[189] “Chronica Monasterii de Melsa,” Rolls Series, ii. 275.
[190] “Rolls of Parliament,” vol. ii. p. 201 (22 E. III, 1348).
[191] Ibid., vol. ii. p. 165.
[192] Earliest reference in England: that in the laws of Ethelbert, King of Kent, later part of the sixth century, where it is said that “the penalty for violation of church frith is to be twice that exacted for an ordinary breach of peace.” Trenholme, “The Right of Sanctuary in England,” University of Missouri Studies, 1903, p. 11.
[193] Trenholme, as above, p. 48.
[194] R. W. Billings, “Architectural Illustrations . . . of the Church at Durham,” London, 1843, p. 20.
[195] “Erant hujusmodi cathedrarum multæ in Anglia . . . Beverlaci autem celeberrima, quæ priscorum regum benignitate (puta Æthelstani vel alterius cujuspiam) asyli nacta privilegium, tali honestabatur inscriptione: ‘Hæc sedes lapidea Freedstoll dicitur, i.e. pacis cathedra, ad quam reus fugiendo perveniens, omnimodam habet securitatem.’” H. Spelman, “Glossarium Archaiologicum,” 3rd ed., London, 1687, p. 248.
[196] Though every consecrated place was a sanctuary, some of them afforded far more safety than others, the penalties for abductors being much greater. A list of the safest of the English sanctuaries is in S. Pegge, “A Sketch of the History of the Asylum or Sanctuary,” in “Archæologia,” 1787, vol. viii. p. 41.
[197] “Brevis annotatio Ricardi, prioris Hagustaldensis ecclesiæ de antiquo et moderno statu ejusdem ecclesiæ,” ed. Raine, “The priory of Hexham,” Surtees Society, 1864–5, 2 vols. illustrated, i. 62. The prior has also a chapter v, “De pace inviolabili per unum milliare circumquaque ipsius ecclesiæ,” p. 19, and a chapter xiv on the privileges, granted by the king, to the Hexham Sanctuary, p. 61.
[198] Raine, as above, II, p. lxiv. Wright’s “Essay” appeared in 1823.