Further light is thrown on the question by an episode in the life of Thomas de la Mare, Abbot of St Albans from 1349 to 1396. At that time the subordinate nunnery of St Mary de Pre consisted of two grades of inmates, nuns and sisters, who were never on good terms. The Abbot accordingly transformed the sisters into nuns and ordained that no more sisters should be received, but only "literate nuns." But hitherto the nuns also had been illiterate; "they said no service, but in the place of the Hours they said certain Lord's Prayers and Angelic Salutations." The Abbot therefore ordered that they should be taught the service and that in future they should observe the canonical hours, saying them without chanting, but singing the offices for the dead at certain times. Since they had apparently no books, from which to read the services, he gave them six or seven ordinals, belonging to the Abbey of St Albans, which caused not a little annoyance among the monks. In order that nuns should not be rashly and easily admitted, he ordered that henceforth all who entered the house were to profess the rule of St Benedict in writing[822]. The requirements seem to be that the nun should be able to take part in the daily offices in the quire, for which reading and singing were essential. It was not, it should be noted, essential to write, though Abbot Thomas de la Mare required the nuns of St Mary de Pre to profess the rule in writing and about 1330 the nuns of Sopwell (another dependency of St Albans) were enjoined by the commissary of a previous Abbot to give their votes for a new Prioress in writing[823]. Nevertheless, strange as this may appear to many who are wont to credit the nuns with teaching reading, writing, arithmetic and a number of other accomplishments to their pupils, it is probable that some of the nuns of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries were unable to write. The form of profession of three novices at Rusper in 1484 has survived and ends with the note "Et quelibet earum fecit tale signum crucis manu sua propria [Maltese cross]"[824] which might possibly imply that these nuns could not write their names. It is significant that the official business of convents, their annual accounts and any certificates which they might have to draw up, were done by professional clerks, or sometimes by their chaplains. Payment to the clerk who made the account occurs regularly in their account rolls; and the Visitations of Bishop Alnwick, to which reference will be made below, show that they were often completely at a loss, when writing had to be done and there was no clerk to do it.