The year 1319

 Summary. In 1319, 76-year-old Bishop Walter de Langton visited Lychefeld to see projects he had funded. The fortified Close now had a magnificent palace. The cathedral was being extended. Chad’s new shrine needed consecrating.

Prior to 1319

Walter de Langton was born in the village of either West Langton[1] or Church Langton, Leicestershire, in 1243. He said his father was Simon Peverel, [2]  whose family had ruled from Peveril Castle in Derbyshire, since 1066. The Peverels had family links to landowners in Dudley, Tutbury and Northamptonshire. Family members were in the church; an uncle had been Dean of York in 1262 and then elected archbishop in 1265 only for it to be rejected by the pope. In 1281–2, Walter became the clerk of the wardrobe in Edward I’s royal chancery, and in 1290 was made Bishop of Ely and then keeper of the wardrobe. During this time, he obtained many ecclesiastical preferment's, making him rich. Langton had been clerk to Robert Burnell, Bishop of Bath and Wells and treasurer of the exchequer, and in 1295, he succeeded to the post of treasurer and retained it until 1307, bringing him more wealth. In 1296, he became Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, [3] with his enthronement delayed until 1299. He now used his considerable wealth to enhance the approaches to the cathedral, the cathedral, and The Close.[4]

AI enhanced statue of Walter de Langton from the middle tier, right side, of the west front.

There was another side to his rise in power. In 1307, he was accused of committing adultery over two years with the wife of Sir John Lovetot, and then murdering the woman’s husband. He was charged with misappropriating funds, communicating with the devil, committing trespass, misbehaving to gain money and concealing his felonies. He was imprisoned in the Tower, at Windsor and then Wallingford for more than a year.[5] He was in prison again in 1311 for a short time, but later exonerated from all his wrongdoings. By 1319, he was accepted back by the king, Edward II, though had lost much of his power. However, he retained his considerable wealth, owning 11 large houses, at least three palaces, including one very large palace in the Strand, London, two castles and much land. He rebuilt the diocesan seat of Eccleshall Castle. It has been estimated at his death in 1321 he left land, money and mortgages worth £50K which today is almost £11.1billion.[6] In 2011. he was thought to have been the 53rd richest person to have lived in England since 1066.   

The year 1319 imagined.

In January 1319, Bishop Langton, aged 76, visited churches and priories[7] in the diocese around Lychefeld. On Thursday 12 January he stayed overnight in his new palace within the cathedral Close.

AI rendition of entering the southeast Close gate. Langton obtained a licence, April 20, 1299, to strengthen and crenellate the boundary walls of The Close. In 1317, Edward II ordered The Close to be securely defended on his behalf. The Dam Street causeway was earlier than the Bacon – Bird Street causeway, 1310, and there is no evidence with a link to Langton. But he could have improved it when adding the walls. The banner above the gate is that for the Angevin empire.

AI rendition of Langton and outriders entering The Close. The twin semi-octagonal towers at the Dam Street entrance were incomplete in 1319, taking another 3 or 4 years to have massive oak doors fitted and later a drawbridge and portcullis (around 50 years later). It was a postern gate, that is secondary to the main gate and used only with permission.

          Entering The Close would reveal the work being done on the east end of the cathedral.[8]  Work on the Lady Chapel started around 1315, and was completed about 1336.[9]

AI rendition of possibly the 4th year on building the Lady Chapel.

            The riders moved to the gate in the wall surrounding the bishop’s palace; this inner wall increased security. The palace was built against the east wall of The Close and completed by around 1314.[10] It had attached octagonal towers and turrets. It was 320 feet long and 160 feet wide. Layout of the palace is known from Henry Greswold’s drawing of 1685.[11] It is unclear how much of the palace in the drawing was originally present in 1299. The ‘Lady’s Chamber’ is problematical and might have been a lesser hall. The chapel might have been at ground level. A treasury is not shown on the drawing. Also missing is a bakery, granary, hay barn, saucery (a room to prepare sauces), dovecot, and pinfold. The gateway on the south side might have been widened for carriages. The gardens had an herbarium and a pond. Water passed to the palace through lead pipes.[12] Lead and tin were added to the roofing, though the outer buildings were probably thatched. Size, dimensions and architecture were similar to the Bishop’s Palace at Wells, 1275-92.

AI rendition of the 1685 layout of the palace.

The palace in 1319 might look like this, if loosely based on the palace at Wells Cathedral.

AI rendition of the original palace. Below the chapel were cellars, a kitchen and brewhouse. The tower would have rooms for lodging.  Staff lived in rooms against the wall on the right. 

