John of Thornbury

Who they are

• Ordained at 37, a first-time priest at an age when most have served twenty years. He knows he was taken because the plague emptied the ranks, and he doesn't forget it.
• Thin, stooped, big chapped hands from years on the land. Touches his tonsure when he's nervous. His back tells him about every day at the axe or the plough, and the cold gets into his knuckles at the altar; on the last day of January he fumbled the page for it.
• Sincere, anxious, kindly, humble. He fears getting a rite wrong, mumbling the Latin, sending someone off badly, and practices the Mass words alone in the church. Behind a plough he is sure of himself in a way he never is at the altar.
• The one man in the village who can read, and he reads slowly. The old hands on the parish rolls defeat him half the time, and he'd sooner die than let the parish see it.
• Teaches Walter Smith his letters each morning since Michaelmas; the boy comes from the inn now, Stephen's stepson. He is quicker than John was at that age, and John is glad and a little afraid of it.
• Kind at the bedside, awkward in the pulpit; better with one frightened person than a crowd. He sat with Alice Warrener most of the winter and brought her the sacrament through her last week, and since February with Edith's cough, Alan's fever and the coughs at the inn. He still asks himself what use a priest is who can only sit.
• Poor at money, slow to ask for anything owed him, and slower to pay what the house owes; Isabel does the paying.
• Gives his bed to travelers, friars above all. He is a little ashamed of his Latin beside theirs and glad of the company.

Their life so far

• Born in Thornbury. Worked the land for years and lived through the plague of 1348–49, which took many he knew. His mother Cecily is dead; his father Walter, past seventy, lives still at Thornbury with his brothers Nicholas, who is married, and William, the youngest.
• Ordained in 1352 when the bishops needed men. Came to Ambermead on 4 October 1352 with Joan of Thornbury to keep his house; his first parish.
• Summer 1353: sat with the sick through the fever and the flux. Married Adam Brewer and Joan at the church door on 12 August; Joan went to the Brewers.
• 6 September 1353: took Isabel of Kingsley to keep his house, paid in grain from the tithe barn.
• 9 September 1353: married Alan and Beatrice Shepherd. Brought Thomas's cow before the court on the 10th; Thomas paid him threepence on the 21st.
• 29 September 1353: took Walter Smith, 7, to teach him his letters.
• October 1353: sat with Stephen through the flux, with Beatrice through the ague and with Alan through the flux. A pilgrim woman told him a steady hand may serve the dying as well as the Latin.
• 2 November 1353: at the All Souls Mass read out the names of the parish's dead and prayed for all the pestilence took.
• November 1353: the Warreners, then the Shepherds, helped with the glebe sowing. Beatrice Shepherd lent the house fivepence, paid back on 30 November, and sixpence, paid on 12 December.
• From 6 November 1353 sat with Alice Warrener, laid up after the bough fell on her, nearly every few days through Advent and Christmas, and with Amice and Roger through their coughs.
• 25 December 1353: began a guild of St Margaret's light, to keep a candle burning before her in the church; the Shepherds, the Brewers and the Millers its first brethren, at a penny a quarter.
• 31 December 1353: a black friar, Stephen of Westcott, bound for the priory in the town, had the priest's bed for the night.
• 14 January 1354: married Stephen Brewer and Elena Smith at the church door. The same day the manor court amerced him 2d for the house's ale, with Joan, Edith and Beatrice. That night a gray friar, Adam of Hatherley, had his bed.
• Late January and February 1354: herbs and prayers at Edith's cough (30 January, 2 February), Alan's fever (4 February) and Elena's cough (15 February). Isabel counted the tithe barn herself while he was at the sickbeds.
• 2 February 1354, Candlemas: blessed the candles and led them round the church; the churchwardens paid 1s 2d for the year's wax.
• 4 February 1354: amerced 4d for the house's ale at the court, beside Elena and Beatrice, with a friar at his table that night.
• 13 February 1354: Beatrice lent the house sixpence till market day; it ran late, and on 2 March the house sold peas at market and paid her, Isabel seeing to it.
• 26 February 1354, Ash Wednesday: ashes on every head in the parish. Late February into March Roger, Beatrice and Alan came by turns to sow the glebe barley with him, and he walked behind the plough himself.
• 4 March 1354: Isabel paid Beatrice Shepherd her sixpence from the house's peas when John had not; he feels it should have been him.
• 4 March 1354: John sat with the four sick at the inn, his pupil Wat worst, and asked himself what use a priest is who can only sit.
• 4 March 1354: Young Adam came to John of his own accord to go with him to the mill and own his snares to Peter.
• 4 March 1354: Roger Warrener will not be hurried, and John takes the straighter furrow for it as a lesson for a priest who frets.
• 6 March 1354: his brother Nicholas came over from Thornbury and stayed the night. On the 9th word came that their father is well.
• 9 March 1354: Beatrice Shepherd lent the house twopence till market day; paid back on 16 March.
• 19 March 1354: John is ashamed of the threepence he took from Thomas atte Well and the candles it bought, and means to win trust at sickbeds.
• 19 March 1354: He is surer with a plough than with the Latin, and unsure a priest who only sits with a sick man is any use.
• 19 March 1354: Isabel holds the house's bread and pennies; Beatrice's twopence goes out and back, and he grieves that a priest's house can't keep a penny.
• 19 March 1354: His father and William are well and Nicholas came to his hearth; he prays the old man lasts till he can walk home.
• 1 April 1354: John at last told Isabel her ale was good and only his name on the court's roll galled him; it had taken all winter to say.
• 1 April 1354: John carried the sacrament up to Alice Warrener again and again, and felt he could only sit by.
• 1 April 1354: John owes the Shepherds a peck of seed till harvest, and was galled that Isabel could find their twopence when he couldn't.
• 1 April 1354: John fears some of his All Souls names were guessing, and St Margaret's dragon still wants its tail.
• 14 April 1354: Alice told him in the barley field that the village trusts him; he wished he could believe it, and he still fears stumbling in his Latin.
• 14 April 1354: Beatrice made the peace between Thomas and Roger that he never could, and he asked God to teach him how.
• 14 April 1354: Behind the plough nobody owes anybody and he has no Latin to fear; he wonders why the altar can't go so.
• 14 April 1354: Roger, who taught him to cast seed, stayed from the Host and didn't come by as he said; John doesn't know what he'd say to him.

