office was to instruct the younger canons, and who was the secretary of the chapter, and the keeper of the chapter seal; and the treasurer, who had the special charge of the ornaments of the church. These dignitaries all consent. The bishop himself consents in his double capacity as canon of Fotheross, which, although assigned by Bricius to the chancellor, the bishop now held. The sub-chanter also joins, whose office it was to fill the important place of the precentor in his absence, so that the daily service of the choir might not be neglected. Besides the dignitaries, eight of the ordinary canons sign, some with the special addition of the parish, which had been appropriated as the prebend of their canonry, and some with the mere addition of canon of Moray. Many of the instruments of Bishop Andrew, in the Register of Moray, are subscribed by the members of the chapter, and from a careful examination I am inclined to fix the date of this deed as 1242. Two chaplains of Moray (“ Capellani Moravienses") are witnesses, but they do not subscribe as members of the chapter, and answer, I suspect, to the position of minor canons in our English cathedrals. He who wishes to understand the constitution of the chapter of Elgin has only to pass from the ruins of its cathedral, with its ancient register in hand, to the cathedral city of Wells, to find the institutions of a chapter organised at the same time as that of Elgin, still kept up, with the exception that in the diocese of Wells, as afterwards in the province of Moray, the bishop has emancipated himself from the wholesome control of his capitular council.* Symon, dean of the cathedral church, styles himself "Decanus Major," the greater dean, to distinguish himself from the deans of the four deaneries into which the diocese was divided, being the deanery of Elgin, the deanery of Inverness, the deanery of Strathbogy, and the deanery of Strathspey. These deans were called "Decani Christianitatis," or Deans Christian, and ecclesiastical courts were commonly called, and indeed are now in England called, Courts Christian. These * Freeman's Lectures on Wells, and Proceedings of Somerset Archæolog. Soc. 1873. Deans Christian were so called, says Bishop Kennet,* "because their chapters were courts of Christianity or ecclesiastical judicature, wherein they censured their offending brethren, and maintained the discipline of the Church within their own precincts." They afterwards were called rural deans,+ but it is likely that at first the dean of the cathedral of Elgin was also the dean of the rural deanery of Elgin. Before the date of our next charter, an important event occurred, which has strangely coloured the history of the family of Byset. It is the banishment of John Byset, the founder of Beauly Priory, with his uncle Walter, Lord of Aboyne. In 1242, Patrick, Earl of Athol, son of Thomas de Galloway, and nephew of Walter Byset's wife, was burnt after a tournament at Haddington. Matthew Paris, writing about 1250, states that in 1242 Walter Byset at the tournament was worsted by the young Earl of Athol, and that Walter Byset contrived to burn the house in which the earl slept, and the earl with it. When this came, he adds, to the knowledge of Earl Patrick and other nobles, they attacked Walter, who fled for protection to the king. The king promised the nobles that Walter should be disinherited, and should abjure Scotland. Walter swore to proceed to the Holy Land, but went instead to the King of England, and, complaining that he had been unjustly deprived of his inheritance, urged that the King of Scotland, being the liege vassal of the King of England, could not, without his consent, disinherit or banish a nobleman from his country for ever, especially if he was not convicted of a crime. The King of England was incensed, but reserved his anger till a more suitable opportunity. The Chronicle of Melrose, written not later than 1270, states that in 1242, John Byset, with Walter‡ Byset and other * Kennet's Parochial Antiquities, 234. + "Decanus ruralis" is the title of Adam Gobinot in the Inquisition touching the chapel of Kilravock, A.D. 1343 (Family of Kilravock, p. 117). Mr Stevenson, in his edition of the Chronicle for the Bannatyne Club, inserts dicti Willielmi; but I have been informed since writing the text, that in the MS. from which the Bannatyne edition is printed it is "W.," that is, Walteri. accomplices, was outlawed, because report asserted that the said John, with the advice of the said Walter, had delivered Patrick of Athol to death. It also records that in 1244, the most wicked traitor,* Walter Byset, with his accomplices, desisted not from pouring the poison of discord into the ears of Henry, King of England, until he advanced to Newcastle with an army against the King of Scotland, when the treaty of Ponteland was made, 24th August 1244. Now, upon this subject, Fordun is often quoted, but Fordun's Scotichronicon contains nothing about it. Fordun mentions the treaty made at Ponteland, and the account that is quoted as Fordun's is that of his commentator, Bower, who did not write till 1441. About that time Wynton compiled his Chronicle. He states that William Byset was Lord of Aboyne, and that John Byset and Walter Byset were his brothers; whereas William Byset does not appear in contemporary documents after 1240, and