The palace was described as spacious and splendid with the great hall hundred feet long and fifty-six feet broad, painted with the coronation, marriages, wars, and funeral of King Edward I, his patron. The Queen described Langton as 'the king's right eye.’[13] The hall is thought to have been the 5th or 6th largest in the country. The kitchen was accessed by stairs in the southern corner going down to ground level.

Langton in the Great Hall, His diners could be family drawn from across the Midlands.

 

          Early on Friday 13 January, he visited the cathedral to see his new shrine to St Chad. He joined the Dean, John de Derby, who had held the post for 29 years, 1280-1319. John died on October 12 and was buried in the cathedral. The bishop greeted many canons and chantry priests waiting at the west door. One could have been Walter’s brother, Robert, who held the prebend of Handsacre, and before that Flixton and Stotfold. The west front of the cathedral was probably unfinished and might not have had spires on the towers.[14] Niches were filled with gilded statues and the niches painted red. It is thought the cathedral was not completed until the late-1330s.

AI rendition of the bishop being met by all the priests and acolytes of the cathedral. This image is the earliest known of the cathedral, and was published in 1655. To the left can be seen the half-timber, half-brick old library later destroyed in the Civil War. The green is painted foliage, but the amount present is questionable. Most likely there were many small angels sculpted, if like at Wells and Salisbury.

Around 1303, Langton gave £2120 to Paris stonemasons to sculpt a monument for Chad’s new shrine in the retroquire. On the stone plinth was set a model of the cathedral in silver and gold. The shrine could have been in place behind the high altar by 1307- 8. A Lichfield Muniment Inventory of 1345 estimated its value at £2000. It was decorated with 6 rubies, 5 sapphires, 15 large emeralds, 16 pearls and many small stones. Some jewels were set in an image of Chad. It is unclear which relics were kept in the casket within the confines of the model cathedral, and which were still in St Chad’s Head Chapel.[15]

AI rendition of Bishop Langton blessing his new shrine to Chad probably in a small chapel behind the high altar. The gilded roof is a conjecture based on Becket’s tomb having one. It would have been raised or lowered by a rope or chain. The shrine had railings around it.

After this ceremony Langton left Lychefeld for Tame worth or Tamworth.[16]

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[1] T. Cox, Survey of the ancient and present state of Great Britain, (London: 1738), 233.

[2] Until recently, he was said to be of lowly birth and loosely connected with the Peverel family. See J. Blackwell Hughes, ‘The episcopate of Walter Langton, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, 1296-1321, with a calendar of his register’, Unpub. thesis, University of Nottingham, 1992, 198.

[3] His consecration by Béraud de Got, cardinal-bishop of Albano, took place on 23 December 1296, at Cambrai, where he was engaged in peace negotiations with the papal nuncios. On his return he made his profession of obedience to the archbishop before the high altar at Canterbury.

[4] For a fuller account of the early years of Langton see the post, ‘Bishop Walter Langton - local benefactor.’

[5] J. B. Stone, A history of Lichfield cathedral, from its foundation to the present time. with a description of its architecture and monuments. with photographic illustrations, (1870). 22.

[6] P. Beresford, The richest of the rich; the wealthiest 250 people in Britain since 1066. (Petersfield: 2011), 118. Langton was 53rd in the list having 1% of the national income.

[7] J. B. Hughes, ‘The episcopate of Walter Langton, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, 1296-1321, calendar of his register," Thesis for Nottingham Univ. (1992) Vol. 1, 283.  His visitations in January 1319 were: Monday 9th at Sandwell Priory, 11th at Canwell Priory and Shenstone, 12th at Farewell Priory staying overnight at Lichfield, 13th at Tamworth, 14th at Harlaston, passing through Lichfield and staying at Clifton Campville, 15th at Burton Abbey, 16th at Barton-under-Needwood, staying at Tatenhill and on 17th ending at Tutbury Priory.

[8] In his will Langton, bequeathed £860 13s 3d towards completing the Lady Chapel, and it is thought this was sufficient, but it is unclear.

[9] In 1336, William de Heywood and Robert Aylbrick were admitted as custodians of the fabric of the chapel of the Blessed Mary. This is taken to indicate the Chapel was now being used.

[10] It might not have been completed until 1314, when Langton visited Lichfield. VCH volume 14, suggests work began on the palace in 1304 and was completed by 1314.

