The Manor of Death Read online

  HAUBERK

  A long chain-mail tunic with long sleeves to protect the wearer from neck to calf, usually slit to enable riding a horse.

  HUNDRED

  A sub-division of an English county, introduced by Alfred the Great. The origin of the name is uncertain but was either an area occupied by a hundred households or a hundred hides of land.

  JOHN LACKLAND

  A sarcastic nickname for Prince John, Count of Mortain. The name came from the refusal of his father King Henry II to endow him with significant territory. When his brother Richard came to the throne in 1189, he gave much land to John, including Devon and Cornwall.

  JUSTICES

  The king's judges, originally members of his royal court, but later chosen from barons, senior priests and administrators. They sat in the various law courts, such as the Eyre of Assize or as Commissioners of Gaol Delivery. From 1195 onwards, Keepers of the Peace, later to become Justices of the Peace, were recruited from knights and local worthies to deal with lesser offences.

  KEEPERS OF THE PEACE

  In 1195, the Chief Justiciar of England, Archbishop of Canterbury Hubert Walter, followed up his revival of the office of coroner the previous year, by establishing law officers to assist in keeping the peace in the counties. With no police force, the old methods of keeping order by the local feudal methods, such as frankpledge (q.v.) could not cope with increasing lawlessness and outlawry, so he appointed knights, of whom there was a surplus after the end of the Third Crusade, to try to supervise and assist the sheriffs and Hundred sergeants and bailiffs. There were few at first, confined to the worst trouble spots, but in 1265 under Henry Ill, the Statute of Winchester made them more widespread. Then in 1361, an Act of Edward III formally appointed 'Justices of the Peace', who still deal with the bulk of criminal cases to this day.

  KIRTLE

  A ladies' floor-length gown. Many variations of style and fit, especially of the sleeves, existed in the fashion conscious medieval period.

  LEMAN

  A man's mistress or concubine.

  MANOR-REEVE

  A villein in a manor elected by his unfree fellows to represent them. He organised their daily labours and was in turn responsible to the lord's bailiff or steward.

  MANTLE

  A cloak, either circular with a hole for the head, or open-fronted with the top being closed either by a large brooch on the shoulder or by a top comer being pulled through a ring sewn to the opposite shoulder.

  MATINS

  The first of nine offices of the religious day, originally observed at midnight or in the early hours.

  NECK VERSE

  If a man claimed 'benefit of Clergy' to obtain immunity from the secular courts on the grounds that he was in Holy Orders, he had to prove that he was literate, but this was commonly done by reciting a short passage from the Bible, usually the Psalms. This became known as 'the neck verse', as it might save him from a hanging.

  ORDEAL

  A test of guilt or innocence, such as walking over nine red-hot ploughshares with bare feet or picking a stone from a barrel of boiling water. If burns appeared within a certain time, the person was judged guilty and hanged. There was also the Ordeal of Battle where a legal dispute was settled by combat. For women, submersion in water was the ordeal: the guilty floated. Ordeals were forbidden by the Lateran Council in 1215.

  OUTLAW

  A man who did not submit to legal processes. Usually an escaped felon or suspect, a runaway sanctuary seeker or abjurer, he was declared 'outlaw' - by a writ of exigent - if he did not answer to a summons on four consecutive sessions of the county court. An outlaw was legally dead, with no rights whatsoever, and could be legally slain on the spot by anyone. If caught by a law officer, he was hanged. A female could not be outlawed, but was declared 'waif', which was very similar.

  OUTREMER

  Literally 'over the sea', the term was used to refer to the countries in the Levant, especially the Holy Land.

  PELISSE

  An outer garment worn by both men and women with a fur lining for winter wear. The fur could be sable, rabbit, marten, cat, et cetera.

  POSSE

  The posse comitatus, introduced by Henry II, was the title given to a band of men raised by a sheriff to hunt felons or enemies of the realm across the county. '

  PREBENDARY

  The canon of a cathedral, deriving an income from his prebend, a tract of land granted to him (see canon).

  PRESENTMENT

  At coroner's inquests, a corpse was presumed to be that of a Norman, unless the locals could prove 'Englishry' by presenting such evidence from the family. If they could not, a 'murdrum' fine was imposed on the community by the coroner, on the assumption that Normans were murdered by the Saxons they had conquered in 1066. Murdrum fines became a cynical device to extort money, persisting for several hundred years after the Conquest, by which time it was virtually impossible to differentiate the two races.

  QUIRE

  The area within a church between the nave and the presbytery and altar, which gave rise to the name 'choir'. The quire was usually separated from the nave by a carved rood screen at the chancel arch, bearing a large crucifix above it.

  SANCTUARY

  An ancient act of mercy: a fugitive from justice could claim forty days' respite if he gained the safety of a church or even its environs. After that time, unless he confessed to the coroner, he was shut in and starved to death. If he confessed, he could abjure the realm (q.v.).

