“Who say that on the Sunday next after the Feast of St. Matthew the Apostle (September 21), the said Matthew was going from Bradestrete towards the Jewry, and when he had reached midway between the lane called ‘Isemongere Lane,’ and the Guildhall of London, there met him certain Jews, Abraham de Derkynge, Isaac de Canterbury, and Cresse, son of Isaac de Lynton. And upon so meeting him, Abraham before-named, of malice aforethought, took the said Matthew by the shoulder, and threw him in the mud; and upon his attempting to rise, Isaac before-mentioned struck the said Matthew with a certain anelace Nothing is said as to the trial of Abraham, Isaac, and Cresse. It was reported that one Gilbert Clope was lying dead on a quay near the Tower. Gilbert was not quite right in his mind. One says he was leaning against a certain wall on London Bridge, and apparently fell asleep, his head and body projecting over the Bridge, so that he fell in and was drowned. Henry de Lanfare met his death in a very singular manner:— “One Richard de Codesfold having fled to the Church of St. Mary Stanigeslane in London, by reason of a certain robbery being by one William de London, cutler, imputed to him, and the same William pursuing him on his flight thereto; it so happened that on the night following the Day of the Invention of the Holy Cross (May 5) in the present year, there being many persons watching about the church aforesaid, to take him, in case he should come out, a certain Henry de Lanfare, ironmonger, one of the persons on the watch, hearing a noise in the church, and thence fearing that the same Richard was about to get out by another part of the church, and so escape through a breach that there was in a certain glass window therein, went to examine it. The said Richard and one Thomas, the then clerk of that church, perceiving this, the said Thomas, seizing a lance, without an iron head, struck at Henry before-mentioned through the hole in the window, and wounded him between the nose and the eye, penetrating almost to the brain. From the effects of which wound he languished until the Day of St. Dunstan (May 19), when he died, at about the third hour. They say also, that as well the said Richard as Thomas before-mentioned are guilty of that felony, seeing that Richard was consenting thereto.” “And the said Thomas was taken, and imprisoned in Newgate, and afterwards delivered before Hamon Haweteyn, Justiciar of Newgate. And the said Richard still keeps himself within the church before-named. Being asked if they hold any more persons suspected as to that death, they say they do not. They have no lands or chattels. And the body was viewed, upon which no other injury or wound was found, save only the wound aforesaid.” The last of these historiettes is the story of Godfrey de Belstede and the manner of his death:— “The before-named Godfrey, on the Day of St. Bartholomew (August 24) last past, was coming from Cestrehunte (Cheshunt) towards London, mounted on a hackney, hired of a certain man of that village, as they believe, but as to whose name and person they are ignorant, and having one Richard le Lacir in his company, they met certain carters coming from London, with three carts, but as to the names and persons of whom they are altogether ignorant. Whereupon, one of the carters aforesaid began most shamefully to abuse the said Godfrey, for riding the said hackney so fast, and a dispute arose between Godfrey and the said Richard, on the one side, and the said carters on the other, one of the carters seizing with his hands a certain iron fork, struck Godfrey upon the crown of his head, with such force, as to inflict a wound two inches in length, and penetrating almost to the brain. The other carters also badly beat him all over the body with sticks, and maltreated both him and the said Richard le Lacir; so much so, that the latter hardly escaped with his life. Godfrey before-named survived from the Day of St. Bartholomew to the Thursday before-mentioned, languishing from the wound and beating aforesaid; and on that day, at about the third hour, he died. And the body was viewed: upon which was seen the wound aforesaid, and it appeared altogether disfigured from the beating before-mentioned.”[CHAPTER XIV]
CHRISTIAN NAMES AND SURNAMES