[11] Plan of Langton’s Palace reconstructed from Plate XVI in The Reliquary, quarterly Archaeological Journal and Review, (London: 1866–67), 7, 254. Also, from a drawing in the Bodleian Library, Tanner 217, f.42.

[12] Water had been piped to The Close from 1140-70.

[13] N. Denholm-Young, The liber epistolaris of Richard de Bury, (Roxburghe Club Oxford: 1950) 317. He was appointed the principal executor of the king’s will.

[14] Two friars minor from Clonmel, Ireland, were on their pilgrimage to Jerusalem and saw the cathedral in 1323. They kept a diary and described the three towers. This is ambiguous and might or might not include the spires.

[15] The shrine was not in place in the Lady Chapel entrance until around 1360. Langton would see it in a small chapel at the end of the squared choir-presbytery.

[16] In 1319 the king gave Tamworth charters confirming the townspeople certain rights. 

The year 1200

Summary. The year 1200 was a transitional year for an old second cathedral, and a new expanding town catering for pilgrimage and servicing for many priests. It was the town that motivated construction of a new Gothic cathedral.

     The year 1200 was a transitional year of change from an old second cathedral to either planning or possibly beginning a third, larger cathedral. Similarly, the town was coalescing from hamlets to an organised, coherent township. Inevitably, in this fluidity there is much uncertainty with dates and order of change, but the following is known about the cathedral, The Close and the town.

AI rendition of the second cathedral in 1200 in a poor state.

Boundary

In Early Medieval times there must have been a ditch and bank around the area, now known as The Close, to keep in livestock. The separate Licitfelda (Lichfield) settlements could even have had a ditch and palisade like the excavated enclosure at Tamworth thought to be c.913.[1]

Ai enhabced imagined enclosure at Tamworth (originally called Tomeworthig). 

Between 1129 and 1135, there is some evidence of a ditch being dug around the coalescing settlements. This was at the beginning of Bishop Roger de Clinton’s episcopate, 1129-48, and plaques around the town attribute the town ditch to his time.[2] Archaeology showed it was 5 m wide and 2.6 m deep in the section named Castle ditch. Various ditches have been found crossing Sandford Street and they vary from 10 m wide down to 4 m wide and 2 m deep. The line for this west end of the ditch is unclear. Within the ditch has been found a large collection of rubbish, including slag from the Sandford Street area showing this community was engaged in metalworking. A 10 m wide, deep ditch containing water would be defensive, but it is unknown whether it completely encircled the small town. The purpose of a large ditch, together with town gates, was more likely to deter traders entering the town and avoid paying a goods tax at the gate. The officers of the town were now directing change which was being called a manor or borough and residents were burgesses.

 Lichfield with new streets, piped water, gates and ditch. It shows prosperity. There were 5 gates listed in the Magnum Registrum Album (Great White Album of the cathedral). They were Bacun or Bachunneswich gate, Stowe or Stowey gate, Tamworth gate, Culstubbe gate and Santford or Sondord gate. The AI enhanced map shows a fortified Close completed c. 1299.

Piped water

Between 1140 and 1170, two springs of water at Manor of Pipe (now the Maple Hayes estate) were bought from William Bell of Pipe and the water conveyed through lead pipes, 1½ inches diameter (38 mm), surrounded by clay. They stretched the 1.4 miles (2.3 k) to the Cathedral Close.[3] It was one of the earliest medieval piped-water systems in Britain.[4] It happened either at the end of the episcopate of Bishop Clinton, or more likely in the time of the following Bishop Durdent since he was at Canterbury when a conduit for water-supply was laid. It is also claimed Canon Thomas Bradford, or Bradeford, secured a clean water supply to the Close, c.1263. The original line of the pipe is unknown, but probably entered the close near the north-west corner. This line was later changed and the pipe entered through the Beacon Street west gate. The pipe ended at the stone cross cistern in the north-west corner of the open space in front of the cathedral.

Conduit-head remains, once housed a pump, in the north-west corner of the Close built 1786.