  SERGEANT

  The term was used in several ways, denoting inter alia an administrative/legal officer in a county Hundred, or a military rank of a senior man-at-arms.

  SECONDARIES

  Young men aspiring to become priests and under twenty-four years of age. They assisted canons and vicars in their duties in the cathedral.

  SHERIFF

  The 'shire reeve', the king's representative in each county, responsible for law and order and the collection of taxes. The office was eagerly sought after as it was lucrative; both barons and senior churchmen bought the office from the king at high premiums, some holding several shrievalties at the same time. Sheriffs were notorious for dishonesty and embezzlement - in 1170, the Lionheart's father, Henry II, sacked all his sheriffs and heavily fined many for malpractice. The sheriff in the earlier Crowner John books, Richard de Revelle, though fictional, was named after the actual Sheriff of Devon in 1194-95. He was appointed early in 1194, then lost office for reasons unknown; he returned to office later in the year, but was dismissed again the following year.

  SOLAR

  A room built on to the main hall of a castle or house for the use of the lord or owner, usually for the use of the lady during the daytime and often as a bedroom at night.

  TRENCHER

  A thick slice of coarse bread, often deliberately stale, used instead of a plate to hold cooked food. Especially after feasts, the trenchers were given to the poor and beggars waiting outside the hall.

  UMBLE PIE

  The umbles were the less desirable parts of venison, such as the offal. Especially at Christmas, they were given by a lord to the poorer people to make 'umble pie', from which the expression 'to eat humble pie' arose as an indicator of subservient status.

  VICAR

  A priest employed by a more senior cleric, such as a canon, to carry out some of his religious duties, and especially to attend the many daily services in the cathedral. Such a priest was often called a 'vicar-choral' because of his participation in chanted services.

  WIMPLE

  A linen or silk cloth worn by women to cover the neck and upper chest, the upper ends being pinned to their hair to frame the face.

  WOLF'S HEAD

  An outlaw was said to be 'as the wolf's head', for like a wolf, he could be beheaded with impunity and a bounty of five shillings could be claimed from the sheriff.

  PROLOGUE

  April 1196

  A brisk south-westerly wind sent the two ships scudding up the
Channel, almost midway between the Cotentin peninsula in Normandy and the coast of Devon. Both landfalls were far out of sight, which was just as well, given the bloody acts that were soon to take place.

  The smaller vessel was faster than the heavy-laden cog, which was hauling a cargo from Barfleur up towards King Richard's new harbour at Portsmouth. The shipmaster was desperately trying to coax every knot from his ungainly craft, and the single sail bellied out so tightly that he feared that some of the stitched repairs in the fabric would tear apart. Every few moments he would look fearfully over his shoulder as he leant on the single long oar pivoted over the steerboard quarter. His heart chilled as with every glance he saw the lighter craft remorselessly overhauling the Blackbird. The other cog, though almost as squat and cumbersome, had a larger sail and a slightly less bulbous hull.

  His four crewmen, powerless to do anything further to speed their ship, stared helplessly astern at what they feared would be their nemesis, for the men they could see on the deck were more than twice their number. As they came nearer, the desperate men on the Blackbird saw that two of the pursuing crew had crossbows ready strung, and the others brandished long knives, maces or short spears. The only one unarmed was a youth, who watched with horror as they drew alongside and, with ferocious yells, all except the steersman leapt across the bulwarks and lashed the two vessels together with ropes.

  Within a couple of minutes all the Blackbird's crew were either lying dead on the deck in pools of their own blood or had been thrown overboard to drown in the choppy waters. The steersman of the pirate vessel abandoned his oar to rush across to join his shipmates - on the way, he gave the youth a buffet across the head and yelled at him as he passed.

  'Come on, you yellow-livered pansy, there's cargo to be shifted! Haven't you seen corpses before?'

  Reluctantly, the lad followed him, but as soon as he had clambered over on to the other boat, he retched at the sight of two men lying with their throats cut and then vomited his breakfast on to the pitching deck. Another man grabbed him and threw him towards the single hatch, where the pirates were ripping off the loose planks that covered the hold. Gagging and keeping his eyes off the dead men nearby, he scrabbled at the boards and then toiled with the others in transferring the kegs of wine and dried fruit and the bales of Flemish cloth across to their own ship. As soon as everything had been pillaged, he heard the sound of axes smashing through the hull down below, and soon they all hurried back across the bulwarks to cast off the ropes before the doomed vessel could drag their own ship down with her.

  Within a few moments the Blackbird rolled over and sank, taking the remaining corpses with her. Crossing himself, the young man sobbed out some prayers to himself and stayed hunched miserably in a corner against the forecastle, as the marauding cog turned north and clawed her way across the wind towards the distant shores of England.

  CHAPTER ONE

  In which Crowner John rides to Axmouth

  Spring was in the air, but Sir John de Wolfe was oblivious to the primroses along the verges and the singing of little birds in the bushes. He had a boil coming on his backside, and riding a horse was the last thing he needed today.

