News
Guild Roll of the Guild of St Mary, Nottingham, 1371
Nottinghamshire Archives has recently purchased a rare Nottingham mediaeval guild roll (right)(1). Previously owned by the Thornton-Parr family, the guild roll was originally auctioned at Sotheby’s Sale of Western Manuscripts on 5 December 2006, with two other unrelated items. Although the Archives bid for the lot, this was unsuccessful and it was purchased by an American collector.
However, following representations from Nottinghamshire Archives and other parties, and most unusually for a local manuscript, the Culture Minister David Lammy placed a temporary export bar on the guild roll, to allow time for money to be raised to keep this important document in the United Kingdom. The Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest recommended that export be deferred on the grounds that 'the guild roll is so closely connected with our history and national life that its departure would be a misfortune' and that 'it is of outstanding significance for the study of the borough in the mediaeval period'.
Supported by grants from the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council/ Victoria and Albert Purchase Grant Fund and the Friends of the National Libraries and from its own resources, Nottinghamshire Archives was able to raise the necessary funds to purchase the roll.
There were three types of mediaeval guild: merchant guilds; craft guilds; and social and religious guilds, of which this roll belongs to the latter group(2). Such a corporation would have provided mutual help in times of adversity such as sickness, death and unemployment, as well as education and the maintenance of religious services and entertainments. The fact that there were forty names of deceased members listed on the roll shows that masses were said for the souls of the dead.
The date of the earliest reference to any religious guild in the Nottingham borough records is 1375–6(3) and as the guild roll dates to 1371, this is the earliest known record of any religious guild in Nottingham. The guild roll is a list of the members of a guild of St Mary. As the majority of the members lived within the parish of St Mary, Nottingham(4) and those who lived in the parishes of St Peter and St Nicholas are listed separately, it seems to imply that the guild was located in the church of St Mary, especially as the vicar of the church, Master John de Stapelford, is listed as a member. If this is the case, it is the first reference ever found relating to this particular guild.
The roll is written in Latin, made of parchment and measures 168 x 14 cm. It lists
207 members of the guild, including towards the end of the roll the names of deceased members. Many are women, both as wives of members or in their own right. There have been estimated to be around 2,000 people dwelling in Nottingham at that time(5), so the 129 members noted on the roll as living in Nottingham made up approximately 6% of the local population. There were some influential men amongst them, including several mayors around this period, such as John Samon whose name is the first on the roll, a few bailiffs and the schoolmaster, William de Adbolton. A few names have occupations attached, such as John Crich, smith, and Roger P[er]vis, butcher.
Down the right hand side of the roll there are a number of streets, identifying where guild members had their homes. All the streets named were in or partly in the parish of St Mary: the Saturday Market (the old Market Place); Gretsmythgate (now Pelham Street); the Road of Butchers (now Fletchergate); Bridge End (the end of the Leen Bridge in Narrow Marsh); the Marshes (may refer to Broad and Narrow Marsh or a larger area); and Pavyment (may include High, Low or Middle Pavements)(6). People from the parishes of St Peter and St Nicholas as well as ‘foreigners’ from such places as Lenton, Wilford, Newstead and even York were also admitted as members.
Proceeds from the dues on the roll come to 26s 11d, approximately £1.35. There are a series of dots and pin pricks next to the names, presumably to show when an instalment had been paid.
The roll now awaits further study to add to our knowledge of the mediaeval borough of Nottingham.
Notes:
1 Nottinghamshire Archives DP/90/1.
2 RFB Hodgkinson and LVD Owen, ‘The Gilds of St George and of St Mary in the Church of St Peter in Nottingham’ Thoroton Society Record Series, vol VII, 1939.
3 Records of the Borough of Nottingham, vol I, 1882, p192.
4 The mediaeval parish boundaries are mapped in SN Mastoris, ‘The Boundary between the English and French Boroughs of Mediaeval Nottingham’, Transactions of the Thoroton Society, vol LXXXV, 1981, fig 2.
5 RFB Hodgkinson and LVD Owen, ‘The Gilds of St George and of St Mary in the Church of St Peter in Nottingham’ Thoroton Society Record Series, vol VII, 1939, p9, Trevor Foulds, ‘The Medieval Town’ in John Beckett (ed), A Centenary History of Nottingham, 2006, p.56.
6 Violet W Walker, ‘Mediaeval Nottingham: a Topographical Study’ Transactions of the Thoroton Society, vol LXVII, 1963, pp28-45; Records of the Borough of Nottingham, vol I, 1882, pp427–442.
Mark Dorrington and Josanne Peet
Nottinghamshire Archives
