This generous and rather touching epitaph in the chancel of the parish church of Holy Trinity at Dartford in Kent is all that remains of the memorial brass to John Hornley, vicar there from 1442 until his death in 1477. If we take it at face value, Hornley was indeed a remarkable pastor. Such epitaphs, however, are usually considered at best self-serving and at worst hyperbole and have rarely been given serious attention by historians. The aim of this essay is to try to establish whether Hornley's epitaph alerts us to an outstanding ministry – whether the lively parish piety which existed in Dartford in the second half of the fifteenth century can be attributed to him. For most incumbents and parishes this would be an impossible task, but the relative abundance of the later medieval records of Dartford enables an attempt to be made.

Studies of parish religion have flourished in the last thirty years. Eamon Duffy’s The Stripping of the Altars placed the parish firmly at the centre of late medieval religion. Clive Burgess has elucidated the richness of urban parish religion, Katherine French and Beat Kümin have written studies based on churchwardens’ accounts, and there have been regional surveys by Andrew Brown and Judith Middleton- Stewart.