we know that Walter Byset was the Lord of Aboyne. Matthew Paris, in his English History, which is a repetition of the Chronicle in which this story of Walter Byset appears, does not repeat it; but still there it is, apparently in his original manuscript, written within six or seven years of the event. The histories of Bower and Wynton allege that the estates of the Bysets were all forfeited, and the whole family banished the kingdom, and this has been improved upon by later Scottish historians, till Mr Burton disposes of the matter thus: "A strong feeling set against the Bysets. Their estates had to be forfeited, and the head of the house escaped alive with great difficulty. The family afterwards pushed their fortunes, with the other Norman houses in Ireland, and their Highland * This expression, "nefandissimus proditor," is used by John of Peterborough, and the use of it serves to show that John wrote after the Chronicle of Melrose was compiled, and clears up the question as to whether this John was John de Caleto, who was abbot 1250-62, or John Deeping, who was abbot in 1410-39 -"a mystery," Sir Thomas Hardy writes, "I am not able to solve" (Catalogue of MSS. for Early English History, vol. iii., p. 216); "for the Chronicle was not closed till 1270, when John de Caleto was dead." estates went to the Frizelles or Frasers, who founded an influence which became troublesome to the Government five hundred years afterwards."* Seeing that the Frasers did not get possession of any portion of the Bysets' Highland estates till 125 years after 1242, and then only of a third of those estates, two-thirds of which were acquired by the Fentons and the Chisholms, the former by the peaceful act of marrying a Byset lady, this is strongly expressed. The only fact certain in relation to this matter is that Patrick, Earl of Athol, was burnt in 1242, and that King Alexander II. assisted Walter and John Byset in leaving Scotland, where a strong party accused them of the murder. Matthew Paris mentions among the anti-Byset party Patrick, Earl of Dunbar; and Bower names David de Hastings, who became Earl of Athol in right of his wife on the death of Patrick of Athol. It is difficult to see any motive for the commission by Walter Byset of so horrible a crime. His wife was aunt of the young earl, but he was not in any way in the line of succession, while the young earl had two sisters married; nor does it appear that Walter Byset had any children by his wife his nephew, we shall see was his heir. But it is not improbable that Walter was likely to make himself disagreeable to David de Hastings on his succession to the earldom. Bower says that after the Provincial Council held at Perth in 1242, the king, retiring with his barons, and separating himself and them from the clergy, all the earls complained to him of the burning of the Earl of Athol.† We get more light on the exile of John and Walter Byset from the English records. Henry III. became King of England in 1216, when he was nine years of age. His sister Joan married Alexander II. in 1221. He, in January 1236, married the daughter of the Count of Provence, and mixed himself much in French affairs. Claiming the recovery of * Burton's History of Scotland, vol. ii., p. 89. Normandy, he declared war against Louis IX. in 1242, and that year went to France and passed the winter at Bordeaux. There, in December 1242, he was in want of soldiers, and must have heard with pleasure of the banishment from Scotland of John and Walter Byset. With his queen was Margaret Byset, now advanced in years, and who had lost this year her cousin, John Byset of Wiltshire, Chief Forester of England. In 1224 and 1226, after the connection between the Scottish and English courts was established, and while Hubert de Burgh, brother-in-law of Alexander II., was still the supreme minister of Henry, the Close Rolls tell us that gifts were made from the Royal Treasury to Walter Byset, so that Walter was well known to the English king. John Byset went, in 1242, from Scotland to Ireland, and there met with Sir James de Savill, a knight in the service of the Justiciary of Ireland, who suggested to John that he should serve the King of England in his wars in Guienne, upon the terms that he should obtain the grant of a knight's fee in Ireland. To this Byset agreed, and the king, on 17th December 1242, at Bordeaux, confirmed it by directing a writ* to the Justiciary of Ireland, ordering him to give a knight's fee to Byset if he would go to parts beyond the sea in the royal service. This was done, and we have the extent of the knight's fee, shown by a verdict of a jury in the following reign. It included the island of Rachrin or Rathlin, on the coast of Antrim, destined afterwards to become famous as the retreat of Robert the Bruce, and from being illustrated by the poetry of Scott. I suppose John went to Bordeaux, where Margaret Byset died that winter, and where the king remained. In August 1243,† King Henry granted to Walter Byset the manor of Lowdham, in Nottinghamshire, adjoining the manor of East Bridgeford, the property of the English Bysets. The object of the grant was to maintain Walter in the service of the king as long as the king pleased. In the following year, Henry, having returned from France, declared war * Pat. and Chart., 27 Hen. III, p. 739. + Ib., In. 4. |