CHAPTER XXIV

THE DOMINICANS

The Dominicans, or Black Friars, came over to England with their Prior, Gilbert de Fraxineto, in the year 1221. There were thirteen of them in company. They were at first received by Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, who invited the Prior to preach, and being greatly pleased with his discourse, became the patron of the Order in England.

Their first quarters were in Holborn on the south side, part of the site of Lincoln’s Inn. Here they built a House and church, and their gates opened upon Holborn on the west side of Chancery Lane. They remained here for more than fifty years, when, in 1276, Gregory de Rokesley, the Mayor, granted the Archbishop of Canterbury permission to stop up certain lanes adjoining Castle Baynard and Montfichet. This was for the purpose of enabling the Dominicans to build a new House on the foreshore or banks of the River Fleet without the wall of the City. The Friars, however, were permitted to take down the wall between Ludgate Hill and the river, and to use the stones of Montfichet Castle for their new buildings. The King ordered the City at the same time to build a new wall along the side of Ludgate Hill, and so south along the bank of the Fleet to the Thames. Of their first House little is known. There was once a convocation of their Order held there attended by four hundred Friars to confer on their own affairs. It is reported that the assemblage was entertained on one day by the King, on the next by the Queen, and on other days by the Bishop of London and the Abbots of St. Albans, Waltham, and Westminster.

If we consider the buildings of the second House we shall find ourselves assisted to a certain extent by the disposition of the courts and lanes at the present moment. Thus, the boundaries of the Precinct are those of the present parish of St. Anne. It is therefore proved that the Friars began by taking down the old wall of the City between Ludgate Hill and the river, in order to build over that part of their Precinct which came to them on the other side of the wall. Again, since the site of a burial-ground within a city is almost always ancient, we may conclude that any burial-ground now within the parish was formerly within the Precinct. And if we have the measurements of the Church, we may lay it down accurately, provided we have a single angle or corner with which to start.

Now, the burial-ground of St. Anne’s still remains untouched. Its length from east to west is about 60 feet. The church of the Friars was 220 feet long and 66 feet broad. It probably consisted of chancel and nave, or antechapel without transepts; the Cloister was a square of 110 feet; the Chapter House on the west was 44 feet by 22 feet. If the chancel was 60 feet long, which is a very fair proportion, it just fits in south of the present burial-ground, while the block of buildings looking upon Church Court corresponds with the breadth of the church. Laying down the church, therefore, with these data, we find the Cloister also fits in with its square of 110 feet, now partly occupied by the Court of the Apothecaries’ Hall.

The rest of the buildings, the dormitories, the Chapter House, the Refectory, the Great Hall, the Misericordia, were all contained in the square of the north-west angle. To place them lower down below the church and cloisters would be to ruin the effect of the group of buildings from the river, a thing abhorrent to the mediæval mind. The lower space, representing an area of more than three acres, was doubtless filled up with gardens, orchards, and offices. In appearance the House was said to resemble a fortress, because it had the battlements and towers of the City wall on two sides. (See Appendix IX.)

If for many generations the Franciscans were of all the Religious the most loved, their rivals, the Black Friars, who were considered the most stalwart defenders of the Faith, were the most respected for their learning. Even when the people threatened to destroy their House, in consequence of their arrogance, they still retained the general respect for learning. Their Precinct was a Sanctuary, so also was that of the Grey Friars; their strong-rooms and treasure-houses were used for the storing of the National Records, Acts, and Charters; they numbered among their body the greatest scholars, theologians, and jurists; their hall was used for the meeting of Parliament, and their church for the hearing of great cases. In the year 1382, for instance, Archbishop Courtenay held in the Blackfriars’ Church his court for the condemnation of Wyclyf’s opinions: and here was held, from day to day, and from week to week, the great trial before Cardinals Campeggio and Wolsey concerning the divorce of Queen Catherine. In the Hall of the Dominicans was assembled one of the Parliaments of Henry the Sixth; here was commenced the so-called “Black” Parliament of Henry the Eighth.

There are many other historical notes connected with this Order in London. Here are one or two of the more important:—

In 1258 the King gave orders that the Dominicans were to have at their desire freestone for making carved statues in stone and a pedestal for the statue of the Virgin; lead for their aqueduct, and other materials for the forwarding of their work. Obviously, therefore, they were engaged in building at their old House.

