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Details
LATIN MANUSCRIPT - Braybroke family cartulary. MANUSCRIPT ON VELLUM.
[Northamptonshire, 14th century]
240 x 170 mm. iii + 82 + iii leaves, COMPLETE, collation: a-b12 c-d8 e12 f8 g6 h-i8, signatures visible in centers of lower margins in first half of each quire, contemporary foliation i-lxxx on versos of leaves (xxii and lvii twice), later pagination 1-172 including one front and all back flyleaves, frame-ruled in brown ink, ca. 35 lines written in brown ink in an English charter script, rubrics in red. Contemporary rough deerskin over wooden boards, remains of one clasp catching on back cover (some wear, pastedowns lifted).
TEXT
A rare secular cartulary, containing a number of records of mortgages held by Jews. Although the Jews of Angevin England were technically forbidden to own land, they often loaned money to landowners. If the landholder found himself unable to repay the loan, one way of resolving the problem was to transfer the land to a third party, who paid off the mortgage. Such a transaction required that the lender renounce further claims against the land and its owners. The resulting documents offer valuable evidence for the role of Jews in the economy of thirteenth- century England.
The present cartulary contains documents primarily from the thirteenth century relating to the holdings of Robert Braybroke (d. 1211) and his son Henry (d. 1234?) of Northamptonshire. Robert was sub-sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire from 1197, and became sheriff of those counties in 1204, of Northampton in 1208 and of Rutland in 1209. Robert inherited these offices, which he held until the rebellion against King John, in which he played a role of some consequence among the barons. As "new men", responsible for day-to-day administration in the shires, the Braybrokes took advantage of their official connections to profit personally. By relieving indebted landholders, they amassed lands in Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and also in Lincolnshire, Leicestershire, Essex and Somerset. A number of the transactions involved arrangements with Jewish creditors that are reflected in the documents preserved here.
This cartulary would have been copied from the original documents in the Braybroke family archives. The majority of the deeds it contains range in date from 8 Richard I (1196-97) to 16 Henry III (1231-21), although the sequence also includes a record of an agreement from 1273-74. A document of 1368-69 (p. 149) and one from 1537-38 (p. 1) were copied into the manuscript later. A similar cartulary from the Braybroke family is British Library, MS Sloane 986 (G.R.C. Davis, Medieval Cartularies of Great Britain, London 1958, no. 1206). The present manuscript is unstudied, and was unknown to Davis, although a few texts that are found both in this codex and in Sloane 986 were edited by H.G. Richardson, The English Jewry under the Angevin Kings, London 1960, pp. 270-280.
PROVENANCE
Braybrooke family of Northamptonshire; Colonel Newman of Cheltenham (pencilled note on lifted pastedown); Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872), MS 24,256 (pencilled number on pastedown; Sotheby's, 30 November 1976, lot 874).
[Northamptonshire, 14th century]
240 x 170 mm. iii + 82 + iii leaves, COMPLETE, collation: a-b12 c-d8 e12 f8 g6 h-i8, signatures visible in centers of lower margins in first half of each quire, contemporary foliation i-lxxx on versos of leaves (xxii and lvii twice), later pagination 1-172 including one front and all back flyleaves, frame-ruled in brown ink, ca. 35 lines written in brown ink in an English charter script, rubrics in red. Contemporary rough deerskin over wooden boards, remains of one clasp catching on back cover (some wear, pastedowns lifted).
TEXT
A rare secular cartulary, containing a number of records of mortgages held by Jews. Although the Jews of Angevin England were technically forbidden to own land, they often loaned money to landowners. If the landholder found himself unable to repay the loan, one way of resolving the problem was to transfer the land to a third party, who paid off the mortgage. Such a transaction required that the lender renounce further claims against the land and its owners. The resulting documents offer valuable evidence for the role of Jews in the economy of thirteenth- century England.
The present cartulary contains documents primarily from the thirteenth century relating to the holdings of Robert Braybroke (d. 1211) and his son Henry (d. 1234?) of Northamptonshire. Robert was sub-sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire from 1197, and became sheriff of those counties in 1204, of Northampton in 1208 and of Rutland in 1209. Robert inherited these offices, which he held until the rebellion against King John, in which he played a role of some consequence among the barons. As "new men", responsible for day-to-day administration in the shires, the Braybrokes took advantage of their official connections to profit personally. By relieving indebted landholders, they amassed lands in Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, and also in Lincolnshire, Leicestershire, Essex and Somerset. A number of the transactions involved arrangements with Jewish creditors that are reflected in the documents preserved here.
This cartulary would have been copied from the original documents in the Braybroke family archives. The majority of the deeds it contains range in date from 8 Richard I (1196-97) to 16 Henry III (1231-21), although the sequence also includes a record of an agreement from 1273-74. A document of 1368-69 (p. 149) and one from 1537-38 (p. 1) were copied into the manuscript later. A similar cartulary from the Braybroke family is British Library, MS Sloane 986 (G.R.C. Davis, Medieval Cartularies of Great Britain, London 1958, no. 1206). The present manuscript is unstudied, and was unknown to Davis, although a few texts that are found both in this codex and in Sloane 986 were edited by H.G. Richardson, The English Jewry under the Angevin Kings, London 1960, pp. 270-280.
PROVENANCE
Braybrooke family of Northamptonshire; Colonel Newman of Cheltenham (pencilled note on lifted pastedown); Sir Thomas Phillipps (1792-1872), MS 24,256 (pencilled number on pastedown; Sotheby's, 30 November 1976, lot 874).