The Augustinian Friars in Britain

Our Hearts are Restless until they Rest in You, Lord

Prior General’s Medieval Seal Die Found in Field

The General Curia in Rome recently bought a fourteenth-century medieval seal die, or stamp, belonging to the prior general.  It was found by an amateur archaeologist using a metal detector in a field near Daventry in Northamptonshire in 2004.  Made of cast metal for use on wax , it would have been used to seal important documents.  The centre shows a standing figure, possibly St Augustine, with a kneeling figure, possibly a prior general, before him.  Above the two figures are the head and shoulders of Our Lady and the child Jesus.  Around the figures is a legend, not easy to read, stating what seems to be:

S PRIORIS GENERALIS ORD STIS HEREMITIAR STI AUGUSTINI – ‘the seal of the Prior General of the Order of Holy Hermits of St Augustine’.

Paul Graham was asked to liaise with Stephen Pulley, the finder of the stamp, before the purchase went ahead.  Mr Pulley provided various documents, most importantly a note from Dr Michael Stansfield, Assistant Keeper of Archives and Special Collections at Durham University Library, who gave a description of the stamp and deciphered the lettering.  The British Museum concurred with Dr Stansfield’s description.  Mr Pulley also signed a statutory declaration before a commissioner of oaths stating that his account of the find is true.

How a prior general’s stamp found its way to England in the fourteenth century was something of a mystery, as generals did not travel around the provinces of the Order to the extent that they do today.  However, further research by Mr Pulley revealed that Prior General Thomas of Strasburg visited England in 1353– the only general in medieval times to do so – as part of a mission to reorganise studies.  In 1362, according to Roth, the Prior General declared Northampton as one of the houses of vacation for foreign students of the order while on vacation. It is not unreasonable to assume, therefore, that Thomas of Strasburg visited the friars in Northampton and possibly mislaid his stamp, only for it to be found 651 years later.