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The Med­iæ­val Hos­pi­tals of Eng­land, by Ro­tha Mary Clay

THE ANTIQUARY’S BOOKS

GENERAL EDITOR: J. CHARLES COX, LL.D., F.S.A.

THE MEDIÆVAL HOSPITALS

OF ENGLAND

[♦] ST. MARY’S HOSPITAL, DOVER

THE

MEDIÆVAL HOSPITALS

OF ENGLAND

BY

ROTHA MARY CLAY

WITH A PREFACE BY

THE LORD BISHOP OF BRISTOL

WITH 78 ILLUSTRATIONS

METHUEN & CO.

36 ESSEX STREET W.C.

LONDON

First Published in 1909

DEDICATED TO

FRANCES ARNOLD-FORSTER

WITH GRATEFUL AFFECTION

PREFACE

WHEN the able author of this book asked me to write a Preface to a work on Hospitals, I replied that I must first see the sheets in proof. This was not due to any doubt of the ability of the writer, it was due to some doubt as to the adequacy of the material at her disposal. This doubt has been much more than removed. The mass of the material collected is remarkable. Still more remarkable is the evidence of the very large part played by Hospitals—in the widest senses of the word—in the social life of the people of this land in the earlier Middle Ages. For the fuller understanding of the social life of our ancestors, this book contributes information of the most luminous character. It will serve also as an example and pattern for young and earnest students of real history, the history of ordinary human beings rather than of generals and of kings. And it must be added that, although the division into numerous headings leads to frequent repetitions of the names and characters of institutions of the nature of Hospitals, it has the great advantage of reducing to order a mass of material which might under less careful treatment have had a chaotic appearance. As a book of reference for readers and writers, this treatise on the Mediæval Hospitals of England ought to hold a distinguished place.

G. F. BRISTOL

July, 1909.

INTRODUCTION

“And to relief of lazars and weak age,

Of indigent faint souls, past corporal toil,

A hundred almshouses, right well supplied.”

(Shakespeare: Henry V., i. 1.)

WHILE we are justly proud of our institutions for the amel­ior­a­tion of the lot of the in­firm and des­ti­tute, we are apt to for­get that they are not the outcome of any modern phil­an­throp­ic move­ment, but are rather England’s in­her­i­tance for above a thou­sand years.

Much has been written of the regular monastic houses. These are situated, as it were, upon the high-roads of ecclesiastical history; but comparatively little attention has been paid to the existence and development of the foundations known as “Hospitals.” Although it is with some trepidation that we tread the less-frequented by-paths of history, an attempt will be made in this volume to illustrate the place of the hospital in pre-Reformation times, and by this means to secure a fuller recognition of the widespread activity of the Church of England in former days. Hospitals played an important part in the social life of the Middle Ages, and from the study of them much may be learnt of the habits of a distant past.

At the outset it will be well to make clear what the hospital was, and what it was not. It was an ecclesiastical, not a medical, institution. It was for care rather than cure: for the relief of the body, when possible, but pre-eminently for the refreshment of the soul. By manifold religious observances, the staff sought to elevate and discipline character. They endeavoured, as the body decayed, to strengthen the soul and prepare it for the future life. Faith and love were more predominant features in hospital life than were skill and science.

It will surprise many to learn that—apart from actual monasteries and friaries—there existed upwards of 750 such charitable institutions in Mediæval England.[1] To appreciate the relative magnitude of this number, it must be remembered that the total population was smaller than that of London at the present day. The fact proves that clergy and laity were battling bravely with social problems. There existed a sense of responsibility, causing real charitable effort, although mediæval methods may appear mistaken in the light of modern scientific and economic principles.

The study of these ancient charities calls attention to the following points. The first is the extent of leprosy in England. There are, indeed, conflicting opinions concerning the prevalence of the disease, but it is certain that the figure mentioned above includes over 200 hospitals occupied at one time by lepers. Secondly, a number of the early foundations were in the main houses of hospitality for strangers; and this testifies to the widespread practice of pilgrimage. There were also general hospitals in which temporary and permanent relief was given to needy persons of all sorts and conditions. Some were very small institutions, mere cottage-hospitals. It is often impossible to ascertain the character of an ancient charity. As long ago as 1594, it was reported concerning St. Edmund’s, Gateshead: “the poor . . . are and have been indifferently of both kindes as men and women; but whether sicke or wholl, lepers or way fairinge, so they be poore, needie, and indigente, is note respected.” On the other hand, in the case of large towns, hospitals were often differentiated. Situated in the main street, perhaps, was an infirmary-almshouse for the sick and helpless; near a frequented gate stood a hostel for passing pilgrims and others; outside the walls there would be at least one leper-hospital.

It is not possible to be precise in chronology, or even to give approximate dates. In Chantry Surveys there is often a memorandum that no foundation can be shown, this being lost in obscurity, and the house founded “before time of memory.” Probably the earliest authentic fact relating to charitable houses other than monasteries is that concerning the Saxon hospital at York, for although, in the words of Canon Raine, “its beginning is enveloped in an atmosphere of historical romance,” the munificence of Athelstan enables us to date its origin about the year 937.

The year 1547 serves as a useful limit to our period, and may well for the purposes of this book denote the close of the Middle Ages in England. Its selection in no way implies a lack of continuity in the Church with which every hospital was intimately associated,—yet it marks a time of transition. Charity was crippled for a time by the confiscations of endowments designed for the relief of the destitute, until a new generation of philanthropists arose and endeavoured to replace them. Thomas Fuller truly says, “the reformed Religion in England hath been the Mother of many brave Foundations.” To support this he instances certain famous hospitals, as that at Warwick, built by the Earl of Leicester (1571); Croydon, by Archbishop Whitgift (1596); Guildford, by Archbishop Abbot (before 1617), and Sutton’s Charterhouse (1611). There is, indeed, no fundamental difference between the earlier and later almshouses of the sixteenth century. The author of A History of English Philanthropy gives two reasons for using the period of the dissolution of monasteries as a starting-point. “It was then,” he says, “that modern problems began to formulate themselves with great precision; and charity was then ceasing to be under the immediate direction and tutelage of the Church.” For the same reasons, the year 1547 is here used to conclude the earlier philanthropic era.

A tabulated list of hospitals will be found in Appendix B. Additions and corrections are earnestly invited by the author, as local and particular knowledge is required to make it accurate and exhaustive. From this list are excluded such infirmaries as formed an integral part of a monastic house; but in cases where some abbey maintained a separate institution outside its gates (with distinct constitution, separate dedication-name, and sometimes a separate seal), the foundation is set down as a hospital. The institutions known as Colleges have no place unless, indeed, they maintained bedemen. The “House of Converts” does, however, rightly belong to our subject, for it was an almshouse and industrial home. “Hospitals” of the Orders of the Temple and St. John of Jerusalem are excluded, because they differ in character, although the work they carried on was partly the same. Moreover, as they formed part of great societies, famous in and beyond Europe, they have their own historians. Houses of the Knights of St. Lazarus must, however, consistency notwithstanding, find a place, because any account of relief provided for lepers would be incomplete if that comparatively small Order were passed over. “Hospital” was a wide-embracing term, and the occasional application of the word to religious foundations of one kind or another has not always been accounted a reason for their inclusion.

The history of many houses is obscure, limited in some cases to a single reference. The great scholars Bishop Tanner and Sir William Dugdale reaped harvests, which are garnered in their Monasticons; yet even a humble student may now glean after them by means of the invaluable printed Calendars of the Public Record Office. The labours of the Historical Manuscripts Commission are likewise fruitful. Wills are useful as showing the period up to which these institutions had popular support. Although Appendix B was mainly compiled before the issue of the Victoria County History, certain shires have received several additions from that great work, the forthcoming volumes of which will doubtless supplement the present list. Episcopal archives throw light upon hospital-life, as upon every department of ecclesiastical history; fresh information and confirmatory evidence about which will be forthcoming when, by means of the Canterbury and York Society and other Record Societies, more Registers become accessible. It is much to be desired that local Archæological Societies should take up and develop the history of particular houses. It is difficult to ascertain which ancient charities still continue, but an attempt has been made to record approximately in the appended table such endowments as now exist.

Grateful thanks are due to those who have assisted the writer in her task. And first, to the Lord Bishop of Bristol, whose kind offer to contribute the Preface to this volume is only the latest proof of the ever-helpful interest he has taken in the whole work. Mention must also be made of Mr. R. C. Fowler, of the Public Record Office, who, after personally examining the List of Foundations, gave hints for its improvement. The Rev. C. S. Taylor, F.S.A. and the Rev. Canon Wordsworth have given invaluable assistance, particularly by the translation of the Office found in Appendix A. In various ways help has been rendered by Miss Arnold-Forster, Professor G. H. Leonard, Mr. W. F. Rawnsley, and by friends and correspondents too numerous to mention. Lastly, it remains for the writer to acknowledge her indebtedness to the Rev. Dr. Cox, General Editor of the Series, without whose kindly encouragement she would never have ventured to go beyond a private study of the subject in hand.

[2]

• Notes — Introduction
  • [1] Nearly 800 are set down in the appended list, but some are uncertain.
  • [2] From The hye way to the Spyttell hous (circa 1536), in which Robert Copland speaks with the Porter of a London hospital, probably St. Bartholomew’s.

p001

MEDIÆVAL HOSPITALS

OF ENGLAND

PART ONE

CHAPTER IHOSPITALS FOR WAYFARERS AND THE SICK

“Founded for the maintenance of poor pilgrims and other infirm persons resorting thither to remain until they are healed of their infirmities.”

“For the poor, for persons going to Rome, for others coming to Canterbury and needing shelter, and for lying-in women.” (St. Thomas’, Canterbury.)

THE earliest char­i­ta­ble ins­ti­tu­tions of Eng­land were houses of hos­pi­ta­li­ty. In sketch­ing the dev­e­lop­ment of these guest-houses we must bear in mind that the hos­pi­tal (de­rived from hos­pes, a host or guest) was a way­side shel­ter for all co­mers.

FIRST PERIOD (circa 925–1170)

[♦ ] 1. ST. JOHN’S HOSPITAL, OXFORD

Travellers were ex­posed to per­il by the rude­ness of the times, but in those early days hos­pi­tal­ity was re­gard­ed as a so­lemn ob­li­ga­tion. To re­ceive any stran­ger was a p002 duty: to wel­come the pas­sing pil­grim was a sa­cred priv­i­lege. Al­though the private ent­er­tain­ment of guests was wide­ly prac­tised, some public ins­ti­tu­tions were required. Tradition tells of at least two “hospitals” or hospices founded in the tenth century (925–940). Both were in Yorkshire,[3] one being in the distant country parts, the other in the populous town. At Flixton in Holderness was a house of refuge “to preserve travellers from being devoured by the wolves and other voracious forest beasts.”[4] The city of York, on the other hand, was so great a place of thoroughfare that it was impossible to entertain all who came. Athelstan, recognizing that the Canons of the Minster were men of holy life, active in helping the needy who flocked to them, assisted them in their hospitality by the foundation of St. Peter’s hospital.

Two other early houses of charity are ascribed to the Saxon bishops Oswald and Wulstan of Worcester. In the eleventh century at least we emerge from tradition, for it seems clear that St. Wulstan founded that hospital near his cathedral city which afterwards bore his name. It will be remembered that bishops were especially bound by their vows at consecration to be given to hospitality. In pre-Norman days, the solemn question was in substance what is asked to-day: “Wilt thou shew mercy and kindness, for the name of the Lord, to the poor, the stranger, and all in want?” (pauperibus et peregrinis omnibusque indigentibus). To this the elected bishop p003 replied, “I will.” This formula occurs in the Exeter Pontifical, compiled about nine hundred years ago, and is repeated in Osmund’s Sarum Use.

There were, of course, pilgrims among those who sojourned in early hostels. Englishmen have always loved travel. Not only did our Saxon forefathers journey to Rome (receiving shelter by the way in hospitals of English foundation), but they constantly visited their national shrines. Probably a fresh impetus was given to pilgrimage by the coming of the Normans. Monastic life was strengthened, and this was a guarantee of hospitality. “Guests are to be received as if they were Christ Himself,” said the rule of St. Benedict. In the century after the Conquest, as in those which preceded it, the chief works of mercy were done in the monastery. There was the hospitium within the abbey-gate, as at St. Mary’s, York; and the “Strangers’ Hall” at Winchester. Then followed the shelter outside the walls, as at Battle, referred to (circa 1076) as “the house of the pilgrims which is called the hospital.” During the twelfth century more independent foundations became common. All sorts and conditions of men were lodged—wayfarers, invalids, and even lepers.

About the year 1148, St. Bartholomew’s, Smithfield, was the resort of sick pilgrims, of whom “many and innumerable were schewid tokynnys of myracles.” The patients who flocked to the famous shrine and hospital were “langwissyng men greuyd with uariant sorys”; one sought “remedie of his akynge hede,” another suffered from “bleriednes of yen” (eyes), and yet another from “ryngyng of his erys.” Victims of the falling sickness p004 (epilepsy), paralysis, dropsy, fevers, insanity, found relief; deaf and dumb were healed; a child born blind received sight from “the heuenly leche.”

Theobald, Archbishop of Canterbury, about 1141, invited help for “the hospital house of Dover, which two brethren, Osbern and Godwin, are diligently building for the reception of the poor and strangers.” This hospital of St. Bartholomew (Buckland) was also used for lepers. The need of further provision for travellers was felt, and a benefactor made extensive grants on condition that a house was provided for the reception of needy people disembarking from ships: before 1163 reference is made to the hospitium for strangers. It was doubtless frequented by voyagers returning from the Crusades; but before long an event occurred which brought multitudes to Dover, and then the old hospital proving insufficient, became chiefly the resort of lepers, and a new Maison Dieu was built near the quay. (See Frontispiece.)

