The kings would be likely to set the example. They were accustomed to divide their time among their principal estates. Aidan’s head-quarters were at Lindisfarne, but he had also a church and chamber at Bamborough, the chief residence of the Northumbrian kings; and, if we rightly understand Bede’s words,[37] he had a church and chamber at other of the principal houses, where the king and his court used to live for months together. It would be natural that the king should provide for the permanent residence of a priest to serve each of these royal chapels, for the well-being of the people on the several royal estates; and the subsequent history of royal free chapels confirms the conjecture that he did so. The great landowners would be among the first to follow the king’s example; and we find some evidence of it in an incidental notice by Bede[38] of the consecration by St. John of Beverley (705-718), then Bishop of Hexham, of a church at South Burton, in Yorkshire, for the Ealdorman Puch, and another at North Burton, in the same county, for Addi the Ealdorman. What Puch and Addi were doing on their estates, probably others of the great Thanes were also doing, though no marvel occurred at the consecration of these other churches to lead the historian to mention them.
House of a Saxon nobleman. The hall in the middle, the church on the right hand.
The nobleman and his wife are distributing alms to the poor. From Harl. MS. 603.
Not only kings and nobles, but the bishops themselves, and the great monasteries with outlying estates, would naturally make provision for the religious interests of the people dependent upon them. In the south we gather from the canons of Clovesho, in 747, that the collegiate and conventual bodies had erected churches on their outlying estates, and that the lands of the lay proprietors had been divided into districts by the bishops, and committed to the care of resident priests.
A letter written by Bede, the most learned and most revered Churchman of the time, to Egbert, on his consecration to the See of York, is a very valuable piece of evidence as to the condition of the Church in the north at that point of time (734). We learn first that the discipline of the monasteries had become lax. Many reeves had obtained land under pretext of founding a monastery, and under that pretext claimed freedom for their land from state burdens, and called themselves abbots, but were living with their wives and families, and servants, very much like other lay folk, and handing down their abbeys as hereditary fees. He says that there are towns and hamlets in the most inaccessible places which are taxed for the support of a bishop—an early notice of the general payment of tithe—but never see one, and are moreover without any resident teacher or minister—which implies that towns and hamlets in more accessible places have a resident minister, and are visited by a bishop for confirmation. The venerable old man gives advice to the youthful prelate for the mitigation of the evils which he points out. He advises him to obtain the fulfilment of the original plan of Gregory the Great, viz. the formation of the churches north of the Humber into a northern province, with York as the metropolitan see, and to obtain the king’s leave to subdivide the northern dioceses to the number of twelve in all, using some of the monasteries of whose decadence he complains for the new episcopal sees; he exhorts him to ordain more priests to preach and administer the sacraments in every village; and, lastly, he suggests the translation of the Creed and Our Father out of Latin into English for the instruction of the people.
Egbert followed Bede’s advice so far as to obtain his recognition as archbishop of the second province which embraced the country north of the Humber, with York as its metropolitan see; but he did not procure the subdivision of the existing dioceses. He did, however, accomplish a great work by raising the schools of York to such an eminence in learning and religion that they were famous throughout Europe. The schools of Wessex, under Aldhelm, rivalled those of Northumbria; the clergy generally could hardly fail to be influenced by the spirit of these great centres.
Meantime churches were being built, and rectors of them settled upon the estates of the landowners. The seventh canon of Graetley, 928, in the reign of Athelstan, dealing with the question of penance for perjury, directs that the parish priest, sacerdos loci illius, is to certify the bishop as to the penitent’s behaviour; which implies that local priests were sufficiently widely scattered to keep in view every member of the small population.
The Parish Priest was not merely one who ministered in spiritual things to those who chose to accept his ministrations, he had ecclesiastical jurisdiction over a definite territory and over all who dwelt within it. Just as the jurisdiction of the heptarchic bishops extended over the kingdoms, so in the parish the jurisdiction of the priest was conterminous with the estate of the lord or thane who invited the priest to minister to himself and his people.
Some of these estates were very extensive, comprising vast tracts of forest and waste around the cultivated land, and therefore some of the parishes were of great extent. Probably the parish priest, in addition to his work in the principal village, would also partially adopt the old system of itinerant mission work by visiting remote hamlets within his jurisdiction at certain times for the preaching of the Word and celebration of Divine worship. It is certain that at a very early period in the history of parishes the rector was assisted by chaplains in the maintenance of the frequent services of the mother church and in the visitation of the people.