The relations between the secular clergy and the mendicant friars in England during the century after the issue of the Bull Super Cathedram (1300)

Abstract

The writer of this thesis has attempted to show that an efficient enforcement by the English episcopate of the terms of Super cathedram brought the friars in England well within the old provincial and diocesan organisation. After a detailed examination of the bull in Chapter I, Chapter II deals with the system of licensing friars to preach and hear confessions erected by the bishops on the terms of the new legislation, and different sections take up the beginnings of the system, the measures taken by the prelates to ensure their control, the numbers and personnel of the friars licensed during the century and the distinction between a licence and a penitentiary commission. The chapter is prefaced with a discussion of the sources, the episcopal registers, in which licences are to be found. All the registers accessible in print have been used; also the MS. registers of wells, very briefly calendared in print, and the unprinted series of York and Lincoln; and Gale's transcripts in B.M.Add. MSS. 5824 and 5825, from the Ely registers. An alphabetical list of about 1600 friars thus licensed is appended to the thesis.