<Preliminary introduction>

The HOLLIS cataloguing may be found here. The following items are worth repeating:

“Description: [208] leaves : vellum ; 28 cm.

“Summary: With several transcribed documents addressed by Henry VI to William Yelverton, Justice of the King’s Bench, including his serjeant’s writ (1438) and some of his commissions.

“Notes: Irregularities and errors in foliation: some leaves unnumbered; others leaves erroneously numbered, beginning with leaf 3r (‘xiiii’).”

The cataloguing in Baker’s English Legal Manuscripts, 1, no. 50 reads as follows:

“REGISTRUM BREVIUM

“MS. 23.

“C.xiv, 207 ff. and additions.

“Perhaps belonged to Sir William Yelverton (d. 1476), whose serjeant’s writ (1438) and some of whose commissions are inserted at the end; later belonged to Edward Umfreville (d. 1786); and later to Sir Thomas Phillipps (MS. 12224); his sale, S. 13 June 1896, no. 619, to Ellis for George Dunn; his sale, S. 12 Feb. 1913, no. 234; bought privately by HLS.

“Census, I, 1026, no. 23; Phillipps Studies, IV, 179; Early Registers, xxvi; J.H. Baker, The Order of Serjeants at Law (1984), 260.”

The script is a standard semi-cursive English legal hand. It looks as if it dates from the first half of the fifteenth century rather than the last half of the fourteenth. It certainly seems later than the ca. 1350 that HOLLIS assigns to it. As we will see below, there are solid reasons for putting the terminus post quem of the register in 1390s.

There are no illustrations or decoration. Some of the writs have a space for a drop-down capital ‘R’ in ‘Rex’ that never got put in. Spacing is generous in number of places, and there are some blanks, some of which, as we will see below, got filled in. The spacing is probably for additional material rather than illustration.

The binding is undistinguished: cardboard covers, which are in turn covered with heavy tan paper. The sewing is loose, though it does appear to be broken anywhere. The pastedowns probably date from the 19th century; the endpaper in the back certainly does (the printed advertisement for Twining’s tea and coffee is telling). The overall interior condition is generally good.

The first folio (and much of the first quire) is, however, soiled and faded. There is a large stain, probably a water stain, at the top of the first folio that penetrates through to the second. The space where we would expect to find the initial writ of right patent on fol. 1r has been erased. That it has been erased can be seen on the image, an observation that is confirmed under ultraviolet light. Unfortunately, the person who did the erasing did a good job. Even under ultraviolet light, it is not possible to read the writ. It is possible, though not certain, that the initial of the king is ‘R’. The erasure had taken place before the header was added, because the header refers to the first writ that is not erased: ‘De recto secundum consuetudinem manerii’.

Fol. 17r contains a writ, Protectio pro clero, written in a book hand that seems much later than the hand that wrote the main manuscript. Fols. 18–20 (the last being cut off about a third of the way down) contain forms of address, the first of which is to the auditor of causes of a Cardinal Thomas archbishop of Canterbury. The only Thomas archbishop of Canterbury in the Middle Ages who was a cardinal was Thomas Bourchier, archbishop of Canterbury, 1454-1486. He did not become a cardinal until 1473. The hand looks as if it dates from late in the 15th century. This hand also looks like the hand in some of the headers. When we combine this fact with the fact that the initial writ of right patent has been erased, we have some evidence that an older (perhaps late 14th century) register was reworked in the second half, probably in the fourth quarter, of the 15th century.

Many of the headers are accompanied by chapter numbers. They begin with ‘c. viii’ on fol. 5v, ‘c. x’ on fol. 12v, ‘c. xi’ on fol. 15r. The next one, ‘c. xiii’, is found on fol. 23v, but ‘c. xiiii, is found on fol. 25r. This pattern, usually in numerical order, but with some skipping, proceeds to ‘c. lx’ on fol. 115r. The numeration begins again with c. i and c. ii on fol. 115v, without there being any obvious change of hand. The second sequence seems, at the beginning, to have more numbers; fewer folios are skipped. The last one in this sequence ‘c. lxii’ on fol. 203v. We have not checked all of the writs, but it appears that there is no duplication of the contents between the two sets of numerations.

Although the manuscript does not now have an index or capitulary at the beginning, such chapter numbers are found connected to such indices in other manuscripts. This manuscript may have had one that is now lost, because the medieval foliation on the manuscript begins on fol. 2r with ‘xiij’. What is difficult to understand is why anyone one would have used two sets of numbering in such an index, and why the numbering would have been started over again between writs ‘De pastura’ and those ‘De rationalibus divisis’. There is no change of hand or quire between the two sets of numbers, but it is possible that the register was copied from a register that was bound in two volumes, each with its own index.