SECOND PERIOD (circa 1170–1270)

The year 1170 marks an epoch, ushering in the great pilgrimage within and towards England. When the shrine of St. Thomas of Canterbury became the goal of pious wayfarers it was necessary to find accommodation for them. The hospitals of Canterbury and Southwark bearing the martyr’s name were among the earliest. Within a few years such houses (often called Domus Dei) were founded in most of the southern ports and along the Pilgrims’ Way, as at Dover, Ospringe, and Maidstone. At Strood “the poor, weak, infirm and impotent, as well neighbouring inhabitants as travellers from distant p005 places,” were cared for “until they die or depart healed.” Norfolk, like Kent, was studded with houses of charity, especially near the highway to Walsingham. Thirteen pilgrims were lodged at Bec, near Billingford. At Thetford there was a hospital near the passage of the river. Among other early hostels we may enumerate those of Newcastle, Hexham, Ripon, Stamford, Aynho, London (St. Mary’s), Bridgwater, and Ledbury.

[♦] PLATE I. REFRESHMENT FOR WAYFARERS

The hospital was a guest-house and infirmary in one. That on the outskirts of Oxford was called in a charter (circa 1194) Herebergeria Hospitalis S. Joh. Bapt.; in 1233 this was refounded (Fig. 1) “that therein infirm people and strangers might receive remedy of their health and necessity.” The inmates of St. Nicholas’, Salisbury, are described as passengers (transeuntes) and as sick and infirm (egroti et infirmi). The same two-fold work of charity was carried on at Chichester, as shown by St. Mary’s statutes:—

“If anyone in infirm health and destitute of friends should seek admission for a term, until he shall recover, let him be gladly received and assigned a bed. . . . In regard to the poor people who are received late at night, and go forth early in the morning, let the warden take care that their feet are washed, and, as far as possible, their necessities attended to.”

There is a MS. in the British Museum entitled The Pilgrim. It is an allegorical poem in the manner of the “Pilgrim’s Progress,” and sets forth the adventures of the traveller. The illustration (Pl. I) and description were probably taken from experience of earthly pilgrimage. “Charity” is seen welcoming strangers, p006 at which work she was always busy in mediæval England:—

“And I suppose for my beste

There to herborewe and to reste

On ther cam and preyed me

And her name was Charite

To pylgrymes in goodly wyse

Sche dyde moste trewely the seruyse

With chere benygne and glad uysage

She brought hem to ther herbergage.”[5]

Among shrines which the pious Englishman visited may be mentioned Bury St. Edmunds, Westminster, Durham, Beverley, St. Albans, Waltham.[6]

THIRD PERIOD (1270–1470)

[♦ ] 2. A PILGRIM

(a) Pil­gri­mage and Va­gran­cy.—The grea­test cen­tury of pil­gri­mage was past, but vag­ran­cy was an ever-in­creas­ing prob­lem, and inas­much as it af­fect­ed the social life of Eng­land, it af­fected hos­pi­tals, di­rect­ly or in­di­rect­ly. In the Sta­tute of La­bour­ers, drawn up in 1350, an at­tempt had been made to re­strain de­sul­tory wan­der­ing, idle­ness, men­di­can­cy and in­dis­crim­in­ate alms­giv­ing. This was fol­lowed by many ord­inan­ces, local and gen­eral. By a pro­cla­ma­tion in 1359 the mun­ic­ipal author­i­ties of Lon­don de­clared that such un­worthy beg­gars “do waste divers alms, which would other­wise be given to many poor folks, such as lepers, blind, halt, p007 and persons oppressed with old age and divers other maladies.” In 1369 they issued a precept “for mendicants, vagrants and pilgrims to leave the city.” The Statute of Westminster (1383) ordered inquiry concerning vagabonds “wandering from place to place, running in the country more abundantly than they were wont in times past.” The Act of 1388 declared that those who “go in pilgrimage as beggars” when fit for employment, should be dealt with according to the previous Statute. It will be observed that these measures were framed from an economic standpoint, not to check pilgrimage as such.

Although pilgrimage was declining, there were still many pilgrims. Some of these were professional palmers, and hirelings fulfilling vows by proxy; for there are numerous bequests in the fourteenth century to persons undertaking journeys on the testator’s behalf to Canterbury, Walsingham, and Bury St. Edmunds, as well as to St. James of Compostella, Rome, or the Holy Land. The special “Jubilee” at Canterbury in 1420 was attended by 100,000 persons, and in 1434 thousands set sail for Compostella.

(b) Provision for temporary relief.—Existing houses of hospitality were kept up, but a growing tendency to discriminate amongst applicants may be noticed. In many cases more beds were reserved for chronic invalids than for casual comers. St. Thomas’ hospital, Canterbury, carried on its old work, but the renewed statutes of Archbishop Stratford (1342) direct “that poor pilgrims in good health shall be entertained only for one night . . . that greater regard shall be had for the sick than for the well pilgrims.” With some diplomacy it describes itself, in a petition to the Pope, as designed “for persons going p008 to Rome (Romipete), for others coming to Canterbury and needing shelter,”[7] etc.

The chief building period was over, as far as this particular kind of temporary provision is concerned, but one or two new foundations must be mentioned. St. John’s, Winchester, was built about 1275 “for the relief of sick and lame soldiers, poor pilgrims, and necessitous wayfaring men, to have diet and lodging thereto fit and convenient for one night or longer, as their abilities to travel gave leave.” In 1393, the Bishop of Ely offered an indulgence to persons contributing to the sustentation of a hospital at Brentford, which consisted of a chapel, newly constructed, “with two houses built there, furnished with beds and other necessaries for the entertainment of poor travellers.” The old hospital at Brackley was reconstituted for the same purpose (1425). It was, however, suppressed sixty years later, because hospitality was being neglected.

One special form of temporary relief came to the front about this time. The assistance of women in childbirth was named in the Petition and Statute of 1414 as part of the recognized aim and scope of hospital charity. The heading to this chapter alludes to the work undertaken at St. Thomas’, Canterbury, in 1363. The foundation deed of Holy Trinity, Salisbury, sets forth that “lying-in women are cared for until they are delivered, recovered and churched.” The Spital near Blyth was newly constructed in 1446 for the lodging of strangers and distressed women.

[♦] PLATE II. HOSPITAL OF ST. THOMAS, CANTERBURY FOR PILGRIMS

It is recorded that the two London infirmaries of St. Mary without Bishopsgate and St. Bartholomew p009 undertook this work; in both institutions the touching provision was made that if the mother died, her child should be brought up there until the age of seven.[8] In the year 1437 privileges were granted to the latter hospital “in consideration of their great charges in receiving the poor, feeble and infirm, keeping women in childbirth until their purification, and sometimes feeding their infants until weaned.” William Gregory, a citizen of London, describing in his commonplace book various foundations, says of “Bartholomewe ys Spetylle”:—

“Hyt ys a place of grete comforte to pore men as for hyr loggyng, and yn specyalle unto yong wymmen that have mysse done that ben whythe chylde. There they ben delyueryde, and unto the tyme of puryfycacyon they have mete and drynke of the placys coste, and fulle honestely gydyd and kepte.”

General hospitals for the sick were thus in process of development. St. Bartholomew’s was steadily fulfilling its founder’s vow to provide a place for the “recreacion of poure men.” After three and a half centuries of usefulness, a roll of 1464 records with approbation “works done within the hospital in relief of poor pilgrims, soldiers, sailors and others of all nations.”

FOURTH PERIOD (circa 1470–1547)

(a) It is evident that pilgrimage was no longer an important factor in the social life of the country. The daily resort to shrines had practically ceased, but the special anniversaries were kept. Such pious travellers as there were, lodged chiefly in inns. At Glastonbury a Pilgrims’ Inn was built by Abbot John, about the year 1475, to accommodate those visiting the holy places of p010 St. Joseph of Arimathæa and St. Dunstan. A later abbot, Richard Beere, writing to Archbishop Warham to defend the genuineness of St. Dunstan’s relics, stated that people had come from far and near to visit the new shrine, especially upon St. Dunstan’s Day (1508).[9] Although the regular stream of pilgrims to Canterbury was no longer seen day by day, the great “Jubilee” celebrations were popular, the last one being kept in 1520. At that time the needs of visitors were met by special provision, a post being set up in the main street with “letters expressing the ordering of uitell and lodyng for pylgrymes.” Probably the bailiffs and citizens made all arrangements for bed and board as they had done in 1420.

Vagrancy still constituted an increasingly grave problem. By “An Acte agaynst vacabounds and beggers,” in 1495 (re-enacted 1503), previous legislation was amended and “every vagabound heremyte or pilgryme,” partially exempt hitherto, was henceforth compelled to fare like wandering soldier, shipman or university clerk. In a letter from Henry VIII to the Mayor of Grimsby it is observed that the relief of the impotent is much diminished by the importunate begging of the sturdy and idle, and it is required that measures be taken “that the weedes over growe not the corne.”[10] The Statutes became increasingly stern, and able-bodied beggars were scourged with the lash from town to town by the Act of 1530–1. But “the greatest severities hitherto enacted were mild in comparison with the severe provisions of the enactment” of the first year of Edward VI (1547). If the young king’s father had literally chastised beggars with whips, his own counsellors desired that they should be chastised with p011 scorpions. They might be reduced to the condition of slaves: their owners might put a ring round their necks or limbs, and force them to work by beating and chains, whilst a runaway could be branded on the face with a hot iron.[11] This brutal law was repealed two years later.

(b) Where towns were few and far between, the need of shelter for strangers was especially felt. Extensive works of hospitality were done by religious houses, particularly in the northern counties. That fresh provision, although on a small scale, was still made for shelter, indicates its necessity. When an almshouse was built at Northallerton (1476), accommodation was made not only for thirteen pensioners, but for two destitute and distressed travellers, who should stay a night and no longer. A hostel solely for temporary shelter was founded at Durham (1493). One Cuthbert Billingham directed the provision of eight beds in a “massendeue or spittel,” where “all poore trauellyng people ther herbery or logyng asking for the loue of Gode shall be herbered and logide.” In Westmorland, a little hospital, with two beds for passers-by, was built by John Brunskill at Brough-under-Stainmoor (1506): it was situated on the pass into Yorkshire.

At seaports and in places of thoroughfare, shelter was still provided for travellers. God’s House, Southampton, expended £28 annually upon “daily hospitality to wayfarers and strangers from beyond the sea,” and similar charity was provided at Dover. Leland describes St. Thomas’, Canterbury, as “An Hospital within the Town on the Kinges Bridge for poore Pylgrems and way faring men.” At Sandwich there was a “Harbinge” attached to St. John’s almshouse. Provision was made for lodgers, p012 and the buildings included “the chambre of harber for strange wemen, the gentilmen chambre and the long harbur chamber” (1489). The town authorities ordered “that no persons do harbour beggars, who are to resort to St. John’s Hospital” (1524).

The existing provision for temporary relief was in fact wholly inadequate. In the metropolis, for example, there was a crying need. It was stated by Henry VII in 1509 that:—

“there be fewe or noon such commune Hospitalls within this our Reame, and that for lack of them, infinite nombre of pouer nedie people miserably dailly die, no man putting hande of helpe or remedie.”

The king, recognizing the need, planned to convert the old Savoy Palace into a magnificent institution (Pl. XIV) in which “to lodge nightly one hundred poor folks.” If this charity corresponded with the recent Statute, it would relieve those vagrants who alone were exempt, namely, women in travail and persons in extreme sickness. The king contemplated building institutions similar to the Savoy in York and Coventry, but the design was not carried out.

The problems arising from true poverty and false mendicancy were, of course, intimately connected with hospital life. A graphic picture of the difficulties which beset administrators of charity about the year 1536 is given by Robert Copland in The hye way to the Spyttell hous. The author states that one wintry day, he took refuge from the snow-storm in the porch of a hospital, probably St. Bartholomew’s. Here he got deep into conversation with the porter of the house. While they talked, there gathered at the gate people of very poor estate,—lame, blind, p013 barefoot—and Copland, who does not despise the honest poor, only those who live in need and idleness, inquires whether they admit all who ask for lodging. The porter at first answers, “Forsooth, yes,” and Copland goes on to protest against indiscriminate hospitality:—

“Me thynk that therin ye do no ryght

Nor all suche places of hospytalyte

To confort people of suche iniquyte.

But syr I pray you, of your goodnes and fauour

Tell me which ye leaue, and which ye do socour.”

The porter replies that the house is no sup­porter of sham beggars. There are some who count­er­feit lep­rosy, and others who put soap in their mouth to make it foam, and fall down as if they had “Saynt Cornelys euyll.” He goes on to describe those who hang about by day and sleep at night at St. Bar­tho­lo­mew’s church door—drunk­ards, spend­thrifts, swear­ers and blas­phem­ers, those who wear sold­iers’ cloth­ing, but are vaga­bonds, and men who pre­tend to have been ship­wrecked. Many of these live by open beggary, with bag, dish and staff:—

“And euer haunteth among such ryf raf

One tyme to this spyttell, another to that.”

The porter intimates that an effort is made to discriminate among those daily harboured, but he confesses that they are obliged to receive many unsatisfactory men, and disreputable women so numerous that they are weary of them; but they refuse stubborn knaves who are not ill, for they would have over many. Indeed, the aim of the hospital is to relieve those who cannot work and are friendless—the sick, aged, bedridden, diseased, wayfaring men, maimed soldiers, and honest folk fallen into poverty. (See p. xxiv.) p014

It is clear, however, that during the sixteenth century there was much genuine distress besides unthrifty beggary and sham sickness. From various economic causes there was a considerable increase of destitution. Legislation entirely failed to solve the problem of an ever-shifting population. The Statute of 1530–1 had recognized the value of charitable foundations by its clause:—“provided also, that it be lawful to all masters and governors of hospitals, to lodge and harbour any person or persons of charity and alms.” Although hospitals had been abused, the neglect of the sick and homeless which their reduction involved was a far worse evil. One writer after another breaks out into descriptions of the increased poverty and pain. Brinklow, in The Lamentacyon of a Christian agaynst the Cytye of London (1545), bewails the condition of the poor:—

“London, beyng one of the flowers of the worlde, as touchinge worldlye riches, hath so manye, yea innumerable of poore people forced to go from dore to dore, and to syt openly in the stretes a beggynge, and many . . . lye in their howses in most greuous paynes, and dye for lacke of ayde of the riche. I thinke in my judgement, under heaven is not so lytle prouision made for the pore as in London, of so riche a Cytie.”[12]

Again, referring to the old order and the new, A Supplication of the Poore Commons (1546) speaks of poor impotent creatures as “now in more penurye then euer they were.” Once they had scraps, now they have nothing. “Then had they hospitals, and almeshouses to be lodged in, but nowe they lye and storue in the stretes. Then was their number great, but nowe much greater.”

