1301-04-12, Feckenham

To the archbishop of Canterbury. The king remembers that he lately, when the church of Rolvyngden, in the archbishop's diocese, was void by the death of so and so, the late rector, which pertained to the king by reason of the wardship of the land there of J. de S., tenant in chief, then in his hands, caused his clerk William de Halstede to be presented to that church to J. then archbishop of Canterbury, who committed the custody of the church to R. de ., the king's chaplain, in the name of the said clerk, because the latter was then under canonical age; as, however, the present archbishop found no one instituted in the church, he has admitted to it Stephen de Certeseya, clerk, at the presentation of J. de Lenham, knight, who asserts that he is patron of the church, to the prejudice of the king's right, since time does not tun against the king in such matters, taking away from the said clerk the custody of the church: the king, being unwilling that his royal right, which the archbishop is bound to preserve by his fealty to the king, should be thus annulled, orders the archbishop to revoke speedily what has been thus attempted by him to the prejudice of the king's right, and to admit the king's said clerk, whom the king believes to be now under no canonical disqualification, to the church at the king's presentation. The archbishop is directed to write back by the bearer what he shall have caused to be done in this matter. [Prynne, Records, ili, 907.]