As we have just noted, there is a medieval foliation that begins, it would seem, with 12 on digital fol. 1. It continues to 221 on fol. 204 of the digital foliation and has been extended in a modern hand to 225 on fol. 208. The foliator did not do a very good job. We counted 18 folios that were skipped in the numeration and 13 that were duplicated. That still does not get us to 208 (it is one too many). Our count probably missed a duplicated folio.

All of these oddities in the medieval foliation seem to be errors of the foliator, except for one. Five numbers are missing between fol. 135 and 136, and there seems to be text missing between them as well. A new quire begins on fol. 136, the most peculiar quire in the manuscript. It lacks a signature (which should be ‘t’) and is the only bifolium in the manuscript. It may originally have been a duernion with the center bifolium removed; there is evidence that something has been cut out in the center. The text carries over from the dorse of fol. 136 to the recto of fol. 137, but after a five-line carryover, the ink, and perhaps the hand, changes. It is possible that the original quire ‘t’ was lost or removed and this shortened quire substituted. Folio numbers were then added to this new quire to match what followed rather than what preceded it.

Signature markings begin on the third quire with ‘d’, further evidence that something at the beginning is missing. Except for ‘t’, which, as noted, is missing, they proceed regularly through ‘z’. There follows, in the ‘second alphabet’, a repeat of ‘r’ and ‘q’, but there is nothing else to suggest that there is anything odd about these quires. A genuine second alphabet begins with ‘aa’ and ‘bb’. The last quire, which should be ‘cc’, has no signature.

The manuscript is mostly regular quaternions. The first quire is a sesternion, and the missing initial quire may have been one too, lacking one. Except for the bifolium, already discussed, which we collate as a duernion lacking two, there is one other duernion, and three ternions, including the last quire, to which one folio and a scrap were added. There is a folio missing in quire 22, and there may be text missing at the end of the quire. Collation follows:

1¹² (f. 1–12), 2–16⁸ (f. 13–124), 17⁶ (f. 125–130), 18⁶ (f. 131–135, lacks one, probably after 135), 19⁴ (f. 136–137, lacks 2 after 136), 20⁸ (f. 138–145), 21⁴ (f. 146–149), 22⁸ (f. 150–156, lacks one, probably after 156), 23–28⁸ (f. 157–194), 29⁶ (f. 195–206 + ii [f. 207–208] tipped in).

In addition to the forms of address, there is other evidence that additions were made to the manuscript in the fifteenth century. Fol. 206v, the last page of what seems to have been the original manuscript has a number of documents concerning William Yelverton, serjeant from 1438, JKB from 1443–1471, who died in 1476. They begin with the writ commanding him to become a serjeant, dated 12 February 1438, and continue with entries concerning him, written in different hands with varying degrees of formality. Following this there is a damaged folio tipped into the manuscript, which also contains documents that concern Yelverton. It is tempting to think of Yelverton as a possible former owner of the manuscript. Whether we think of him as a possible original owner depends on what we make of the conflicting evidence about the date of the register itself.

As we noted above, the initial writ of right patent has been thoroughly erased. Under ultraviolet light, we thought that we could see that the initial letter was ‘R’, but we could not be sure. We have another manuscript, MS 168, in which an initial writ of right patent issued in the name of Richard II was crudely altered to make it read ‘Henry’. If that was all that we had to go on here, we might be tempted to think that this was a register from the time of Richard II that was used, as it certainly was, in the time of the Lancastrians, but in which the name of Richard II was deliberately removed. Reinforcing that speculation is the fact that we have as yet found nothing in the contents of the register that would lead us to date it after 1399. We do have, however, quite a bit that would bring us into the 1390s. Among the ‘Brevia de statuto’ are a number that refer to statutes of Richard II (e.g., fol. 139v, referring to 13 Ric. 2, c. 13 [1390]), the last of which in time seems to be 15 Ric. 2, c. 2 (1391) (fol. 137v). Perhaps even more important for our purposes is that the text of the writ on this page refers to Richard II as ‘nuper rex’. When we couple this fact with the fact that it is hard to reconcile the script of the main hand of the register (or of any of the additions) with a date even in the late 14th century, there seems little doubt that this register was written in the fifteenth century.

We then have to come to grips with the fact that, at least so far, nothing has been found in the register that has to date from the 15th century. As the Analysis of Writs shows, there is nothing about the structure and contents of this register that is incompatible with a date late in the reign of Richard II. While it is possible that the initial writ of right patent was erased because the register was being used, as we shall see, in the Chancery in the time of Edward IV, it seems more likely that it was erased because it was issued in the name of Richard II. We might even imagine someone saying to the original scribe who was a copying a register from late in the reign of Richard II: ‘Take that writ of right out, you ninny, we don’t talk about that guy any more’. That this is a copy may also be indicated by the fact that both real names and dating clauses seem to have been quite aggressively removed. Nothing that we found in the main hand so far looks as if it has been copied from a real writ.

