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11 - The seventeenth-century introductions to medieval inquisition records in Bibliothèque nationale de France, Collection Doat Mss 21–26
- Edited by Peter Biller, L. J. Sackville
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- Book:
- Inquisition and Knowledge, 1200-1700
- Published by:
- Boydell & Brewer
- Published online:
- 26 May 2022
- Print publication:
- 18 February 2022, pp 255-272
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Summary
Between 1665 and 1670, Jean de Doat, Président of the Chambre des Comptes of the Parlement of Pau, was commissioned by Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis XIV's minister, to copy documents held in various archives in Languedoc, ‘for the conservation of the rights of our crown and to serve history’ (pour la conservation des droicts de nostre couronne et pour servir à l’histoire). These fill 258 large volumes, now preserved in the Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris as ‘Collection Languedoc Doat’. Among the materials selected for copying were a number of thirteenth-century inquisition documents, mostly depositions, produced in Toulouse and Carcassonne, the two main centres of inquisition in Languedoc, which now occupy volumes 21–26 in this collection. All the original documents are now lost, which makes their survival in the Doat collection doubly precious.
The documents copied are of very uneven length, from the giant volume ‘FFF’ from the Inquisition archives in Carcassonne, whose original contained 247 pages, and which now occupies Doat 23 and significant portions of Doat 22 and Doat 24, to the smaller inquisitions and collections of sentences found in Doat 21. Some appear to have been copied in their entirety – others are extracts. Some of the material in Doat 21, for example, comes from a register from which extracts have also been copied into other volumes.
Doat 21 contains a wide variety of material – short inquisitions, collections of sentences, safe-conducts and other documents. The remaining five volumes contain depositions before various inquisitors. The large volume FFF from Carcassonne, containing the inquisitions of Ferrier and his colleagues, as has been said, occupies Doat 22 from fol. 107r, Doat 23 and Doat 24 to fol. 238r. These date from the 1230s and 40s. At the beginning of Doat 22 is a collection of roughly contemporary depositions before the inquisitors Bernard of Caux and John of Saint-Pierre, taken from a composite volume in the archives of the Dominicans of Toulouse; the remainder of Doat 24, from fol. 239r, contains a collection of depositions from Pamiers in front of the same inquisitors. The depositions in Doat 25 and 26 are from the later thirteenth century: in Doat 25 and folios 1r–78v of Doat 26 are depositions from Toulouse before Ranulph of Plassac, Pons of Parnac and their colleagues; from fol.
6 - A Tale of Two Abbots: Petitions for the Recovery of Churches in England by the Abbots of Jedburgh and Arbroath in 1328
- Edited by Helen Killick, Thomas W. Smith
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- Book:
- Petitions and Strategies of Persuasion in the Middle Ages
- Published by:
- Boydell & Brewer
- Published online:
- 20 August 2020
- Print publication:
- 21 December 2018, pp 126-147
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Summary
Among the articles of the peace treaty ratified by King Robert I of Scotland at Holyrood on 17 March 1328 and by King Edward III of England at Northampton on 4 May, a treaty by which England renounced all claims of overlordship or sovereignty over Scotland, is the following clause: ‘And it is the intention of the said King of Scotland, and of the aforesaid messengers and proctors of the said King of England that, by the treaties that are now made, no manner of prejudice should be done to the right of Holy Church in the one realm or in the other.’ Holy Church was quick to take advantage of this. On the day before the signing of the treaty, 16 March, Robert I inspected a number of charters granted by his predecessors to Durham Priory, thus confirming its possession of its Scottish cell at Coldingham; in England, the close rolls show instructions given on 31 August 1328, and again on 28 October, for the restoration of lands and possessions seized during the war to a variety of religious houses in Scotland. Two petitions asking for the return of such property, from the abbot and convent of Jedburgh and the abbot of Arbroath, survive in the SC 8 class at The National Archives, Kew, as numbers SC 8/16/756 and SC 8/16/757. We know from external evidence that they were presented to the Salisbury parliament of October 1328. Both concern the return of churches: Jedburgh claimed Arthuret in Cumberland and the advowson of Abbotsley in Huntingdonshire; Arbroath asked for Haltwhistle in Northumberland. The petitions received similar responses: inquisitions were to be held and justice was to be done; as a result, Haltwhistle was returned to Arbroath on 25 May 1329 and Arthuret to Jedburgh on 22 February 1330. (The inquisition into the advowson of Abbotsley was delayed by the death of one of those appointed to hear it and it remained in the king's hand, although the parson was ordered to pay the abbot the pension due from the church.)
What immediately strikes the reader of these petitions is the very different strategies used by the supplicants. In this chapter I examine these strategies and what they say about the two houses and their occupants during the First Scottish War of Independence.
11 - Words and Realities: The Language and Dating of Petitions, 1326–7
- Edited by W. Mark Ormrod, Gwilym Dodd, Anthony Musson
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- Book:
- Medieval Petitions
- Published by:
- Boydell & Brewer
- Published online:
- 28 February 2023
- Print publication:
- 19 February 2009, pp 193-205
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The Parliament of 1327 began at Westminster on 7 January. It had originally been scheduled for 14 December 1326, and was officially called by writs of 28 October in the name of Edward II. These stated that the king would be out of the country, and that the business of Parliament would therefore be conducted before the queen and his eldest son, Edward, duke of Aquitaine, in his capacity as keeper of the realm. In reality, Edward II was on the run, and it was the queen, her lover and ally Roger Mortimer, and the prince, who had invaded England in September 1326, who were in charge. On 3 December, after it had taken control of the great seal, the prince's administration issued supplementary writs proroguing the meeting to 7 January. By the time Parliament finally met, the Despensers, father and son, who had held the realm in their grip for five years, had been executed, and Edward II was a prisoner in Kenilworth castle. Before it ended on 9 March, the king had been deposed, Prince Edward had been proclaimed and crowned king, and the Parliament had reconvened in the name of Edward III.
This Parliament clearly presented great opportunities, but was also held with the realm in a state of confusion. Many private petitions must have been submitted: not only would those with grievances against the deposed king have hoped for a kinder ear from the new regime, but less politically motivated people would also have been quick to take advantage of this opportunity to petition, after a year without a Parliament. This chapter aims to examine the language and content of some of these petitions, in order to establish what they can tell us about the practical impact on the petitioners of this sudden and violent regime change. How far does the language of the petitions presented at this Parliament reflect what was going on during this time? And how do the unique conditions of 1327 help or hinder us in dating petitions to this year?
For the period under discussion the wording can be both helpful and problematic in dating a petition. The swift changes in events left many petitioners bewildered, and the consequent contradictions and inconsistencies in the petition can help to tie many to the ambiguous period between Queen Isabella's invasion and the accession of Edward III.