Who Bought The Halls?

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Who Bought Blackfriars?

 

  • Even before the dissolution of Blackfriars, Augustine Steward, three times mayor of Norwich, sent messengers to London, proposing:

 [Letter and Papers, Henry VIII, xiii, pt ii, no 282]

To make the churche a fayer [fair]] and large halle, well pathed, for the mayor and his bretherne, … for their common assemblyes [assemblies] … to fynd a perpetual free-scole [school] therein … [and to keep a chapel] to pray to Almightye God for the properouse [proper] preservacyon of your most Royall estate … [and] to have there a pulpitte for all straungers [strangers, i.e. outsiders or visitors] to preache the worde of God.

 
  • Steward was successful in his bid and, in June 1540, the city paid £81 for the buildings, with all their lead, iron and glass; the pruchase price also acquired the old site over the river.
  • Later the King renegotiated the agreement, and the city was obliged to pay another £152 for the roof lead it had already purchased. However, even at this price the buildings represented good value. Steward probably got a bargain.
  • In 1542, the Norwich Assembly agreed to indemnify Steward and Master Necton in the sume of 500 marks , which they stood bound to pay the king 'ffor the leade of the late blak ffreres chirch' [NRO, NCR, 16D/2, Norwich Assembly Proceedings, 1542, f. 177v]
  • The rebuilding programme was interrupted in 1549, when it proved necessary to clear out all the muck left behind when the Duke of Warwick quartered his horses in the building during Kett’s rebellion.

The nave of the church

[A Mid-Ninteenth Century view of the nave by C. J. Greenwood]
  • The nave of the church was converted into an assembly hall (the Common Hall) and used for a variety of functions: ceremonial feasts for the city council, and receptions for important visitors. It was also repaved in 1541/42, using stone from one of the city’s less fortunate friaries, Greyfriars, which was effectively demolished:

NCR, 18A/6, Chamberlians' Account Book,  1541-42
 [Paid to] Roger Lawes & Henry Carter ffor the cariage off xvij [7] lodes pathingtyle from the grey ffreres to the common hall, at iijd [3 pence] the lode

  • The Guild of St George, which since the early fifteenth century had run the city, as well as constituting a religious confraternity, held its annual feasts in the hall.
  • From the 1540s onwards, the symbol which it carried in procession, the famous snapdragon, was stored here. The snapdragon can now be seen nearby in the Castle Museum.
  • A substanital part of the site was also let out to tenants, a large grain store was created for the benefit of the poorer citiziens and there was even briefly a schoolhouse, before the boys moved into their permanent home in the cathedral close.
  • These and many other changes are recorded in the city's copious sixteenth-century archives, most notably in the pages of the chamberlains' accounts book.