The house of Austin Canons at Rocester was often called an Abbey, and its Abbot was William Grafton. It was a house with a history containing many points of minor interest. We see how the religious were able to turn the difficulties of others to their own advantage when we read that when Sir Hugh de Okeover’s unwavering loyalty to Henry III during the Welsh War and the Barons’ Revolt seriously impoverished him and he had to sell much of his patrimony, the neighbouring Abbot of Rocester was a ready purchaser of his lands. The wool trade made Rocester prosperous for a time, and Edward I granted the Abbot a fair and a market. So late as the reign of Henry VI a second fair was obtained. The Manor of Rocester had been granted to the Abbey when the Chester Earldom was appropriated by Henry III as a provision for the heir-apparent. The house had once maintained two chantries, one at Halywell in Warwickshire and another at Lees in Staffordshire. The prosperous days of the canons had ended even before the Black Death. In 1318 they alleged that the cattle plague and bad harvests had reduced them to such poverty that they had been obliged to go out and beg _quasi mendicantes_. But on Bishop Norbury’s personal visitation of Rocester Priory he found that heavy debts had been incurred through the attempt to obtain possession of the appropriation of Woodford in Northamptonshire. There were other abuses, too. He forbade the granting of corrodies and the keeping of _canes venatici_, but his injunctions were not observed. It was in the time of Bishop Norbury that the interesting question arose about Easter Communions, which has already been mentioned. The arrangement of the summary in _Valor Ecclesiasticus_[101] is identical with that of Croxden, with an interesting addition which will be noticed presently. Ecclesiastical revenues include the tithes of straw (“garbas”) and hay in Rocester (with Waterfall and Bradley), Edensor, Kynston, and Woodford. The tithes in Rocester, etc., appear to be leased (_de firma_). The total is £46 13s. 10d. The fixed rents were from lands in “Le Clownams” (Clownholme), Glaston, Great Meadow, and Rocester, and amounted to 13s. 1d. Lands and tenements produced £40 8s. 8d. They were situated in Rocester, Swinscoe, Stanton, Combridge, Quickshill (“Quitsell”), Denstone, Alton, Waterfall, Foston, and Hognaston. The value of the demesne lands is stated to be estimated, by the judgment of the Commissioners and others appointed by them, at £23 16s. _per annum_: they were reserved “_ad usum hospicii monasterii_.” From the Paper Survey we know they consisted of arable, 70 acres; pasture, 201 acres, and meadow, 20 acres. The outgoings begin with the fixed payments: 1d. to the Earl of Shrewsbury for lands in Alton, £1 to William Bassett, Kt., for lands in Swinscoe, and 10s. to the King.