[♦] PLATE III. ST. JOHN’S HOSPITAL, CANTERBURY

• Notes — Chapter I
  • [3] There were probably other Saxon hospitals. Leland notes the tradition that St. Giles’, Beverley, and St. Nicholas’, Pontefract, were founded “afore the Conquest.”
  • [4] Dugdale, charter temp. Henry VI.
  • [5] Cott. Tib. A., vii. f. 90.
  • [6] See also J. C. Wall, Shrines of British Saints in this Series.
  • [7] Cal. Pap. Letters, 4, p. 36.
  • [8] Close Rolls 1344, 1353.
  • [9] Chron. and Mem. 63, p. 434.
  • [10] Hist. MSS. 14th R. (8) 249.
  • [11] C. J. Ribton-Turner, Vagrants and Vagrancy, 1887.
  • [12] Early Eng. Text Soc. Extra Series 22, p. 90.

[♦] p015

CHAPTER II HOMES FOR THE FEEBLE AND DESTITUTE

“Hospitals in cities, boroughs and divers other places . . . to sustain blind men and women . . . and people who have lost their goods and are fallen into great misfortune.”[13]

THE majority of hospitals were for the support of infirm and aged people. Such a home was called indiscriminately “hospital,” “Maison Dieu,” “almshouse” or “bedehouse.” It was, as in the case of Kingston-upon-Hull, “God’s House . . . to provide a habitation for thirteen poor men and women broken by age, misfortune or toil, who cannot gain their own livelihood.” It occupied the place now filled by almshouses, union workhouses, and homes for chronic invalids or incurables.

(1) ALMSHOUSES IN CITIES

One of the most ancient hospitals for permanent relief was St. John’s, Canterbury, founded about 1084, and still existing as an almshouse. (Pl. III.) Eadmer tells us that it was intended for men suffering from various infirmities and for women in ill health. The inmates are described as a hundred poor, who by reason of age and disease cannot earn their bread; and again, as a hundred brothers and sisters blind, lame, deaf and sick. It is p016 characteristic that the earliest foundation of this type should be found in the chief cathedral city of England: every such town had a hospital in connection with the See. The prince-bishops of Durham, for example, provided houses of charity around the city and at their manors. Ralph Flambard built St. Giles’, Kepier; Philip of Poitiers founded St. James’ near Northallerton; Robert de Stichill, St. Mary’s, Greatham; and Nicholas of Farnham, St. Edmund’s, Gateshead. The most famous episcopal hospital remaining is that of St. Cross, near Winchester. (Pl. VIII.)

Other charities were associated with cathedral clergy. There was a hospital for the poor in the precincts of St. Paul’s Cathedral. Before the year 1190, one of the canons gave his house for the purpose, and the Dean endowed it with certain tithes. St. Nicholas’, Salisbury, founded by the Bishop, was afterwards committed to the Dean and Chapter. The existing almshouses in Chichester and Hereford were likewise associated with those cathedrals.

(2) ALMSHOUSES IN BOROUGHS

The municipal control of charity is an ancient custom. Before burgesses were called to Parliament, townsmen of Exeter, Northampton, Nottingham and Wallingford were trustees of the hospitals of St. John in those places. The leper-houses of Lynn and Southampton were also early instances of municipal administration. In the reign of Edward I the hospitals in Scarborough were declared to have been “founded by burgesses of the town of old.” During the fourteenth century, if not before, the “keepers” of Beverley, the “jurats” of Hythe, p017 and the commonalties of Bedford, Gloucester, Huntingdon, Pevensey, Sandwich, Wilton, etc., controlled almshouses in those towns.[14] Old deeds of the Winchester corporation refer to Devenish’s hospital as “oure hous of Synt John.” Freemen had an advantage, if not a monopoly, when seeking entrance into houses under municipal supervision. The “Customals” of Rye and Winchelsea show that men and women “who have been in good love and fame all their time, and have neither goods nor chattels whereof to live” were received without payment into the hospitals of the town. Bubwith’s almshouse, Wells, was to receive men so poor that they could not live except by begging, and so decrepit that they were unable to beg from door to door. Reduced burgesses were assigned “the more honourable places and beds.” At St. Ursula’s, Chester, candidates were preferred who had been one of “the twenty-four,” or the widows of aldermen and common council-men.

In some towns charities were not directly connected with the municipality but with local trustees. St. Katherine’s, Rochester, was under the governance and correction of the parish priest, the city bailiff and the founder’s heirs. Davy of Croydon put his almshouse under the vicar and other townsmen, answerable ultimately to the Mercers’ Company, and provided that his pensioners should be “householderers or trewe laborers” from within four miles, preference being given to residents of long standing, if of good character and destitute. p018

(3) GILD ALMSHOUSES

The gilds were an important factor in the economy of towns, and their works of piety sometimes included hospital maintenance. St. Cross, Colchester, having been practically disendowed—the advowson was granted to the commonalty in aid of the repair of the town walls—was revived in 1407 as an almshouse under the auspices of St. Helen’s gild. Barstaple of Bristol founded his almshouse for twenty-four poor, (granting the advowson to the mayor and commonalty,) and also a fraternity for himself, his wife and others who wished to join. The institutions were incorporated separately. Each community was ruled by a warden, possessed a common seal, and had power to make ordinances.[15] In other cases a private individual attached his charity to an existing association to secure continuity of rule. Hosyer’s almshouse in Ludlow, e.g., “appertained” to the Palmers’ gild. These religious societies often began in connection with some trade. At Winchester, financial assistance was given to St. John’s by “the fraternity of St. John, in the hospital there by providence of the Tailors of Winton first ordained.”

The craft-gilds and city companies supported disabled members in places like the Maison Dieu of the Shoemakers at York, called also the Bedehouse of the Cordyners. There are countless references in wills to the poor of the Drapers’ or Fullers’ Halls, etc. Although such institutions were really almshouses, they are not (with certain exceptions) included in the appended list, and their history must be sought in connection with the trades. p019

In ports, special provision was made for seafaring men. Leland remarks that St. Bartholomew’s, Sandwich, was “fyrst ordened for Maryners desesid and hurt.” The Fraternity of the Blessed Trinity at Kingston-upon-Hull maintained “an house of alms of poor mariners,” and a similar institution was incorporated with Trinity House, Newcastle-upon-Tyne. A society of merchants at Bristol provided for poor seamen within the old hospital of St. Bartholomew (1445). Upon arrival in port, masters and mariners alike contributed to the charity because “the wheche prest and pore peple may nott be founden ne susteyned withoute grete coste.” This fraternity was in fact a benefit-club, for members became eligible for admission after paying their dues for seven years. The community was especially bound to pray for seamen in time of peril.

(4) PRIVATE ALMSHOUSES

In villages, the lord of the manor or squire provided a charity for his retainers, tenants or neighbours. This was done at Arundel, Donnington near Newbury, Heytesbury, Ewelme, Thame, etc. A man who had risen to prosperity occasionally remembered his birthplace in this way, as Chichele did at Higham Ferrers.

Although most hospitals were of a general character, some were designed for particular classes of persons, such as homeless Jews, poor clergy, decayed gentle-people, women and children.

(5) HOMES FOR JEWS

The chief “hospital” for Jewish converts was in London. The inmates were not ailing in health, but they needed succour because they were unable to earn a p020 living, and were cut off from their own families as apostates. Converts were often sent to monasteries for maintenance. The names of almost five hundred, together with the particular houses that received them, are recorded in one roll of 39 Henry III.[16]

[♦ ] 3. HOUSE OF CONVERTS, LONDON

Special provision for the maintenance of converted Jews was made in 1232, when Henry III founded the House of Converts, Hospital of St. Mary or “Converts’ Inn,” near the Old Temple. Within twenty years Matthew Paris described its purpose, also making a drawing (Fig. 3) in the margin:—

“To this house converted Jews retired, leaving their Jewish blindness, and had a home and a safe refuge for their whole lives, living under an honourable rule, with sufficient sustenance without servile work or the profits of usury. So it p021 happened that in a short time a large number were collected there. And now, being baptized and instructed in the Christian law, they live a praiseworthy life under a rector specially deputed to govern them.”[17]

The year of this chronicler’s death (1256), upwards of 160 convert brothers received tunics from the king’s almoner. Probably about half were inmates, and half unattached pensioners. The number may have been increased from interested motives on account of the persecution of Jews which followed the supposed “horrible crime lately perpetrated in the city of Lincoln, of a Christian boy crucified.” In January 1256, pardon was granted to John the convert, who was a Jew of Lincoln when the so-called “little St. Hugh” was put to death.

The Domus Conversorum was rebuilt by Edward I, who bestowed much attention upon it. By his ordinance, the pensioners were taught handicrafts and trained to support themselves. He ordered that school should be kept and that suitable converts might be educated as clerks or chaplains. St. Mary’s was an industrial home or training institution for persecuted Jewish Christians, who were safe only under royal protection. Another roll of the same year shows that a special effort was made at that time to evangelize the Jews. Orders had recently been given to repress notorious blasphemers, and those who after baptism had been “perverted to Jewish wickedness.” Edward also directed that strenuous efforts should be made by the Friar Preachers for their conversion. Finally he set himself to improve the endowments of the institution:—

“He therefore, in order that those who have already turned p022 from their blindness to the light of the Church may be strengthened in the firmness of their faith, and those who still persist in their error may more willingly and readily turn to the grace of the faith, has taken measures, under divine guidance, to provide healthfully for their maintenance.”[18]

The House of Converts was then supporting ninety-seven persons. Of these fifty-one remained in 1308. After the great expulsion in 1290, the numbers were quickly reduced. In 1327, there were twenty-eight. In 1344, the institution supported eight converts and seven admitted for other causes. After that date the pensioners dwindled to two. During the fifteenth century, a few foreign Jews were received from time to time, the household varying between eight and three. The hospital was empty in the days of Edward VI, and remained so until 1578; its subsequent history is related by Adler.

The Domus Conversorum in Oxford was likewise founded by Henry III. There, says Wood, “all Jews and infidells that were converted to the Christian faith were ordained to have sufficient maintenance. By which meanes it was soe brought about that noe small number of these converts had their abode in this place and were baptized and instructed.” The building (figured in Skelton’s Oxonia Antiqua) subsequently became a Hall for scholars.

According to Leland and Stow there were homes, or, at least, schools, for Jews in London and Bristol before Henry III turned his attention to this work. Stow, referring to the original foundation of St. Thomas’ hospital, Southwark (1213), says that it was a house of alms for converts and poor children. Leland, quoting from a manuscript of the Kalendars’ Gild in Bristol, states that p023 in the time of Henry II there were “Scholes ordeyned in Brightstow by them for the Conversion of the Jewes.” The information (which he gleaned from the Little Red Book) originated in the bishop’s inquisition made in 1318, which found that Robert Fitz-Harding and the Kalendars “established the schools of Bristol for teaching Jews and other little ones under the government of the same gild and the protection of the mayor.” It should be noticed that scola also refers to a Jewish synagogue, but the term Schola Judæorum is applied by Matthew Paris to the House of Converts in London.

[♦ ] 4. POOR PRIESTS’ HOSPITAL, CANTERBURY

(6) HOMES FOR POOR CLERGY AND FOR LAY GENTLEFOLK

Diocesan clergy-homes were provided during the thirteenth century in most ecclesiastical centres. At Canterbury, the Archdeacon built (before 1225) the Poor Priests’ hospital (Fig. 4). St. Richard of Chichester began p024 a similar charity at Windeham in his diocese. Walter de Merton designed a small institution at Basingstoke for “ministers of the altar whose strength is failing,” and incurables of Merton College. There were three beds for chaplains at St. Wulstan’s, Worcester, and the Stratford gild intended to initiate a hospital for the diocesan clergy. To St. Giles’, Lincoln, were admitted “needy ministers and servants and canons not able to work.”

Similar retreats arose in the following century. The Bishop of Exeter built near his palace at Clist Gabriel a home for twelve blind, infirm, ancient or disabled priests, deacons and sub-deacons. The Dean of York maintained six infirm chaplains in St. Mary’s, Bootham. Clergy-homes were usually founded by ecclesiastics; but in 1329, a London layman, Elsyng by name, touched by the sufferings of the clergy in that time of scarcity, began his almshouse, ordaining that among the hundred pensioners, blind, paralytic and disabled priests should be specially cared for. The need is evident from a deed concerning St. Giles’, Norwich (1340). The house had been founded for the poor “and principally to minister the necessaries of life to priests of the diocese of Norwich, who, broken down with age, or destitute of bodily strength, or labouring under continual disease, cannot celebrate divine service”; but the number of such priests and infirm persons “flocking to the hospital hath so grown and daily groweth” that assistance was urgently required. Although the priesthood was temporarily diminished by the pestilence of 1349, clerks acting as chantry priests were again numerous during the fifteenth century. These unbeneficed clergy, it was said, “when depressed by the weight of old age, or labouring under weak health . . . p025 are by necessity compelled to wander about, begging miserably for food and raiment . . . to the displeasure of Him whose ministers they are.” To put an end to this scandal, “the fraternity of St. Charity and St. John Evangelist” was founded in London (1442), and this clerical almshouse was commonly called “The Papey.” Gregory, who was mayor in 1451, describes it in his note-book:—

[♦] PLATE IV. HOSPITAL OF ST. GILES, NORWICH FOR AGED CHAPLAINS AND OTHER POOR

“Pappy Chyrche in the Walle be twyne Algate and Beuysse Markes. And hyt ys a grete fraternyte of prestys and of othyr seqular men. And there ben founde of almys certayne prestys, both blynde and lame, that be empotent.”