In 1326, when the Queen and her son issued letters to the citizens of London exhorting them to aid in destroying the enemies of the country, and Hugh le Despenser in especial, it was at the House of the Friars Preachers that the Mayor and Aldermen received the commonalty in conference. A little later occurs the very curious story (_Chron. of Mayors and Sheriffs_, p. 267) of the removal of Edward the Second to Berkeley Castle for fear that he might be carried off by the abetting and procurement of a Brother Thomas Dunheved, a Dominican, who, with many others of that Order, conspired with him. This Brother Thomas had been sent to the Pope from Edward to pray for a divorce from Isabel; he now raised a body of men in the King’s service, was unsuccessful, was taken prisoner, confined in Pontefract Castle, and was killed while endeavouring to escape. There were evidently two parties among the Preaching Friars.

Later on we hear of a quarrel between the Duke of York and the Duke of Somerset, and of the spoiling of the goods of the latter by the people of the former at the Friars Preachers’.

The place was also one at which Royal and distinguished persons were entertained. The Dominicans, for instance, received Charles the Fifth of Spain on his visit to Henry the Eighth. It was in the Hall, called the Parliament Chamber, that Wolsey was found guilty on a Præmunire. The brethren, of course, took no part in these functions; but the fact that they were held in their House proves the position which they occupied. They did not, being mendicants, and without property, entertain Royal persons at their own charges. The sentence on Wolsey was the last event of importance connected with the Black Friars. Within a very few years after the holding of that Court, the proud Dominicans were turned into the street. Their whole property consisted of a few houses within the Precinct, which were valued at an annual rental of £104: 15: 4, so that, like the Franciscans, they remained actually mendicant to the very end. The respect in which these Friars were held, especially by the better sort, is shown by the list of great people buried in their church. Among the names we find those of Margaret, Queen of Scots; Hubert de Burgh, Earl of Kent; the children of the Earl of Arundel; Queen Eleanor, wife of Edward the First, whose heart lay here; the Earls of March and Hereford; the Duchess of Exeter, and many more. The House was surrendered in 1539. It does not appear that anything was done with it in the lifetime of Henry the Eighth. Very possibly he kept the place as convenient for holding Parliaments on occasion; it was also, and had been, at least since the time of Edward the Second, a house where Records and Charters were kept. Edward the Sixth granted the Hall and the site of the Prior’s House to Sir Francis Bryan; three years afterwards he gave the whole Precinct to Sir Thomas Cawardine.

We have seen that the Liberties of Sanctuary, especially that of St. Martin’s-le-Grand, were always a great trouble and annoyance to the City. Now the Precincts both of the Grey Friars and the Black Friars were claimed—though there were no more Friars—by those who had succeeded in the ownership of the Precincts as being without the jurisdiction of the City, and privileged, whether for those who took Sanctuary in the Precinct, or for those who carried on trade to be free of the City. This claim was stoutly resisted by the City authorities, and in 1586 the case was heard in Court before the Chief Justices.

There was a small church called the Church of St. Anne, which appears to have stood beside the great church, just as St. Margaret’s stands beside the Abbey; St. Gregory beside St. Paul’s; St. Peter’s beside the Austin Friars. The Precinct became the Parish of St. Anne. The old church of St. Anne seems to have perished with the Friars’ church. Perhaps it was an aisle. Then they built another church, which was nothing more than an upper chamber. As for the liberties and privileges of the Precinct, these were gradually forgotten and lost like those of the Grey Friars. The church was unroofed for the sake of the lead; it was then divided into two parts, part becoming a carpenter’s yard, and part converted into stables. The church, according to Wyngaerde, had no transepts, so that it would be easy to divide it. The Hall remained standing for some time longer, and was used for a Theatre—Burbage’s Theatre,—and some of the Shakespearian plays were acted there.

In the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the Precinct was “much inhabited” by noblemen and gentlemen. Afterwards the place became the residence of feather-dressers and glass-blowers—because it was still outside the City,—and later still of artists. “Thence into Blackfriars, visit the painters where you may see pictures” (Ben Jonson, _The Devil is an Ass_). Vandyck died here in 1641; Cornelius Jansen lived here; Isaac Oliver died here. There is one spot in modern Blackfriars which may still be recognised as part of the ancient house of the Dominicans. Passing through Playhouse Yard at the back of the _Times_ office, and turning into a narrow lane called Church Entry, there is the small disused burial-ground of which I have already spoken. An open yard on the other side of the court apparently formed part of the Friars’ cemetery, just as at Westminster, where, the cloisters being reserved for the brethren, there might be a burial-ground outside the church. On the east of this yard is a fragment of ancient wall, and in a carpenter’s shop (No. 7 Ireland Yard) there is still (April 1900) remaining a single arch which once formed part of the House. I know not to what building this arch belonged; the site was afterwards a mortuary and a Watch house, but I know not which of these uses was the earlier.