Aspects of Kentish Local History

the enteryng of the quyer ys one of the fayrest and the most auncyent crosse that ever I saw, a ix footes, as I ges, yn highte. It standeth lyke a fayr columne. The base greate stone ys not wrought. The second stone being rownd hath curiously wrought and paynted the images of Christ, Peter, Paule, John and James, as I remember. Christ sayeth Ego sum Alpha et O. Peter sayeth, Tu es Christus filius Dei vivi. The saing of the other iij when painted majusculis literis Ro. but now obliterated. The second stone is of the Passion. The third conteineth the xii Apostles. The iiii hath the image of Christ hanging and fastened with iiii nayles and sub pedibus sustentactilum. the hiest part of the pyller hath the figure of a crosse." Plates I and II.
   Sir Charles Peers has identified carved fragments of this richly carved stone cross in the modern church at Hillsborough, a mile inland from the old church of Reculver which was partly pulled down in 1805. In a communication read to the Society of Antiquaries in 1927 he has claimed that the cross was put up by the first builder of the monastery of Reculver not much after the year 670, and has shown that it stood on a masonry platform immediately west of the arcade of three semi-circular arches of Roman brick springing from lofty circular stone columns which divided the nave from the chancel. The columns with their capitals and bases still exist, and now stand in the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral.
   At the time of Archbishop Winchelsey's visitation a

chest for offerings and alms stood in front of the great stone cross. The parishioners claimed the offerings for the fabric fund, because they had accepted responsibility for the repair of the chancel as well as the nave, and they also provided service books, ornaments and vestments. The vicar complained to the Archbishop that the parishioners persuaded strangers to put their offerings into the chest, and moreover they placed their own offerings made at the churching of women after childbirth, at weddings and at funerals in the chest instead of giving them at the high altar, and so they defrauded him of his dues. He also alleged that the parishioners opened the chest as they chose and spent money on other purposes than the repair of the fabric. In a judgment given on June 12th, 1296, the Archbishop decreed that the chest should have four keys, one kept by the vicar, two by parishioners elected by the community, the fourth by an elected parishioner of Herne chapel. It was understood that the chest was to be provided with three or four different locks, and could only be opened when three or four of the parties were present with their keys. The feast of the Nativity of the Virgin (September 2nd) drew crowds to Reculver, and on that annual occasion the Archbishop settled that a clerk in orders, wearing a surplice, and two or three of the parishioners if they wished, should collect the offerings and put them in the chest. If money should be needed for the repair of the fabric and other obligations, the chest should be unlocked