BATTLE ABBEY. Conveyance by John [Hamond], abbot of Battle, of advowsons to the vicarages of Great Sampford and Hempstead in Essex, given in the chapter house of Battle Abbey, 10 March 1535/6.

BATTLE ABBEY. Conveyance by John [Hamond], abbot of Battle, of advowsons to the vicarages of Great Sampford and Hempstead in Essex, given in the chapter house of Battle Abbey, 10 March 1535/6.

In Latin. On vellum, 16 lines on one membrane, 155 x 250mm (slightly stained and cockled, a few repairs to verso). Seal of Battle Abbey in brown wax, the obverse with representation of the abbey church and lettering '[SIGILLVM CONVENTVS SANCTI] MARTINI DE BELLO', reverse depicting St Martin, with lettering ' SIGILL. DEI GRA. ABBATIS DE BELLO', pendant on vellum tag, approx. 70mm diameter (somewhat chipped at outer edges, with losses to lettering on obverse). Provenance: With the archive of the Harvey family of Hempstead; sold at Bloomsbury, 20 June 2002, lot 1 (part); and again, 8 July 2010.

A grant by the last abbot of Battle. The abbot grants the advowsons of Sampford Magna [Great Sampford] and Hempstead, Essex, to Robert Mordaunt of Hempstead esquire. 'The church of Great Sampford in Essex and its chapel of Hempstead were among the properties added by William II to his father's endowment of Battle Abbey. The two rectorial glebes were run together as a single farm, which after the appropriation of the livings was considerably augmented; it produced a rental income of between £30 and £40 a year in the 14th century' (East Sussex Record Office, AMS 6929).

John Hamond was elected abbot of Battle in 1529. He and his 17 monks were already living on borrowed time when the present grant was made: Thomas Cromwell's agent Richard Layton had written a virulent description of the abbey to his master in the previous October, alleging 'that the abbot and all but two or three of his monks were guilty of unnatural crimes and traitors, further terming the abbot "the veriest hayne betle and buserde" and the arrantest churl, adding the sweeping condemnation, "the black sort of devilish monks, I am sorry to know, are past amendment".' ('Houses of Benedictine monks: Abbey of Battle', in A History of the County of Sussex: Volume 2, ed. William Page (London, 1973), pp. 52-56. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/sussex/vol2/pp52-56). The abbey was closed on 27 May 1538, and John was granted a pension of £100.