We realize that we are disagreeing here with Baker, who dated the register to the 14th century, but are encouraged by the fact that Hall independently came to the conclusion that the manuscript belongs to the 15th century. If we are right, then Baker and Hall were, in some sense, both right. This is a 14th-century register copied in the fifteenth. As to when it was copied in the 15th century, we have to be cautious, if not agnostic. If we want to connect the manuscript with Yelverton from the beginning – something that is possible, although not required, by the evidence that we have – we might think of a date ca. 1430, a date that fits quite comfortably with the base script. Hence, our bracketing dates are 1391 X 1438, with ?ca. 1430 in parentheses.

We may put all of this information together into a somewhat speculative story of the manuscript. A register of writs, probably dating from late in the fourteenth century, was copied sometime in the first half of the fifteenth century. That the original writ of right patent was expunged rather than simply altered may reflect the damnatio memoriae of Richard II by the Lancastrians. The copy could have been made for Yelverton, perhaps before he became a serjeant. Over the course of Yelverton’s career various documents concerning him were copied into the back of the manuscript or on a separate folio that eventually got tipped into the manuscript. The last date that we have found in these items seems to be (the king is not named but the regnal year is given) 14 July 1461 (i.e., 1 Edw. 4).

When Yelverton died or retired, the manuscript may have come into the hands of a Chancery clerk. That could have happened sometime between Yelverton’s death in 1476 and Bourchier’s in 1486. The reason for suspecting that the owner at this point was a Chancery clerk is that while many different professionals had need of a register of writs, very few would need to know the exact form of address for the officials of dozens of different English towns. The note on what writs were de cursu would also have been useful for a Chancery clerk, but others might want the knowledge as well.

How much reworking of the fourteenth-century register was done in fifteenth we cannot tell. A more careful examination of the writs themselves might tell us more. As it is, we can say that this is a large register (see the Analysis of Writs below). There is much more in this register than just the basics.

No heading found

As discussed at some length in the Introduction, the bracketing dates for this register are 1391 (the most recent statute cited in the writs) X 1438 (the date of the writ making William Yelverton a serjeant). We also came to the conclusion that the writing of the register dates from the 15th century (Richard II is referred to by name as ‘nuper rex’), but that much of its contents, perhaps all of its contents in the basic hand, were copied from a register of the 1390s. More speculative was our assignment of a date of ca. 1430 to the copying.

The following table gives a rough transcription of the marginalia in the register in the order in which they appear on the page. Two counts of the writs are given in the right-hand columns of the table. The first counts all the writs for which there are marginal notes, excluding, however, the notes that are labelled ‘Regula’ or ‘Nota’. The second excludes from the total all the writs where the marginal note includes the words ‘eodem’ or ‘aliter’. The conclusion that follows the table discusses the relationship of this register to MS 53, which we dated in 1371, four that we have from the reign of Richard II, MS 165, 155, 168, and 34, and one that may be contemporary with the copying of this register, MS 22.

The totals, 1763 in the long count, and 1118 in the short count, are large. There is also reason to believe that the count understates the actual number of writs. We found only one writ that was added later that was identified in the marginalia (fol. 84v); the rest of them have no marginalia. We have also found a number of folios written in the base hand that contain writs that are not identified in the marginalia (fol. 152v, 158r, 203r). There may be more. For statistical purposes, however, the numbers that we give are probably a pretty good approximation, though on the low side.

Though the numbers are large, they are by no means that largest that we have. MS 34, which dates from the reign of Richard II, has 2714 writs in the long count and 1591 in the short. The register also has some idiosyncrasies. The second writ, after the initial writ of right patent is to the bailiffs of the queen in MS 53 (ca. 1371), 166, 155, 158, 165, 34 (all from the reign of Richard II), 22, 26, and 27 (roughly contemporary with this register if we date it to ca. 1430). It is followed in all of these manuscripts by a writ to the bailiffs of a nobleman, who is quite easy to identify if he is not named. MS 23 has neither of these writs.

Let us look more closely at the structure and contents of MS 23, in order to compare it to the other manuscripts that date from the reign of Richard II. We warn that the proportions here are particularly problematic. MS 23 has a number of gaps and blank pages. It seems to have been designed to accommodate later additions, of which there are some. That means that in some cases the proportions, which are based on the number of folios encompass blank, or partially blank, pages. That said, here they are: Right (12%), Ecclesiastical (15%), Waste (2%), Replevin (3%), Trespass (17%), Account, Debt (6%), Rights in land (2%), Covenant (2%), Succession (3%), Writs on statutes (6%), Novel disseisin (10%), Mort d’ancestor (1%), Entry (4%), Formedon (2%), Testaments (1%), De indempnitate nominis (1%), Ad quod dampnum (5%), De libertatibus allocandis (2%), Ecclesiastical addition (3%), Mainprize (1%), Audita querela (1%), De supersedendo (1%).

