INTRODUCTION

The manuscript of the book of recipes was deposited in the Bedfordshire County Record Office in 1950 by Mrs. Wyldbore Smith, of Husborne Crawley, by whose kind permission publication has been possible. The volume measures 8 in. by 6¼ in., has 224 pages and is bound in vellum. The greater part of the book is carefully written, but after recipe number 335 the writing ages a little and the general effect becomes less tidy.

The notebook of Diana Orlebar (née Astry) is with the Orlebar papers at Hinwick House and thanks are due to Capt. R. Orlebar for his help, interest and permission to publish the manuscript. The book measures 7 in. by 3 in., only twelve pages have been used and it is hastily written in writing which is rather large for the size of the page, and which is identical with the less tidy writing of the later recipes.

Internal evidence makes the attribution of this notebook to Diana Astry unimpeachable. In 1705 she makes a note of her weight and initials the entry “D.A.”; in the entry of 10 June 1703 she mentions “Sir John Smyth & my Sister & my Sister Chester”—her sister Elizabeth married Sir John Smyth of Ashton and her sister Anne married Thomas Chester IV of Knole; further, on 19 March 1706, she refers to “my sister Arabella”. The implication of the remark on 2 September 1708 “At Henbury… Sir Simon Heartcourt and heas sunn dined with us then”, together with other references to meals at Henbury (the home of the Astry family) and at Ashton (the home of Sir John and Lady Smyth), references which are not normally followed by the name of the family living there, also point to Diana Astry as the writer of the notebook.

The internal evidence of the sources of the different recipes, not to mention the very close similarity between the handwriting in the recipe book and that of the notebook, point to the writer of both being one and the same person. Further in the recipe book at the end of one recipe an added note is attributed to “Sister E.S.