Who Do You Think You Are? Encyclopedia of Genealogy (76 page)

The majority of material will be in county archives, though many manorial documents are incorporated in the private papers of large estate owners, much of which may not even be in the public domain. Many of the larger families owned manors in more than one county, so you'll need to establish where the central place of deposit is. To help you locate court rolls, you can search the Manorial Documents Register at The National Archives. The returns for several counties are available online at www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/mdr with plans to make more available over the coming years; the paper lists are on open access in the main search room. Alternatively, you can conduct a search of Access to Archives at www.a2a.org.uk by the name of the manor in the hope of locating other related sources.

The legal requirement to hold manorial courts was only one part of the steward's administrative duties, particularly if the manor formed part of a larger estate. To assist his work, various rentals, periodical surveys and regular accounts were prepared, many of which can be useful to a family historian. Some of the most useful are listed here.

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Extents
often list all manorial tenants, free and customary, alongside the lands held by each, a brief description of the land and the rental value to the lord. The drawback is that they were a much earlier source, disappearing from most manors by the sixteenth century.

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Rentals
replaced extents and were less detailed, but were created on a more regular basis. They often only list the tenant and their rent, but were frequently annotated on the death of a tenant.

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Surveys
survive on a more regular basis from the seventeenth century onwards, and often link tenants to a particular piece or parcel of land. They comprised many subsidiary documents, including rent rolls – a list of rents owed per tenant – and often maps of the manor, with the inclusion of data about the historic customs that tenants were required to observe.

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Accounts
were regularly compiled by stewards as they collected the rents due from the manorial land, not just from tenants but from individuals who leased the lord's demesne lands too. Most are complicated financial documents, but you will find names of manorial tenants listed, and the rents due.

In addition to these ‘manorial' documents, you may also find miscellaneous information relating to the running of an estate.

Before the inception of civil registration and census returns in the nineteenth century, and the organization of central government in the late eighteenth century, various institutions had traditionally overseen the administration of Crown affairs and ensured that its rights were enforced. Some of these institutions date back to the time of the Norman Conquest, and the records they produced over the centuries are full of personal names and genealogical information. Here are some of the most important that you should consider using to trace your ancestors through time.

As described above, the feudal system of landholding was essentially a pyramid, with the King at the top who granted estates to tenants-in-chief in return for service. However, the Crown also retained various rights over these lands, particularly at the death of a tenant-in-chief. If an heir wished to inherit, he (and it was generally the oldest living son) would pay the King a ‘relief' to enter into possession of the land. However, they had to be 21 years old to do this, and if they were underage the King would be granted ‘wardship' of the estate, running it as he saw fit and taking the profits. Often, though, the wardship would be granted to a third party, usually at a price. The ability of unmarried heiresses to choose a husband, or widows to remarry (or not, depending on the circumstances), was also governed by the Crown, and money was paid to the King to control the right of marriage. Together, these were known as the Crown's ‘feudal rights' and were fiercely protected. The paperwork – or parchment – that was generated contains a great deal of information about medieval families up to the seventeenth century, when many of these rights were relinquished after the Civil War. These feudal rights generally only affected the top level of society, though with subinfeudation more and more people came under the Crown's sphere of operations.

One of the most important sources of information for family historians are Inquisitions Post Mortem (IPMs), not to be confused with the modern post mortem examination to determine the cause of death. Medieval IPMs were conducted whenever a major tenant-in-chief or principal landowner died. The records start in the thirteenth century and continue right up to the start of the Civil War, and were created when a royal writ was sent to the sheriff, or more usually the royal escheator (an official in charge of looking after lands in the King's hands), for each county in which the deceased held lands, instructing them to gather together a jury of men of standing, usually knights or esquires, who would answer questions about the lands held. The aim of the inquisition was to determine:

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The name and date of death of the deceased

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What lands they held in the county, including a description

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Whether they were held directly in chief from the King, and if not from whom they were held

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What military service was owed on the land (the technical term being ‘knight's fee')

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What rent was due from the land

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Whether the heir at law was sane, or of age to inherit (i.e. over 21 years old)

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If under age, who the guardian of the child was

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An important source of information is the Inquisition Post Mortem
.'

If the heir was under age, then the lands would default to the Crown and the heir would become a ward; and if they were of age, then the level of relief would be set according to the amount of land held. Three copies were usually made, with one sent to the Royal Chancery, which had issued the original writ; another to the Exchequer (which dealt with financial aspects of the royal administration); and, with records dating from 1509, the last was sent to the newly established Master of the Wards to ascertain whether wardship was required. The surviving documents are written in abbreviated Latin, and – given their antiquity – many of them are now hard to read.

The records of IPMs are now held in The National Archives, with the period from 1236 to 1418 in series C 132–138 and E 149, between 1418 and 1485 in C 138–141 and E 149, from 1485 to 1509 in C 142 and E 150, and from 1509 to 1640 in series C 142, E 150 and WARD 7. There are various ways to access them; one of the best is to search the catalogue online by surname at www.nationalarchives.gov.uk, where there's also a research guide to explain more about the records and how they are arranged. In addition, there are printed ‘calendars' in the reading rooms, which are indexed volumes that summarize the content of the records. Whilst they do not cover the entire period, it is well worth using them as many contain translations into English, allowing you to pick out the salient genealogical points.

