MONER, John, of Salisbury, Wilts.

Published in The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1386-1421, ed. J.S. Roskell, L. Clark, C. Rawcliffe., 1993
Available from Boydell and Brewer

Constituency

Dates

Jan. 1397

Family and Education

Offices Held

Mayor, Salisbury 1 Nov. 1388-9, 1391-2, 1397-8; alderman 1412-13.1

Commr. of inquiry, Salisbury Mar. 1398 (death of a chaplain).

Biography

In June 1388 Moner and two other Salisbury merchants, Richard Juel* and John Salisbury, petitioned the government for the return of 140 tuns of wine of theirs, arrested at Southampton as having belonged to Sir John Salisbury, one of the traitors condemned to death and forfeiture in the Merciless Parliament. Moner’s main stock-in-trade, however, was not wine but woollen cloth: he presented the comparatively large number of 67 entire cloths for alnage in 1394-5, and some 54 more in 1397-8. In March 1398, during his third term as mayor, he served ex officio on a royal commission; and in the following September he was responsible, again as mayor, for drawing up the local version of the renewed oath of loyalty and support demanded of Salisbury and other major towns by Richard II. A parishioner of St. Edmund’s church,2 Moner, in the course of his career, witnessed a large number of local deeds.

Moner acted as surety for the attendance of Thomas Child at the Parliament of 1407. Then, in October 1409, he obtained a life exemption from being compulsorily appointed to any office in the Crown’s grant. It did not follow that he wished to retire from public life altogether, for on 2 Apr. 1411, in the course of the dispute over tolls between Salisbury and Southampton, he was one of those licensed by the convocation to negotiate with representatives of the opposition. Two years later, and along with Richard Spencer*, Moner, who was now an alderman, granted to the corporation of Salisbury four tenements in mortmain: the rents of these (about £5 a year) were intended to help pay taxes levied on the city. At Michaelmas 1414 he was appointed supervisor of Spencer’s will.3

By this time Moner must have been one of the richest citizens of Salisbury. Certainly he contributed by far the largest sum—no less than £10—towards the loan made by the commonalty to Henry V in March 1415, and in 1417 he paid £2 (twice as much as anybody else) towards the city’s apportioned share of a parliamentary subsidy. Moner was dead by January 1425, when the will of Walter Shirley* provided for prayers to be said for his soul.4

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: Charles Kightly

Notes

  • 1. R. Benson and H. Hatcher, Old and New Sarum, 695; Tropenell Cart. ed. Davies, i. 255; Salisbury RO, ‘Domesday bk.’ 2, ff. 16, 21; ledger bk. A, f. 43.
  • 2. CCR, 1385-9, p. 398; E101/345/2; ledger bk. A, ff. 7-8; Benson and Hatcher, 755.
  • 3. CPR, 1409-13, p. 138; C219/10/4; ledger bk. A, f. 42; ‘Domesday bk.’ 3, f. 11; CPR, 1405-9, p. 468.
  • 4. Ledger bk. A, ff. 54, 60; PCC 3 Luffenham.