St. Cyriac's, Swaffham Prior, was
so appointed. (fn. 39) In 1388 and 1389 William de
Bottesham, sub-prior of Anglesey, was the nuns'
confessor, (fn. 40) as was John de Norwich, Prior of the
Dominicans of Cambridge, in 1393, (fn. 41) and in 1404
Bishop Fordham licensed the prioress, Elizabeth,
to choose her own confessor for three years. (fn. 42)
That the house was in difficulties early in the
16th century is suggested by the fact that in 1505
the prioress, Christine Pope, pawned a chalice
with the President of St. Catharine's Hall for £5. (fn. 43)
Thirty years later, if rumour might be trusted, the
spiritual side of the community was also at a low
level. The prioress, Joan Spylman, was said to be
'naught' with a friar (fn. 44) of bad reputation, to whom
she had given the benefice of Swaffham Bulbeck;
and all the sisters of the convent were as bad as
herself, according to Dr. Legh, who adds that
they would all have left the place if he had not
restrained them; and preparatory to so doing they
had apparently sold all the corn, cattle, and household stuff. (fn. 45) Joan Spylman obtained a pension of
£6 13s. 4d.; (fn. 46) but, although she had been so
willing to abandon the priory, the neighbourhood
appears to have retained an attraction for her,
perhaps in the person of the friar, as in 1602
Robert Manning of Burwell, then aged 80,
remembered that for more than a year after the
dissolution of the house she remained 'in a cave
in the ground at the Vicaredge'. (fn. 47)
In 1535 the value of the priory was stated as
£40, no details being given; (fn. 48) but a valuation of
the estates drawn up shortly after the house had
been dissolved yields a total of £63 18s. 2d. (fn. 49)
The smaller sum may have been the net value
after deductions which are given in the later
account, or it may be due to omission of the rectory of Swaffham Bulbeck, worth £20, (fn. 50) given by
the prioress to her favoured friar.
Prioresses of Swaffham (fn. 51)
Agnes, tpe. John (1199-1216) (fn. 52)
Agnes, occurs 1234-5
Maud, occurs 1242-3, 1247-8, 1252-3
Sybil, tpe. Henry III (fn. 53)
Alice, occurs 1269, 1271, 1285-6 (fn. 54)
Agnes de Ely, died 1340
Isabel de Abbotslee, elected 1340 (fn. 55)
Eve Wastoneys, (fn. 56) occurs 1378-9
Elizabeth de Teversham, occurs 1397, 1404
Joan Clare, resigned 1460
Joan Sopham, or Swaffham, occurs 1473, (fn. 57)
died 1480 or 1481 (fn. 58)
Margaret Ratcliff, occurs 1481
Christine Pope, occurs 1503, 1505 (fn. 59)
Joan Spylman, surrendered 1535