Chapter XII: Appendix: C

CHANTRIES, CHAPELS, AND ALTARS

The eight chantry foundations of the thirteenth century were St. Thomas the Martyr (three), St. Peter, St. Nicholas (with Halam annexed), St. Stephen, St. John Baptist, and St. John the Evangelist. After a lull of more than a century come St. Mary at the altar of St. Michael (with Wheatley annexed), a second St. John the Baptist, otherwise the Morrow Mass, St. Mary Magdalene, and Our Lady, and St. Cuthbert (two, founded in 1479).

The Lady Chapel is a puzzle: it was outside the choir, on the north side, and with the churchyard adjoining the east; and no site seems to satisfy these three conditions. Perhaps more than one chapel is so named in wills. The chapel of St. John the Baptist had two altars, one to that saint, and another to St. Cuthbert, each with two chantries: it was the Vavasour or Booth Chapel at the south-west of the nave, the place of the Grammar School. The chapel of St. John the Evangelist was in the north aisle (whether of nave or choir not stated).

The locality of St. Thomas’ Chapel with its three chantries is uncertain; and there is a mention of the chapels of St. Lawrence and of St. Margaret near one another, but their altars are not mentioned. The altar of St. Peter was within the choir, but the sites of the remaining chantry altars cannot be settled. Besides the parish altar of St. Vincent, that of Our Lady of Grace is twice mentioned in the wills. The high altar is in one place called “the greater altar of St. Mary.”

There were, besides, the chapels of St. Thomas the Martyr in the Burgage, St. Catherine at the end of Westhorpe near the holy well, two in Easthorpe half-a-mile apart, and one in Normanton. The names of the three last are unknown; and the five seem to have been chantries. I am chiefly indebted to Mr Leach for the above information.