It is probable that the single best known phrase pertaining to medieval liturgy in England is “Sarum Use.” The phrase refers in the first instance to the medieval services at the present Salisbury cathedral, and, more generally, to the totality of rubrics, texts, and saints – eventually, even styles of vesture and certain liturgical colors – supposed to derive from that model. This sounds very neat, and, as it is widely known that that cathedral began to be built in 1225 and was largely finished (save for the spire) in three decades, it is natural to suppose that a new rite was confected for the new building, and even that the articulation of this rite was accomplished by one person: Richard Poore, whose work will be treated mainly in the next chapter.

The actual story turns out to be much more complex, and indeed is by no means perfectly clear at present. It begins in 1075, when, as part of a royal post-Conquest policy of moving centers of dioceses from (more) obscure locations to places that seemed for one reason or another more logical, the headquarters of what had originally been the West Wessex diocese centered for the most part at Sherborne was moved to the hill-fort site usually known today as Old Sarum – the conventional term, retained here so that “Salisbury,” if not otherwise qualified, can be reserved for the new city and church, extant from roughly 1225.