Introduction
The Ledger-Book or "Green Book" of the Cistercian Abbey
of Vale Royal in Delamere Forest appears to have been lost
in comparatively recent times. It was in the possession of
Thomas Marbury of Marbury in 1658, when the historical
portion of it, forming Part I of the present volume, was copied
from it to be printed in Dugdale's Monasticon. In 1662 it
was at Sir Thomas Mainwaring's at Peover, though it is not
clear that he was the owner, and from it was made the
transcript now preserved in the British Museum as Harl.
MS. 2064. Seventy years later, according to Tanner, the
original was at Vale Royal. Another transcript is said to have
been owned by the Duttons of Dutton, but nothing is now
known of it.
The copy made in 1662 is therefore the only one available.
It is the work of Randle Holme III, and numbered by him
AAA. It was the second part of a larger work, and the list of
"Things of note in this book" at the beginning proves that
some thirty folios have been lost, for the numbering began at 211
originally, whereas the first numbered folio is now 241. The
lost portion related to the colleges and chantries in Cheshire suppressed at the Reformation. The "coppy of Vale Royall Leger
book" occupies folios 241 to 301; at folio 306 begins a series of
Stanlow Abbey charters, many of them from the original deeds,
drawings of the seals being added.
The transcriber did not perform his task well, so that there
are numerous difficulties in his text; but Mr. John H. Cooke of
Northwich obtained a careful translation of it from Miss Ethel
Stokes, and has generously placed it at the disposal of the Record
Society. It is this translation of Holme's transcript which is now
offered to the members of the Society.
Holme carefully noted the folios of the original in making his
copy, but unfortunately that is not enough to enable us to reconstruct the original. The Ledger-Book appears to have been begun
in the time of the fifth abbot, Peter, perhaps about 1338, and its
plan is set forth clearly in the title. There were to be three
sections:
I. A history of the abbots;
II. An account of the various pleadings, &c., in which the
abbey had been involved;
III. A collection of the papal bulls conferring special privileges upon the Cistercian Order.
The account was intended to be systematic, and therefore
numerous blank folios were left to allow of later documents being
entered in their right places. Such later records have indeed
been inserted, but no order was observed, and the volume is in
the greatest confusion.
Hence in preparing the translation for the press some alteration was necessary, for the convenience of the student. On the
other hand, it is the obvious duty of a Record Society to print the
records as they have come down to us. The compromise here
adopted will, it is hoped, meet with approval, as reducing the
necessary transpositions to a minimum. The order of the
original design has been followed, and the first part therefore
contains the history of the monastery under its first abbots, being
folios 6/243 to 11d/248d of the Holme MS. The second part
contains records of disputes, revenues, and other matters touching the possessions and rights of the abbey, being folios
11d/248d to 46d/283d of the original, to which are added
the miscellaneous documents entered in the beginning on folios
4/241 to 5d/242d, and at the end on folios 57d/294d to 64/301.
The confusion in this part may be remedied to some extent by
the use of the table of contents; the index will enable a complete survey to be made. Among the more important documents
are the account of income in 1336, the rental of the abbey, the
records of the customs of Darnhall and Over, and the account
of the appropriation of Llanbadarnfawr. The statute of Bishop
Alexander concerning tithes is also worthy of mention; it applied
to the whole diocese of Lichfield.
The third part occupies folios 47/284 to 57d/294d of the
manuscript, but as it concerns the privileges of the Cistercian
Order in general, with no special reference to Vale Royal, it has
been deemed unnecessary to print any of it except one portion—
the record of a case in which the official of the archdeacon of
Chester thought he had found a weak place in the immunities
of the monks, and took advantage of it to excommunicate one
Arnold de Embsay, a monk of Whalley. After trial before the
Abbot of Westminster, the protector of the Order, the official was
found to be in error, and his sentence was revoked accordingly.
It is to be regretted that very few charters are found in the
volume. The plan does not seem to have embraced such documents, for the royal charters and papal bulls have not been transcribed in it. This is all the more to be regretted, as very few
deeds relating to the abbey's lands are known from other sources;
even the important bull appropriating Kirkham Church to the
abbey is unknown except from the references to it herein printed.
Possibly the abbey's charters were not numerous. (fn. 1) It was of
royal endowment, and few smaller benefactors came in to assist;
in fact, the foundation appears to have been very unpopular in the
district in its early days. This may have been due to the lawless
character of the inhabitants of a forest district, for the site had
been a haunt of desperadoes; and in some degree to the fact that
the establishment of an abbey there in various ways diminished
the customary liberties. The resolute struggle made by the bondmen of Darnhall for enfranchisement may indicate that under the
rule of the bailiffs of the earls of Chester they had had in fact a large
amount of freedom, while with abbot and monks living in their
midst legal rights were more strictly enforced against them. On
the other hand, it is possible to take the view that the rule of the
monks was so much milder than the older one that the bondmen
took advantage of it, and supposing this religious mildness to be
an indication of weakness resolved to ignore the monks' rights
altogether, with the results described in the narrative.
The first part is of much interest. As already stated, it
was probably composed about 1338, in the time of Abbot Peter;
indeed, if one phrase be pressed—qui ante nos prefuerunt—it seems
likely that this abbot himself was the author. It appears from it
that some persons were living at the time of writing who could
remember what happened at the building of the church, which
began in 1277. The writing was after 1330, when the new conventual buildings were blessed, but no later date occurs in this first
section. On the other hand, the writer was not accurately acquainted with the origin of the monastery, for he states that it was
founded by Edward I when Prince of Wales (sic) in fulfilment of a
vow made by him when shipwrecked on his return from one of the
crusades. Mr. Cooke, in the preface to Ida, corrects this as follows:
"Prince Edward only went to the Holy Land on one occasion, namely,
when he set sail from Dover on 20 August 1270. He did not return to
England until after the death of his father, Henry III, which occurred
on 16 November 1272, and the news of that death reached him in Sicily.
