Guilds -- England -- London; London (England) -- Description and travel; London (England) -- History
=St. Mary Bothaw= was situated on the east side of Turnwheele Lane,
Cannon Street. The date of foundation is unknown. Newcourt mentions
Adam Lambyn as a rector, who died 1279. In the Taxation Book of Pope
Nicholas IV., 1291, the church occurs as Sancte Marie de Bothaw. It
was destroyed by the Great Fire, but not rebuilt, its parish being
annexed to that of St. Swithin. Stow supposes, for want of a better
theory, that “this church being near unto the Down-Gate in the river
of Thames, hath the addition of Bothaw, or Boat Haw, of near
adjoining to a haw or yard, wherein of old time boats were made, and
landed from Downgate to be mended.” Strype mentions that it seems
“of old to be called St. Mary de Bothache,” and Mr. Loftie in his
_London City_ (1891) says that the name is “most likely from ‘la
board hatch,’ a wooden gate-lock called also in some ancient
documents ‘Board-Hatch.’” The map by Agas _c._ 1560, and Hollar’s
view of London, call the church St. Mary Buttolph Lane. It is
somewhat remarkable that Dowgate is almost the only one of the older
City gates which has no Church of St. Botolph near by, as at
Billingsgate, Aldgate, Bishopsgate, and Aldersgate. The term St.
Mary Bothol occurs more than once in records of the sixteenth
century. Can it be that the name bears witness to the existence of a
St. Botolph’s Church here, which was dedicated to the Virgin, with
the name Botolph attached as a remembrance of the former
appellation? The earliest date of an incumbent is 1281.
The patronage of the church was in the hands of: The Prior and
Convent of Christ Church, Canterbury, before 1281; the Dean and
Chapter of Canterbury from 1552 up to the time it was annexed to St.
Swithin in 1666.
Houseling people in 1548 were 182.
Chantries were founded here: By Lady Joan Fastolf, to which Robert
Kirke was instituted, May 10, 1445; by and for John, son of Adam de
Salusbury, who endowed it with a tenement called the “Key” in
Coleman Street, which fetched £7 in 1548; by and for John Hamond,
before 1387; by James le Butler; by Hugh Fostall.
Many noble persons were buried here, as appeared from the arms in
the windows, the defaced tombs, and print of plates torn up and
carried away. The most remarkable, perhaps, was that of Sir Henry
Fitz-Alwine, draper, the first Lord Mayor of London, who continued
in his position for twenty-four years. Here, too, Robert Chicheley,
grocer and mayor of London in 1422, was buried; he appointed by his
will that 2400 poor men should each have a good dinner on his
birthday, and he also gave a plot of land for the building of the
parish church, called St. Stephen’s, Walbrook.
No charitable gifts are recorded by Stow.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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