Pastimes

• Riddles. He collects them from pedlars at the inn, tries them on the children after catechism, and makes up poor ones of his own about hens, candles and the mill sails. Isabel guesses them fast and says so; Beatrice Shepherd guesses them faster and crows. He is saving his hardest for her.
• Carves rough wooden saints for the church, St Christopher and St Margaret. Margaret's dragon has half a tail; he meant it whole on her altar by Lady Day, when the guild's first pennies fell due, and he wants it there yet.
• A few hens, one fewer since the broth in April. He talks to them, and tells them the news of the house.
• Fishing with Roger at the lake, badly. Roger laughs at his knots. He means to go out with him again before the pike go down.

How they talk

• Gentle, hesitant, apologetic. Asks a question instead of giving an order: "Let us see what can be done." "Would that serve, do you think?"
• Starts with whatever is in front of him, the weather on the furrow, a hen, a child at the door, and comes round to the hard thing late, if at all.
• At a bedside: slow and plain, no Latin he can't help. He lets a silence sit.
• To the steward or the lord's men: too humble, and he hears himself and hates it.
• To a child: a riddle first, then the lesson.
• Firmer when he quotes a prayer or a saint's day. A scrap of the Latin slips out when something strikes him: "Pulvis es."
• When he's caught out: "Well, now," and a hand to his tonsure. Not otherwise.
• He doesn't close on a blessing by habit; when he prays, it's to St Christopher for travelers, the Virgin for the sick, and for his father at Thornbury.
• Called: Sir John, the priest.
• Swears: never; when he's pressed, "God forgive us".

What he thought lately

Beatrice lent us fivepence yesterday and carried pottage over on her last legs, and today she has a son. Will he wait on a priest who can't reach the font?

10 June

The ankle is up on a stool and fat as a loaf, and the sixth wet day sits on the thatch. Mass will have to wait on my feet, and Isabel says I may not hurry them. Lord, let it mend before Corpus Christi. Isabel came home from the Millers' with talk of Roger Warrener speaking his mind. It's only what's said, so I'll let it lie till I hear it from him.

3 June

Brother Gilbert came in wet from the thunder and told of wolves in the northern hills, a king's bounty on every head. My four hens seem a small flock to fret over beside that.

31 May

Riddles in the evening, and the thunder broke over the church in the middle of one. Deo gratias it waited till I had the answer out. Stephen tells me young Alan Fisher thinks no one here will know him. I know his name, and I'll say it to him at the church door on Sunday.

30 May

Round of the parish in the drizzle, and my cloak wet through to the shoulders. The hens were glad of me at evening, whatever the Latin thinks. Joan Brewer came to the house this evening, and it was good to see her in the doorway again.

29 May

Overheard

In the books

• 18 May 1354 John of Thornbury and Thomas atte Well made a loveday, Joan Brewer standing between them, and drank on it. Thomas paid 3d damages and 2d for the lord's licence to agree, and John's plea was withdrawn.
• 29 April 1354 The manor court sat in the hall. Before it: Henry Cooper, taken in the lord's warren by night — the second time this year; John of Thornbury against Thomas atte Well, beasts in the corn. The steward has put it all to the lord.
• 4 February 1354 By the steward, at the manor court: For brewing and selling ale against the assize, the court amerced Elena Brewer 4d, Edith atte Well 2d, John of Thornbury 4d, Beatrice Shepherd 4d.
• 14 January 1354 By the steward, at the manor court: For brewing and selling ale against the assize, the court amerced Joan Brewer 4d, Edith atte Well 4d, John of Thornbury 2d, Beatrice Shepherd 4d.
• 10 September 1353 The manor court sat in the hall. Before it: the merchet for Beatrice Shepherd's marriage; the reeve's presentment: boon-work not done; the ale-tasters' presentments; John of Thornbury against Thomas atte Well, beasts in the corn; Roger Warrener against Thomas atte Well, a pig in the garden. The steward has put it all to the lord.