[697] Liveing, Records of Romsey Abbey, p. 98. Similarly Bishop Edyndon wrote in 1346 and again in 1363 to St Mary’s Winchester, Wherwell and Romsey, forbidding them to take a greater number of nuns than was anciently accustomed or than could be sustained by them without penury. Ib. p. 165.
[698] V.C.H. Dorset, II, p. 77. Nevertheless at Romsey and at Shaftesbury the King and the Bishop himself continued to “dump” nuns, in accordance with their prerogative right, throughout the career of both houses. In the six years following this prohibition of 1326 Bishop Stratford not only gave permission for a novice to be received at the nuns’ own request, but deposited no less than three there himself. The words and the actions of bishops sometimes tallied ill.
[699] See V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 113, 117, 119, 120, 124, 161, 163, 171-2, 188; Reg. of Archbishop Giffard (Surtees Soc.), p. 148; Reg. of Archbishop Wickwane (Surtees Soc.), pp. 112, 113, 140-1.
[700] Reg. Giffard, loc. cit.
[701] V.C.H. Yorks. III, p. 117.
[702] Ib. III, p. 163. The house was heavily in debt at the time and though the Bishop had forbidden the granting of corrodies and liveries without leave, the Prioress was also charged with having “sold or granted corrodies very burdensome to the house.”
[703] Heynings, Ankerwyke, Legbourne, Nuncoton, St Michael’s Stamford, Gracedieu, Langley.
[704] Linc. Visit. II, p. 134.
[705] Alnwick’s Visit. MS. ff. 71d, 77d.
[706] It would be interesting to collect statistics as to the relative size of different nunneries at different periods. It is here possible to give only a few examples of the decline in the number of inmates. The numbers at Nuneaton varied as follows: 93 (1234), 80 (1328), 46 (1370), 40 (1459), 23 (1539). (V.C.H. Warwick. II, pp. 66-9.) At Romsey (where the statutory number was supposed to be 100) as follows: 91 (1333) and 26 (from 1478 to the Dissolution). (Liveing, Records of Romsey Abbey, passim.) At Shaftesbury as follows: forbidden to receive more than 100 in 1218 and in 1322; number fixed at 120 in 1326; between 50-57 (from 1441 to the Dissolution). V.C.H. Dorset, II, p. 77.