  'You need to see an apothecary, master,' chided Thomas de Peyne, his diminutive clerk. 'A good clay poultice would draw out the poison.'

  'Or I could lance it with the point of my dagger!' offered Gwyn, his unsympathetic henchman, who rode on his other side as the three trotted along the road eastwards from Exeter.

  The gaunt coroner scowled at his two assistants, not deigning to answer their helpful advice. He was too concerned about taking the weight off his bottom by pressing his feet down into the stirrups - hardly the best way to cover the twenty miles to Axmouth. Before they had left soon after dawn, his housekeeper Mary had given him a folded pad of soft wool to slip inside his breeches, which helped a little. But now, as they entered the hamlet of Sidford some two hours later, he felt the need for a rest and some refreshment.

  Gwyn of Polruan, a giant with unruly ginger hair and a drooping moustache of the same hue, had an insatiable appetite for food and drink, which led him unerringly towards one of the thatched cottages that clustered around the packhorse bridge that spanned the little River Sid. A bedraggled bush hanging over the low doorway indicated it was an alehouse, and soon a snivelling youth had led their horses around the back to be fed and watered, while the coroner's trio went inside to seek some victuals.

  The building was old and decrepit, patches of the lime-and-horsehair plaster crumbling from the panels of hazel withies that filled the spaces between the timber frames of the single room. The floor was of beaten earth with a sparse covering of mouldy rushes, the only furniture being two rough tables with benches on each side and a few rickety stools. The coroner carefully lowered himself on to a bench, so that the offending part of his anatomy overhung the back.

  The Saxon ale-wife who ran the establishment was civil enough, glad of the custom of a Norman knight and a priest, though she looked askance at the wild-looking redhead in his scuffed leather jerkin. At their request, she filled two clay pots with ale from a five-gallon crock in the corner and poured Thomas a smaller mug of cloudy cider from a large jug.

  'I can give you good potage, sirs,' she offered. 'Got some rabbit in it, fresh trapped this morning. And there's new bread and cheese.'

  'Must have been a bloody small rabbit!' grunted Gwyn a few moments later as he stirred through his bowl with a wooden spoon, trying to identify some shreds of meat amongst the thin gruel.

  'It's been a hard winter. Many of these remote villages have very little left by this time of year,' rumbled de Wolfe. Though one of the toughest of men, he had grown up in a small village and had much sympathy for those who lived in manors whose land was poor or where their lords and bailiffs were incompetent managers. In bad years, many villagers starved to death because of poor husbandry.

  Their conversation was muted until they had finished eating, even the fastidious Thomas devouring the plain fare without complaint. He looked as if he needed the food, being a pale, scrawny young man with a slight hump on his back. His appearance was not improved by his peaky face, a long sharp nose emphasising his receding chin. However, his poor looks were more than compensated for by an agile brain and a compendious knowledge of religion and history. Recently restored to the priesthood after being defrocked several years earlier following a false allegation of indecent assault, he now combined religious duties at Exeter Cathedral with invaluable assistance to the coroner as his very literate clerk.

  Gwyn, the coroner's officer and bodyguard, sank the rest of his quart of ale in a single swallow and after a thunderous belch brought the conversation around to their present assignment. 'Are we sure that this is a killing, not just some body washed up on the beach?' he demanded. 'That messenger didn't seem all that sure of it.'

  John de Wolfe shrugged, though even that gave him a twinge in his buttock. 'He was the clerk to this Keeper of the Peace, so maybe he can recognise a murder when he sees one,' he grunted.

  Last evening, just before the city gates closed at curfew, a rider had entered Exeter and sought out the coroner, who was still in his chamber above the gatehouse of Rougemont Castle. He had been sent by his master to report the finding of a body in suspicious Circumstances at the small harbour town of Axmouth, in the east of the county near the boundary with Dorset. Though seemingly vague about the details of the death, he was adamant that his employer, Sir Luke de Casewold, considered that the deceased had been murdered.

  Gwyn reached out to tear off a chunk of coarse rye bread from the loaf on the table, the crust burnt black on top by a careless village baker. He used his dagger to hack off a slice of hard cheese from the lump provided by the landlady but paused with the food halfway to his mouth to ask a question. 'This Keeper of the Peace is some new-fangled official, is he?'

  Thomas, always the best informed about current affairs, looked scornfully at his big colleague. 'If you ignorant Cornishmen spent less
time eating, drinking and gambling, you might know more about what's going on in the world!' His head stuck out of his shabby black cassock like a rabbit peering from its burrow. 'Just as the Chief Justiciar established coroners eighteen months ago, last December he carried out the king's orders to set up knights in every county to keep the peace - or try to, in this disorderly realm where people seem to have conveniently forgotten the Ten Commandments!' He crossed himself piously, as he did a score of times each day in a habit as compulsive as Gwyn scratching his armpits or his crotch.