Persons of gentle birth who had suffered reverses of fortune often retreated into convents, or were received into hospitals with a semi-official position. During the fifteenth century one or two institutions arose to benefit those decayed gentlefolk who, as one has said, are of all people “most sensible of want.” Staindrop College maintained a staff of priests and clerks, and certain gentlemen (certi pauperes generosi) and yeomen (pauperes valecti) who had been in the Earl of Westmorland’s service. The “New Almshouse of Noble Poverty” (Nova Domus Eleemosynaria Nobilis Paupertatis), which Cardinal Beaufort intended to add to the original establishment of St. Cross, was never fully completed, but there are still four brethren of the professional class on the Cardinal’s foundation.

(7) HOMES FOR WOMEN AND CHILDREN

One of the earliest permanent homes for women was St. Katharine’s-by-the-Tower, London. The sisters of St. John’s, Reading, are described as “certyn relygyous p026 women, wydowes in chast lyuyngg in God’s seruyce praying nygt and day.” To provide for fatherless children and widows was part of the design of Holy Trinity, Salisbury. In two hospitals outside Lincoln this particular work was carried on. Originally served by the Gilbertine Order, they became entirely eleemosynary institutions under the care of lay-sisters. Many wills about the year 1400 allude to St. Katharine’s asylum or hospital for widows, orphans, and bedemen. The daughter-house was a home for waifs and strays, namely, “certain orphans placed in danger through the negligence of their friends, and deserted, and brought into the hospital of St. Sepulchre, guarded and educated there.”

A further reason for the adoption of children into the hospital family was this: that when women died in confinement, their infants were frequently kept and cared for. (See p. [9].) In connection with St. Leonard’s, York, mention is made of “ministering to the poor and sick and to the infants exposed there.” In 1280 there were twenty-three boys in the orphanage, with a woman in charge. Education was provided for them and for the thirty choristers. Two schoolmasters taught grammar and music. The Dean and Chapter were forbidden by the King on one occasion (1341) to meddle with the grammar school in the hospital. Among the expenses in 1369 is a gratuity to the bishop of the choir-boys. This shows, says Canon Raine, that there was a “boy-bishop” at St. Leonard’s as well as in the Minster.

Nor was it uncommon thus to find young and strong side by side with aged and infirm inmates. Several almshouses maintained children. Bishop Grandisson carried out his predecessor Stapeldon’s intention of p027 adding twelve boys to the foundation of St. John’s, Exeter, and Archbishop Chichele attached a boarding-school to his bedehouse at Higham Ferrers. There were children and adult pensioners in St. Katharine’s, London, and in Knolles’ almshouse, Pontefract.

Some hospitals had boarders or day-boarders whose studies were conducted in neighbouring schools. St. John’s, Bridgwater, maintained thirteen scholars—such as were habiles ad informandum in grammatical—who were excused from full ritual that they might keep schools daily in the town (1298).[19] In some cases, like St. Giles’, Norwich, food was provided for children who were getting free education elsewhere. At St. Cross, Winchester, seven choristers were boarded and instructed. Thirteen poor scholars from the Grammar School also received a substantial meal daily.

In other instances we find that instruction was provided without board and lodging. The lads taught in God’s House, Exeter, were not inmates, like those of St. John’s in that city. The master of the hospital was required to teach from three to nine boys, beginning with the alphabet and going on to the “great psalter of the holy David.” In the almshouses of Ewelme and Heytesbury also there were non-resident pupils. Only the more advanced at Ewelme aspired to “the faculty of grammar.” It was directed that should the schoolmaster have no more than four “childer that actually lernes gramer, besides petettes [i.e. beginners] and reders,” he should assist at matins and evensong. He must so rule his scholars that none be tedious, noisome, or troublous to the almspeople. Payment was forbidden at p028 Heytesbury except as a free gift, or by pupils whose friends had a yearly income of over £10. Bishop Smyth, a patron of learning, added a schoolmaster and usher to his restored almshouse at Lichfield, where very poor children were to be taught. The Grammar School connected with St. John’s hospital, Banbury, became famous.

Lastly, the development of these institutions must be considered. Many of the almshouses built during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries were intended from their foundation for life-pensioners. In other cases, however, on account of necessity or expediency, the permanent home was evolved from one originally of a temporary character. Charities underwent a change during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. This may be attributed to various social and economic causes—the decline of leprosy, legislation regarding vagrancy, and the redistribution of wealth. As the number of lepers decreased, the alms formerly bestowed upon them were available for other necessitous persons, and some lazar-houses gradually became retreats for aged invalids. This was chiefly during the fifteenth century, but even about 1285 St. Nicholas’, York, is said to be “founded in the name of lepers, and for the support of the old and feeble of the city.” Again, when it was realized that indiscriminate hospitality encouraged vagrancy, the character of some hospitals gradually altered. The Statute of 1388 helped to develop local administration of charity by ordaining that beggars unable to work must either remain in the town where they found themselves or return to their birthplace and abide there for life. p029

[♦ ] 5. BEDE-HOUSE, STAMFORD

The crying need for the permanent relief of genuine distress made itself heard. Langland, the poet of the people, called attention to the necessity of rebuilding hospitals. In his Vision “Truth” begs rich merchants to put their profits to good uses and “amenden meson-dieux” therewith. In 1410, and again in 1414, the Commons suggested that new almshouses might be founded if some ecclesiastical property were confiscated. Although this was not done, many were provided through private liberality. By the redistribution of wealth and the rise of the middle classes, a fresh impetus was given to building. The chantry system also had an increasingly powerful influence upon the charity of this period. The newer foundations, even more explicitly than the older, were “bede-houses” or houses of prayer. All p030 charitable foundations were to a certain extent chantries. Many, alas! were solely on this account marked with the stigma of superstition, and fell under the two Acts for the dissolution of chantries: the plea of usefulness, however, happily prevailed in several cases.[20] For a time the work of building almshouses ceased, but revived after a while. In 1583 Philip Stubbes complained that although in some places the poor were relieved in hospitals, yet more provision was required:—

“For the supplie whereof, would God there might be in euerie parish an almes house erected, that the poore (such as are poore indeede) might be maintained, helped, and relieued. For until the true poore indeed be better provided for, let them neuer thinke to please God.”[21]

• Notes — Chapter II
  • [13] Rolls of Parl. 2 Hen. V, Vol. IV, p. 19b Petitions, No. III.
  • [14] St. John’s, Bedford, was intended only for townsmen; all such applying to the master for relief were to be received, but “all poore folkes dwellyng without the same town to be expulsed and put out.” Chantry Cert. (ed. J. E. Brown).
  • [15] Pat. 9 Hen. IV, Pt. i. m. 8.
  • [16] Tovey, Anglia Judaica, 227.
  • [17] Chron. and Mem. 44, iii. 262.
  • [18] Pat. 8 Edw. I, m. 17.
  • [19] Bishop Drokensford’s Reg. p. 268.
  • [20] See Chapter XVI.
  • [21] Anatomie of Abuses, Pt. II, 43.

[♦] p031

CHAPTER III HOSPITALS FOR THE INSANE

“Hospitals . . . to maintain men and women who had lost their wits and memory.” (Rolls of Parliament, 1414.)

LITTLE is known regarding the extent and treatment of insanity during the Middle Ages. Persons “vexed with a demon” were taken to holy places in the hope that the “fiends” might be cast out. An early thirteenth-century window at Canterbury shows a poor maniac dragged by his friends to the health-giving shrine of St. Thomas. He is tied with ropes, and they belabour him with blows from birch-rods. In the second scene he appears in his right mind, returning thanks, all instruments of discipline cast away. Even in the sixteenth century we read of pilgrimage by lunatics, especially to certain holy wells.

Formerly, all needy people were admitted into the hospital, mental invalids being herded together with those weak or diseased in body. From the chronicle of St. Bartholomew’s, Smithfield, we learn that in the twelfth century mad people were constantly received as well as the deaf, dumb, blind, palsied and crippled. One young man lost “his resonable wyttys” on his journey to London. He wandered about running, not knowing whither he went. Arriving in London, he was brought to the hospital and “ther yn shorte space his witte p032 was recoueryd.” Another patient was taken with the “fallynge euill” [epilepsy], which is described as a sickness hindering the operation of the senses. It would seem that persons subject to fits were sometimes placed in a lazar-house, for at St. Bartholomew’s, Rochester (1342), was one patient “struck with the epilepsy disease.”

The public did not make itself responsible for the custody of the lunatic, whose own people were required to guard him and others from harm. One of the “Customs of Bristol” (1344) orders that the goods and chattels of demented men be delivered to their friends until they come to a good state of mind (ad bonam memoriam). The sad condition of “lunatick lollers” is described by Langland, who speaks compassionately of this class of wanderers.

In London, the question of making special provision for the insane came to the front about this time, for in 1369 one Denton intended to found a hospital “for poor priests and others, men and women, who in that city suddenly fell into a frenzy (in frenesim) and lost their memory,” but his plan was not carried out. Stow mentions that the earliest asylum for distraught and lunatic persons was near Charing Cross, “but it was said, that some time a king of England, not liking such a kind of people to remain so near his palace, caused them to be removed farther off, to Bethlem without Bishopsgate.”

St. Mary of Bethlehem was the most famous refuge for the mentally disordered. In 1403 there were confined six men deprived of reason (mente capti), and three other sick, one of whom was a paralytic patient who had been lying in the hospital for over two years. The good work p033 done in the institution was fully recognized. A bequest was made in 1419 to the sick and insane of St. Mary de Bedlam. A Patent Roll entry of 1437 speaks of “the succour of demented lunatics” and others, and of the necessity of cutting down these works of piety unless speedy help were forthcoming. The then town clerk, John Carpenter, recalled this need and remembered in his will (1441) “the poor madmen of Bethlehem.” Another citizen, Stephen Forster, desired his executors to lay out ten pounds in food and clothing for the poor people “detained” there. Gregory, citizen and mayor, describes in his Historical Collections (about 1451) this asylum and its work of mercy, and it is satisfactory to hear that some were there restored to a sound mind:—

“A chyrche of Owre Lady that ys namyde Bedlam. And yn that place ben founde many men that ben fallyn owte of hyr wytte. And fulle honestely they ben kepte in that place; and sum ben restoryde unto hyr witte and helthe a-gayne. And sum ben a-bydyng there yn for evyr, for they ben falle soo moche owte of hem selfe that hyt ys uncurerabylle unto man.”

Probably the utterly incurable were doomed to those iron chains, manacles and stocks mentioned in the inventory of 1398 and quoted at the visitation of 1403:—

“Item, vj cheynes de Iren, com vj lokkes. Item iiij peir manycles de Iren. ij peir stokkys.”[22]

In other parts of the country it was customary to receive persons suffering from attacks of mania into general infirmaries. At Holy Trinity, Salisbury, not only were sick persons and women in childbirth received, but mad people were to be taken care of (furiosi custodiantur donec sensum adipiscantur). This was at the p034 close of the fourteenth century. In the petition for the reformation of hospitals (1414) it is stated that they exist partly to maintain those who had lost their wits and memory (hors de lour sennes et memoire). Many almshouse-statutes, however, prohibited their admission. A regulation concerning an endowed bed in St. John’s, Coventry (1444), declared that a candidate must be “not mad, quarrelsome, leprous, infected.” At Ewelme “no wood man” (crazy person) must be received; and an inmate becoming “madd, or woode” was to be removed from the Croydon almshouse.

Such disused lazar-houses as were inhabitable might well have been utilized as places of confinement. This, indeed, was done at Holloway near Bath. At what period the lepers vacated St. Mary Magdalene’s is not known, but it was probably appropriated to the use of lunatics by Prior Cantlow, who rebuilt the chapel about 1489. At the close of the sixteenth century, St. James’, Chichester, was occupied by a sad collection of hopeless cripples, among whom were found two idiots. A hundred years later the bishop reported that this hospital was of small revenue and “hath only one poor person, but she a miserable idiot, in it.”

Bethlehem Hospital was rescued by the Lord Mayor and citizens at the Dissolution of religious houses and continued its charitable work. In 1560 Queen Elizabeth issued on behalf of this house an appeal of which a facsimile may be seen in Bewes’ Church Briefs. “Sume be straught from there wyttes,” it declares, “thuse be kepte and mayntend in the Hospital of our Ladye of Beddelem untyle God caule them to his marcy or to ther wyttes agayne.”

[♦] PLATE V. HARBLEDOWN HOSPITAL, NEAR CANTERBURY ONCE USED FOR LEPERS

• Note — Chapter III
  • [22] Char. Com. Rep., xxxii. vi. 472.

[♦] p035

CHAPTER IV THE LAZAR-HOUSE

“For the relief of divers persons smitten with this sickness and destitute and walking at large within the realm.”[23] (Holloway, 1473.)

ON the outskirts of a town seven hundred years ago, the eye of the traveller would have been caught by a well-known landmark—a group of cottages with an adjoining chapel, clustering round a green enclosure. At a glance he would recognize it as the lazar-house, and would prepare to throw an alms to the crippled and disfigured representative of the community.

It is a startling fact that there is documentary evidence for the existence of over 200 such institutions in this country in the Middle Ages, though historians disagree in their conclusions on this subject, as they do on the extent and duration of the disease itself. To some, leprosy is a phantom playing upon the imagination of a terror-stricken nation; to others, an all-devouring giant stalking through the land. One writer surmises that all the British leper-hospitals together did not exceed fifty, for “there might have been a leper in a village here and there, one or two in a market-town, a dozen or more in a city, a score or so in a whole diocese.” Another says that “the number of these lazar-houses, however great, was insufficient to accommodate p036 more than a small proportion of those suffering from the disease. The rest flocked to the high roads, and exposed their distorted limbs and sores, and sought by attracting the notice of travellers to gain alms for their support.”

Speaking broadly, one may say that leprosy raged from the eleventh to the middle of the thirteenth century, when it abated; that it was inconsiderable after the middle of the fourteenth; that, though not extinct, it became rare in the fifteenth; and had practically died out by the sixteenth century, save in the extreme south-west of England.

