york00orns

GEOFFRY PLANTAGENET.
Archbishop raised the spiritual arm. Bishop Pudsay
and the refractory chapter of York were, each
in their turn, excommunicated. This seems to have
been a weapon which Geoffry was always ready to
employ. Appeals were made to Rome, and the
relations between Geoffry and his chapter, and with
his haughty suffragan, became embittered to the last
degree. It was even alleged that the Archbishop
had employed some one to poison the Dean and
some of the more obnoxious canons. One of his
feuds with the chapter arose out of Richard I.'s
request to Geoffry that he should do all he could to
assist in raising the enormous ransom which was
required to release him frorn his imprisonment in
the Tyrol. Geoffry demanded one fourth of their
annual revenue from the dean and canons. This
they utterly refused, charged him with an attempt to
destroy the liberties of the Church of St. Peter, and
closed the minster against him.
Their refusal was in
part owing to the Archbishop claiming to appoint to
the deanery, which was vacated in 11 94, the chapter
adhering to their right of electing their own superior.
The pope set aside the claims of both, and gave it of
his own authority to Simon of Apulia. The chapter
retorted by laying before the apostolic see a long
list of complaints of Geoffry's utter neglect of his
spiritual functions. He hawked and he hunted, but
he neither held ordinations, consecrations, or synods,
set the liberties of the minster utterly at naught,
gave benefices to boys, and if any one suggested an
appeal to Rome he was thrown into prison. Pope
Celestine issued a commission of inquiry. During its