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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016
The picture drawn by Chaucer in the Friar’s Tale is a little journalistic, not to say sensational, and it deals with only some aspects of the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of his day, yet it leaves us in no doubt as to the importance of the courts, and of the way in which they were regarded in some quarters. Perhaps the picture was overdrawn, and true only of the half century or so within Chaucer’s own knowledge. On the other hand it has recently been demonstrated that these same courts furnished some at least of the excuses for royal and parliamentary action at the outset of the reformation, and there seems to be good reason for a closer look at them in this context. Most of all, however, for those whose principal interest is the quality of medieval life, it is desirable to consider the institution during the whole period for which there is some sort of continuous record of its working, that is, for the years covered by my title. There is no doubt that such a study should reveal a considerable section of the public and private life of the time, and while in the limits of this paper I can do no more than skim the surface of my material I hope that I shall persuade others to make further and deeper studies.
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4 Sexti Decret, lib. 1, tit. xvii, c. vii.
5 I hope to publish an edition of this register for the Canterbury and York Society.
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17 I have discussed some of these disputes in John Lydford’s Book, Historical Manuscripts Commission and Devon and Cornwall Record Society, forthcoming.
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20 I am very grateful to Mrs Gurney and her staff at York for the facilities they have afforded me, and also to Miss Penelope Morgan, Mr F. B. Stitt, Mr P. Walne and Dr Felix Hull for permitting access to collections in their care.
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23 A start has been made by Dr R. Houlbrooke’s Oxford D Phil thesis ‘Church courts and people in the diocese of Norwich 1519-70’ (1970), and Mr C. A. McClaren’s M Litt thesis (1972) on a London vicar general’s book.
24 Cambridge University Archives, Consistory probate records, liber B, fols 1-99.
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35 EDR MS D2/1, fols 57,v 65, 82, 162v.
36 At Rochester in 1347-8: 30 instance causes and 123 corrections; 30% matrimonial, 23% tithe, 17% each probate and defamation, 10% perjury and 3% usury. At Ely in 1374-81: 177 instance and 70 corrections; 33% defamation, Whalley 1510-38: 29 instance, 250 corrections; 45% matrimonial, 17% each, tithe and probate, 14% defamation, 7% perjury.
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38 BM MS Harley 862, fol 20. This early fifteenth-century compilation uses much Exeter material and is drawn largely from the practice of two Devon notaries, John and Robert Stephen, but it includes causes from Wells, Lincoln, Oxford and Salisbury.
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40 Y[ork] B[orthwick] Institute] MS CPE 13/21.
41 YBI, MSS CPE 15, 17, 19, 25.
42 YBI, MS CPE 208.
43 YBI, MS CPF 89.
44 YBI, MS CPF 104.
45 YBI, MSS CPF 33, 62; CPE 248.
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56 YBI, MSS CPE 123, 230.
57 BM MS Harley 862, fols 148v, 209.
58 YBI, MS CPF 150.
59 YBI, MS CPE 90.
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63 Ely consistory probate, liber B, fols 65v, 66; Hertforshire Record Office MS ASA/1AR, fol 76.
64 YBI, MS CPE 22.
65 Lichfield Joint Record Office MS B/C/1/2, fol 16.
66 EDR MS D2/1, fols 43v-44v; YBI, MS CPE 194, CPF 82.
67 YBI, MSS CPE 180, 199, 204, 224; CPF 1, 52, 77, 80.
68 EDR MS D2/1, fols 126-8.
69 Ibid, fols 123, 82v-85; BM MS Harley 862, fol 199.
70 EDR MS D2/1,fol 57v.
71 YBI, MS CPF 63.
