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PARDON BRASSES. 13
days to all who would hear the mass of Robert de Bardleby, Canon of York and the King's clerk, on Easter day, and pray for the good estate of the said Robert and his father and mother. In these York grants it is noticeable they are not made merely within the limits of the diocese, but apparently were granted for any locality.*
Mr. J. G. Waller observes : " The announcement of pardon for saying prayers for the deceased is very commonly found on monumental brasses, but never before has the promised reward been of so liberal a character [as in that of the Macclesfield monument, to be mentioned presently]. In the earlier examples, those of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, a very common form of inscription appears, in which forty days of pardon is promised to those praying at the tomb. This occurs so frequently that it seems to have been the most usual term. About this period very many similar ones occur, but the largest amount of ' pardon' vouchsafed appears on a small brass, having two demi figures, in Heylesdon Church, Norfolk, where ten years and forty days are granted. This is an unusual
* Transactions of the Cambridge University Association of Brass Collectors, No. xi., vol. ii., p. 9. Several instances in this paper are given by Dr. Fairbank. See also No. x., p. 19. |
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