The arrangements for the new foundation were of the most elaborate character. For his own guidance Islip found it necessary to summarise the long indenture made between the King and himself. Apart from the worship in the chapel itself Henry VII. was to be remembered daily both at the high mass and the Chapter mass. Ultimately the masses in the King’s chapel were to be said only by bachelors or doctors of divinity, though the Abbot, Prior, and Monk-Bailiff were to be excused this qualification.
Accordingly the Abbot was bidden to cause the Oxford students of his monastery to take these degrees as soon as might be and within three months thereafter to appoint them to the service of the King’s masses. Three additional monks above the present number of the monastery were to be acquired and placed on the new foundation to say each a mass daily for the King’s welfare in life and death. These three masses were to be said at the altar “under the lantern place� until the chapel should be ready. The greatest bell was to be rung for forty strokes or above a quarter of an hour before each of these masses and from noon till one o’clock before the preaching of certain “solemne sermondis� appointed for various feasts and fasts. Once a year every priest in the monastery was to say a mass of requiem with special collects and every lay-brother the psalter of David or our Lady. Needless to say the most elaborate directions were given as to tapers and torches. Various officials of the kingdom such as the Chancellor, Treasurer, Master of the Rolls, Barons of the Exchequer and Justices of the Benches were to receive fees if they attended the anniversary. So too the Mayor of London, the Recorder and Sheriffs, for whom the costs of their barges were to be defrayed. In default of attendance the fees were to go to the prisoners in the King’s Bench or “mareschalsy.� A weekly distribution of alms was provided for and an almshouse for thirteen poor men founded. Some nineteen other monastic or collegiate foundations were to receive fees from the Abbot of Westminster for the performance of services, as well as the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, Masters, and scholars of both universities. It would be tedious to follow Islip’s summary of the duties in any more elaborate detail and it must suffice to add that specific forfeitures of money were prescribed for the neglect of any article contained therein.
To meet all these expenses the King’s endowment was generous. The Deanery of St. Martin-le-Grand, the Priory of Luffield, various manors and advowsons formed substantial gifts, while a sum of more than five thousand pounds in money was made over for the purchase of other estates. In the Orde MS. there is the entry of a payment of thirty thousand pounds for the purchase of lands for the King’s new chapel, but it is not possible to verify the accuracy of what is only a transcript from the privy purse expenses of the King. The same manuscript records in seventeen different items the payment of £9,844 18s. 3d. to the Abbot of Westminster for the carrying on of the building between October 1st, 1502, and May 20th, 1505. A number of entries in the King’s Books of Payments (Treasury of Receipts) beginning in January, 1506, amount to more than £11,188, and so the total expenditure on the new building was certainly more than twenty-one thousand pounds. The last entry occurs on April 15th, 1509, about a week before the King died. It would appear to be a final payment for it refers to the accomplishment and performing of the chapel, while no entries of payments occur in the succeeding book. It is unfortunate that it is not at present possible to do much more than note the cost of the chapel and the years occupied in the building, for the “reckonings� which were presented by Islip from time to time for the royal approval do not appear, though all probable sources have been searched.
Islip would seem to have been the general supervisor of the works and responsible for the disbursement of the money, but the building itself was carried on under the direction of the royal workmen. One problem of the greatest interest remains unsolved, and that is the identity of the master-mason or architect who made the original design and plan of the chapel. Among the names suggested have been John Alcock, Bishop of Ely from 1486 to 1501; Sir Reginald Bray; Richard Fox, Bishop of Winchester from 1501 to 1528, and even the King himself. Mr. Lethaby[4] assumes that there can be no doubt that Robert Vertue, the senior royal mason, was the architect, but in the absence of evidence the matter must remain unsolved. It is to be noted that the only person mentioned in the directions as to the chapel given in the will of Henry VII. is the Prior of St. Bartholomew’s, Smithfield, who is described there as the master of the works of the said chapel. The reference is of course to Bolton who was Prior from 1505 to 1532 and whose work in his own church may still be seen. Stow refers to him as a great builder and in any discussion as to the identity of the architect his name must not be forgotten.
