presented Jocelin to the benefice of Winsham. It looks as though he did not contemplate his appointment to the bishopric. Indeed as late as 9 March a charter is issued at Nottingham 'by the hand of Jocelin of Wells', who does not yet bear the style of 'the elect of Bath', as he does when he attests at Winchester on 20 April.
On 23 April the king writes from Dogmersfield to commend the bishop-elect to the papal legate; and on 3 May he issues three Letters Patent dealing with the temporalities of the see. Hitherto they had been in the charge of Hugh of Wells, archdeacon of Wells, and William of Wrotham, archdeacon of Taunton, who had custody alike of the episcopate of Bath and of the abbey of Glastonbury. Thus the diocese was for the moment fortunate in having two of its archdeacons in the king's employ. The first of the three Letters Patent issued on 3 May 1206 deals with the city of Bath which Savary had granted to K. Richard, and with the portion of the Glastonbury estates which Savary had held. These remain in the king's hands, but are to be in the custody of Jocelin the bishop-elect and of Hugh archdeacon of Wells, till other order shall be taken. The second restores to Jocelin the temporalities of the see of Bath as they were before Savary's time under Bishop Reginald. It goes on to declare as before that the city of Bath and the share of Glastonbury which Savary held are to be in the custody of Jocelin and Hugh, until the Roman curia shall have decided what is to be done about Glastonbury. The third letter is addressed to the knights and tenants of the episcopate of Bath, bidding them do their homage to Jocelin as their lord.
These documents are quite explicit, Jocelin is 'the elect of Bath', not of 'Bath and Glastonbury'. The king is expecting the separation, and he does not claim the city of Bath, as his own, but considerately places both that and the Glastonbury share in the custody of the bishop-elect and his brother the archdeacon of Wells.
On 5 May 'the elect of Bath' was still despatching the king's letters at Fremantle; five days after this the bishopric of Lincoln fell vacant, but the king took no steps to fill it for the next three years. Possibly Bath would have remained vacant as long, but for the pressing problem of the abbey of Glastonbury.
Jocelin was consecrated at Reading on Trinity Sunday, 28 May 1206, by William of St. Mere l'Eglise, the bishop of London, with nine other prelates assisting: for the archbishopric of Canterbury was still vacant, and a fierce struggle had already begun to be waged about it. To that struggle we must now turn leaving Bishop Jocelin for a while.
