Carthusian Priory of the Salutation of St. Mary (prior and convent of the house of the Salutation of St. Mary of the Carthusian order near London.) was granted an exemption from murage dated 20/3/1399.
Wording
Grant, of special grace, to the prior and convent of the house of Mountgrace of the Carthusian order, that they and their successors shall have and hold all their manors, lands, tenements, rents and possessions well and in peace with all their liberties and customs, as well touching the election of prior as touching the other customs which the house of Chartreuse has, and quit of gelds, danegelds, hidages, scutages, works of castles, bridges, parks, dikes and houses, of toll, passage, payage, pontage, lestage, all service and custom, and all payments (questu pecuniario) to the king;
and that they shall be free throughout the realm, on either side the sea, of essarts and regard of forest within their boundaries, of shires and hundreds and suits thereof, and of all pleas and plaints;
and that all their lands from which they were wont to pay the murder-fine, shall be quit of the same and of all earthly exaction;
and that no forester or minister of a forester shall trouble them within their bounds, nor those entering or quitting the same;
and that the prior and brethren of the house shall be quit throughout the realm of all aids, tallages, payments and customs payable to the king without any impediment;
and that if the temporalities or spiritualities of other religious in the realm of England shall be taxed by any grant made to the king in any way, the goods of the said prior and convent shall not be taxed, nor aught thereof levied to the use of the king;
and that the prior and convent shall have all fines, ransoms, forfeited issues and amercements pertaining to the king for any trespasses, or offences, whereof the tenants and servants of the prior and convent may be impeached or questioned before the justices for keeping the statute and ordinance of labourers and workmen, so long as the said statute and ordinance are in force; with power to levy the same by their bailiffs by estreats of the said justices to be delivered to the said bailiffs without any impediment;
that the prior and convent and lay brethren of the said house and other servants shall not be troubled before these justices or other ministers for any hides, whether of their own beasts or not, purchased for the behoof of the prior and convent, tanned in the tannary of the house and then sold for their profit at a price agreed upon between them and the purchaser;
since the king has taken the said house and the monks and their household under his special protection, ordering that no sheriff or minister or other person shall presume to thresh any of their corn or take and carry away any victuals, goods, horses, oxen, wains, carts, ships or boats of theirs under colour of purchase in any merchant town or elsewhere against the will of the prior and convent or the keepers of the same, or under that pretext extort anything from them, upon pain of the penalties contained in the statute enacted at Westminster in 3 Edward III;
the prior and convent may work all mines of lead found upon their own ground and take the issues without impediment;
the prior and convent throughout the realm shall be quit of murage, quayage, picage, pavage and stallage and all other such customs. By K.
The like charters under the following dates to the following:-
March 20. Westminster
The prior and convent of the house of the Salutation of St. Mary of the Carthusian order near London.
May 21. Haverford.
The prior and convent of the house of St. Anne of the Carthusian order by Coventry.
The prior and convent of the house of the Visitation of St. Mary of the Carthusian order in the Isle of Axiholm.
Granted by Richard II. (Regnal year 22). Granted at Westminster. Grant by By K..
Primary Sources
Maxwell Lyte, H.C. (ed), 1916,
Calendar of Charter Rolls 15 Edward III - 5 Henry V 1341-1417 Vol. 5. (HMSO) p. 382
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Record created by Philip Davis. This record created 03/03/2009. Last updated on 19/01/2013. First published online 6/01/2013.
