The Grey Friars in Oxford

by A. G. Little

‘Three things,’ said Friar Albert, Minister General, ‘tended to the exaltation of the Order,—bare feet, coarse garments, and the rejecting of money[23]’; and the Oxford Franciscans were as zealous in the last respect as in the other two. The Archdeacon of Northampton sent a bag of money to Friar Adam Marsh, and when the latter refused it, the messenger threw it down in the cell and left it:—

‘Wherefore,’ writes Adam to the Archdeacon, ‘the bearer of these presents has at the instance of the brethren taken the said money, just as it was, sealed with your seal, to your lordship, to dispose of according to your pleasure[24].’

The evidence of the Public Records, containing scattered notices of grants from the Crown, is striking on this point, and the poverty of these early Franciscans can hardly be better illustrated than by the means taken to relieve it. During the long reign of Henry III, the Patent, Close, and Liberate Rolls contain only three grants of money to the house of the Minorites at Oxford, and all of them are due to exceptional circumstances. They are, ten marks for the support of a provincial chapter in 1238, 60s. for their houses in 1245 in lieu of six oaks which the king had before given them, and three marks for the fabric of their church in 1246[25]. The alms to the house at Oxford are almost wholly in kind, and consist chiefly of supplies of firewood from the royal forests round Oxford. The earliest recorded instance of royal bounty was a grant of thirteen oaks in ‘Brehull’ (Brill) forest for fuel on the 9th Jan. 1231[26]. A few years later they received fifteen cartloads of brushwood from Shotover forest[27], and in 1237 fifteen oaks in Wychwood Forest ‘to make charcoal[28].’ Similar notices occur almost every year—sometimes twice a year—throughout the reign of Henry III[29]. In 1240 the keepers of the wines at Southampton were ordered to deliver one cask of Gascon wine, of the king’s bounty, to the Friars Minors at Oxford ‘to celebrate masses[30].’ In 1248 the Sheriff of Oxford received orders to

‘give to the Friars Minors of Oxford one cask of wine of the six casks which he took into the king’s hand of the wine of those who lately killed a clerk in the town of Oxford[31].’

But a fortnight later the king repented of his generosity and assigned the same cask to one of his numerous relatives[32]. Of more interest, as showing that the friars were really classed with the poor of the town, is a royal brief of the 12th of Dec. 1244 to the bailiffs of Oxford, bidding them

‘give of the ferm of their town to Friar Roger, King’s Almoner, on Wednesday the morrow of the feast of St. Lucy the Virgin, ten marks, to feed a thousand paupers and the Friars Preachers and Minors of Oxford, for the soul of the Lady Empress sister of the King, on the day of her anniversary[33].’

With all their poverty and holiness they were singularly free from that form of piety which consists in wearing a sad countenance and appearing unto men to fast. We hear indeed of strict silence, of constant prayer, of vigils that lasted the whole night[34].

‘Yet,’ continues Eccleston[35], ‘the brethren were so full of fun among themselves, that a mute could hardly refrain from laughter at the sight. So when the young friars of Oxford laughed too frequently, it was enjoined on one that as often as he laughed he should be punished. Now it happened that, when he had received no punishments in one day, and yet could not restrain himself from laughing, he had a vision one night, that the whole convent stood as usual in the choir, and the friars were beginning to laugh as usual, and behold the crucifix which stood at the door of the choir turned towards them as though alive, and said: “They are the sons of Corah who in the hour of chanting laugh and sleep.”... On hearing this dream, the friars were frightened and behaved without very noticeable laughter[36].’

Grostete said to a Friar Preacher, ‘Three things are necessary to temporal health—to eat, sleep, and be merry[37].’ Excessive austerity was discountenanced by the authorities of the Oxford convent. Friar Albert of Pisa, who was himself ‘always cheerful and merry in the society of the brethren[38],’ compelled Friar Eustace de Merc, contrary to custom, to eat fish, saying that the Order lost many good persons through their indiscretion[39]. Grostete again

‘commanded a melancholy friar to drink a cup full of the best wine as a penance, and when he had drunk it up, though most unwillingly, he said to him, “Dear brother, if you often performed a penance like that, you would have a better ordered conscience[40].”’