Pope Leo addressed his reply to king Kenulf, his most loved bishops, and most glorious dukes. It was a difficult letter to write, for Kenulf had been very frank about the uncanonical action of Hadrian the Pope. Leo answered this part of Kenulf’s letter by stating that his predecessor had acted as he had done (1) because Offa had declared it to be the universal wish, the petition of all, that the archbishopric should be divided into two; (2) because of the great extension of the Mercian kingdom; (3) for very many causes and advantages. He, Leo, now authorized the departure from Pope Gregory’s order in so far as this, that he recognized Canterbury, not London, as the chief seat of archiepiscopal authority. He declared that Canterbury was the primatial see, and must continue and be viewed as such. I cannot find in his letter a definite declaration that he annuls the act of his predecessor, but that is the effect of the letter; nor does he declare that Lichfield is no longer an archbishopric. Kenulf, as we have seen, had sent him, out of his affection for him, a gift of 120 mancuses. But he reminded the king that Offa had bound his successors to maintain the gift to the Pope, in each year, of as many mancuses as there are days in the year, namely, he says, 365, as alms to the poor, and as an endowment for keeping in order the lamps [in the churches]. This is much more likely than the shadowy gifts of Ina, king of Wessex, to have been the origin of Peter’s Pence, a sum of money collected in England, at first fitfully and eventually year by year, and sent out to the Pope. The money was collected in the parishes of each diocese down to the time of the Reformation. It is a regular item in the churchwardens’ accounts of the earlier years of Henry VIII. Only a fixed amount of the whole sum collected was sent to the Pope, the balance being used for repairs in the several dioceses. We have a list prepared by a representative of a late mediaeval Pope giving £190 6_s._ 8_d._ as the amount received by him for the year, corresponding roughly to a normal 300 marks a year. Offa’s money for the Pope went of course from Mercia. When Wessex became predominant, Ethelwulf, the son of Ecgbert and father of Alfred, made large gifts to Rome, and left by will 300 mancuses, 100 in honour of St. Peter, specially for filling with oil all the lamps of his apostolic church on Easter Eve and at cock crow, 100 in honour of St. Paul, in the same terms and for the same purpose in respect of the basilica of St. Paul, and 100 for the Pope himself. King Alfred also sent presents to Rome. From 883 to 890 there are four records of gifts from Wessex. After 890 we have no such record in Alfred’s reign; and in Alfred’s will there is no mention of the spiritual head of the Church of the West.