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Henry of Eastry
26th Prior of Christ Church
Effigy of Prior Henry of Eastry
Church	Canterbury Cathedral
Installed	1285
Term ended	1331
Predecessor	Thomas Ringmere
Successor	Richard Oxenden
Other post(s)	Treasurer of Christ Church (1275-1278, 1282-1285) Monk-warden for the Custody of Essex (1278-1282)
Personal details
Born	c.1239
Died	1331

Henry of Eastry

Henry of Eastry (d. 1331), also known as Henry de Eastry or Henricus de Estria, was a monk and 26th Prior of Christ Church Priory, Canterbury from 1285 to 1331. He was Christ Church Priory, Canterbury's longest reigning prior at 46 years. During his tenure, he strengthened the Priory's finances through careful land management and diplomacy, and funded numerous building projects with the Cathedral precinct and its estates. Henry is most remembered because of the many surviving records that he commissioned and which preserve his memory and work, these include; multiple bespoke cartularies, hundreds of his own letters close (Cambridge University Library, MS Ee.V.31) and his famous Memorandum Book (British Library, Cotton MS Galba E IV).

Alongside his monastic duties, Henry was also a politically active figure. He was a close confident and advisor to four Archbishops of Canterbury, including Robert Kilwardby (1273-1279; in whose household he served), John Peckham (1279-1292), Robert Winchelsey (1294-1313) and Walter Reynolds (1313-1327), and frequently participated in the courts of English King's Henry III, Edward I, Edward II and Edward III.

Early Life

Nothing is known about Henry's adolescence, but it is likely he was born around 1239 in Eastry, a village in east Kent, where he likely lived occasionally throughout his life. He possibly entered Christ Church Priory in the early 1260s and by 1274, he was serving as a clerk in Archbishop Kilwardby's household. Soon after he returned to Christ Church to perform the roles of treasurer (1275-1278 and 1282-1285) and monk-warden for the monastery's Essex estates (1278-1282).

Prior of Christ Church Priory

On 10th April 1285, Henry was appointed Prior of Christ Church following previous Prior Thomas Ringmere's forced resignation. Ringmere left behind considerable debts of near £5,000, owed mainly to Italian merchants and resulting from Ringmere's aggressive management, and it would appear that Henry was purposefully elected to reduce expenditures and restore peace. This was a task that he was already undertaking as treasurer under a mandate of Archbishop Peckham which ordered that all Priory expenses (excluding those of the Almoner and the Prior's chambers) had to be handled by the treasurer.

Financial revival

Jewish quarter -

Archival reorganisation

Henry was prolific in producing and reorganising the Prior's muniments. It has been suggested that financial and political pressures from Edward II's government are responsible. Notably, Edward's government introduced the Statutes of Mortmain and Quo warranto which increasingly sought to investigate and curtail ecclesiastical land ownership.

Register of Writs - (Cambridge Univeristy Library, MS Ee.V.31)

Memorandum Book - (British Library, Cotton MS Galba E IV)

Registers - A, B, C, D & E

Construction projects

Henry heavily invested in construction projects in both the Priory and the wider monastic estates.

Death

Henry died on 8th April 1331 during mass, supposedly aged 92. His condition had been declining since at least 1326, as from this year he begun requesting in letters to Edward II and patron Archbishop Reynold's for his sub-prior or a general attorney to act in his stead due to his ill health. A letter from 1326 to Archbishop Reynolds, in which Henry declined to visit because he could not ride a horse, would suggest in his final years he was increasingly immobile. Regardless, he evidently still made efforts to carry out business as in 1329 he requested Florentine merchants in London to purchase him a Flemish mule for travel.

Upon his death, his personal library was bequeathed to the Priory. This library contained 80 manuscripts, listed under the headings theology, canon law, civil law and ecclesiastical law. The majority were books which contained compilations of copied texts of similar genres combined in singular volumes, but his collections also included complete works, or glosses, by scholars like Cassiodorus and Peter Lombard, an even contemporaries of Henry including Guido de Baysio, Giovanni d'Andrea and Raymond Martini. He also held many personal copies of the monastic administrative documents, including a copy of the Priory's main cartulary 'Register E' (CCA-DDc/Register/E), identifiable by its title Registrum omnium cartarum et composicionum Ecclesie Cantuar (fround on the first folio), and his Memorandum Book.

Lit MS E. 27 - list of items?

Tomb of Prior Henry of Eastry (left) and Archbishop Walter Reynolds (right)

Monument

Henry was buried in his own full stone tomb in Canterbury Cathedral's south choir aisle; he is the only Prior of Christ Church to be commemorated with a monument of this scale. According to the Priory's treasurer's accounts for 1330-1331, the tomb cost £21.3.4d to build, with a further 12 pence spent in 1331-2 for a mason to complete the work.

His tomb is made primarily from Caen stone and is situated in a bay immediately east of his patron Archbishop Reynolds (d. 1327). It is positioned marginally lower than of the Archbishop and features an naturalistic effigy of a gaunt and old Henry, who is wearing mass vestments and holding a mitre and gloves, privileges bestowed on the office of Prior since 1221. His head rests on a cushion, above which is a canopy, and his feet rest on plinth. The effigy is placed upon a table top which surmounts a decorated front with trefoil arches and quartrefoils. The tomb is positioned between two vaulting shafts and resides below Window s:XIV, which depicts scenes from the life of St Andrew. There are two angled vacant niches with ogee arches on either side of the tomb, which according to Henry's will formally contained statues of St. Osyth and St Apollonia.

It was originally painted and possibly surmounted by a canopy and screen, but which were subsequently removed. The effigy's face has been slightly mutilated over time and Henry's effigy also appears to be too large for the bay it occupies, suggesting alterations to the surrounding space were required to make it fit.