Santiago de Compostela
Reasons for Pilgrimage
John Marabel, a married man, is cited of adultery and
incest with Alice, daughter of Robert de Wywell, daughter of the said John's
wife. The man appears and admits (his sin). The woman is not found. And
John is forbidden from coition with either the mother or the daughter in
future, unless the mother, who is the wife, seeks the debt and he pays
it with sadness. And he will have as penance to make a pilgrimage with
bare feet to St. Mary at Lincoln, to St. Thomas [Becket] at Canterbury,
and to [St. Thomas Cantilupe] at Hereford and to beatings in penitential
fashion round the church and round the marketplace of Grantham. And he
will forswear the sin and suspect locations for the said Alice under pain
of 40/-. It is later held that the same John on his pilgrimage would take
much from his said wife, (so) the penance was changed so that he will fast
on bread and water as long as he lives every fourth and sixth week, unless
work or sickness prevents this... We John warn thee, the aforesaid John,
once, twice and a third time that you, having been parted for good from
your wife, will eject the said Alice from your company within the next
six days under pain of greater excommunication which is now (pronounced)
most firmly on your person in these writings if you should disdain to carry
out the aforegoing. [1347. Lincoln Dean and Chapter, A/2/24, fo. 72v, courtesy
Poos.]
Translation by Paul Hyams of Cornell University.
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