 

Lichfield town or manor

If the cathedral Close was now bounded, perhaps, walled, it must have been necessary to clear away dwellings close to the previous palisade ditch. Bishop Clinton might have needed to garrison his soldiers, he was a warrior-bishop, and this necessitated the commandeering of dwellings. So where did the occupants go? Was this the spur to add five or six streets on an east-west axis and at least four streets on a north-south alignment on wet ground south of the cathedral? It was the formation of an early grid-town[5] and has always been ascribed to Clinton’s plan for Lichfield. It came towards the end of his episcopate and followed on with the next bishop. Strangely, the new streets were on a low-lying area that was wet and easily flooded, so why build there and not on the higher ground near Gaia or at Borrowcop? It has been noted the new town was roughly equidistant from the communities in the Close, at Sandford and Greenhill.[6] The town comprised of separated hamlets.[7]

 

At the Culstubbe Street gate (St John’s Street) stood two crosses known as Bishop Durdent and Bishop Pucelle, and it might be the gates came later. There were crosses at all the gates and this must have signified to pilgrims they had arrived at Lichfield.[8]

Lichfield's market, chartered in 1153, was held initially on Sundays, and could have existed unofficially long before the new town was laid out.

The river, name is unknown, gave good separation of The Close and cathedral from the separate hamlets and later pools added to this isolation. A deed[9] dated 1176 refers to 'a tithe of fish from the bishop's fishponds in Lichfield' known as Vivarium Lichesfeldense.[10]  Both Stowe Pool and Minster Pool were artificial ponds created to drive water mills. The Domesday record mentions two mills belonging to the church estate and a third serving the outlying members of the manor which suggests the ponds existed in 1086.[11]

Plan of Lichfield 1150 interpreted by Bassett.[12] Note the Close is traversed from Dam St to the North side. There is an extra entrance on the east side. There was a mill close to the Dam St entrance. It is thought the Dam Street causeway was constructed before the Beacon Street causeway. Note the grid pattern of roads for the new settlement. It is unclear whether the earthworks around Lichfield formed a complete boundary.

Slater's idea of the Close around the year 1100[13] This map has more detail that Bassett’s map suggesting the manor of Lichfield was more coherent and integrated. Slater thought the Stowe area was most developed.

Plaques giving a version of gates and ditches.

Cathedral. Strictly the church of St Chad after the Normans removed the bishop. The entry for St Chad’s church, Lichfield, in the Domesday Book, 1086-7, stated there were present five canons holding three ploughs.

The Early Medieval cathedral-church must have been in a poor condition by the year 1200 and its future an issue. It is thought the first three bays of the choir were repaired, with a date of 1185; later dates have been suggested. It has some Early English stonework. Most likely the small area was being isolated for worship to continue whilst around the area was being prepared for a new cathedral. Being a non-monastic, secular cathedral meant a lack of cloisters and outer chambers limited the options for where to continue worship. A chapel on the south side of the second cathedral, built adjacent but not connected, could still be standing at this time and is thought to have been used as a sacristy.[14] 

Bishop Clinton’s statue on the west front has him holding an early church (Wing, Buckinghamshire?) The second cathedral would have had a resemblance to the held church.

The cathedral-church was must have been neglected and financially poor. Some of the estates held by the bishop are thought to have belonged to the church and might be considered early prebends provided some tithe money. Portions of several manors, such as Baswich, Brewood, and Eccleshall, were said to have been held by the church and are known to have become prebends by the end of the 12th-century. Some historians have suggested a full prebendal system was created by Bishop Clinton in the 1130s, but others have argued the income went to the twinned monastery at Coventry. The relationship between the more important Benedictine Priory in Coventry and the smaller church in Lichfield was strained with bishops favouring Coventry. It is thought Clinton formed a ‘collegium canonicorum’ along the same lines as those founded at Lincoln, Salisbury, and York some forty years previously. Then in 1191, a constitution based on one created at the cathedral of Rouen, was adopted which gave a greater measure of independence for the cathedral with four individuals, dean, precentor, treasurer and chancellor, having some control, but still subject to the bishop and king. The earliest dates for these offices were dean 1140, sub-dean 1165, precentor 1177, treasurer 1140, and chancellor 1200. By 1195, there were 22 canons, and a statute laid down that each should reside in The Close for a minimum of 3 months each year. The preoccupation of the cathedral in the 12th-century seems to be a formalising of the priesthood and the financing and management of the cathedral now beginning to have restored status. However, there is not much evidence for the appearance of the bishop, Hugh de Nonant, 1188-98. The prebend of Wolvey was formed about 1200 by Bishop Geoffry de Muschamp, and more followed in the years to 1255. Around this time various churches were given to the Chapter of the cathedral and they raised funds from a destitute level.

Some accounts have Clinton founding a pilgrim’s rest-house called St John the Baptist in 1135, but the earliest record is a grant given in 1208; an inconsistency mentioned by Harwood.[15] The purpose of the house was to accommodate travellers, especially pilgrims, who arrived when the town gates were closed. Its position outside the town is seen in its current name of St John the Baptist without the Barrs. Its existence soon after 1200 does indicate pilgrimage to St Chad’s relics was ongoing.