Mention has been already made[5] of the “brassen� chapel or chapel within the grille surrounding the tomb of Henry VII. One reference to this occurs in the Exchequer Accounts of September, 1505, where a payment is recorded of twenty pounds to “Thomas Ducheman Smith� for copper-work for the “chapell of metal� at Westminster. This chapel is said to have been called St. Saviour’s, while the high altar of the new building retained its dedication to the Blessed Virgin. The dedications of the chapels in the apse cannot be determined with certainty, but among them may well be St. Dionysius, St. Ursula and St. Giles, for chapels in honour of these find mention in the Sub-sacrist’s roll for the year ending at Michaelmas, 1524. If the last-named chapel may be identified with “or ffather Abbottes Chappell wt. in the new chapell� for which the Sub-sacrist was wont to supply six candles a year, there would be some slight additional reason for supposing that Islip’s family name was Giles.
The work of Torregiano in connection with the tomb of the royal founder is too well known to call for additional record.
The devotion of the Jesus mass, which began to be popular towards the close of the fifteenth century, was in vogue at Westminster some years before the actual erection of the Jesus Chapel. For instance, in an indenture made between the Countess of Richmond and the Abbot and Convent in the year 1506 it was agreed that when her chapel was ready an altar should be erected there in honour of the Holy Name and the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin, and that among the masses said there should be a Jesus mass every Friday.
It does not appear when the Jesus Chapel, now commonly known as the Islip chantry, was built. Its accounts, if they survive, are so inextricably mixed up with those of building in other parts of the church that it is impossible to separate them. We have, however, hints here and there which suggest that it followed closely upon the completion of the chapel of Henry VII. It is certain that the Jesus Chapel was in use before it was actually finished, for the Sub-sacrist notes the provision of pound tapers to be burnt there at Christmas, 1523, while two years later there is a record in the Novum Opus roll of a payment for carving in the chapel. The final decoration was not completed until 1530, when Master Humfrey received the last instalment of the money owing to him for “payntyng uppon the wall in Ihs Chappell� and for some further work in connection with the Five Wounds which John Ellys had made for the stairs. The Islip roll gives some faint indication of the painted Crucifixion on the eastern walls above the altars and shews also the medallion of the head of our Lord on the outer side of the western parapet. There is record that weekly masses were said for Islip after his death and these would naturally be performed in the chapel where he lay buried, so that Islip’s chantry is a fitting description of it; but it is to be regretted that its earlier name and dedication should be relatively forgotten.
The completion of the nave and the building of this chapel do not form the whole tale of work for which Islip was directly responsible. The same document which records the payment for painting of the Jesus Chapel refers to my lordes chapell at Chenygates. On the northern side of the courtyard over part of the substructure of Abbot Litlyngton he built a set of rooms of two storeys and continued the building round the side of the south-west tower, making a window into the nave of the church. The whole of course forms a private part of the present Deanery, but the panelled chamber called Jericho Parlour which looks on to the courtyard is well enough known. The chapel at Cheynygates has been identified with a chamber on the upper floor built in between the tower and the first buttress of the nave.
In addition to the work in connection with the Abbey church and his own house Islip was called upon in 1518 to undertake the rebuilding of the chancel of St. Margaret’s Church, of which the Convent took the rectorial tithes. The rebuilding of that church had already occupied some years of the previous century but had been carried on with a view to the least possible disturbance of parochial worship. The nave was completed before Islip was required to rebuild the chancel. It was work which he could not neglect, for the King had made a special grant of land to facilitate the extension of the church. In justice to him it must be mentioned that there is no evidence to shew that he desired to escape his responsibilities. When in 1905 the chancel was still further extended the demolition of the east wall revealed two stones bearing Islip’s rebus with which in some of its varying forms the visitor to the Abbey church is familiar. These stones may still be seen incorporated into the east wall of the chancel of St. Margaret’s and in fact their pattern has been multiplied in the frieze of the wooden panelling.