Manorial Documents Register Project Archives - Page 3 of 5

It’s our custom – day to day life in the manorial documents

24/08/2016 by Northumberland Archives

We can learn a lot about everyday life in the manor by looking at how it was organised. Using manorial documents we can identify individuals and look at what ‘customs’ (rules) they were required to live by, and how they bent or broke the rules that their manor imposed. You could be ‘presented’ before the manor to be ‘amerced’ (fined) for anything from large offences like cheating buyers at your market stall, to not having your chimney in correct repair or cutting back a tree hanging into a neighbour’s garden. Between different manors these rules could be strikingly different.

The customs were upheld by a number of different officials. A Bailiff or Reeve (paid and unpaid versions of the same post) took on the day to day running of the manor. He might be assisted by a barleyman (‘byelaw man’ in charge of upholding the bye laws of the manor), Pinder or pounder (in charge of impounding livestock), lookers (into a particular area, such as fencelooker who examined boundaries and fences), among other roles depending on the needs of the manor. We find evidence of these officials in the manorial documents.

NRO 672/A/3/87 first page giving details of Hexham manor, the names of the borough Jury and the Afeerors. — Part of the first page of NRO 672/A/3/87 giving details of Hexham manor, the names of the Borough Jury and the Afeerors.

To show how customs worked we will take Hexham manor as an example. In Hexham we have an excellent series of what is known as the Borough Jury books (often spelt ‘burrow books’) from the seventeeth to nineteenth century which give ‘presentments’ (judgements of cases) jurored by a group of the townsmen known as the four and twenty. These books list other roles like the common keepers, market keepers, waits, affeerors, and scavengers. Affeerors were appointed from among the tenants to ensure amercements (fines) were kept fair. Waits were watchmen, often required to sound the hour. The (often female) scavengers swept the market and maintained street gutters in the town, fighting against the piles of rubbish (also ashes, thatch, weeds, gravel, bark and stones) Hexham’s townspeople were presented for leaving.

Detail from NRO 672/A/3/87 giving the names of the Scavengers.

Other roles can also be found:

Leaving your mark – strange signatures in the court documents

10/05/201610/05/2016 by Northumberland Archives

In the course of looking through some of the manorial sources we are using on the project we see a lot of different types of handwriting. Some are beautifully practiced and elegant, others scribbled and hard to decipher. Examples like the one below from Morpeth in 1659 show how different letters can look to modern eyes, but with time and patience they can be worked out.

This however is the handwriting of educated clerks and court officials. Most of the rest of the population would have been illiterate, so it would be required for them to give a ‘mark’ of some description. For more affluent classes this may be shown by a seal, but in most cases a simple ‘X’ would show they had been present and gave their agreement to the document being signed. However more complicated marks could be devised by an individual to identify themselves. Such identifiers are found in other areas of medieval and post-medieval life. Masons’ marks on stone would identify who had prepared each block, and would often be passed down families, with additions by each generation. Likewise potters would mark the underside of their work to show its provenance in their workshop. Though we have featured the document below previously, this is a good example of a document signed by numerous people with their own marks.

There are several ways these men have chosen their mark. John Roddam (1st line) has taken the ‘R’ from his surname. Conversely Ridley Havelock (4th line) has used the initial ‘R’ from his first name, and the same can be found with ‘T’ for William Taylor (6th line) and Thomas Pattason (8th line). William Ransom (last line) uses a bold ‘W’ of two crossed V’s like witches’ marks, and perhaps Thomas Smith’s (10th line) began as a ‘T’, but was added to. The ‘N’ of Nicholas Ridley (2nd line) is reversed, and William Coulson (12th line) could be an inverted ‘C’, or reflect a horseshoe or other device. The others seem to be choosing marks unrelated to their name, similar to simple marks like the masons’ marks.

We are keeping our eyes peeled for interesting examples like these as we look through the manorial documents we hold, and were excited to share a recent discovery that has given us much discussion and food for thought. In the image below we see a ‘H’ used by Humphrey Heatherington like the previous examples, and John Heatherington’s half-cross is much like that used by John Reay (11th line). A squiggle also represents a mark or signature used by William Marshall. However our favourite is that used by John Riches, a doodle perhaps symbolising a hook, or even a bird.

We would love to be able to work out what it means, if anyone has any suggestions please let us know! In the meantime we will keep looking for other interesting examples.

Domestic pigs and dusty feet: the smaller courts of Pannage, Woodmote and Piepowder.

14/03/2016 by Northumberland Archives

The Manorial Documents Register (MDR) records documents produced in the honour courts. An honour is an administrative unit based on a number of manors, the tenants of which owed suit to an honour court in addition to, or in place of, the normal manor court. As explained in one of our earlier blogs the two main types of manor court are the Court Baron and the Court Leet. However there were other smaller courts dealing with specific types of business, these are not recorded on the MDR but it is useful to be aware of their function.

The Forest Court had jurisdiction over woodland and was sometimes called the Woodmote or Swainmote Court. The Court of Pannage dealt with the business of releasing domestic pigs into the forests to feed on acorns, beech mast and chestnuts. This was often a right or privilege given to local people or in some places pigs were customarily presented to the lord of the manor. In some areas of the country a unit of administration existed between the shire and parish, this was called a Hundred and had its own court. In Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Leicestershire the Hundred Court was referred to as the Wapentake Court.

ZHE 2/2, reference to the Piepowder court highlighted.

The Court of Piepowders was held in a borough on the occasion of a fair or market.

This document from the Allendale papers mentions a Court of Piepowder in 1685. The court had unlimited jurisdiction over events taking place in the market and tended to deal with disputes between merchants, theft, and acts of violence. The court was held in front of the mayor and bailiffs of the borough or the steward, if the market or fair was held by a lord. The jury comprised of three or four men and punishment ranged from a fine to the pillory. Trials were short and informal. If the court ruled against the defendant and the defendant could not pay his property could be seized and sold to cover the costs.

These courts existed to administer speedy justice over people who were not permanent residents of the place where the market was held. The name referred to the dusty feet (in French, pieds poudrés) of travelers and vagabonds, and was only later applied to the courts which dealt with such people. Court members themselves also wandered around the fair rather than sitting on a bench often getting their feet dusty in the process. In modern French, the word pied-poudreux is still occasionally used for travelling beggars.

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