[1466] V.C.H. Beds. I, p. 389.
[1467] Alnwick’s Visit. MS. f. 39d. Compare the case of Thomas de Raynevill who in 1324 was ordered, as penance for seducing a nun of Hampole, to stand on a Sunday, while high mass was being celebrated, in the conventual church of Hampole, bareheaded, wearing only his tunic and holding a lighted taper of one pound weight of wax in his hand, which he was to offer, after the offertory had been said, to the celebrant, who was to explain to the congregation the cause of the oblation. Also on feast days he was to be beaten round the parish church of Campsall. But two years later the Archbishop was still repeating directions for the performance of the penance. V.C.H. Yorks. III, p. 164.
[1468] From Nunkeeling to Yedingham (1444); from Arthington to Yedingham (1310); from St Clement’s, York, to Yedingham (1331); from Basedale to Sinningthwaite (1308); from Hampole to Swine (1313); four disobedient nuns of Keldholme to Handale, Swine, Nunappleton and Wallingwells respectively (1308); and two others to Esholt and Nunkeeling (1309); from Nunappleton to Basedale (1308); from Rosedale to Handale (1321); from Swine to Wykeham (1291); from Wykeham to Nunappleton (1444); from Arthington to Nunkeeling (1219). V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 121, 127, 130, 159, 163-4, 168, 171, 175, 180, 183, 189. Also from Kirklees to Hampole (1323) and from Basedale to Rosedale (1534). Yorks. Arch. Journ. XVI, pp. 362, 431-3.
[1469] V.C.H. Suffolk, II, p. 84.
[1470] See for instance the insistence on costs and charges in Archbishop Lee’s letter transferring Joan Fletcher, ex-Prioress of Basedale, from Rosedale where she was doing (or not doing) her penance, back to Basedale again. Loc. cit. pp. 431-3.
[1471] Joan Trimelet of Cannington was to be shut up for a year, fasting thrice a week on bread and water, suos calores macerans juveniles. Dugdale, Mon. IV, p. 416. Margaret de Tang of Arthington was “if need be to be bound by the foot with a shackle, but without hurting her limbs or body.” V.C.H. Yorks. III, p. 189. The runaway Agnes de Flixthorpe was similarly to be bound, see above, p. [444]; Anne Talke was imprisoned for a month. Liveing, Records of Romsey Abbey, p. 244. Joan Hutton of Esholt, who had had a child (1535), for two years unless the Archbishop relaxed her penance. Yorks. Arch. Journ. XVI. p. 453.
[1472] Yorks. Arch. Journ. XVI, pp. 456-7. The recorded penances given by Archbishop Melton are all very severe, though it must be admitted that the state of the nunneries in his diocese gave him cause for severity and that the penitents were all hardened sinners. Compare penances given by him in V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 175, 189. There is an extremely severe penance imposed by Archbishop Zouche on a nun who had several times run away from Thicket, ib. p. 124, and another by Archbishop Lee in 1535 cited in the last note.
[1473] Jessopp, Visit. in Dioc. Norwich, p. 110.
[1474] V.C.H. Suffolk, II, p. 84.
[1475] “Expresse inhibentes, ne infuturum aliqua monialis de crimine incontinencie conuicta vel publice diffamata, antequam de innocencia sic diffamate constiterit, ad aliquod officium domus predicte et precipue ad ostiorum custodiam admittatur.” Lambeth, Reg. Courtenay, I, f. 336. Injunction to Elstow in 1390 and repeated by Bishop Flemyng in 1421. See above, p. [396]. Compare the charge against Margaret Fairfax, Prioress of Nunmonkton, in 1397: “Item, moniales quae lapsae fuerint in fornicatione faciliter restituit.” Dugdale, Mon. IV, p. 194.