(5) Every scholar shall say daily the matins of Our Lady for himself, and on every festival day the Seven Psalms for the convent and our founders.”[519]
In the schedule of the almoner’s duties at St. Albans[520] it is stated that the almoner is responsible for the repair of the studies of the monks, and of the grammar schoolhouse in the town. He has also the right of appointing the master of grammar, subject to the approval of the archdeacon. He is entrusted with the general care and supervision of the boys, and for the payment of the stipend of the schoolmaster.
A description of the almonry school at Durham is given in the “Rites of Durham.”[521] This account states that “there were certain poor children called children of the Almery, who only were maintained with learning and relieved with the alms and benevolence of the whole house, having their meat and drink in a loft, on the north side of the abbey gate. And the said poor children went daily to school at the Farmary School, without the abbey gates; which school was founded by the prior of the said abbey, and at the charges of the said house.”
There is also a reference to this school in the Valor Ecclesiasticus[522] which mentions “De magno solario supra tenebatur scola.” The same authority tells us that there were thirty poor scholars who attended this school.
The duties commonly undertaken by the schoolmaster of the almonry boys may be gathered from the agreement entered into in 1515, between the abbot of the monastery of Gloucester and the schoolmaster he appointed. The agreement specified that the master was to “teach the art of grammar to all the youthful brethren of the monastery sent to him by the abbot, and thirteen boys of the clerk’s chambers; and shall teach and inform five or six or seven boys apt and ready to learn in plain song, divided or broken song and discant, sufficiently and diligently.” In addition, the schoolmaster was to sing and play the organ at the monastery services.[523]
Besides the almonry schools in connection with the monasteries at St. Albans, Durham, and Gloucester, to which we have referred, almonry schools have also been traced at Canterbury,[524] Reading,[525] Westminster,[526] Winchester,[527] Bardney,[528] Worcester,[529] St. Mary’s Abbey, York,[530] the Carthusian Monastery, Coventry,[531] Coventry Priory.[532]
The examples given support the probability that every monastery supported an almonry school. Admission to these schools was in some cases regarded as a valuable scholarship. This is evidenced by a letter which Queen Philippa wrote to the prior of Canterbury in 1332, and in which she asks for a boy to be admitted into the almonry “to be maintained like other poor scholars of his estate.”[533]
It would be an idle task to attempt to estimate the value of these almonry schools for national education. We do not possess any definite information as to the number of boys who were educated in this way at each monastery, neither do we know for certain the number of monasteries which provided these facilities. All we can really assert is, that a large majority of the chief monasteries provided board and residence and education for a number of children, who would otherwise be unable to obtain any education. These children would learn to sing and read, and would also master grammar to the extent necessary to proceed to the universities if they desired to do so.
Mr. G. C. Coulton warns us that there was a great temptation for the monastic authorities to neglect the almonry schools. He points out that, in 1520, the visitors found that Norwich Cathedral Priory had cut down its almonry scholars from thirteen to eight, and that in 1526 it was noted at Rushworth that “pueri in collegio non continue aluntur sumptibus collegii sed custodiunt pecora parentum nonnunquam.”[534]
III. The Education of Girls.