AI rendition of an early drawing of St John’ the Baptist chapel and hospital.

Robert Wills examined some of the remains of a foundation of the second cathedral revealed in 1854 in August 1859, took measurements and published his findings in 1861.[16] The layout shows the features that date it to around the year 1200 and suggest this was the transitional church. The first three Early English piers from the tower were, in the original plan, octagons, with a triple clustered shaft added on each face. The third pier from the tower is half Early English and half Decorated. The walls, windows, and vaulting of both the choir aisles are Early English as far as the third pier of the choir. The sacristy has three Early English windows.

AI double chevron in north choir aisle archway which could be Early English.

The notion the cathedral dominated and motivated the town is wrong. The third cathedral does not begin construction until 15 or even 25 years after 1200.[17] Perhaps, there was some building with Bishop Geoffry de Muschamp, 1198-1208, since he might have been buried in the cathedral. It is more likely work commenced under Bishop William de Cornhill, 1215-23,[18] and he was recorded as being buried in the cathedral. In 1221, Henry III gave the Dean and Chapter twenty oaks from Cannock Forest to be used for rafters and timber for the church.[19]  If this was the start of concerted construction then the cathedral is 805 years old. By this time the town or manor had grown considerably. It is pilgrimage, hostelries, small manufacture in metals, leather and food supplying the palace, priests and acolytes in the cathedral, and local markets which drive prosperity and must have induced the construction of a new Gothic cathedral.[20]

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[1] The Roman town of Letocetum is centred on a defended area of some 5 acres astride Watling Street enclosed by a 4th-century wall 9 feet thick fronted by three ditches and backed by a turf rampart: J. Gould, ‘Caer Lwytgoed:  Its significance in early medieval documents’, Staffordshire Archaeological and Historical Society Transactions, (1993), 7.

[2] Clinton also fortified Coventry as part of the siege during the Anarchy. A ditch 1.58 m deep and 7.5 m wide has been excavated at the cathedral site in Coventry.

[3] J. Gould, ‘The twelfth-century water-supply to Lichfield Close’, Antiquaries J, (1976), 56, 1, 73–78.

[4] It is thought the earliest system was at Canterbury Cathedral.

[5] J. Blair, Building Anglo-Saxon England. (Princeton and Oxford: 2018) thought grids of 12th and 13th century towns were based on irregular parallelograms and conjectured they might have triangulated with ropes which would give poor measuring out. Grids of 40 feet and 41.25 feet have been identified in the street layout.

[6] C. C. Taylor, ‘The origins of Lichfield, Staffordshire’, South Staffordshire Archaeological and Historical Society transaction. (1969), 10, 43–52.

[7] The growth of Lichfield has been described as polyfocal, that is, disparate, unconnected communities occupying a common location and with time coming together as a town.

[8] The crosses deteriorated with time, or were knocked down by parliamentarian forces in the Civil War.

[9] Magnum Registrum Album of Lichfield Cathedral, no. 497

[10] H. Wharton, Anglia Sacra, (1619), i, 442.

[11] T. R. Slater, ‘The topography and planning of Medieval Lichfield. A critique. South Staffordshire archaeological and historical society transactions for 1984-1985. (1986), 26, 11-35.

[12] S. R. Bassett. ‘Medieval Lichfield: A topographical review. South Staffordshire Archaeological and Historical Society transaction. (1980), 22, 117, Fig. 5B.

[13] T. R. Slater, (1986), 26. See note 11.

[14] See the post, ‘Two early chapels.’

[15] T. Harwood, The history and antiquities of the church and city of Lichfield. (London: 1806).

[16]  R. Willis, ‘On foundations of early buildings recently discovered in Lichfield Cathedral’ The Archaeol. J. (1861) 18, 1–24. Willis visited the Cathedral in 1849 to examine window tracery. In 1854, he was invited to forward a drawing for the restoration of the choir area. Before publication Willis gave a lecture reported in The Gentleman’s Magazine, March 1861, vol 210, 296‑300.

[17] See the post ’Dating the cathedral.’

[18] Burial must have been close to the Early English choir area.

[19] See note 226 given in M. W. Greenslade and R. B. Pugh (eds.) 'House of secular canons - Lichfield cathedral: To the Reformation', in A History of the County of Stafford: Volume 3, (London, 1970), 140–166.

[20] Taking 110-140 years. Lack of written evidence makes this dating an estimate.