Ipswich Whitefriars - Early Provincials

Early Provincials

The Ipswich house rapidly became involved in the leading affairs of the English province. An early Prior, Richard de Yllea (Monks Eleigh), had joined the Order after the death of his wife, and had received his own son Thomas into the Order. (Thomas became a very devout follower of the rule, took degrees at Cambridge, and wrote books on philosophy, theology and the Apocalypse.) Following the death of a provincial superior, a chapter was held at Ipswich in 1300, at which the then Ipswich Prior, William Ludlyngton (a native of Lincoln, who had studied at Oxford), was elected the new Provincial. Three years later, at a General chapter at Narbonne, the General superior Gerard of Boulogne announced his intention to split the English province by creating a separate Irish province. Ludlyngton, Thomas de Yllea and many others opposed him, but after a Papal intervention and a great chapter at London in 1305, Ludlyngton was forced to resign and was sent to Paris "to fast and to read Divinity", and Thomas de Yllea similarly was sent to Bruges as a lecturer.

• John Barkhamstead, a former Prior of Ipswich, was elected Provincial in 1312.
• John Polested, a friar of Ipswich from his youth who afterwards studied at Oxford, became Vicar-General under the General Petrus de Casa (1330-1339) and Provincial from 1335 until his death in 1341: the author of more than twenty scholarly works, he was buried at York.
• John Kynyngham, another member of the Ipswich community, was elected Provincial of England and Ireland in a chapter at Yarmouth in 1393, and held it until his death in 1399. He was the confessor of John of Gaunt, and at Oxford frequently disputed with John Wycliffe. He wrote a disputative book against Wycliffe, and commentaries, treatises, sermons and 13 books on metaphysics.
• Friar Nicholas Kenton received his early education at Ipswich Whitefriars, before studying at Cambridge. He became renowned as historian, poet, philosopher, theologian and orator, and became chancellor of the University of Cambridge for 1445. He was elected Provincial of the Carmelite Order in 1444 until his resignation in 1456. He was the author of many books including a Life of Saint Cyril of Constantinople, a Carmelite saint.