Although the exact arrival date of canons at Blythburgh is unknown,'Houses of Austin canons: Priory of Blythburgh', in W. Page (ed.), A History of the County of Suffolk, Victoria County Histories, Vol. 2 (Archibald Constable and Company Limited, London 1907), pp. 91-94 (Internet Archive). by 1147 a charter of King Stephen mentions two canons established there.Maxwell-Lyte, 'MSS of T.S. Hill', p. 452, fol. 7 b (Internet Archive). The Ipswich house of canons at Holy Trinity Priory had been founded by 1133; Blythburgh probably remained only a cell of St Osyth's'Bliburgh or Blythburrow', in T.Tanner, ed. J. Tanner, Notitia Monastica: or, an Account of all the Abbeys, Priories and Houses of Friers (John Whiston, etc, London 1744), p. 513 (Google).R. Taylor, Index Monasticus: or the abbeys and other monasteries... in the Diocese of Norwich (etc.), (Lackington and Company, London 1821), pp. 92-93 (Google). until King Henry II granted to the abbot of St Osyth's, c. 1164-1170, the right to appoint or remove the prior at Blythburgh, privileges later ratified by Pope Innocent III.Harper-Bill, Cartulary, I, nos. 63, 64; Maxwell-Lyte, 'MSS of T.S. Hill', p. 452, fol. 9 b (Internet Archive). Although paying an annual tribute to the mother house, the prior and convent of Blythburgh acted independently in the acquisition of lands. The Dunwich historian Gardner observes that priors of Blythburgh, being nominated by the abbot and convent of St Osyth's, were on every occasion presented to the Bishops of Norwich, for their institution, by the Lords of the Blything Hundred, successively the Claverings, Audleys, Uffords, and Lords Dacre, as patrons.Gardner, Historical Account of Dunwich, p. 129 (Google); see also Page, Victoria County History II (1907), p. 92 at note 2 (Internet Archive).
