Note 948 — Chapter V · THE ANGEVIN EMPIRE. 1175–1183.

Founded in 1173, at Vaubourg in the forest of Roumare—an old hunting-seat of his Norman grandfather; Stapleton, Mag. Rot. Scacc. Norm., vol. i., Observ., p. cxli. Of the other houses, three were Austin priories: S. Laurence at Beauvoir in the forest of Lions, founded while Henry was still only duke of Normandy (ib. p. cxiv); Newstead, in Sherwood Forest, founded before 1174 (its foundation-charter, dated at Clarendon, has no mention of day or year, but is witnessed by “Geoffrey archdeacon of Canterbury,” who in 1174 became a bishop; Dugdale, Monast. Angl., vol. vi. pt. i. p. 474); and the priory “B. Mariæ Mellinensis,” near La Flèche, founded in 1180 (Gall. Christ., vol. xiv. col. 600. I cannot identify this place). The other two were Carthusian houses, Witham in the forest of Selwood and Le Liget in that of Loches, founded respectively in 1174 and 1175. (The date of Le Liget is traditional; I cannot find any mention of the place in Gall. Christ.) Of all these, Witham is the only one of any consequence; and the importance of even Witham lies chiefly in its connexion with S. Hugh. (For its history see Magna Vita S. Hugonis, Dimock, pp. 52 et seq.) The insignificance of the others is shewn by Gerald’s account of Henry’s religious foundations, in De Instr. Princ., dist. ii. c. 7 (Angl. Christ. Soc., pp. 27, 28)—an account, however, which is by no means fair. Henry on his absolution for S. Thomas’s death, in 1172, promised to go on a crusade of three years’ duration (Rog. Howden, Stubbs, vol. ii. p. 37); this undertaking he was afterwards allowed to exchange for a promise that he would build three religious houses in his dominions. According to Gerald, he managed one of these by turning the nuns out of Amesbury and putting a colony from Fontevraud in their place (see Gesta Hen., Stubbs, vol. i. pp. 134–136, 165), and another by turning the secular canons out of Waltham and putting regulars in their place (ib. pp. 134, 135, 173, 174, 316, 317. Both these transactions took place in 1177.) “Tertium vero,” says Gerald (as above) “vel nullum, vel simile prioribus sibique prorsus inutile fecit; nisi forte domum conventualem ordinis Cartusiensis de Witham, s. modicis sumptibus et exilem, ad hoc fecisse dicatur.” No doubt Witham was one of the three. But the other two are easily found; they were Newstead and Vaubourg or Le Liget. R. Niger (Anstruther, p. 168) is as unjust to Henry in this matter as Gerald; but so he is on most others also.