Plaque numbers 01 and 79 can be found at this location.
The plaque is on the wall of Windover House (nos. 22–24) St Ann Street, SP1 2DR.
The O/S grid position is SU 14661 East 29637 North.
Acquired by William Windover, Merchant, in 16th century.
Richard II and Queen Ann feasted the Franciscan Friars Minor here in 1393.
Plaque presented by Salisbury Chamber of Commerce
Windover House (nos. 22–24) contains the roof of a medieval hall and solar range,
but was considerably remodelled in the early 17th century and later.
There is a fine portrait of William Windover in Salisbury Guildhall next to the market place.
The Dominicans (Black Friars, Friars Preachers) and Franciscans (Grey Friars, Friars Minor) arrived in England in the 1220s. In September 1224 a group of 9 Franciscans under the leadership of Agnellus of Pisa arrived at Dover and established settlements at Canterbury, London, Oxford and Northampton. They saw their mission as particularly aimed at city dwellers, and so their interest in Salisbury testifies to the city's growing importance. They arrived here in about 1225 and were given the St Ann Street Friary site by Bishop Richard Poore. King Henry III was a major benefactor, in 1230 granting them (among other things) the timber from five oaks and allowing them to use wood from Savernake forest for building. In 1243 there were 20 brethren: by 1283 the number had grown to 40. They continued to enjoy royal patronage; in 1290 Edward I allowed them to use building stone from Old Sarum. The Dominicans had established a house in Fisherton (near the old Infirmary) by 1280. Generally, neither order sought permanent endowments but preferred to rely on day-to-day charity. They lived lives of preaching, teaching, poverty and simplicity.
Relations between secular clergy and the friars were sometimes strained. There was a difference in the emphasis of their ministry. The Church's rites proclaimed Christ's divinity and majesty: preaching friars, on the other hand, urged their hearers to meditate on Christ's humanity and suffering. On a more mundane level, some friars were licensed to hear confessions and were reputed to impose easier penances than did the parish clergy (in any case, people perhaps found it easier to confess to an anonymous wandering friar than to a parish priest who was part of their own community). Friars did not always receive a good press: Chaucer's friar Huberd (in the General Prologue to the Canterbury Tales) is said to ”know the taverns well in every town, and every innkeeper and barmaid better than lepers and beggars“.
In Salisbury, however, the brethren, citizens and cathedral clergy appear to have coexisted happily. During a visitation in 1475, Bishop Beauchamp found that of 20 sermons to be preached annually in the cathedral, 9 were customarily allocated to the friars. Friars were usually better educated than were the parish clergy. Over the years, a number of notable friar scholars took up residence in Salisbury, among them Henry of Woodstone, Hugh of Wimborne (both 1250) and Hugh of Brisingham (1280). They probably helped to establish the city's reputation as a centre of learning, leading to the founding of the colleges of St Edmund (see plaque 78) and St Nicholas de Vaux.
The Salisbury Franciscan friary seems to have been quite prominent. In 1393 the Chapter of the English province of the Order met here, and, unusually, the king himself attended the meeting, as commemorated in plaque 1. A contemporary account says that ”the King [Richard II] splendidly feasted the Chapter of the Friars Minor in Salisbury and there ate with them in the refectory, having with him the Queen Anne and bishops and other lords on the feast of the assumption of the Blessed Mary [15 August], and there wore the regalia and crown.“ The feast cost £80 3s 8 1/2d ; for comparison, the Christmas Day feast had cost £200. The Chapter did not meet again in Salisbury until 1510, when Henry VIII (ominously, perhaps) contributed £10.
Later in Henry's reign, the Franciscan brethren in Salisbury took the oath of supremacy in 1534 recognising Henry as the head of the Church in England, but if they hoped thereby to remain undisturbed they were to be disappointed. In July 1538 the Royal Commissioner Richard Ingworth (a Dominican) arrived to take an inventory of the friary property and in October of that year the brethren formally surrendered it. In August 1544 the site was sold to John Wrothe for £39. The next recorded owner was William Windover in 1600.
Eulogium (Historiarum sive Temporis) ”a chronicle from the creation of the world until AD 1366 written by a certain monk of Malmesbury. Two continuations are added, one of which extends to 1412, the other to 1490“ - edited by Frank Scott Haydon, 1863 , vol 3 page 369 (in the Rolls series) This shows the King's feast as having taken place in 1392, but A.G.Little (see below) says this is an error and dates it to 1393 but see plaque 5 and The Calendar Act where the year change was moved from March 23rd to January 1st.
The works of Geoffrey Chaucer edited by F.N. Robinson - Oxford University Press 1957
Grey Friars of Salisbury - A.G.Little - Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine vol xlvii pp 36- 54 (held as a monograph in Salisbury reference library under the shelf code SAL275)
England under the Norman and Angevin Kings - Robert Bartlett (the New Oxford History of England) - Oxford University Press 2000
Reformation - Europe's House Divided - Diarmaid MacCulloch - Penguin Books 2004
History of Modern Wiltshire - Hoare, Benson and Hatcher - published by John Bowyer Nichols and Son, 1843
The Wikipedia entry on Franciscan Friars.
The plaque can be found on the building called Friary Court on the road called "The Friary". This road can be found by going straight on (slightly left) where Brown Street meets St Ann Street.
The O/S grid position is SU 14654 East 29692 North.
In about 1225 Franciscan Friars
established a religious house
near this place. It was
dissolved in 1538
in the reign of Henry VIII.
See under plaque 1 for details about the Franciscan Friars in Salisbury.
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