secular canons, but in 1177 the then Earl of Arundel
introduced in their place four or five monks under a Prior from St
Martin of Seez. In the fourteenth century, however, these alien monks
withdrew to their mother house, and in 1380 the Priory of St Nicholas
in Arundel was reconverted into a collegiate church. This college
consisted of a master and sub-master, ten chaplains, two deacons, two
sub-deacons, and five choristers. The choir of the church was the
chapel of the college, the remainder being parochial. The college
survived the general suppression, but was eventually bought by the Earl
of Arundel, who had previously offered a thousand pounds for it. And so
it was that after a long law-suit in 1880 the chancel of the parish
church of Arundel was given up to the Duke of Norfolk.

I did not sleep in Arundel, but, though it was already afternoon, I set
out westward once more through the great park, and just before sunset I
came to the great church of Boxgrove, which stands between the road I
had followed from Arundel and the Roman Stane Street, where they
approach to enter the East Gate of Chichester together at last. This
great and beautiful sanctuary, gives one, I think, a better idea of
what the great monastic churches really were, than any other building
left to us in Sussex. It is like a cathedral for solemnity, and for
size too, though it is only a fragment, and its beauty cannot be
forgotten.

In its foundation the church is very ancient, a small college of
secular canons serving it in Saxon times. But all was changed when
Robert de Haza, to whom Henry I. had granted the honour of Halnaker, in
1105 bestowed the church upon the Abbey of Lessay, which sent hither
its Benedictines and built for them a new sanctuary. Boxgrove was thus
an alien priory from 1108 till in 1339. Richard II. affirmed its
independence, and this was confirmed by the Pope in 1402. It seems
then to have been in a bad way, but later recovered. In the thirteenth
century it had boasted nineteen monks, but at the time of the
suppression it only mustered eight priests, who seem to have kept a
school for the children of the neighbourhood. What remains of the
Priory, not much more than a gateway, for most of it was destroyed in
1780, stands to the north of the church.

The original Norman church here was cruciform. Of this building we
still see the tower, the transepts and the lower part of what remains
of the nave, and the arcade to the south.