JAMes PLuMtree* SEX, LIES, AND VISITATIONS: SECRETS AND DISCOVERY IN THE REGISTERS OF JOHN WALTHAM AND JOHN CHANDLER Prior to the 1394 visitation of the city of Salisbury, John Maydenhith, residentary canon of Salisbury, announced in English the defects, errant behaviour and sins he wanted to be discovered and dealt with by the proceedings 1 . The irst set of ills was concerned with the clergy. [I]f they are in holy orders; about those not ordained priests within a year of obtaining a cure; about [their] titles and those with several cures; about simoniacs ordained or promoted; about clerks who carry arms, prowl by night, cause quarrels, get drunk, haunt taverns, hunt, engage in business, roam about, and frequent markets or other public places; about clergy holding secular ofices [more especially] those involving the shedding of blood; about clerks married for the irst or second time who minster in churches; about non-residents with cures or chantries; about those farming churches or other beneices to laymen, religious, or others without bishop’s licence, or for more than ive years; about those alienating or wast- ing church goods; about clerks who have concubines, commit adultery or incest, or keep women in houses of ill repute; about those oficiating and present at clandestine marriages; if they keep hospitality or give alms in their parishes; if they teach parishioners form for baptizing infants in case of necessity; if they preach or have sermons preached; if through their fault any have died without sacraments. The second concerned was church fabric and churchyards. [I]f there is divine ofice daily in churches; if sacraments are duly administered to parishion- ers; if anything is taken for administering the sacraments; if chantries, rents, lights, or other church goods are withheld, and by whom; about dilapidation in churches, chapels, and churchyard enclosures, and repairs [needed] to parsonage property, books, vestments, and other church ornaments; about undedicated churches and altars, and if dedication festival is kept; if parishioners offer on dedication day; if Reserved Sacrament, chrismatory, and font are under lock and key; if appropriated churches have vicars and adequate vicarage endow- ments; about those receiving portions, pensions, or tithes in other parishes. * American University of Central Asia, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan; jamesplumtree@gmail.com. Thanks are given to the Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre, and to the Salisbury Cathedral Library and Archive, for access and assistance with the manuscripts, to FIDEM and Central European University, Budapest, for inancial support that enabled this study to be improved and expanded by comments made at the conference, and to Katalin Szende who read earlier drafts of this paper. 1 Salisbury, Salisbury Cathedral Library and Archive, Chapter Act Book of Coman, f.51v (numbered 102); the translation appears as appendix D7 in The Register of John Waltham Bishop of Salisbury 1388-1395, Ed. and tr. T. C. B. Timmins, Boydell Press, Woodbridge 1994 (Can- terbury and York Society, 80). This publication is later abbreviated to RJW. An Arabic number following the abbreviation refers to an entry number; a Roman numeral to a page in the introduc- tion; a capital letter followed by a number an appendix. Abbreviations used by Timmins have been expanded for ease of reading.