A Grave Concern

Historical Note

Grand funerary monuments were popular among the medieval rich, and grieving kin had a choice of ways to commemorate their loved ones. The more expensive option was a tomb topped with a sculpted effigy, while the cheaper one was a brass. One of the most famous fourteenth-century latteners was Richard Lakenham, who had a wife named Cristine and an apprentice named James Reames.

A paper in Historical Research by Nigel Saul, Jonathan Mackman and Christopher Whittick relates the curious case of a mason named John Petit (he had an apprentice named Peter Lucas), who was taken to court for producing inferior work in 1421 by the executors of Sir John Dallingridge. One of these executors was Henry Cook the barber. A fragment of Dallingridge’s tomb still survives in Bodiam Castle, but it is an alabaster effigy, not the marble tomb that was specified in the contract. This suggests that Petit’s services were dispensed with, and someone else was hired to provide the finished product. Dallingridge was a Sussex man, and never made arrangements to join the University in Cambridge.

Other characters in A Grave Concern were also real. Michaelhouse scholars included Master Ralph de Langelee, Michael (de Causton), William (de Gotham), John Clippesby, Thomas Suttone, William Thelnetham and William Kolvyle (Colville). John Aungel, Francis Mallet and John Islaye were later members of the College.

Thomas Hopeman was a Dominican friar who got into trouble in 1355 for going overseas (probably to Avignon) without a licence; he wrote several commentaries on the Bible. William Morden was Prior of the Cambridge Black Friars, and Byri (or Bury) was one of his priests. James Nicholas was a University clerk in the 1360s, while John Godrich was a Fellow of King’s Hall. He was the son of the King’s cook, and later became keeper of various royal forests.

Roger Frisby was a Franciscan priest who attended the University but later embroiled himself in politics and was hanged for treason in 1402. Richard Milde was vicar of St Clement’s in the 1350s, and Hugh de Gundrede was a thief who spent time in Cambridge Gaol in the 1330s.

There was indeed an election for the post of Chancellor around 1360. This position had been held by Richard Lyng in 1339, 1345–1346 and 1351–1352. Lyng actually died in 1355. By March 1359, William Tynkell had stopped being Chancellor, and went on to an ecclesiastical career before his death in 1370. Thomas Suttone became Chancellor in March 1359, and was heavily involved in expanding Michaelhouse’s holdings. He died in 1384.

John Sheppey, Bishop of Rochester, died in 1360. He was succeeded by the Benedictine William Whittlesey, who had been Master of Peterhouse. Whittlesey was related to Archbishop Islip, which may explain his meteoric rise. He stayed at Rochester for two years before becoming Bishop of Worcester, and eventually succeeded his uncle as Archbishop of Canterbury in 1368. He died six years later, and left his law books to Peterhouse.

Sir John Moleyns was a flamboyant character, who rose from obscure beginnings to embroil himself in all manner of trouble; his entry in the Oxford New Dictionary of National Biography lists him as ‘administrator and criminal’. He married Egidia in the 1320s, and promptly murdered her uncle Peter Poges, so that she would inherit his estates. The manor of Stoke Poges then became the centre of Moleyns’ power. He was a lawyer, and avoided a murder conviction by picking his own jury. His partner in crime was fellow Justice of the Common Bench, John Inge.

Moleyns was later accused of treason, and was obliged to flee to France. He returned to favour in 1346 by joining the Crécy campaign, but it was not long before he was in trouble again. He had been appointed Queen’s Steward but by 1357 he had blotted his copy book by indulging in robbery, cattle rustling, horse theft, burglary and harbouring felons. He was found guilty and imprisoned in Windsor Castle. He was later taken to Nottingham, and then Cambridge, where he probably died in 1360. Egidia was pardoned shortly afterwards, and the estates that had been confiscated were returned to her. She died seven years later.