As well as IPMs, the Crown routinely conducted other surveys into its rights. Another similar source were Inquisitions Ad Quod Damnum, literally an inquisition to ascertain ‘what damage' was done to Crown rights when private grants were made. Once again, they are stored at The National Archives, and can provide a fascinating insight into what our more lordly ancestors were doing to incur the interest of the Crown, such as endowing monasteries with land, requesting the right to hold a market or fair, and other such staples of medieval life. They can be found in series C 143 and cover the mid-thirteenth century to the late fifteenth, with calendars and indexes also available to help your research.

(Miscellaneous inquisitions are in series C 145, and contain references to forfeited estates, when your ancestors really stepped out of line.)

To regulate and deal with the growing business of wardship handled by the Master of the Wards, first appointed in 1503, the Court of Wards and Liveries was created in 1540, surviving over a century before becoming another casualty of the Civil War. There are a wide range of documents relating to the work of the institution, aside from the copies of IPMs described above; grants of wardships to third parties, leases of wards' lands, deeds and evidence, accounts, valuation documents and – perhaps most importantly – judicial records. These are described below along with other equity court records, but were the material generated by disputes between rival claimants over rights to exploit the profits from wardships that had fallen into private hands. Together, the records of the Court of Wards and Liveries form a rich resource for the patient researcher, and can be found in The National Archives in series WARD 1–15. Further information can be found at www.nationalarchives.gov.uk

One of the principal ways that the Crown funded its operations was through regular grants of taxation from its subjects – an unpopular move since it was first tried on a large-scale basis in the late twelfth century. Although occasional levies on property and movable goods were attempted throughout the thirteenth century, regular grants only became established under Edward I (1272–1307) and became known as lay and clerical subsidies. The records for national taxation are stored in The National Archives in series E 179, but in many ways the records listed there are only the tip of the iceberg.

As well as taxes on property, individuals were assessed depending on the rate of tax granted. The assessments form the bulk of useful material in E 179, though a whole range of other documentation exists – poll tax returns, early income tax documents from the fifteenth century, clerical taxation, alien subsidy returns, as well as exemption certificates, accounts, arrears and inquisitions. Assessments tend to list every eligible taxpayer in a parish, with totals for the amount on which they were assessed, and the amount they were due to pay. These can be searched online by name of parish (so you'll need to know where your ancestor was living at the time) at www.nationalarchives.gov.uk, and there's a research guide on taxation to help you locate the most suitable records.

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Tax assessments list every eligible taxpayer in a parish
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Chapter 27 has dealt with records generated by the criminal courts, when our more wayward ancestors were caught by the long arm of the law. However, apart from nefarious activities that society frowned upon, our ancestors proved particularly adept at fighting one another in court, as well as rowing frequently with friends, neighbours, landlords and a variety of other people. The records generated by inter-personal lawsuits fall under two main branches of civil litigation – common law and equity.

A quick sketch of how civil law evolved is necessary before the records are examined, because it can be rather confusing. Common law was the older branch of legislation open to civil litigants, and its courts dispensed justice based on the ancient custom of the land and used past precedent to settle cases. However, in many instances this produced unfair resolutions, and so a separate legal code based on the principle of ‘equity' developed, which used justice and conscience to reach a judgment rather than basing a decision solely upon what had happened in the past. This was the preferred route for families that were in dispute, often concerning inheritance or property.

One of the main government departments was the Chancery. Its original function was to write all royal writs and correspondence, but it quickly compiled its own archives where copies of all correspondence were written in long rolls. The main two sets were known as Patent Rolls, so called because correspondence sent out by the King with the royal seal attached but with the letter open for all to see was known as ‘Letters Patent'; and Close Rolls, which earned their name for recording letters that were sealed ‘closed' so that only the recipient could see the contents. These two record series, dating back to the late twelfth century, quickly became important places where people could ‘enrol' information, on payment of money to the Crown; a record of the Crown's interaction with individuals was preserved permanently in written form.

The rolls are now in The National Archives in series C 66 and C 54 respectively, and indexes and calendars are available to help you search for the thousands of individuals whose names are recorded within them. In many instances, issues of contemporary genealogical importance are preserved, such as petitions from the heirs of an executed traitor attempting to get their lands back; lists of eligible men who could be called upon to serve in the militia; copies of land grants to individuals; appointments to office; indeed, any aspect of royal administration in the shires that required correspondence to be issued. Further information on the history and content of the rolls can be found online in a research guide at www.nationalarchives.gov.uk. You may even find the original correspondence or grant within private collections in county archives.

Similar enrolments can be found in the Chancery series of records for financial agreements between
Crown and individual (Fine Rolls, C 60); grants and inspections of charters (Charter Rolls, C 53); and expenditure authorized by the Crown and the issue of money to individuals (Liberate Rolls, C 62).

In addition to the official enrolments are the various pieces of miscellaneous correspondence, working papers, reports and documentation that were used to conduct the day-to-day business of government from the sixteenth century onwards. These have been brought together by reign and organized according to date, type and place, and form the State Papers collection in The National Archives. Although there are many stray individual documents that predate the series, the earliest relate to the reign of Henry VIII (1509–47) and are usually broken down into Domestic and Foreign, with separate collections emerging for relations with Scotland and Ireland. The series ends in the reign of George III (1760–1820) when modern Departments of State were introduced, such as the Home Office and War Office. Most of the earliest documents relate to correspondence between the leading political figures of the age, such as Elizabeth I's Secretary of State William Cecil (Lord Burghley) and his spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham.