deacon of Northumberland ; Chancellor of York,
1410-26; and Dean of St. Mary's College, Norwich,
1405-26. He was also prominent in University affairs,
having already held the office of Chancellor for a year
at the time of his appointment to the mastership. He
retained the Chancellorship for seven years, a rather
unusual thing at that time, on account, we are told,
of his services during the violent dispute then existing
between the University and the town. Rickinghale
was a strenuous supporter of the privileges of his
own body.
He was, we may gather, a sturdy upholder of the
authority of the Church, and a personal friend of that
redoubtable warrior prelate, Henry de Spencer, Bishop
of Norwich. He was one of the assessors of the Bishop
in 1399, when William Chatris, or Sautre, renounced in
the church of the Hospital of St. John at Lynn the
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 15
reformed opinions for which he was subsequently burnt.
In his will Rickinghale leaves to the church of Thorpe
Abbotts a vestment which had belonged to Spencer
4 recolendae memoriae. 1
He was consecrated Bishop of Chichester at Mort-
lake Church, Surrey, June 3, 1426. He only survived
his elevation to this post three years, dying in the
summer of 1429, and was buried in his cathedral.
Rickinghale resigned the mastership on becoming
Bishop in 1426, and was succeeded by Thomas Atwood,
the sixth Master. To Atwood, or Wood, as he is
sometimes called, we owe a great deal, as it was
during his time, and largely through his exertions, that
the first distinctive College buildings were erected. Till
now nothing but the chapel had been added to the two
original houses acquired with the ground in 1354.
Those houses had doubtless been modified, but appa-
rently not added to. In them were lodged the Master
and the four Fellows, as well as the two or three
servitors, or poor students, who in colleges, as in
monasteries, occupied an intermediate position between
ordinary servants and members of the foundation. A
room must have been set apart for dining purposes,
and probably another as a library and treasury, but
during the first hundred years no funds for further
building were procurable.
An important addition was secured by Atwood's
aid. He was not improbably a Norwich man, and had
certainly several rich and powerful friends amongst the
merchants and Aldermen of that city. Two of these at
least are mentioned as helping him, viz., John Warwick
and John Preston. By their combined efforts the old
16 CAIUS COLLEGE
houses were joined to the chapel by a row of buildings,
thus constituting three sides of a court. These buildings
contained a hall at the north end, coinciding approxi-
mately with the present tutor's house ; a pair of rooms,
upper and lower, where our combination-room and
entrance porch now stand ; a library ; and, at the south
end, a Master's Lodge. This last coincided almost
exactly with the entrance passage, bedroom overhead,
and staircase of the present Master's Lodge. We have
described these positions somewhat carefully because
it must be understood that the buildings erected in
1441-44 are still in great part existent. In their case,
as in that of the chapel, little as those who walk
through the court may suppose it, the ancient walls
are still standing, though coated over with the ashlar
placed on them in 1754. The tutor's house really is
the old hall, which was divided up into sitting and
bed rooms when the new hall was built in 1854 ; even
the ancient beams of the roof are still to be seen in the
attics. The combination-room has been more altered ;
but when the present bow- window was made in 1870,
the original front, with its small windows, was dis-
closed under the stone facing. Similarly with the
library, of which the old front is doubtless standing.
The rooms over this library, probably intended for
students' accommodation, are now divided into servants'
bedrooms in the Master's Lodge, and the old roof-beams
may still be seen there. Nearly all of the old Master's
lodge has been converted, as already said, into an
entrance porch and staircase ; but the upper room over
the passage between the Gonville and Caius Courts, where
the Masters used to sleep, has been very little changed.
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 17
Small as some of these buildings were found to be
in lapse of time, they were not small for their date.
Indeed, they must have been designed by men who were
very hopeful as to the future, The hall was actually
in use till 1854, and must have been quite spacious
for the small assembly that used first to meet in it.
The library was perhaps intended to invite the gift of
new books, by offering such more than ample accom-
modation for what was already in possession.
All these buildings had windows which, though
small, were doubtless adorned with the arms of the
donors, and with inscriptions recording their names.
So, indeed, we are told by Dr. Caius, in whose time
most of them were still surviving. Similarly with the
hall, where the names seem still to have been displayed
in his day. It is a sad pity that these memorials of
the past, recalling as they did the student days of
prelates and scholars who more than four centuries
ago trod our courts and perused the volumes we still
possess, should have been lost. Unfortunately, that
callous indifference to the past which, when some
alteration becomes necessary in a building, will rather
throw away a window or a monument than take the
trouble to preserve it in some new position, is no pre-
rogative of the present day. The seventeenth century
was a worse offender in this way than ours, and it was
then that most of the destruction took place of what we
should now so highly value. Of all the many windows
which once adorned our buildings, there is not, it is
believed, with a single exception, to be hereafter
mentioned, a fragment now in existence.
At wood died early in 1456, having apparently re-
18 CAIUS COLLEGE
signed the mastership two years before. He held at
that time the living of Elsworth, near Cambridge. In
his will he desires to be buried there, and that a fair
marble monument should be erected in the chancel to
the memory of himself and his mother.
Thomas Boleyn, seventh master (1454-1472), belonged
to a family which was a typical specimen of a class
which was now beginning to rise into great importance
in English history. A young scion of decent stock,
sprung from the country, goes to London ; enters into
trade there ; acquires a fortune, and duly becomes
Sheriff and Lord Mayor ; purchases a mansion ; founds
a family ; is knighted or ennobled ; and marries into
the ancient nobility. This was, briefly, the history of
Jeffrey Boleyn, the brother of our Master. He, his
son, and his grandson, all made such marriages : the
marriage of his unfortunate great-grand-daughter Anne
is a part of English history.
Thomas Boleyn himself seems to have been originally
of Trinity Hall, of which College he was a Fellow at
the time of his ordination as priest in 1421. He was
initiated into public affairs whilst still a young man,
for in 1434 he obtained letters of protection abroad,
being about to accompany Edmund Beaufort, after-
wards Duke of Somerset, to the Council of Basle. His
subsequent advance in the Church, however, was not
so rapid as this might suggest. He was Rector of
Hackford, Norfolk, and a prebendary of Hereford and
afterwards of Wells ; and probably master of the
college at Maidstone. He was evidently also a
man of some note in the University, as he was one
of those to whom was entrusted the framing of the
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 19
statutes of Queens 1 College. He died in 1471 or
1472.
Edmund Sheriffe, eighth Master, only presided for
three years, namely, from 1472 to 1475. Short as his
rule was, the College owes him not a little, for, in
addition to leaving behind him the character of an able
and honest ruler, he was the first before Dr. Cams 1
time to show an interest in the preservation of our
records. He had transcripts made of many old deeds
and other documents, the originals of some of which
have since been lost. The volume is preserved in our
library, under the name of 4 SherinVs Evidences,' and
was the source whence Dr. Caius obtained many of the
early facts which he has recorded in his ' Annals. 1
Henry Costessey, or Cossey, ninth Master (1475-1483),
is of interest in connection with Gonville^s two founda-
tions at Rushworth and at Cambridge. He is the only
personal connecting link between the two colleges, as
he was elected to the former in 1472, and held both
until his death. It has been sometimes supposed by
those who did not understand the object of a secular
foundation for priests, such as that at Rushworth, that
Gonville must have been contemplating a sort of feeder
for his Cambridge house. This is quite a mistake.
The foundations were totally distinct, and that at
Rushworth had no primary connection whatever with
education or study. The duties of his priests there
were those of parish work and religious exercises.
With the exception of Costessey, we do not know
that the two colleges ever had a single member in
common.
Costessey, like Atwood, was well supported by some
20 CAIUS COLLEGE
of the Norwich citizens ; the village from which he
doubtless derived his name is but a few miles from the
city. Three prominent merchants, at least, gave their
aid, namely, John Droll, Richard Brown, and John
Aubrey. We record their names, not only out of
gratitude, but as illustration of how completely the
colleges in Cambridge had by now won the confidence
of leading citizens in what was then one of the first
commercial towns in England. All three were promi-
nent men. Droll and Aubrey were repeatedly Mayors
of the city, and each was chosen as its burgess in
Parliament; Brown was an Alderman, and afterwards
Sheriff. Between them they contributed the large sum
of about 360. By the deeds of gift it appears that
the money was spent in rebuilding Physwick Hostel,
enclosing the College with walls, making a stable and
fuel house, and providing hangings and tapestry for
the hall and the Master's chambers. Physwick Hostel
was built in somewhat grand style, with a gateway and
tower, and the building was used as a part of Trinity
College, when it was appropriated in 1546 by
Henry VIII. It was removed about 1585, when the
present great court was built. As regards the College
walls, most of those which were then built were stand-
ing till the middle of this century. One piece of them
still survives unchanged. It is the lofty wall of the
Master's garden, facing Trinity Hall, and deserves
recognition as the solid work provided for us by those
Norwich merchants 400 years ago.
About this time several important additions were
made to the College, both in respect to the buildings
and the endowments. The court, it will be remembered,
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 21
had still only three sides ; and, as the buildings on the
west side were all of a public kind, little or no addition
had yet been made to the accommodation for students.
The fourth side was due to the munificence of a wealthy
lady, Eli/abeth, widow of Robert Clere, of Ormesby,
of whose good deeds Dr. Caius (no admirer of her sex
in general) breaks into admiration, and calls her ' the
nurse and almost the mother' of the College. This
addition completed the court, the entrance to it being,
of course, from the present Trinity Lane. In its general
appearance it must have been somewhat similar to the
present old court of Corpus.
The endowments were also added to about this time
by the foundation of two fellowships, in addition to the
original four provided by Gonville or Bateman. One
of these was the gift of the above-mentioned lady,
Elizabeth Clere ; the other was provided by a parish
priest, Stephen Smith, Rector of Blonorton, Norfolk.
A Papal Bull issued by Sixtus IV., 1481, deserves
notice, as it helped to supply the College with what
was, relatively speaking, a very important class of
students, viz., that of young and promising monks from
the greater monasteries. We shall recur to this subject
again presently, as its importance in college and Uni-
versity history in the years before the Reformation is
often overlooked. It will suffice to say here that the
Pope now expressly granted permission to the monks
of the great Benedictine Priory of Norwich to study at
Gonville Hall and Trinity Hall, a permission of which,
as our books show, they soon began to avail themselves.
John Barly, tenth Master (1483-1504), was closely
connected with Norwich, a connection which, as in the
22 CAIUS COLLEGE
case of his predecessor, proved advantageous to the
College. He held successively the livings of Barningham
Winter, Mattishall (in the gift of the College), and
Winterton, before his election to the mastership.
During the last two or three years of his life he seems
to have resided in Norwich, where he was Rector of St.
Michael's Coslany, the advowson of which had not long
before come into possession of the College. He was a
friend of Robert Thorpe, one of the great merchants of
Norwich, and well known as the builder of the beautiful
Lady Chapel of St. Michael's. Thorpe founded a
chantry in this chapel, the patronage of which he left
to our College ; but, like other such endowments, this
was swept away at the Reformation. Whether at his
own cost, or aided by his rich friends, Barly found a
considerable sum for completing the walls with which
the College was enclosed.
Two events deserve notice during this period. One
of these was the foundation of our first scholarship in
the modern sense of that term. This demands a little
explanation. It must be remembered that in very early
times there was no distinction drawn between ' Fellows
and ' scholars. 1 The Fellows were often chosen when
very young. They had no undergraduates to look
after ; and their stipends were given to support them
whilst studying for the higher degrees. The only
persons in college who were under them were the few
servants, most of whom would now be described as sizar
students. As time went on, and a class of what might
now be called 'undergraduates' made its appearance,
the position of the Fellows assumed somewhat more of
authority, and scholarships began to be established.
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 23
The scholars were at first very commonly called < Bible-
clerks, 1 a name which still survives in Oxford, from
its being one of their duties to read the Latin Bible
during meal-time, according to the immemorial custom
of the monasteries. These were in every sense what
would be now called ' scholars ** ; for they were on the
foundation, were seldom at the time graduates, and
received their stipends to support them during their
time of study. The first of such scholarships in our
College was founded in 1501 by Thomas Willows, a
citizen and glover of Cambridge, two others following
almost immediately afterwards.
The other event was the obtaining of two Papal
Bulls. So marked was this favour, that a subsequent
Fellow of the College, Richard Parker, writing in the
days of James I., held that our College had been a
special favourite of the Popes presumably in re-
membrance of the services of Bishop Bateman. It
may have been so, but it is more likely that the favours
were due to the active interest of a Fellow of the
College, Thomas Cabold by name, who was at this
time at Rome in the service of Alexander VI., hold-
ing the important office of penitentiary. One of these
Bulls certainly conferred a special privilege on Gonville
Hall. It is well known that the Universities of Cam-
bridge and Oxford enjoyed the Papal permission to
send out annually twelve preachers into any diocese,
irrespective of the Bishop's license. What the Pope
now did was to give the same permission to our College
to send out two such preachers. I cannot find that any
similar favour was granted elsewhere. Another Bull,
dated May 16, 1500, granted permission to the students
24 CAIUS COLLEGE
dwelling in Physwick Hostel to attend our chapel,
instead of being obliged to attend the service at their
parish church of St. Michael. It also permitted burials
in the College chapel.
Barly died towards the beginning of the year 1505,
and was succeeded by Edmund Stubbe, who held the
office till 1513. He belonged to a good family, that
of the Stubbes of Scottow, whose pedigree and arms are
recorded in the Heralds' Visitation of the county. It
seems likely that he resided mostly in Norwich, where,
like his predecessor, he held the College living of St.
Michael Coslany. In his will he desires to be buried
in that church, to which he left a small endowment.
The stream of endowment was still flowing in, steadily
if not rapidly. One benefaction deserves notice here,
partly on account of the donor, partly because the
names in question are so familiar in modern Cambridge.
This was the gift of the Manor of Newnham, by Lady
Anne Scroop. Lady Scroop may be called the last of
the Gonvilles, her mother Jane being the daughter and
sole heiress of the great - grandson of Sir Nicholas,
Edmund's brother. She was herself a great heiress,
and was the widow, through her third marriage, of
Lord Scroop of Bolton. She gave the Manor of
Newnham, part of the ground belonging to which is
occupied by the present Scroop Terrace. As everyone
knows, the rights and customs connected with mills are
often of great complexity and immemorial antiquity.
There are two mills, on opposite sides of Sheep's Green,
the ' King's Mill ' by Queens' College, and the one in
question. The former was the older one, and had
first right to the use of the water from the river.
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 25
The rule under which the College held their mill was
as follows :
' That before the said mill of Newenham beginneth to
grind or go, the bailiff of the King's Mill . . . hath blown
his horn to warn the miller for the time being of the said
mill of Newenham. And before that, the said mill not to
grind . . . and to surcease of grinding after and upon blow r -
ing of the said horn/
William Buckenham, twelfth Master (1513-1536),
seems to have been an active and efficient administrator;
but he is best remembered by his work in the University.
He was Vice- Chancel lor in 1508 and 1509, and whilst
holding that office compiled a list of charters and deeds
affecting the interests of the University. He was also
employed as an arbitrator between the University and
the Priory of Barn well. In later years he retired to the
rectory of St. Michael Coslany in Norwich, where he
resigned the mastership, June 12, 1536. He continued
to live there for some years, and died June 18, 1540.
Dr. Caius has recorded a curious incident which
occurred during this period, namely, about 1521. As
he entered college only eight years afterwards, the
event must have been within the memory and experience
of many whom he knew. The reader has probably heard
of the bitterness and rivalry which often existed in those
days between the students who came from the North
and from the South of England. It was in order to
check this, and to prevent either party acquiring too
completely the upper hand, that regulations were some-
times made prohibiting more than a certain proportion
of the fellows being selected from either division, the
26 CAIUS COLLEGE
boundary line between the two being the river Trent.
