{59}Landewi Nant Hodeni,or the church of St.David on the Hodni,is now better known by the name of Llanthoni abbey.A small and rustic chapel,dedicated to St.David,at first occupied the site of this abbey;in the year 1103,William de Laci,a Norman knight,having renounced the pleasures of the world,retired to this sequestered spot,where he was joined in his austere profession by Ernicius,chaplain to queen Maude.In the year 1108,these hermits erected a mean church in the place of their hermitage,which was consecrated by Urban,bishop of Llandaff,and Rameline,bishop of Hereford,and dedicated to St.John the Baptist:having afterward received very considerable benefactions from Hugh de Laci,and gained the consent of Anselm,archbishop of Canterbury,these same hermits founded a magnificent monastery for Black canons,of the order of St.Augustine,which they immediately filled with forty monks collected from the monasteries of the Holy Trinity in London,Merton in Surrey,and Colchester in Essex.They afterwards removed to Gloucester,where they built a church and spacious monastery,which,after the name of their former residence,they called Llanthoni;it was consecrated A.D.1136,by Simon,bishop of Worcester,and Robert Betun bishop of Hereford,and dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
{60}The titles of mother and daughter are here applied to the mother church in Wales,and the daughter near Gloucester.
{61}William of Wycumb,the fourth prior of Llanthoni,succeeded to Robert de Braci,who was obliged to quit the monastery,on account of the hostile molestation it received from the Welsh.To him succeeded Clement,the sub-prior,and to Clement,Roger de Norwich.
{62}Walter de Laci came into England with William the Conqueror,and left three sons,Roger,Hugh,and Walter.Hugh de Laci was the lord of Ewyas,and became afterwards the founder of the convent of Llanthoni;his elder brother,Robert,held also four caracutes of land within the limits of the castle of Ewyas,which king William had bestowed on Walter,his father;but joining in rebellion against William Rufus,he was banished the kingdom,and all his lands were given to his brother Hugh,who died without issue.
{63}This anecdote is thus related by the historian Hollinshed:
"Hereof it came on a time,whiles the king sojourned in France about his warres,which he held against king Philip,there came unto him a French priest,whose name was Fulco,who required the king in anywise to put from him three abominable daughters which he had,and to bestow them in marriage,least God punished him for them.'Thou liest,hypocrite (said the king),to thy verie face;for all the world knoweth I have not one daughter.''I lie not (said the priest),for thou hast three daughters:one of them is called Pride,the second Covetousness,and the third Lecherie.'With that the king called to him his lords and barons,and said to them,'This hypocrite heere hath required me to marry awaie my three daughters,which (as he saith)I cherish,nourish,foster,and mainteine;that is to say,Pride,Covetousness,and Lecherie:and now that I have found out necessarie and fit husbands for them,I will do it with effect,and seeks no more delaies.I therefore bequeath my pride to the high-minded Templars and Hospitallers,which are as proud as Lucifer himselfe;my covetousness I give unto the White Monks,otherwise called of the Cisteaux order,for they covet the divell and all;my lecherie I commit to the prelats of the church,who have most pleasure and felicitie therein.'"{64}This small residence of the archdeacon was at Landeu,a place which has been described before:the author takes this opportunity of hinting at his love of literature,religion,and mediocrity.
{65}The last chapter having been wholly digressive,we must now recur back to Brecknock,or rather,perhaps,to our author's residence at Landeu,where we left him,and from thence accompany him to Abergavenny.It appears that from Landeu he took the road to Talgarth,a small village a little to the south east of the road leading from Brecknock to Hay;from whence,climbing up a steep ascent,now called Rhiw Cwnstabl,or the Constable's ascent,he crossed the black mountains of Llaneliew to the source of the Gronwy-fawr river,which rises in that eminence,and pursues its rapid course into the Vale of Usk.From thence a rugged and uneven track descends suddenly into a narrow glen,formed by the torrent of the Gronwy,between steep,impending mountains;bleak and barren for the first four or five miles,but afterwards wooded to the very margin of the stream.A high ledge of grassy hills on the left hand,of which the principal is called the Bal,or Y Fal,divides this formidable pass (the "Malus passus"of Giraldus)from the vale of Ewyas,in which stands the noble monastery of Llanthoni,"montibus suis inclusum,"encircled by its mountains.The road at length emerging from this deep recess of Coed Grono,or Cwm Gronwy,the vale of the river Gronwy,crosses the river at a place called Pont Escob,or the Bishop's bridge,probably so called from this very circumstance of its having been now passed by the archbishop and his suite,and is continued through the forest of Moel,till it joins the Hereford road,about two miles from Abergavenny.This formidable defile is at least nine miles in length.
