Historic%20Yorkshire
Historic%20Yorkshire
Historic%20Yorkshire
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LEEDS UNDER THE NORMANS. 27<br />
driven even to devouring the corpses of those who first<br />
fell victims to the pangs of starvation. We find,however,<br />
that the monks of Kirkstall were very assiduous in<br />
cultivating the land, draining themarshes, enclosing and<br />
reclaiming commons and woods, by which the district<br />
round the neighbourhood of Leeds was considerably<br />
improved,and in 1372 we find, instead of the one mill,<br />
rude, and valued, according to the Doomsday Book, at<br />
four shillings, two corn mills, which, styled " the corn<br />
mills of the Queen's<br />
Majesty at Leeds," were held by<br />
special letters patent under the seal of the Duchy of<br />
Lancaster, and it is stated that in the same reign<br />
(Edward III.), fulling mills stood near the Castle. In<br />
1376 the increasing prosperity and extent of the town<br />
rendered desirablethe building of a bridge over the Aire<br />
at Leeds. This,probably, was not the first bridge which<br />
took the place of the Roman trajectus or ford, but was<br />
most likely the mostpermanent in characterand material,<br />
affording a means of transit as well as communication,<br />
and is in any case the first bridge of which any distinct<br />
mention is made. It was stated to have been built from<br />
the ruins of the Castle,but that is not likely,the Castle<br />
being used for the imprisonment of RichardII. twentythree<br />
years after the noticeof the bridge's erection. The<br />
same was also stated of the chantry which was built on<br />
the bridge, but this was refuted by the discovery at its<br />
demolitionthat the foundations of the chapel were incorporated<br />
with those of the bridge itself,<br />
The next episode in the history of the county in which<br />
Leeds took any part was the disastrous " Pilgrimage of<br />
Grace" of 1535. On the dissolution of the innumerable<br />
religious houses, and the dispersion of their monkish<br />
inmates, these worked on the superstition of the people,<br />
and the personal awein which they themselves wereyet<br />
held by the ignorant, to arouse an agitation by their<br />
harangues,having for an object the reinstatement of the<br />
expelled clerics. An immense multitude was speedily<br />
raised in the northern counties, and which, armed and