It is commonly supposed that leprosy was introduced into this country by returning crusaders. “The leprosy was one epidemical infection which tainted the pilgrims coming thither,” says Fuller; “hence was it brought over into England—never before known in this island—and many lazar-houses erected.” Voltaire makes this satirical epigram:—“All that we gained in the end by engaging in the Crusades, was the leprosy; and of all that we had taken, that was the only thing that remained with us.” This theory, however, is no longer accepted, and Dr. C. Creighton expresses an opinion that it is absurd to suppose that leprosy could be “introduced” in any such way. Geoffrey de Vinsauf, the chronicler who accompanied Richard I, says, indeed, that many perished from sickness of a dropsical nature. He was an eyewitness of the famine which led to the consumption of abominable food, but there is little proof that these wretched conditions engendered leprosy among the pilgrim-warriors. Only once is a leper mentioned in his Itinerary, and then it is no less a personage than Baldwin IV, the young prince who became seventh King of Jerusalem and victor over p037 Saladin. It is, moreover, an undeniable fact that there were lepers in Saxon and early Norman England. The Anglo-Saxon equivalent is found in the vocabulary attributed to Aelfric. Roger of Hoveden tells the story of a poor leper whom Edward the Confessor was instrumental in curing. Aelfward, Saxon Bishop of London, retired into a monastery because of this affliction; and Hugh d’Orivalle, Bishop of London, a Norman, died a leper in 1085. Finally, at least two lazar-houses were established within twenty years of the Conquest, and before the first Crusade.

(a) Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries

Leprosy was rampant during the Norman period. By a happy providence, charity was quickened simultaneously by the religious movement which illuminated a dark age, so that the need was met. Two leper-houses were rivals in point of antiquity, namely, Rochester and Harbledown, both founded before 1100. These were followed (before 1135) by foundations at Alkmonton, Whitby, London, Lincoln, Colchester, Norwich, Newark, Peterborough, Oxford, Newcastle, Wilton, St. Alban’s, Bury, Warwick. Within the next twenty years hospitals are mentioned at Canterbury (St. Laurence), Buckland by Dover, Lynn, Burton Lazars, Aylesbury, York, Ripon, and Northampton; there were also other early asylums at Carlisle, Preston, Shrewsbury, Ilford, Exeter, etc. The chief building period was before the middle of the thirteenth century. A glance at Appendix B will show how such houses multiplied. Moreover, many not specifically described as for lepers, were doubtless originally intended for them. (Cf. Lewes, Abingdon, Scarborough, etc.) p038

(b) Fourteenth Century (1300–1350)

During the first part of the fourteenth century, leprosy was widespread, but by no means as common as formerly. Directly or indirectly, testimony is borne to the fact of its prevalence by national laws, by hospital authorities and by the charitable public.

In the first place there is the witness of external legislation, which is two-fold. Schemes of taxation refer constantly to lepers (Rolls of Parliament, 1307–1324). Measures were repeatedly taken for their expulsion from towns. An ordinance was made in the Parliament of Lincoln (1315) commanding that houses founded for the infirm and lepers should be devoted to their use. The admission of other persons was now refused, as, for example, at St. Giles’, London, and St. Bartholomew’s, Oxford.[24]

There is, secondly, the phraseology of contemporary leper-house statutes, e.g. those drawn up by the Abbot of St. Alban’s (1344), and by the Bishop of London for Ilford (1346). Here it is right to note a case where infected inmates were already in a minority. A summary of the history of St. Nicholas’, Carlisle (1341), includes this definite statement:—“until by lapse of time the greater part of the lepers died, when . . . their places were filled by poor impotent folk.”[25]

Thirdly, it is evident from the gifts of charitable persons that there were still many outcasts in need of assistance. Bishop Bitton of Exeter left money to lazars in thirty-nine localities within his diocese (1307). p039 Practically all the wills of the period allude to the presence of lepers in the neighbourhood. Although there already existed two asylums outside Rochester (St. Bartholomew’s and St. Nicholas’ at Whiteditch), to which bequests were continuously made until far into the next century,[26] St. Katherine’s hospital was founded in 1316 for lepers and other mendicants:—

“if it happe anie man or woman of the cittie of Rouchester to be uisited with lepre, or other suche diseases that longe to impotence, with unpower of pouertie, there sholde be receaued.”

If leper-houses were empty, the fact is largely accounted for by the mismanagement and poverty of charitable institutions at that period. This aspect of the subject has never received adequate attention. Destitute persons were ousted to make way for paying inmates. One thirteenth-century master of St. Nicholas’, York, admitted thirty-six brethren and sisters, of whom four were received pro Deo, because they were lepers, but the rest for money. This practice was sadly common, and notorious instances might be cited from Lincoln (Holy Innocents’), London (St. Giles’), and Oxford (St. Bartholomew’s).

Moreover, the leper would probably not be anxious for admission, because at this time, when hospitals were barely able to supply the necessaries of life, it meant restriction without the corresponding comfort which sometimes made it welcome. It is related that in 1315, the lepers of Kingston showed their independence by quitting the hospital and demolishing it. A Close Roll entry relating to St. Nicholas’, Royston (1359), declares that the “lepers for a great while past have refused to come or to dwell p040 there.” About the year 1350 the chronicler of St. Alban’s states that at St. Julian’s hospital “in general there are now not above three, sometimes only two, and occasionally one.” Possibly they had rebelled against the strict life enforced: in 1353 the master and lepers were made semi-independent by grant of the abbot and convent.[27]

In truth, hospitals were in great straits during this distressful century, and retrenchment was necessary. Leper-houses in particular were seldom on a sound financial basis. Even if they possessed certain endowments in kind there was rarely money to spend on the fabric, and buildings became dilapidated. Experience teaches the difficulty of maintaining old-established charities. Much of the early enthusiasm had passed away, and charity was at a low ebb.

It was indeed a poverty-stricken period. Heavy taxation drained the country’s resources. War, famine and pestilence were like the locust, palmerworm and caterpillar devastating the land. These were cruel times for the poor, and also for houses of charity. The mediæval tale of Sir Amiloun shows that, so long as the land had plenty, the leper-knight and his companion fared well, but that when corn waxed dear, they were driven by hunger from town to town, and could barely keep themselves alive.

A few instances will show how charity suffered. At the Harbledown leper-house (1276), voluntary offerings were so diminished that inmates were come to great want, and it was feared the sick would be compelled to leave. In 1301 the authorities of the Stafford hospital were p041 said to be accustomed to receive lepers with goods and chattels, but they were not bound to support them, and the prior himself had been driven away by destitution. St. Giles’, Hexham, was suffering from the Scotch wars. An inquiry ordered by the archbishop (1320) showed that the numbers were reduced, that none were admitted without payment, and that they had to work hard. The allowance of bread and beer from the priory was diminished, oxen were borrowed for ploughing, and there was scarcely enough corn to sow the land.[28] Wayfaring lepers had ceased to frequent St. Mary Magdalene’s, Ripon (where they used to receive food and shelter), because applicants went away empty-handed (1317); and a later inquiry showed that none came there “because it was fallen down.” In 1327, the Huntingdon lepers had barely sufficient to maintain their present company, admittance being refused to applicants solely on that account, and they were excused taxation in 1340, because if payment were made, they would have to diminish the number of inmates and disperse them to seek their food. Civil and ecclesiastical registers alike, in issuing protections and briefs for leprous men collecting alms for hospitals, tell a tale of utter destitution.

(c) Fourteenth Century (1350–1400)

Having discussed that portion of the century which preceded the fateful year 1349, we now inquire to what extent leprosy existed during the fifty years that followed. It is no longer mentioned in legislation, and there are indications that it had come to be regarded chiefly as a question for local government: the Letter Books of the p042 Corporation of London record edicts of expulsion. There are other proofs that the number of sufferers was decreasing. If, for example, the language be compared of two Harbledown deeds, dated 1276 and 1371, an appreciable difference can be discerned. In the first it is declared that there “a hundred lepers are confined to avoid contagion,” but a century later it is merely stated that “some of these poor are infected with leprosy.” It was said at Maldon in 1402 that there had been no leper-burgesses for twenty years and more. The mention of burgesses is, however, inconclusive, for there may have been mendicant lazars who would gladly have accepted the shelter of St. Giles’; but the town was not bound to support them.

The gifts and bequests of this period testify to the fact that although there were lepers—notably in the vicinity of towns—yet the institutions provided for them were small in comparison with former asylums. A new lazar-house was built at Sudbury in 1373, to accommodate three persons. Shortly before 1384 a house for lepers and other infirm was founded at Boughton-under-Blean.[29] Richard II left money to complete two hospitals near London. The will of his uncle, John of Gaunt, who died the same year (1399), indicates the smallness of existing institutions within five miles of the city, for he bequeaths to every leper-house containing five malades, five nobles, and to lesser hospitals, three nobles each.

For a time, the pestilence of 1349 had brought financial ruin to houses dependent upon charity. In London, for example, in 1355, the full complement at St. Giles’ should p043 have been fourteen—it had originally been forty—but the authorities complained that they could not maintain even the reduced number, for their lands lay uncultivated “by reason of the horrible mortality.” St. James’ hospital—which used to support fourteen—was empty, save for the sole survivor of the scourge who remained as caretaker, nor does it appear to have been reorganized as a leper-asylum.

This diminution in numbers may be attributed to various causes. An increase of medical knowledge with improved diagnosis, together with the strict examination which now preceded expulsion, doubtless prevented the incarceration of some who would formerly have been injudiciously classed as lazars. Possibly, too, the disease now took a milder form, as it is apt to do in course of time. Again, the Black Death (1349) had not merely impoverished leper-hospitals, but must surely have been an important factor in the decline of leprosy itself. If it reduced the population by two-thirds, or even by one-half, as is computed, it also carried off the weakest members of society, those most prone to disease. When the plague reached a lazar-house, it found ready victims, and left it without inhabitant. The same may be said of the terrible though lesser pestilences which followed (1361–76). The attempt to purify towns by sanitary measures contributed to the improvement of public health. In Bartholomew’s De Proprietatibus Rerum (circa 1360) it is declared, among divers causes of leprosy that:—“sometyme it cometh . . . of infecte and corrupte ayre.” Steps were taken in London to improve sanitation (1388) because “many and intolerable diseases do daily happen.” p044

(d) Fifteenth Century

Having admitted that leprosy was steadily declining, so that by the year 1400 it was rare, we are not prepared to echo the statement that its disappearance “may be taken as absolute.” Certain lazar-houses were, indeed, appropriated to other uses, as at Alkmonton (1406), Sherburn (1434), and Blyth (1446). In remembrance of the original foundation, accommodation was reserved at Sherburn for two lepers “if they could be found in those parts” [i.e. in the Bishopric of Durham] “or would willingly come to remain there,” the place of the sixty-five lepers being now taken by thirteen poor men unable of their own means to support themselves.[30] This was a period of transition, and although ruins already marked the site of many a former settlement, yet there were places where a few lepers occupied the old habitations.

Leprosy certainly lurked here and there. The testimony of wills may not be considered wholly trustworthy evidence, yet they show that the public still recognized a need. In 1426 a testator left money for four lepers to receive four marks yearly for ten years. Bequests were made to lepers of Winchester (1420); to “eche laseer of man and woman or child within Bury” (1463); to “the leprous men now in the house of lepers” at Sandwich (1466). There were, perhaps, cases where testators had little personal knowledge of the charities. We cannot, however, doubt that a real need existed when the former mayor of Newcastle leaves forty shillings to “the lepre men of Newcastell” (1429), or when p045 John Carpenter—for over twenty years town-clerk of London—bequeaths money to poor lepers at Holborn, Locks and Hackney (1441).

In 1464, when confirming Holy Innocents’, Lincoln, to Burton Lazars, Edward IV renewed Henry VI’s stipulation that three leprous retainers should still be supported:—“to fynde and susteyn there yerely for ever, certeyn Lepurs of oure menialx Seruauntez and of oure Heires & Successours, yf eny suche be founde.” The king relinquished some property near Holloway (Middlesex), in order to provide a retreat for infected persons. In the year 1480 there were a few lepers at Lydd, who were allowed to share in the festivities when the quarrels between Edward IV and Louis XI came to an end. The ships of the Cinque Ports had been requisitioned, including “the George” of Romney. The town-clerk of Lydd makes an entry of 4d. “Paid to the leperys, whenne the George was fette home fro Hethe.”[31]

(e) Sixteenth Century

Cases of true leprosy were now of rare occurrence. Probably leper hospitals were in the main only nominally such, as a testator hints in 1519, bequeathing a legacy “to every Alms House called Lepars in the Shire of Kent.” But although the social conditions of the country improved during the Tudor period, they were still low enough continually to engender pestilence. When Erasmus visited England, he was struck by the filthy habits which were prevalent; but the avengers of neglect of cleanliness were now plague and the sweating sickness. In some few cases old hospitals were p046 utilized for the sufferers. The plague having lately raged in Newcastle, it was recorded in the Chantry Certificate of St. Mary Magdalene’s (1546) that it was once used for lepers, but “syns that kynde of sickeness is abated it is used for the comforte and helpe of the poore folks that chaunceth to fall sycke in tyme of pestilence.”

The south-west corner of England was now the last stronghold of leprosy. St. Margaret’s, Honiton, had been refounded about 1530. A new leper-hospital was built at Newton Bushell near Exeter in 1538:—

“for the releff of powre lazar-people, whereof grete nomber with that diseas be now infectid in that partis, to the grete daunger of infection of moche people . . . for lacke of conueayent houses in the county of Devonshire for them.”

Even in 1580, none were admitted to St. Mary Magdalene’s, Exeter, except “sick persons in the disease of the leprosy.” About the same time it was reported that “for a long time there had been a great company of lazar-people” at Bodmin.