The date of the foundation charter of the abbey of Darnhall . . . is
2 August [1270, a few days] before the prince set sail for the Holy Land.
Moreover that charter, granted by Prince Edward, states that 'we, being
sometime in danger at sea,' have founded the abbey at Darnhall (as) a
monastery of the Cistercian Order. No mention is made in the charter
connecting the shipwreck with the prince's voyage to or from the Holy
Land; indeed, it could not be correctly referred to. The charter issued
by King Edward in respect of Vale Royal Abbey is dated 1299, 'upon
a vow once made, being in danger of shipwreck.' Again no reference
to the Holy Land. We are therefore compelled to look for some shipwreck prior to 1270 as the occasion when the vow to build a monastery
was made at sea. The Dictionary of National Biography, in an article
written by the Rev. W. Hunt, under the head of Edward I, states that
he as Prince Edward in the year 1263, immediately after Christmas, set
sail for France and 'had a stormy passage and made vows for safety.'
Sir James Ramsay in his Dawn of the Constitution (p. 210) says
Henry III crossed from Dover to Calais on the 2nd January 1263–4,
and Prince Edward his son had gone over a few days before. It seems
therefore certain that the vow could not have been made on his return
journey from the Holy Land in 1272, but was made shortly after Christmas 1263."
It is in the Dunstaple Annals that the prince's vow is recorded,
and then by a hostile writer, who states that in the terrific storm
Edward made ever so many vows in his fear: (fn. 2) behaviour as unlike that of so brave a knight as it is unlike the story of the Vale
Royal historian. The public events of the years 1264 and 1265
would prevent him fulfilling his vow, and it may have been overlooked until a resolve to go to the Holy Land caused him to
"set his house in order" before starting. The charter of 1270,
printed in Dugdale and Ormerod, shows that the manors of
Over and Darnhall and certain churches had been appropriated
to the monks, and speaks of the abbey as already existing.
Whether any beginning had been made or not is uncertain;
according to the Vale Royal chronicler the monks did not leave
the mother-house of Dore, in Herefordshire, until January
1273–4, but for some reason he ignores Walter, the first abbot of
Darnhall. The plan may not have been carried forward with
any vigour until Edward's return from the Holy Land; his preservation from the assassin's dagger there would give him a further
reason for this offering of thanks to God. It will be observed
that the charges fell mainly, almost exclusively, upon the revenues
of the earldom of Chester, (fn. 3) which were no doubt regarded as
Edward's private revenues, distinct from the national taxation.
Had the reign been peaceful the king would probably have
carried out his design in all its splendour; with constant wars
with Welshmen and Scots it is surprising to find how much could
be spent upon Vale Royal. The excavations recently made on
the site show that the buildings were large and beautiful. (fn. 4) Still
there never seems to have been anything like the projected hundred
monks in the abbey, which, so far as can be judged from the few
notices of it, had little prosperity. In the time of Edward III
further considerable sums were spent upon the completion of the
buildings, (fn. 5) and the Black Prince gave a second tun of wine from
the Chester customs, (fn. 6) while in 1359–60 an important addition to
its revenue was made by the appropriation of the rectory of
Llanbadarnfawr in South Wales; but in 1439 it was recorded
that the abbey of Vale Royal was so wasted by misrule that
£1000, it was thought, would be needed to repair its estate. (fn. 7)
Other signs of decadence appear. In 1428–9, when the
abbey was vacant, an order was issued to arrest those who
were interfering with the freedom of election. (fn. 8) Again in
1436 the sheriff and others were ordered to keep the peace
at the approaching visitation of the abbey, for those who had
been appointed to make the visitation feared that they would
be obstructed in their duty. (fn. 9) It may perhaps be inferred from
these entries that there was a zealous and reforming party in the
monastery, fighting with a prevalent corruption supported by
some of the lay magnates of the district. (fn. 10) Thomas, made abbot
about 1438, possibly as a consequence of the visitation referred
to, seems to have had a good reputation, for he was appointed
Bishop of Sodor and Man in 1458, most likely as an assistance to
the revenues of the monastery. Trespasses in Delamere Forest
in 1485 and later were charged against some of the monks—
Geoffrey Weverham, Richard Letham, John Whalley, Hugh
Birmingham, and Henry Ledes. (fn. 11) Some building is recorded at
the end of the fifteenth century, but little further is known until
the final tragedy: the surrender of the abbey to the king on 7 September 1538, and the trial and conviction—not necessarily a fair
trial and an honest conviction—of the last abbot for the death of one
of his monks. He and his monks appear to have been suspected
at least of sympathy with the recent popular insurrections in favour
of the monasteries, but if so, they soon made peace with the king,
as the allowance of pensions demonstrates. At this time the net
revenue was a little over £500, and the establishment consisted
of an abbot, a prior, and thirteen monks; of these eight were
living and receiving their pensions in 1556.
Speaking generally, it is to the credit of a monastery that
nothing is heard of it, for its members are supposed to retire
from the world to pursue a life of religious contemplation. The
story of Vale Royal shows that at least it began well, under
worthy abbots, and if after a time scandals are found, there seems
to have been a recovery. No crimes, except that mentioned,
were alleged against its latest members. It is but seldom that
the abbot was employed either as a royal official or a papal delegate; but this may have been due to the comparative poverty
of the house and not to any supposed incapacity of its head. It
is to be regretted that no complete list of those heads can as yet
be given; but it is lawful to hope that the issue of the present
volume may provide both aid and stimulus to fuller researches
into the history of this favourite creation of one of our greatest
kings.
J. BROWNBILL.