The third 1 is from the Avignon Regesta, which the Public Record Office authorities have passed over in their series of Calendars, only temporarily it is to be hoped. Having been, by the good officesof Mr. W. H. Bliss and the courtesy of the Vatican authorities, allowed to make a prolonged study of this Record, I can testify not only to its unique value to the Scottish student for the period of the Schism, but also to the considerable amount of English and Irish matter still to be disinterred from the Avignon Regesta of the Pontiffs who reigned at Avignon before 1378.

The remainder of the volume is derived entirely from the Dupplin charter chest. It consists, as already stated, of eightyseven originals, two copies, and forty-eight Deeds from two registers. These must now be described in more detail.

(1) The originals here printed are seventy-three charters and fourteen Papal Bulls. The condition of these, on the whole, bears witness to the care with which they have been preserved.2 A few are slightly frayed away in places; none have suffered appreciably from damp or vermin; many retain their seals in good condition (see the description in Appendix I.). They have been put up by Mr. Chapman (see Preface) in small canvas bags, some containing one document, some two or more; numbered consecutively, but without systematic arrange-ment. The series comes down to the end of the seventeenth century, and includes not only Inchaffray Deeds but many others; every Deed relating to estates not now in Lord Kinnoull's possession being classed among the Inchaffray muniments. Only those which can be considered as title-deeds of the abbey are given in the text of the present volume; a few of later date, selected I fear rather at haphazard, will be found in the Appendix, and Mr. Lindsay has added his notes of a few others at the end of the Introduction: these will serve as a supplement to the matter of the same kind contained in the later section of the Bannatyne Club volume. The collection contains extensive materials for the Reformation and post-Reformation history of the abbey lands and churches, which is outwith the scope of the present publication. I need only add that forty-three charters, and all the Bulls, are now first printed; the thirty already printed from the Register are now given from the originals, the Register readings being given in footnotes when they seemed worth recording.

1 No. CXLI.

2 See the facsimiles at the end of the volume.

Of the two documents given from copies at Dupplin,' it need only be said that both copies are on paper, and of the sixteenth century.

The older Register, that printed for the Bannatyne Club, is a parchment book, in small quarto, in a modern half-binding. The leaves measure 73 by 5 inches; the number of lines to a page varies from twenty-one to twenty-nine. The writing is of the fifteenth century; the latest charter inserted is No. CXLII. of the present volume, dated 1389. There are fifty-one leaves, numbered in a handwriting of about 1700; Sir James Balfour refers to the first leaf as fol. 2, and quotes a memorandum from fol. 53; which suggests that a leaf at the beginning and another at the end have disappeared, perhaps removed by the modern binder. The Register ends on fol. 51, recto, in the middle of a document. The first three pages and the last have suffered by the application of gall. The fifty-one leaves are in nine gatherings of six leaves, the last three leaves of the last gathering having been cut away. Each charter is preceded by a title, opposite to which in the margin are usually set the letters Rca, occasionally at full length, Rubrica. The titles, and the large capitals with which each document begins, are, like the rest of the writing, in black (not red) ink. These initials are now and then left blank throughout the volume, and never filled in after fol. 43 recto. The first fifty charters are numbered consecutively in Roman numerals; No. LI. is unnumbered; the next six are numbered LI. to LVI., the last ending imperfectly at the bottom of a page; then follow seventeen more charters numbered 1. to XVII., with a heading at the beginning of the first, Hic incipiunt carte et confirmaciones omnium ecclesiarum monasterio Insule missarum pertinencium.' The gatherings are linked together by a peculiar system, not employed in any other manuscript known to me or to any correspondent. A proper name is written, half at the top of the last

1 No. 1.; Appendix No. VII.

4

2 The Bannatyne Club edition has a few errors of transcription; one of which (in No. 78 of Lib. Ins. Mis. =LIX. of new edition) shows that the editor had not the use of the Register for correcting the proofs. See also Lib. Ins. Mis., 69 (XIV. of new edition). But on the whole it faithfully reproduces the text. The punctuation and capitals are editorial.

3 Advocates' Library MS., 33.2.38.

In the footnotes the numeration of Lib. Ins. Mis. is that referred to.

The first five names, which form a hexameter line, are scribbled on the fly-leaf of a Register of Bury St. Edmunds in the British Museum (Royal MS. 8 E x,

page of each gathering, the other half at the top of the first page of the next gathering. The names thus employed form, so far as they go, an alphabet; they are as follows:

On fols. 6 verso and 7 recto A-dam.

There is no catchword between fols. 48 and 49.

Now fol. 42 ends in the middle of a charter (No. LVI. in the Register, 57 of Lib. Ins. Mis., XXXVIII. of the present volume); and fol. 43 begins with a new heading and fresh numeration as above described. This led the editor of Lib. Ins. Mis. to suspect a lacuna at this point; and the above list of catchwords enables us to calculate the extent of the gap. The end of the name which begins Ge- (perhaps orgius) is gone; so is the beginning of the name (presumably Jo-) which ends -hannes; and between them must have come a name beginning with H. It follows that two gatherings (twelve leaves) are wanting. The facsimile given in Lib. Ins. Mis. is of fol. 2 verso, the first line of fol. 3 being added to make up a complete charter. That given in this volume represents a double page,1 and illustrates the system of catchwords just described.