A few of the old hospitals were kept up in different parts. In the first year of Edward VI (1547) it was enacted that all “leprouse and poore beddred creatures” who were inmates of charitable houses should continue in the places appointed, and be permitted to have proctors to gather alms for them. The Corporation MSS. of Hereford include a notification that year of the appointment of collectors for “the house of leprous persons founded in the worship of St. Anne and St. Loye.” Strype records similar licences granted to Beccles and Bury; and he also cites[32] “A protection to beg, granted to p047 the poor lazars of the house of our Saviour Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene, at Mile-end [in Stepney], and J. Mills appointed their proctor” (1551). The sixteenth-century seal of this Domus Dei et S. Marie Magd. de Myle End (figured below) shows a crippled leper and an infirm woman of the hospital. In 1553, £60 was given to the lazar-houses round London on condition that inmates did not beg to people’s annoyance within three miles.

It has here been attempted to bring together some notes touching the extent and duration of leprosy during the Middle Ages, as affecting the provision and maintenance of leper-hospitals. Into the nature of the disease itself we have not endeavoured to inquire, that being a scientific rather than an historical study. Those who would go further into the subject must gain access to the writings of Sir James Simpson, Dr. C. Creighton, Dr. George Newman and others.

[♦ ] 6. SEAL OF THE LAZAR-HOUSE, MILE END

• Notes — Chapter IV
  • [23] Patent 12 Ed. IV, pt. II, m. 6.
  • [24] Pat. 8 Edw. II, pt. ii. m. 5. Close 9 Edw. II, m. 18 d.
  • [25] Pat. 15 Edw. III, pt. i. m. 49, 48.
  • [26] J. Thorpe, Custumale Roffense, p. 39 et sq.; Reg. Roff. p. 113.
  • [27] Pat. 27 Edw. III, pt. ii. m. 16.
  • [28] Surtees Soc. 46, ii. 130.
  • [29] Cited Vict. Co. Hist. Kent.
  • [30] One deed of reformation speaks of “the diminution of the means of the hospital and the small number of lepers who resort thither.” (Pap. Lett. 1430–1.)
  • [31] Hist. MSS. 5th R. p. 527 a.
  • [32] Ecclesiastical Memorials, II, 248.

[♦] p048

CHAPTER V THE LEPER IN ENGLAND

“From the benefactions and possessions charitably bestowed upon the hospital, the hunger, thirst and nakedness of those lepers, and other wants and miseries with which they are incessantly afflicted . . . may be relieved.”

(Foundation Charter of Sherburn.)

WE now turn from leper-asylums to consider the leper himself—a sadly familiar figure to the wayfaring man in the Middle Ages. He wears a sombre gown and cape, tightly closed; a hood conceals his want of hair, which is, however, betrayed by the absence of eyebrows and lashes; his limbs are maimed and stunted so that he can but hobble or crawl; his features are ulcerated and sunken; his staring eyes are unseeing or unsightly; his wasted lips part, and a husky voice entreats help as he “extends supplicating lazar arms with bell and clap-dish.”

At the outset it is necessary to state that inmates of lazar-houses were not all true lepers. Persons termed leprosi, infirmi, elefantuosi, languidi, frères malades, meselles, do not necessarily signify lepers in a strict sense. Gervase of Canterbury, writing about 1200, speaks of St. Oswald’s, Worcester, as intended for “Infirmi, item leprosi”; and these words are used synonymously in Pipe Rolls, charters, seals, etc. “Leprosy” was an elastic term as commonly used. In the statutes of one hospital, p049 the patriarch Job was claimed as a fellow-sufferer—“who was so smitten with the leprosy, that from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head there was no soundness in him.” A lazar was one “full of sores,” and any person having an inveterate and loathsome skin-eruption might be considered infected. Disfiguring and malignant disorders were common. Victims of scrofula, lepra, lupus, tuberculosis, erysipelas (or “St. Anthony’s fire”) and persons who had contracted disease as the baneful result of a life stained with sin, would sometimes take advantage of the provision made for lepers, for in extremity of destitution this questionable benefit was not to be despised. In foreign lands to-day, some are found not unwilling to join the infected for the sake of food and shelter; we are told, for example, that the Hawaiian Government provides so well for lepers that a difficulty arises in preventing healthy people from taking up their abode in the hospitals. On the other hand, it often happens that those who are actually leprous refuse to join a segregation-camp.

No one, however, can deny that leprosy was once exceedingly prevalent, and after weighing all that might be said to the contrary, Sir J. Y. Simpson and Dr. George Newman were convinced that the disease existent in England was for the most part true leprosy (elephantiasis Græcorum).

1. PIONEERS OF CHARITY

One practical outcome of the religious revival of the twelfth century was a movement of charity towards the outcast. The Lazarus whom Jesus loved became linked in pious minds with that p050 Lazarus ulceribus plenus neglected by men, but now “in Abraham’s bosom,” and the thought took a firm hold of the heart and imagination. Abandoned by relatives, loathed by neighbours, the famished leper was now literally fed with crumbs of comfort from the rich man’s table.

The work of providing for “Christ’s poor,” begun by the great churchmen Lanfranc and Gundulf, was carried into the realm of personal service by Queen Maud (about 1101), the Abbot of Battle (before 1171) and Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln (about 1186). Queen Maud is the brightest ornament of the new movement. Like St. Francis of Assisi a century later, she “adopted those means for grappling with the evil that none but an enthusiast and a visionary would have taken.” Aelred of Rievaulx relates how Prince David visited her and found the house full of lepers, in the midst of whom stood the queen. She washed, dried and even kissed their feet, telling her brother that in so doing she was kissing the feet of the Eternal King. When she begged him to follow her example, he withdrew smiling, afterwards confessing to Aelred:—“I was sore afraid and answered that I could on no account endure it, for as yet I did not know the Lord, nor had His spirit been revealed to me.” Of Walter de Lucy, the chronicler of Battle Abbey writes:—

“He especially compassionated the forlorn condition of those afflicted with leprosy and elephantiasis, whom he was so far from shunning, that he frequently waited upon them in person, washing their hands and feet, and, with the utmost cordiality, imprinting upon them the soothing kisses of love and piety.”

St. Hugh used to visit in certain hospitals, possibly those at Peterborough and Newark connected with the p051 See or the Mallardry at Lincoln.[33] He would even dwell among the lepers, eating with them and ministering to them, saying that he was inspired by the example of the Saviour and by His teaching concerning the beggar Lazarus. On one occasion, in reply to a remonstrance from his Chancellor, he said that these afflicted ones were the flowers of Paradise, pearls in the coronet of the Eternal King.[34]

2. PUBLIC OPINION

These noble pioneers were doubtless important factors in moulding public opinion. They may often have outstepped the bounds of prudence, but, as one has observed, “an evil is removed only by putting it for a time into strong relief, when it comes to be rightly dealt with and so is gradually checked.” As long as possible the world ignored the existence of leprosy. The thing was so dreadful that men shut their eyes to it, until they were shamed into action by those who dared to face the evil. The Canon of the Lateran Council of 1179 acknowledged that unchristian selfishness had hitherto possessed men with regard to lepers. We need not suppose that the heroism of those who ministered to lepers was that which boldly faces a terrible risk, but it was rather that which overcomes the strongest repulsion for hideous and noisome objects. There is no hint in the language of the chroniclers of encountering danger, but rather, expressions of horror that any should hold intercourse with such loathsome creatures. The remonstrances of Prince David and of William de Monte were not primarily on account of contagion.—“What is it that thou doest, O my lady? p052 surely if the King knew this, he would not deign to kiss with his lips your mouth thus polluted with the feet of lepers!” “When I saw Bishop Hugh touch the livid face of the lepers, kiss their sightless eyes or eyeless sockets, I shuddered with disgust.”—If St. Francis raised an objection to inmates wandering outside their precincts, it was because people could not endure the sight of them. The popular opinion regarding the contagious nature of the disease developed strongly, however, towards the close of the twelfth century. The Canon De Leprosis (Rome, 1179; Westminster, 1200) declares emphatically that lepers cannot dwell with healthy men. Englishmen begin to act consistently with this conviction. The Prior of Taunton (1174–85) separates a monk from the company of the brethren “in fear of the danger of this illness”; and the Durham chronicler mentions an infirmary for those “stricken with the contagion of leprosy.”

3. CIVIL JURISDICTION

(a) The Writ for Removal.—The right to expel lepers was acknowledged before it was legally enforced. An entry upon the statute-book may be merely the official recognition of an established custom. The fact that where use and wont are sufficiently strong, law is unnecessary, is illustrated to-day in Japan, where public opinion alone enforces the separation of lepers. At length English civil law set its seal upon the theory of infection by the writ De Leproso Amovendo, authorizing the expulsion of lepers on account of manifest peril by contagion. An early instance of removal occurs in the Curia Regis Rolls (1220). It is mentioned that William, son of Nicholas Malesmeins, had been consigned with the assent p053 of his friends to a certain Maladria in Bidelington, where he abode for two years. This was the leper-house near Bramber, mentioned four years previously in a Close Roll as “the hospital of the infirm of St. Mary Magdalene of Bidelington.”

Legislation on this subject was chiefly local. The Assizes of London had proclaimed in 1276 that “no leper shall be in the city, nor come there, nor make any stay there.” Edward III supplemented existing measures by an urgent local edict for London and Middlesex. The royal proclamation sets forth that many publicly dwell among the citizens, being smitten with the taint of leprosy; these not only injure people by the contagion of their polluted breath, but they even strive to contaminate others by a loose and vicious life, resorting to houses of ill-fame, “that so, to their own wretched solace, they may have the more fellows in suffering.”[35] All persons proved leprous—citizens or others, of whatever sex or condition—are to quit the city within fifteen days, “and betake themselves to places in the country, solitary, and notably distant from the city and suburbs.” This order, sent to the mayor, was followed by a proclamation to the sheriff of the county. Lepers are to abandon the highways and field-ways between the city and Westminster, where several such persons sit and stay, associating with whole men, to the manifest danger of passers-by.[36]

This social problem continued to vex municipal authorities. A precept was issued (1369) “that no leper beg in the street for fear of spreading infection.” The porters of the eight principal gates of the city were sworn p054 to refuse them admittance. (That barbers—forerunners of the barber-chirurgeons—were included among the gate-keepers in 1310 and 1375, was perhaps due to their supposed capability of recognizing diseases.) If a leper tried to enter, he should forfeit his horse or his outer garment, and if persisting, be taken into custody. The foreman at “le loke” and an official at the Hackney lazar-house were also bound to prevent their entry into the city.

The “Customs of Bristol,” written down by the recorder in 1344, declare “that in future no leper reside within the precincts of the town.” Imprisonment was the penalty—a plan of doubtful wisdom. The measures ordained by the burgesses of Berwick-on-Tweed were summary:—

“No leper shall come within the gates of the borough; and if one gets in by chance, the serjeant shall put him out at once. If one wilfully forces his way in, his clothes shall be taken off him and burnt, and he shall be turned out naked. For we have already taken care that a proper place for lepers shall be kept up outside the town, and that alms shall be there given to them.”[37]

It was comparatively easy for the civic authorities to control the ejection of lepers when the asylum was under their supervision, as it frequently was. At Exeter, ecclesiastical leniency permitted a continuance of the custom (which was already “ancient” in 1163) of allowing lepers to circulate freely in the town. In 1244 the bishop seems to have agreed with the mayor and corporation about the inadvisability of the practice; and he resigned the guardianship of the lazar-house, accepting in its stead that of St. John’s hospital. p055

Municipal documents record the expulsion of lepers. In Gloucester (1273), Richard, Alice and Matilda gave trouble and would remain within the town “to the great damage and prejudice of the inhabitants.” John Mayn, after repeated warnings to provide for himself some dwelling outside London, was sworn to depart forthwith and not return, on pain of the pillory (1372). A Leet Roll among the records of Norwich states that “Thomas Tytel Webstere is a leper, therefore he must go out of the city” (1375). In the following instances, the infected were consigned to hospitals. Margaret Taylor came before the keepers of Beverley in the Gild Hall, and asked by way of charity permission to have a bed in the lepers’ house outside Keldgate Bar, which request was granted (1394). The town-clerk of Lydd makes an entry of ten shillings “Paied for delyvere of Simone Reede unto the howse of Lazaris” (circa 1460). The manorial court sometimes dealt with such cases. That of the Bishop of Ely at Littleport recorded (1321):—“The jurors say upon their oath that Joan daughter of Geoffrey Whitring is leprous. Therefore be she set apart.”[38]

The law evidently had no power to touch a leper unless he made himself a source of public danger. No one interfered with him as long as he remained in a quiet hiding-place, quitting it, perhaps, only at night. Individuals, sheltered by the affection or self-interest of relatives, might never come under the ban of the law: in the Norwich records, for example, Isabella Lucas seems to have been allowed to remain at home (1391). Judge Fitz-Herbert, commenting on the writ of removal, observes p056 that it lies where a leper is dwelling in a town, and will come into the church or amongst his neighbors.[39]

English legislation was never severe regarding lepers. We may believe that the tolerant spirit of a certain thirteenth-century Scottish canon prevailed throughout Great Britain. Lepers, it was declared, might well fulfil their parochial obligations, but “if they cannot be induced to do so, let no coercion be employed, seeing that affliction should not be accumulated upon the afflicted, but rather their misfortunes commiserated.”[40] In France, however, upon one terrible occasion, Philip V was guilty of the abominable cruelty of burning lepers on the pretext that they had maliciously poisoned wells. Mezeray says:—“they were burned alive in order that the fire might purify at once the infection of the body and of the soul.” The report of this inhuman act reached England and was recorded both in the Chronicle of Lanercost (under date 1318) and also by John Capgrave, who says:—

“And in this same yere [1318] the Mysseles [lepers] thorow oute Cristendam were slaundered that thei had mad couenaunt with Sarasines for to poison alle Cristen men, to put uenym in wellis, and alle maner uesseles that long to mannes use; of whech malice mony of hem were conuicte, and brent, and many Jewes that gave hem councel and comfort.”[41]

