BENEFACTIONS OF THE LADY MARGARET. 1502–1504.

(a) Readership or Professorship in Divinity.

(b) Preachership.

Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby, mother of King Henry the Seventh, founded a Readership or Professorship in Divinity (Lectura perpetua unius lectoris perpetui sacre theologie); and also a Preachership (Cantaria perpetua vnius predicatoris verbi dei). She obtained a license to found the former 10 December 1496, but did not complete the foundation until 1502, when by deed, dated 8 September (A), she declares the Readership to be established, prescribes statutes, and appoints John Fisher, D.D., to be the first Reader. The licence to found the Preachership is dated 7 February, 1504, and her own deed of foundation (B) 30 October, 1504, in which John Fawne, B.D., is nominated the first Preacher, and statutes are prescribed. The stipends of both the Professor and the Preacher are to be paid by the Abbot of S. Peter's, Westminster, out of the revenues of certain lands conveyed to him by the Countess for that purpose. The deeds providing for these stipends are dated respectively 1 July, 1503 (C), and 6 November, 1505 (D). After the dissolution of the monastery both stipends were continued by decrees of the Court of Augmentations, confirmed by letters patent of King Henry the Eighth, dated respectively 26 June and 16 June, 1542 (E, F).