_St. Peter's-upon-Cornhill_ claims to be the oldest church in London, and to have been the stool or a Romano-British archbishop. The pretension seems to have been recognised by St. Paul's in the Middle Ages, and Bishop Stubbs was inclined to accept the archbishopric as having existed in London. As the interval in Church continuity cannot have been long, it is most likely that Mellitus reconsecrated some Roman temples or some of the old churches, as Augustine is known to have done at Canterbury. In Gregory's letter of directions to Mellitus he says that the temples of idols ought not to be pulled down, but be consecrated and converted from the worship of devils. The Church of St. Peter must have been very ancient, as the legend in regard to it appears in Jocelyn of Furness, a writer of the twelfth century. Bishop Ælfric, who died in 1038, gave in his will a "hage into Sce Pætre binnon Lunden."[180] A beautifully written Saxon charter in the British Museum, calendared as probably of the date 1038, records the gift of a messuage in London to St. Peter's Church.[181] This church, seated at the Carfax of the city, has at the same time the most important of dedications, and took precedence, Riley tells us, over the others. [Illustration: FIG. 32.--SAXON TOMB FROM ST. BENET FINK. RESTORED.] _St. Michael, Ludgate_, is referred to by Geoffrey of Monmouth in connection with Cadwaladr: "They also built a church under it (Ludgate) in honour of St. Martin, in which divine ceremonies are celebrated for him" (Cadwaladr). It must be of early foundation when such a story could be told only some fifty years after the Conquest. _St. Mary Aldermary_ was so called, says Stow, because it was the oldest church dedicated to the Virgin. It is sometimes called Elde Maria Church, and certainly dates from before the Conquest, for in 1067 the Conqueror confirmed the possession of the Church of _St. Mary called Newchurch_ to Westminster, and it is evident that the title Aldermary is a comparison with this New Mary. The latter as _Mary le Bow_ is mentioned by William of Malmesbury as having suffered an accident in 1091. _St. Mary_, Friday Street, is mentioned in 1105; _St. Margaret_, Lothbury, in 1104. Other pre-Conquest city churches confirmed to Westminster in the same charter of 1067 are _St. Magnus_, described as the "stone church _S. Magni Medietus_," _St. Clement_ [East Cheap], and _St. Lawrence_ [Pounteney].