The principal institutions of medieval Birmingham collapsed within the space of eleven years between 1536 and 1547. The Priory of St Thomas was suppressed and its property sold at the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1536, with the Guild of the Holy Cross, the Guild of St John and their associated chantries also being disbanded in 1547. Most significantly, the de Birmingham family lost possession of the manor of Birmingham in 1536, probably as a result of a feud between Edward de Birmingham and John Sutton, 3rd Baron Dudley. After brief periods in the possession of the Crown and the Duke of Northumberland, the manor was sold in 1555 to Thomas Marrow of Berkswell. Birmingham would never again have a resident Lord of the Manor, and the district as a whole was to remain an area of weak lordship throughout the following centuries. With local government remaining essentially manorial, the townspeople's resulting high degree of economic and social freedom was to be a highly significant factor in Birmingham's subsequent development.