The story that Caius records is that the students of
Gerard's Hostel, who mostly belonged to the Northern
faction, made a determined assault upon Gonville Hall,
which was almost entirely Southern. Gerard's Hostel
the name still survives in Garrett Hostel Lane stood
exactly opposite the small back-gate of our College, on
part of the ground where Bishop's Hostel, in Trinity,
now stands. With the laudable wish, perhaps, not to
let his students incur risks which he was not prepared
to run himself, William Tayte, the Master or Principal
of Garrett's Hostel, headed the assault. They burnt
the gate and proceeded to sack the College, poured out
all the liquor they could find in the buttery, and but
for the promptitude of the butler, who hid the silver in
the well, would have appropriated this. Tayte in after-
days became a Canon of Windsor. Perhaps this migra-
tion southwards gave his sympathies a similar shift ; at
any rate, Caius assures us that in after-life he showed
his penitence for the wrong he had done us by leaving
many books to our library.
One bequest made at this time deserves record.
Feudal tenures and forms were not yet so entirely
extinct as to make cash payments universal, but never-
theless one legacy of a country squire in 1513 is, we
think, exceptional. John Lestrange of Massingham
left by will ' seven hundred ewes going at East Lexham,
and three hundred lambs ... to be delivered to the
Master and fellows at midsummer.' The College, in
return, bound itself, under its common seal, to pray for
the soul of John Lestrange himself, ' his wife, his father
and mother, his both brothers, his father-in-law, and
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 27
for the souls of all his benefactors and all good Christian
souls. 1 This kind of reciprocity is a common feature
in most of the charitable foundations of the Middle
Ages.
As the period roughly indicated as the medieval is
here drawing to a close, it may be convenient to gather
up the materials as well as we can, even at the risk of
repetition, in order to form some conception of the
character, material and social, of the College at the
stage we have now reached. Gonville Hall ranked as
a small college even in those days, when Trinity was
yet to be founded, and St. John's was only at the com-
mencement of its career. It consisted of a single court.
On the north side were the two old stone buildings,
dating probably from Norman days. To the east was the
comparatively new row of chambers built by Elizabeth
Clere. To the west were the hall and library. On the
south was the chapel. The ancient houses were of
stone, the rest of the buildings probably of brick and
clunch, or, it may be, faced with plaster. Though built
without the slightest pretence to grandeur, or even
beauty, the size of the buildings was ample for the
demands then made on them. The chapel and the
hall could not have been more than a quarter filled ;
the library had accommodation for tenfold its then
contents. The total number of residents in the College
was probably about thirty. They consisted of the
Master and seven or eight fellows, of whom most would
be clergy, of two or three scholars, three or four
servants, themselves mostly poor students, and from
twelve to twenty occasional residents termed 'pen-
sioners, 1 who will be described presently. These were
28 CAIUS COLLEGE
crowded, as we should now consider it, into ten or
twelve chambers, each ' chamber, 1 it must be remem-
bered, consisting only of a single room in which the
occupants both lived and slept. Several, of course,
dwelt in the same room ; somewhat later, in Elizabethan
times, the rule was made that not more than four
students should be accommodated in the room with their
tutor. This was when the numbers were somewhat
swollen ; early in the sixteenth century the pressure,
probably, was not so great.
The only regular entrance passage to the College
was from Trinity Lane, then called St. Michael's Lane.
Facing it, to the north, were Michael House and
Phys wick's Hostel, separated by the lane, which was
always in a filthy condition, and sometimes so bad that,
as in the days of Richard II., the King himself was
appealed to in order to check the ' horror abominabilis '
with which students were struck on their way to the
schools. Facing the west side were Gerard's Hostel
and Trinity Hall. The present Tree Court was
occupied with houses and small gardens, separated from
the College by a high wall. One of these houses had
been the rectory of St. Michael's, and was now (1520-30)
the residence of John Siberch, the University printer,
known as the friend and publisher of Erasmus. To
the south, where the Senate House stands, was then a
mass of town houses which covered all the now open
space opposite St. Mary's. The present Senate House
passage only extended from Trinity Hall as far as
where our Gate of Honour now stands. Here it turned
off to the right, and led, amongst the houses, to the
public schools, which had already long been built. At
THE MEDIEVAL QUIET 29
the point where it stopped and thus turned off was
St. Mary's Hostel, with a small garden. This is worth
noticing, because it explains the appearance of bricked-