page_title: Roger Northburgh
section_title: Diocesan business
hierarchical_section_title: Roger Northburgh / Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield / Diocesan business
caption_attribution_description: English: Domestic buildings, called west range on site, but actually the western end of the south range. Included the abbot's lodging. Lilleshall Abbey, Lilleshall, near Telford, Shropshire.
context_page_description: Roger Northburgh was a cleric, administrator and politician who was Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield from 1321 until his death. His was a stormy career as he was inevitably involved in many of the conflicts of his time: military, dynastic and ecclesiastical.
context_section_description: The ODNB entry on Northburgh describes him as apparently "efficient and conscientious" as a bishop. There is evidence that he undertook further visitations in 1331, 1338 and 1378-8. He seems generally to have been supportive to serving clergy and fairly sensitive to the needs of the laity, while often firm with clerical laxity.
  At St John the Baptist's Church, Chester, a great collegiate church, Northburgh's visitation of 1331 found the usual absenteeism by the chapter, who relied on poorly paid vicars to perform their work. He gave the vicars security of tenure, ordering that they be dismissed only with his own permission, and ordered that they be paid punctually and allowed to use the dwellings of the absentee canons, pending provision of  proper common quarters. When he visited in 1348 he found that the vicars were still not being allowed to use the premises of the canons. Moreover, absenteeism and poor management had wasted resources, allowing the fabric of the building and the liturgical vestments to deteriorate alarmingly. This time he cancelled outstanding leases and capped the canons' incomes at 16 marks, earmarking the surplus for necessary work.
  Language issues seem to have loomed large and Northburgh intervened in various ways to remove barriers to communication. When appointing penitentiaries for the diocese, empowered to hear confessions from all the laity and clergy of their districts, Northburgh took care to ensure that there was one to serve the Welsh language speakers – the Rector of Hanmer, near Wrexham – as well as several to work in English. He also licensed John Gilbert to start an embryonic grammar school at Oswestry. Latin was a barrier even to many clerics and religious. After visiting Farewell Priory, very close to Lichfield, in 1331, Northburgh had a good deal to say about enforcing better discipline and segregation from lay people, but was compelled to have his decrees translated from the customary Latin into Norman French to ensure there was no excuse of incomprehension for the nuns.
  Northburgh carried out numerous visitations to religious houses, as well as intervening on other occasions to secure improvements in governance. In 1322 William de Bloxham, the Prior of Arbury, offered his resignation as soon as a visitation was announced, explaining that he was insufficiens ad regimen, not up to the task of leadership, as soon as Northburgh arrived in the diocese and Holbeach was deputed to hold an inquiry. Evidently Holbeach recommended acceptance of the Prior's resignation, as shortly afterwards Northburgh was making enquiries about the competence and character of John de Borebach, the prior-elect. Later still, under 1326, Northburgh's register has a record of the Prior being deprived, but this appears out of place: it cannot refer to Borebach, who survived in office until 1329. Hobhouse, the editor, conjectured it had been added as a model document for such occasions. Another displaced entry makes clear that provision was made for the retirement of the former prior.
  John of Chetwynd, abbot of Lilleshall seems to have resigned in 1330 with a visitation in the offing. Northburgh's register records the proposals made for his retirement by the Augustinian canons, who described Chetwynd as "much beloved." His allowance was substantial and burdensome to the community: the building where he lived, including several rooms and a chapel, heating, wax for six candles during winter, a corrody equal in value to that of two canons, a servant, two grooms, a canon to act as chaplain, and a palfrey and baggage-horse, with their fodder. Allegedly to cover his clothing, he was also to receive the income from two of the abbey's manors, Blackfordby in Leicestershire and Freasley, near Tamworth and of two of its churches. Finally his guests and family were to receive to receive reasonable hospitality at Lilleshall. An earlier visitation, probably in 1324, had reported that Chetwynd ran the abbey in a wasteful, dictatorial and unaccountable way. In fact Chetwynd had a history of criminality and violence. In 1316 he 
caption: Part of the domestic range at Lilleshall Abbey, which included the abbot's lodging.
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