The later Register is a quarto volume, parchment, in vellum wrapper. The pages measure 103 by 8 inches. The portion used consists of one leaf of index and forty-six of text, beginning with a preface in rather turgid Latin, running in the name of Alexander Gordon the Commendator. There are twenty-eight feu charters engrossed, of the years 1554, 1555, and 1557; after which follow memoranda of later date, the last being dated

pointed out by Mr. Gilson of the MSS. Department). Canon Christopher Wordsworth has unearthed for me the following lines which occur in a manuscript at Clare College, Cambridge (see Dr. James's Catalogue of Western MSS. in the Library of Clare College, Cambridge, 1905, p. 28):

Adam Bernardus Clemens Dionisius Ennok

Felix Galfridus Henricus Job Katerina
Lucas Matheus Nicholaus Odo Philippus.

1 Fols. 24 verso and 25 recto. As these are outside pages of gatherings, they are more worn than an average page of the Register.

336 CHARTERS OF THE ABBEY OF INCHAFFRAY

20 May 1692. At the beginning and end there are several blank leaves, on the first of which is written in a sixteenth century hand the document No. CL. of the present volume.

I must not conclude without acknowledging the valuable help given me by Miss E. M. Thompson in obtaining for me in London material for this Appendix and for my contributions to the notes.

1

APPENDIX V

ADDITIONAL PARTICULARS WITH RESPECT TO
CERTAIN OF THE ABBOTS OF INCHAFFRAY

The following Notes from the Vatican Registers have been furnished by Dr. Maitland Thomson. They did not arrive in time to be incorporated in the section of this volume dealing with the Abbots.

(1) There is mention of John de Moravia, abbot of Inchaffray, in 1435. The abbot named John, who appears in Nos. CXLIV., CXLVI., may have been John of Moravia.

(2) Nicholas Fechil and George Murray. On 4 (pridie nonas) February 1463-4, at St. Peter's, Rome, Pius II. issued a commission to Antonio de Grassis, papal chaplain and auditor of causes of the Camera Apostolica, to hear and dispose of the case raised on petition of George Murray, abbot of Inchaffray. The petition states that on the death of Abbot John (extra curiam) the superior and convent elected the said George concorditer; he having been a monk (sic) of the abbey, professed of the Order, a priest, bachelor in theology, and of noble race on both sides. He accepted, received benediction from the Ordinary, and obtained possession of the benefice and papal confirmation. Yet Nicolaus Fechel, alleged to be a monk of the Order, by laic power despoiled George of the benefice, and, by the inordinate favour of certain magnates of Scotland, so terrified him that he dared not in the lifetime of Nicolaus assert his right. After the death of Nicolaus, William de Hadington, a monk of the abbey, though he had taken part in the election of George, by laic power and by armed force took possession, and by threats induced some of the convent to elect him abbot. George had appealed, but William held the benefice pendente lite, and dilapidated it with a certain public concubine of his, by whom he had had several children walking the earth, and

had contemptuously remained for a year and more under the greater excommunication (Reg. Vat. 495, fol. 219).

(3) On 24 (9 Kal. Jun.) May 1468, Paul II., at St. Peter's, Rome, issued a commission to Berard [Eruli], cardinal of S. Sabina, on petition of George Murref (sic), abbot of Inchaffray. The petition stated that the Pope's predecessor (Pius II.) had in the lifetime of Nicolaus reserved the abbey, and after the death of Nicolaus had duly provided William de Hadington, canon of the abbey, to the abbacy; that there had been a contest between him and George, and that the decision of the Commissioner, above mentioned, had been in favour of George, and that George had accordingly received papal provision. But as William and his complices still held the abbey, George petitioned. The Commissioner is authorised to put George in possession.

(4) The volume which contained the provision to Laurence Oliphant is amissing; but it appears that he was made commendator for six months, and thereafter abbot.

To the above there remain to be added the following particulars, furnished subsequently by Dr. Maitland Thomson, which should be used to supplement and correct the statements made in pp. 254-256.

(5) The provision of John de Moravia (who had been elected by the canons of the monastery) by Eugenius IV., bearing date 6 April 1435, states that the abbacy was void by the death (extra Romanam curiam) of William Carnoch (Obbligazioni, vol. 65, fol. 23 verso). This William is, doubtless, the person who in the record followed by Brady (relying on late copies) is called William de Carmiele (see p. 254).

He

(6) Again, the Bull of provision of the Abbey to John Hamilton (see p. 256) styles him the son of the Regent Arran, which fact answers the query put in the earlier part of this volume. was, presumably, the same person who was afterwards commendator of Arbroath, and ancestor of the Dukes of Hamilton. He was for a long time known commonly as John, Lord Hamilton, and was created Marquess of Hamilton by James vi. See the Scots Peerage, iv. 370.

(7) William Franklyn (see p. 254). Benedict XIII. issued a commission to the Bishop of St. Andrews, dated 1 October 1414 (twentieth year of his pontificate) on the information of Moriella, wife of the Regent Albany, to deprive William Francland (sic), 'qui

Y