Ecclesiastical patronage was an essential part of the social and political cement of western Christendom. It was the only way in which the laity were permitted to exercise rights in the Church and its property. This work studies the deployment of such patronage by the higher nobility of later thirteenth-century England. It is about the nature and extent of patronage rights, how they were identified and used, why and for whom they were valuable, what challenges lay patrons faced, and how these patrons looked to the future in the ways in which they made gifts to the Church. This book is not primarily about lay piety, although the piety of individuals will be encountered as a motive for making the endowments which resulted in the exercise of rights. But the main concern is with patronage rights as property that had to be defended and as resources to be managed.

The term ‘patronage’ is, therefore, being used in a very particular sense. Patronage in general terms involves an inherently unequal relationship between a dominant party which chooses to offer favours and opportunities to a recipient who is more or less beholden and dependent. The nature of what is offered will vary according to circumstance, but the significance of patronage for the medieval political and social historian can hardly be over-stated. The use or abuse of patronage was a key factor in the success or failure of kings; it determined the character of office-holders; it underpinned the growth of factions; it was the driver of social mobility.