It turns out that at this level of generality MS 23 is quite similar to other registers from the reign of Richard II. Like all of them it begins with a series of large categories that have been there for some time and in this order. MS 34, for example, begins with Right (8%), Ecclesiastical (15%), Waste (2%), Replevin (3%), Trespass (14%), Criminal (0%), Account (1%), Debt (3%); MS 155 with Right (10%), Ecclesiastical (20%), Waste (2%), Replevin (4%), Trespass, Criminal (17%), Account, Debt (5%). As turned out to be the case when we compared MS 34 with MS 155 in the conclusion to the Analysis of Writs in the former, categories that look different among the three manuscripts turn out on closer examination to be the product of the categorization process and not of much real underlying difference in what is there. For example, the category that we called Succession in MS 23, is represented in MS 155 by writs about wardship and dower, found in the same position. Those writs are separated by covenant in MS 34, and the category that we called Succession in MS 34 (Nuper obiit, De ventre inspicienda, Diem clausit extremum, De etate probanda) is represented in MS 23 only by Nuper obiit but in the same place, between mort d’ancestor and entry. As a general matter, the categories and proportions between Debt and Formedon track better with those in MS 155 than they do with those in MS 34. MS 155: Rights in land (2%), Covenant, Quid iuris clamat (1%), Wardship, Dower (3%), Writs on Statutes (6%), Novel disseisin (12%), Mort d’ancestor (2%), Ejectment (quare eiecit) (1%), Entry (4%), Cessavit (0%), Formedon (2%); MS 34: Rights in land (1%), Warranty of charter (0%), Annuity, Mesne (1%), Wardship (1%), Escheat (0%), Covenant (1%), Dower (0%), Rights in land (1%), Suit of court (0%), Coroners (0%), Assizes, Local courts (4%), Novel disseisin (11%), Mort d’ancestor (1%), Succession (1%), Ejectement (Quare eiecit) (0%), Entry (3%), Cessavit (0%), Formedon (1%). As in MS 155, Quid iuris clamat appears in MS 23 as part of the series of writs about fines that follows Covenant; as in MS 155, Cessavit appears in MS 23 separating entry from formedon. Many of what look like differences between MS 23 and MS 34 turn out to be the product of the more fine-grained categories of MS 34 and not real differences. For example, Warranty of charter, Annuity, and Mesne separate Rights in land from Covenant in MS 155 as they do in MS 34. The writs about suit of court and electing coroners appear in MS 23 as part of Writs about statutes rather than as separate categories as in MS 34. The writs, however, about local courts, and particularly view of frankpledge, that are found in MS 34 are not found in MS 23.

Like all the registers from the time of Richard II a substantial proportion of the writs are found after formedon (15%). The proportion is smaller than it is in MS 155 (19%) or MS 34 (23%). The topics covered are fairly close, but not quite the same, as those in MS 155: Testaments (1%), Ad quod dampnum (6%), Rights of those of lower status (1%), De libertatibus allocandis (1%), Corrodies, pensions (2%), Ecclesiastical additional (3%), Mainprize, De supersedendo (3%), Miscellaneous (2%). They are less close to those in MS 34: Testaments (0%), Ad quod dampnum (5%), Rights of those of lower status (1%), De libertatibus allocandis (1%), Corodies and pensions (1%), De idiotis, leprosis, viis et venellis (0%), Ecclesiastical additional (2%), De idemptitate nominis (1%), Mainprize (2%), De supersedendo (1%), Customs (1%), Weights and measures (0%), Protection (5%), Review (2%), Pardons (1%), which in this regard is the one that is quite idiosyncratic.

We will not compare in detail the structure and proportions in MS 23 with those in MS 26 and 27 (which are substantially the same). Suffice it to say here that the major difference between MS 23, on the one hand, and MS 26 and 27, on the other, is the quite substantial amount of space in the latter devoted to writs of pardon at the end (5% and 7%, respectively). There are no charters of pardon of the kind found in MS 26 and 27 in MS 23. Indeed, the addition of this large section of charters pardon is one of the main differences, perhaps the main difference, between MS 26 and 27 and registers from the reign of Richard II. This could mean that MS 23 was slightly out of date when it was made. It might also suggest that it was made for a somewhat different purpose. If, as seems likely, MS 26 and 27 were made for clerks, MS 23 probably became, if it was not such from the beginning, a register for a man who became a serjeant. Such a man, we might imagine, would have less need to know exactly how to write a charter of pardon.