(b) Property.—The legal status of the leper must now be examined. When pronounced a leper in early days, a man lost not only his liberty, but the right to inherit or bequeath property. A manuscript Norman law-book p057 declares “that the mezel cannot be heir to any one.” In the days of Stephen, for example, Brien Fitz-Count was lord of Wallingford and Abergavenny. “He had two sons, whom, being lepers, he placed in the Priory of Bergavenny and gave lands and tithes there to for their support,” bequeathing his property to other kinsmen. Again, two women of the Fitz-Fulke family appeared in the King’s Court (1203) in a dispute about property at Sutton in Kent: Avice urged that Mabel, having a brother, had no claim—“but against this Mabel says that he is a leper.”[42] Even a grant made by such a person was void. In 1204 King John committed the lands of William of Newmarch to an official who should answer for them at the Exchequer, but “if he have given away any of his lands after he fell sick of the leprosy, cause the same to be restored to his barony.”[43] This illustrates Bracton’s statement that “a leprous person who is placed out of the communion of mankind cannot give . . . as he cannot ask,” and, again, “if the claimant be a leper and so deformed that the sight of him is insupportable, and such that he has been separated . . . [he] cannot plead or claim an inheritance.”[44]

On the other hand, Lord Coke declares that “ideots, leapers &c. may be heires,” and he comments thus upon Bracton and Britton:—“if these ancient writers be understood of an appearance in person, I think their opinions are good law; for [lepers] ought not to sue nor defend in proper person, but by attorney.”[45] Possibly the Norman custom of disinheritance prevailed in England at one time and then died out. The case of Adam p058 de Gaugy proves that in 1278 this Northumbrian baron was not liable to forfeiture. He was excused, indeed, from appearing in the presence of Edward I, but was directed to swear fealty to an official. Although spoken of as his brother’s heir, Adam did not long enjoy his property. He died the same year, childless, but leaving a widow (Eve), and the barony passed to a kinsman.[46]

The Norman maxim that the leper “may possess the inheritance he had before he became a leper” is illustrated by the story of the youthful heir of Nicholas de Malesmeins. Having attained full age, he left the hospital where he had been confined, appeared before his feudal lord, did homage, made his payment, and entered his fief.[47]

4. ECCLESIASTICAL JURISDICTION

Although leprosy was a penal offence, only laymen could be cited and dealt with by the king, mayor or feudal lord. Clerks in holy orders had to answer to their bishop. In the case of parochial clergy, the diocesan was responsible for their suspension from office, as stated by the Canon De Leprosis. Lucius III (1181–1185) decreed that they must serve by coadjutors and wrote to the Bishop of Lincoln on this subject.[48] The episcopal registers of Lincoln afterwards record the case of the rector of Seyton (1310). Several leprous parish priests are named in other registers, e.g. St. Neot, 1314 (Exeter), Colyton, 1330 (Exeter), Castle Carrock, 1357 (Carlisle). In the latter instance, the bishop having learned with sorrow that the rector was infected and unable to p059 administer the sacraments, cited him to appear at Rose with a view to appointing a coadjutor.[49] It was ordered by Clement III that when clergy were thus removed, they should be supported from the fruits of their benefices. Sir Philip, the leper-priest of St. Neot in Cornwall, was allowed two shillings a week, besides twenty shillings a year for clothing. He was permitted to keep the best room in his vicarage and the adjoining chambers, except the hall. The rest of the house was partitioned off for the curate, the door between them being walled up.[50]

5. EXAMINATION OF SUSPECTED PERSONS

[♦ ] 7. LEPER AND PHYSICIAN

The duty of reporting and examining cases fell to the clergy, doctors, civil officers or a jury of discreet men. (Cf. Fig. 7.) A curiously complicated lawsuit brought into the King’s Court in 1220 relates how a certain man had custody of the children of Nicholas de Malesmeins. When the eldest-born became a leper, his perplexed guardian took the young man to the King’s Exchequer, and before the barons of the Exchequer he was adjudged a leper, and consigned to a hospital. (See pp. [52], [58].)

In ordinary cases, the leper would show himself to the parish priest as the only scholar. It was the village priest who helped the stricken maiden to enter “Badele Spital” near Darlington, and afterwards attested her p060 cure, as related by Reginald of Durham. (See p. [97].) The register of Bishop Bronescomb of Exeter declares that “it belongs to the office of the priest to distinguish between one form of leprosy and another.” It was the duty of the clergy to take cognizance of cases, but it was not always politic to interfere. In 1433 the parson of Sparham endeavoured to get a parishioner, John Folkard, to withdraw from the company of other men because he was “gretely infect with the sekeness of lepre.” The vicar advertised him to depart, for “his sekenes was contagious and myght hurte moche people.” After much disputing, John went off to Norwich and took an action for trespass against the parson before the sheriffs. Whereupon the vicar had to appeal in chancery.[51]

The writ of removal ordered the careful investigation of cases in the presence of discreet and lawful men having the best knowledge of the accused person and his disease. Probably the best was not very good, for many judged by the outward appearance only. The Bishop of Lincoln, directing the resignation of a clergyman (1310), says that he is besprinkled with the spot of leprosy. The decree of 1346 condemns “all those who are found infected with leprous spots” to be removed. Anthony Fitz-Herbert, writing in 1534, points out that the writ is for those “who appear to the sight of all men that they are lepers,” by their voice, disfigurement and noisome condition.

In medical treatises, great stress was laid on the necessity of investigation with pondering and meditation. The Rosa Anglica of John of Gaddesden (physician to Edward II) declares that “no one is to be adjudged a leper, and separated from intercourse of mankind, until p061 the figure and form of the face is actually changed.” The contemporary French doctor, Gordon, uses almost the same words; and, repeating his precautions, observes that “lepers are at the present day very injudiciously judged.” A later writer, Guy de Chauliac (circa 1363) says:—

“In the examination and judgement of lepers, there must be much circumspection, because the injury is very great, whether we thus submit to confinement those that ought not to be confined, or allow lepers to mix with the people, seeing the disease is contagious and infectious.”

Sir J. Simpson gives copious extracts from Guy’s Chirurgia, which has also been translated into modern French (1890). Guy describes fully the examination of a suspected person, giving in detail all possible symptoms. It may here be observed that Bartholomew Anglicus, his contemporary, enumerates among the causes predisposing to leprosy, dwelling and oft talking with leprous men, marriage and heredity, evil diet—e.g. rotten meat, measled hogs, flesh infected with poison, and the biting of a venomous worm: “in these manners and in many other the evil of lepra breedeth in man’s body.” Guy advises the doctor to inquire if the person under examination comes of tainted stock, if he have conversed with lepers, etc. He must then consider and reconsider the equivocal and unequivocal signs of disease. After a searching investigation—not to be confined to one day—the patient must either be set free (absolvendus) with a certificate, or separated from the people and conducted to the lazar-house.

About the time that John of Gaddesden was professor of medicine at Oxford (1307–1325), and was writing upon p062 leprosy, “experienced physicians” were summoned to examine a provincial magnate. The mayor and bailiffs of royal Winchester had been over-zealous “under colour of the king’s late order to cause lepers who were amongst the healthy citizens to be expelled.” It was surely a bitter hour to Peter de Nutle, late mayor of the grand old city, when his successor and former colleagues hounded him out! But there was justice for one “falsely accused”; and subsequently an order of redress was sent, not without rebuke to the civic authorities for their malicious behaviour towards a fellow-citizen:—

“as it appears, from the inspection and examination before our council by the council and by physicians expert in the knowledge of this disease, that the said Peter is whole and clean, and infected in no part of his body.”

A few days later the sheriff of Hampshire was directed to make a proclamation to the same effect, so that Peter might dwell as he was wont unmolested.[52]

The royal mandate of 1346 reiterated the stipulation that men of knowledge should inquire into suspected cases. It therefore seems unlikely that a London baker ejected in 1372 was merely suffering from an inveterate eczema, as has been suggested. Careless as were the popular notions of disease, medical diagnosis was becoming more exact; four kinds of leprosy were distinguished, of which “leonine” and “elephantine” were the worst.

There is an interesting document extant concerning a certain woman who lived at Brentwood in 1468. She was indicted by a Chancery warrant, but acquitted on the p063 authority of a medical certificate of health. The neighbours of Johanna Nightingale petitioned against her, complaining that she habitually mixed with them and refused to retire to a solitary place, although “infected by the foul contact of leprosy.” A writ was therefore issued by Edward IV commanding a legal inquiry. Finally, Johanna appeared before a medical jury in the presence of the Chancellor. They examined her person, touched and handled her, made mature and diligent investigation, going through over forty distinctive signs of disease. She was at length pronounced “utterly free and untainted,” and the royal physicians were prepared to demonstrate this in Chancery “by scientific process.”[53]

6. TREATMENT OF THE BODY

Alleviation was sometimes sought in medicinal waters. Here and there the site of a hospital seems to have been selected on account of its proximity to a healing spring, e.g. Harbledown, Burton Lazars, Peterborough, Newark, and Nantwich. In various places there are springs known as the Lepers’ Well, frequented by sufferers of bygone days.

Tradition ascribes to bathing some actual cures of “leprosy.” Bladud the Briton, a prehistoric prince, was driven from home because he was a leper. At length he discovered the hot springs of Bath, where instinct had already taught diseased swine to wallow: Bladud, too, washed and was clean. The virtue of the mineral waters, well known to the Romans, was also appreciated by the Saxons; possibly the baths were frequented by lepers p064 from early days, for there was long distributed in Bath “an ancient alms to the poor and leprous of the foundation of Athelstan, Edgar and Ethelred.” A small bath was afterwards set apart for their use, to which the infected flocked. Leland notes that the place was “much frequentid of People diseasid with Lepre, Pokkes, Scabbes, and great Aches,” who found relief. A story similar to that of Bladud, but of later date, comes from the eastern counties: a certain man, sorely afflicted with leprosy, was healed by a spring in Beccles, near which in gratitude he built a hospital.

[♦ ] 8. ELIAS, LEPER MONK

There was rivalry between the natural water of Bath and the miraculous water of Canterbury; the latter consisted of a drop of St. Thomas’ blood many times diluted from the well in the crypt of the cathedral.[54] William of Canterbury, a prejudiced critic, is careful to relate how a leper-monk of Reading, Elias by name, went with his abbot’s approval to Bath desiring to ease his pain, and there sought earnestly of the physicians whatever he was able to gather from them. “He set his hope in the warmth of the sulphur and not in the wonder-working martyr,” says William. After forty days in Bath, Elias set out for Canterbury, but secretly, pretending to seek medicine in London; because (adds the chronicler) the abbot honoured p065 the martyr less than he ought to have done, and might not have countenanced the pilgrimage. On his way, Elias met returning pilgrims, who gave him some of the water of St. Thomas (Fig. 8); he applied this externally and internally and became well.[55] Lest any should doubt the miracle, Benedict of Canterbury tells us that many who were especially skilled in the art of medicine used to say that Elias was smitten with a terrible leprosy, and he proceeds to detail the horrible symptoms. In the end, however, William declares that he who had been so ulcerated that he might have been called another Lazarus, now appeared pleasant in countenance, as was plain to all who saw him. What the Bath doctors and Bath waters could not do, that the miraculous help of St. Thomas had achieved.

We see from the story of the monk Elias that the ministrations of the physician and the use of medicine were sought by lepers. Bartholomew says that the disease, although incurable “but by the help of God” when once confirmed, “may be somewhat hid and let, that it destroy not so soon”; and he gives instructions about diet, blood-letting, purgative medicines, plasters and ointments. Efficacious too was (we are told) the eating of a certain adder sod with leeks.

There is no information forthcoming as to the remedial treatment of lepers in hospital. The only narrative we possess is Chatterton’s lively description of St. Bartholomew’s, Bristol, the Roll of which he professed to find; it satisfied Barrett, a surgeon, and a local, though uncritical, historian. A father of the Austin Friary came to shrive the lepers (for which he received ten marks) and to dress p066 their sores (for which he was given fifty marks) saying, “lette us cure both spryte and bodye.” When barber-surgeons came for an operation—“whanne some doughtie worke ys to bee donne on a Lazar”—friars attended “leste hurte ande scathe bee done to the lepers.” The friars’ knowledge was such that barber-surgeons were willing to attend “wythoute paye to gayne knowleche of aylimentes and theyr trew curis.”

7. TREATMENT OF THE SPIRIT

Disease was sometimes regarded as an instrument of divine wrath, as in the scriptural case of Gehazi. Thus Gilbert de Saunervill after committing sacrilege was smitten with leprosy, whereupon he confessed with tears that he merited the scourge of God. The popular view that it was an expiation for sin is shown in the romance of Cresseid false to her true knight. But except in signal cases of wrong-doing this morbid idea was not prominent; and the phrase “struck by the secret judgement of God” implies visitation rather than vengeance. Indeed, the use of the expression “Christ’s martyrs” suggests that the leper’s affliction was looked upon as a sacrifice—an attitude which illuminated the mystery of pain. St. Hugh preached upon the blessedness of such sufferers: they were in no wise under a curse, but were “beloved of God as was Lazarus.”

Those responsible for the care of lepers long ago realized exactly what is experienced by those who carry on the same extraordinarily difficult work to-day, namely, that leprosy develops to a high degree what is worst in man. Bodily torture, mental anguish, shattered nerves almost amounting to insanity, render lepers wearisome p067 and offensive to themselves no less than to others. These causes, together with the absence of the restraining influences of family life, make them prone to rebellious conduct, irritability, ingratitude and other evil habits. Hope was, and is, the one thing to transform such lives, else intolerable in their wintry desolation. St. Hugh therefore bade lepers look for the consummation of the promise:—“Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious Body.”[56]

Alleviation of the agonized mind of the doomed victim was undertaken first by the physician and afterwards by the priest. A recognized part of the remedial treatment advocated by Guy was to comfort the heart. His counsel shows that doctors endeavoured to act as physicians of the soul, for they were to impress upon the afflicted person that this suffering was for his spiritual salvation. The priest then fulfilled his last duty towards his afflicted parishioner:—

“The priest . . . makes his way to the sick man’s home and addresses him with comforting words, pointing out and proving that if he blesses and praises God, and bears his sickness patiently, he may have a sure and certain hope that though he be sick in body, he may be whole in soul, and may receive the gift of eternal salvation.”

The affecting scene at the service which followed may be pictured from the form in Appendix A. There was a certain tenderness mingled with “the terrible ten commandments of man.” The priest endeavours to show the leper that he is sharing in the afflictions of Christ. For p068 his consolation the verse of Isaiah is recited:—“Surely He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet did we esteem Him as a leper, smitten of God and afflicted.” The same passage from the Vulgate is quoted in the statutes for the lepers of St. Julian’s:—“among all infirmities the disease of leprosy is more loathsome than any . . . yet ought they not on that account to despair or murmur against God, but rather to praise and glorify Him who was led to death as a leper.”

[♦ ] 9. A LEPER

After separation the fate of the outcast is irrevocably sealed. Remembering the exhortation, he must never frequent places of public resort, nor eat and drink with the sound; he must not speak to them unless they are on the windward side, nor may he touch infants or young folk. Henceforth his signal is the clapper, by which he gives warning of his approach and draws attention to his p069 request. (Fig. 26.) This instrument consisted of tablets of wood, attached at one end with leather thongs, which made a loud click when shaken. In England, a bell was often substituted for this dismal rattle. Stow and Holinshed refer to the “clapping of dishes and ringing of bels” by the lazar. The poor creature of shocking appearance shown in Fig. 9 holds in his one remaining hand a bell. His piteous cry is “Sum good, my gentyll mayster, for God sake.” This was the beggar’s common appeal: in an Early English Legendary, a mesel cries to St. Francis, “Sum good for godes love.”

Compelled to leave home and friends, many a leper thus haunted the highway—his only shelter a dilapidated hovel, his meagre fare the scraps put into his dish. To others, the lines fell in more pleasant places, for in the hospital pain and privation were softened by kindness.

• Notes — Chapter V
  • [33] See p. 180.
  • [34] Chron. and Mem. 37, Magna Vita, pp. 162–5.
  • [35] Riley, Memorials of London, 230.
  • [36] Close 1346 pt. i. m. 18 d, 14 d, and 1348 pt. i. m. 25 d.
  • [37] Toulmin Smith, Gilds, 241.
  • [38] Selden Soc., Court Baron, p. 134.
  • [39] Natura Brevium, ed. 1652 p. 584.
  • [40] Wilkins, Concil. Mag. i. 616.
  • [41] Chron. and Mem., 1. 186.
  • [42] Selden Soc., 3, No. 157.
  • [43] Rot. Litt. Claus. 6 John m. 21.
  • [44] Chron. and Mem., 70, i. 95; vi. 325.
  • [45] First Institutes, p. 8a., 135b.
  • [46] Inquisition, cf. Rot. Curia Scacc. Abb., i. 33.
  • [47] Curia Regis Rolls, 72, m. 18 d.
  • [48] Conciliorum Omnium, ed. 1567, III, 700 (cap. 4).
  • [49] Reg. Welton. Cited Vict. Co. Hist.
  • [50] Reg. Stapeldon, p. 342.
  • [51] P.R.O. Early Chancery Proceedings, Bundle 46, No. 158.
  • [52] Close 6 Edw. II, m. 21 d.
  • [53] Close Roll, Rymer, ed. 1710, ix. 365. Translated, Simpson, Arch. Essays.
  • [54] Chron. and Mem., 67, i. 416.
  • [55] Id. ii. 242.
  • [56] Compare the title of a modern leper-house at Kumamoto in Kiushiu, known as “The Hospital of the Resurrection of Hope”: and in Japanese Kwaishun Byōin—“the coming again of spring.”

[♦] p070

CHAPTER VI FOUNDERS AND BENEFACTORS

“Hospitals . . . founded as well by the noble kings of this realm and lords and ladies both spiritual and temporal as by others of divers estates, in aid and merit of the souls of the said founders.”

(Parliament of Leicester.)

AS our period covers about six centuries, some rough sub­div­i­sion is nec­es­sary, but each cent­ury can show pat­rons of royal birth, bene­vo­lent bish­ops and barons, as well as char­i­table com­moners. The roll-call is long, and includes many note­worthy names.

FIRST PERIOD (BEFORE 1066)

First, there is the shadowy band of Saxon benefactors. Athelstan, on his return from the victory of Brunanburh (937), helped to found St. Peter’s hospital, York, giving not only the site, but a considerable endowment. (See p. [185].) Among other founders was a certain noble and devoted knight named Acehorne, lord of Flixton in the time of the most Christian king Athelstan, who provided a refuge for wayfarers in Holderness. Two Saxon bishops are named as builders of houses for the poor. To St. Oswald (Bishop of Worcester, died 992) is attributed the foundation of the hospital called after him; but the earliest documentary reference to it is by Gervase of Canterbury (circa 1200). St. Wulstan (died 1094) p071 provided the wayfarers’ hostel at Worcester which continued to bear his name. Wulstan, last of the Saxon founders, forms a fitting link with Lanfranc, foremost of those Norman “spiritual lords” who were to build hospitals on a scale hitherto unknown in England.

SECOND PERIOD (1066–1272)

[♦ ] 10. “THE MEMORIAL OF MATILDA THE QUEEN”

Lanfranc erected the hospitals of St. John, Canterbury, and St. Nicholas, Harbledown; these charities remain to this day as memorials of the archbishop. His friend Bishop Gundulf of Rochester founded a lazar-house near that city. In Queen Maud, wife of Henry I, the bishop found a ready disciple. Her mother, Margaret of Scotland, had trained her to love the poor and minister to them. St. Margaret’s special care had been for pilgrims, for whom she had provided a hospital at Queen’s-ferry, Edinburgh. The “holy Queen Maud,” as we have seen, served lepers with enthusiasm, and she established a home near London for them. (Fig. 10.) Henry I caught something of his lady’s spirit. “The house of St. Bartholomew [Oxford] was founded by our lord old King Henry, who married the good queene Maud; and it was assigned for the receiving and susteyning of infirme leprose folk,” says Wood, quoting a thirteenth-century Inquisition. Henry endowed his friend Gundulf’s foundation at Rochester, and probably also “the king’s hospital” near Lincoln, which had possibly been begun by Bishop Remigius; that of Colchester was built by his steward p072 Eudo at his command, and was accounted of the king’s foundation. Matilda, daughter of Henry and Maud, left a benefaction to lepers at York.

King Stephen reconstructed St. Peter’s hospital, York, after a great fire. (Cf. Pl. XXIV, XXV.) His wife, Matilda of Boulogne, founded St. Katharine’s, London, which continues to this day under the patronage of the queens-consort. Henry II made considerable bequests for the benefit of lazars, but it is characteristic that his hospital building was in Anjou. Richard I endowed Bishop Glanvill’s foundation at Strood. King John is thought to have founded hospitals near Lancaster, Newbury and Bristol. He is sometimes regarded as the conspicuous patron of lepers. Doubtless this may be partly attributed to the fact that at the outset of his reign the Church secured privileges to outcasts by the Council of Westminster (1200). There seems, however, to be some ground for his charitable reputation. Bale, in his drama Kynge Johan, makes England say concerning this king:—

“Never prynce was there that made to poore peoples use

So many masendewes, hospytals and spyttle howses,

As your grace hath done yet sens the worlde began.”

· · · · · ·

“Gracyouse prouysyon for sore, sycke, halte and lame

He made in hys tyme, he made both in towne and cytie,

Grauntynge great lyberties for mayntenaunce of the same,

By markettes and fayers in places of notable name.

Great monymentes are in Yppeswych, Donwych and Berye,

Whych noteth hym to be a man of notable mercye.”[57]

Indeed, as the Suffolk satirist knew by local tradition, King John did grant the privilege of a fair to the lepers of Ipswich. p073

[♦] PLATE VI.

a. ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S, GLOUCESTER

b. ST. MARY’S, CHICHESTER

Henry III erected houses of charity at Woodstock, Dunwich and Ospringe, as well as homes for Jews in London and Oxford. He refounded St. John’s in the latter city, and laid the first stone himself; he seems also to have rebuilt St. John’s, Cambridge, and St. James’, Westminster. The king loved Gloucester—the place of his coronation—and he re-established St. Bartholomew’s, improving the buildings (Pl. VI) and endowment. The new hospitals of Dover and Basingstoke were committed to his care by their founders. Of Henry III’s charities only that of St. James’, Westminster, was for lepers; but St. Louis, who was with him while on crusade, told Joinville that on Holy Thursday (i.e. Maundy Thursday) the king of England “now with us” washes the feet of lepers and then kisses them. The ministry of the good queen Maud was thus carried on to the fifth generation.

If history tells how Maud cared for lepers and provided for them in St. Giles’, London, tradition relates that Adela of Louvain, the second wife of Henry I, was herself a leper, and that she built St. Giles’, Wilton. A Chantry Certificate reports that “Adulyce sometym quene of Englande” was the founder. The present inmates of the almshouse are naturally not a little puzzled by the modern inscription Hospitium S. Egidii Adelicia Reg. Hen. Fund. The local legend was formerly to be seen over the chapel door in a more intelligible and interesting form:—

“This hospitall of St. Giles was re-edified (1624) by John Towgood, maior of Wilton, and his brethren, adopted patrons thereof, by the gift of Queen Adelicia, wife unto King Henry p074 the First. This Adelicia was a leper. She had a windowe and dore from her lodgeing into the chancell of the chapel, whence she heard prayer. She lieth buried under a marble gravestone.”

Although in truth the widowed queen made a happy marriage with William d’Albini, and, when she died, was buried in an abbey in Flanders, she did endow a hospital at that royal manor—maybe to shelter one of her ladies, whose affliction might give rise to the tale of “the leprosy queen” and her ghost. When a person of rank became a leper, the terrible fact was not disclosed when concealment was possible. This is illustrated by another Wiltshire tradition—that of the endowment of the lazar-house at Maiden Bradley by one of the heiresses of Manser Bisset, dapifer of Henry II. The story is as old as Leland’s day; and Camden says that she “being herselfe a maiden infected with the leprosie, founded an house heere for maidens that were lepers, and endowed the same with her owne Patrimonie and Livetide.” Margaret Bisset was certainly free from all taint of leprosy in 1237, when she sought and gained permission to visit Eleanor of Brittany, the king’s cousin. She was well known at court at this time, and a Patent Roll entry of 1242 records that:—“At the petition of Margery Byset, the king has granted to the house of St. Matthew [sic], Bradeleg, and the infirm sisters thereof, for ever, five marks yearly . . . which he had before granted to the said Margery for life.” Another contemporary deed (among the Sarum Documents) may support the legend of the leper-lady. It sets forth how Margaret Bisset desired to lead a celibate and contemplative life; and therefore left her lands to the leper-hospital of Maiden Bradley on condition that she herself was maintained there. p075

Many famous churchmen, statesmen and warriors were hospital builders. Among the episcopal founders who figured prominently in public affairs were the following. Ranulf Flambard—“the most infamous prince of publicans” under William Rufus—founded Kepier hospital, Durham. The warlike Henry de Blois, half-brother of Stephen, erected St. Cross near Winchester. Hugh de Puiset, being, as Camden says, “very indulgently compassionate to Lepres,” gathered them into his asylum at Sherburn, but it is hinted that his bounty was not altogether honestly come by. Again, “the high-souled abbot” Sampson—he who dared to oppose Prince John and also visited Richard in captivity—was the founder of St. Saviour’s, at Bury St. Edmunds.

Even in the troublous days of Stephen there were barons who were tender towards the afflicted. William le Gros, lord of Holderness, was one of these. He was the founder of St. Mary Magdalene’s, Newton-by-Hedon, for a charter speaks of “the infirm whom William, Earl of Albemarle, placed there.” The Chartulary of Whitby relates how the earl—“a mighty man and of great prowess and power”—was wasting the eastern parts of Yorkshire. Nevertheless he “was a lover of the poor and especially of lepers and was accustomed to distribute freely to them large alms.” Abbot Benedict therefore bethought him of a plan whereby he might save the threatened cow-pastures of the abbey from devastation: he permitted the cattle belonging to the Whitby hospital to join the herds of the convent; consequently the earl was merciful to that place on account of the lepers, and the herds fed together henceforth undisturbed.

[♦ ] 11. THE TOMB OF RAHERE

(Founder and first prior of St. Bartholomew’s)

Another charitable lord was Ranulf de p076 Glanvill—“justiciary of the realm of England and the king’s eye”—who with his wife Berta founded a leper-hospital at West Somerton upon land granted to him by Henry II. His nephew Gilbert de Glanvill built St. Mary’s, Strood, near his cathedral city of Rochester (circa 1193); the loyal bishop declaring in his charter that it was founded amongst other things “for the reformation of Christianity in the Holy Land and for the liberation of Richard the illustrious king of England.” After the royal captive had been freed, he endowed his faithful friend’s foundation with seven hundred acres of land. Among the leading men of the day who built hospitals were Geoffrey Fitz-Peter and William Briwere, Peter des Roches and Hubert de Burgh, together with Hugh and Joceline of Wells. Yet another distinguished bishop of this period must be p077 mentioned, namely, Walter de Suffield, who was very liberal to the poor, especially in his city of Norwich. During his lifetime he established St. Giles’ and drew up its statutes. He directed that as often as any bishop of the See went by, he should enter and give his blessing to the sick, and that the occasion should be marked by special bounty. His will shows a most tender solicitude for the welfare of the house, which he commended to his successor and his executors.

Benefactors included not only men eminent in church and state, but “others of divers estates,” clerical and lay commoners. Foremost of these stands Rahere, born of low lineage, but court-minstrel and afterwards priest. In obedience to a vision, he determined to undertake the foundation of a hospital. He sought help from the Bishop of London, by whose influence he obtained from Henry I the site of St. Bartholomew’s, Smithfield. While many founders are forgotten, men delight to honour Rahere. The chronicler, who had talked with those who remembered him, records how he sympathized with the tribulation of the wretched, how he recognized their need, supported them patiently, and finally helped them on their way. Rahere’s character is delightfully portrayed in the Book of the Foundation:—