bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
On a Contemporary Drawing of the Burning of Brighton in the time of Henry VIII
Authors: Gairdner James
Published: March 2007

There are two different dates in the reign of Henry VIII. at which historians relate, on the authority of early chronicles, that the French landed at Brighton, then called Bright-hampstead or Brighthelmstone, and burned the town. The first was in the spring of 1514, the sixth year of the reign, and the second was in July 1545, the thirty-seventh year of the reign. The contemporary picture-map, of which a copy stands before you, would seem, by an inscription upon it, to be a representation of the latter event. But the inscription, I may say at once, does not appear to be in a handwriting quite of Henry VIII.'s time, and it is one object of this paper to show that the conflagration depicted is the one of 1514. Further, I may say that it appears to me very questionable whether the burning in 1545 was an actual fact at all.
The Northern Treaties of 1719–20
Authors: Chance J. F.
Published: March 2007

In a paper read before the Royal Historical Society in its last session I traced the northern policy of George I. to the time that the news arrived of the death of Charles XII. of Sweden, ending with the treaty of Vienna signed by Austria, Hanover and Saxony on January 5, 1719. My present paper has for its subject the peace-making which necessarily followed the death of Charles, a peace-making conducted by George I. in accordance with his own views, as modified by the necessity of consulting the wishes of the regent of France and by the recalcitrance of Denmark.
Municipal Administration in the Spanish Dominions in America
Authors: Kirkpatrick F. A.
Published: March 2007

An official account of the Indies states that in 1574 there were 200 Spanish settlements or towns (pueblos de Españoles) in Spanish America, some of them ranking as cities, others as villas (i.e. boroughs or towns); 100 of these were in South America. Here is an extract from the book:—

‘The city of Popayan is 22 leagues from the city of Cali, which bounds it on the North; and 20 leagues from Almaguer, which bounds it to the South. It has 30 Spanish householders (vecinos), of whom 16 are encomenderos. Its district contains 32 villages or divisions of Indians, with 9000 tributary Indians, divided into 19 repartimientos, 3 of them tributary to the king, the rest to individuals.’
The Historical Side of the old English Poem of ‘Widsith’
Authors: Anscombe Alfred
Published: March 2007

Nearly ninety years have passed away since J. J. Cony-beare prepared the first edition of the Old English poem of ‘Widsith,’ or ‘The Traveller's Song,’ for inclusion among his ‘Illustrations of Anglo-Saxon Poetry,’ a work published in 1826. ‘Widsith’ is the oldest Germanic poem we have and its imprint excited immediate attention. The student of legend was attracted to it by the close connexion it shows with Germanic saga, and the historian timidly acknowledged the appeal it made to him to honour it as a genuine source of information. The characteristics of the poem have combined to place it in the forefront of that great mass of dubious documents which are found written in sundry western languages and which purport to deal with the story of the legendary heroes of Germanic race from the time of Constantius Chlorus to the middle of the sixth century.
The Voyage of Pedro Teixeira on the Amazon from Para to Quito and Back, 1637–39
Authors: Edmundson G.
Published: March 2007

The first European to make acquaintance with the main stream of the mightiest of all rivers, the river of the Amazons, was the Spaniard, Francisco de Orellana. This man was one of the leaders of an expedition of discovery, which left Quito on Christmas Day, 1539, under the command of Gonzalo Pizarro. After the endurance of terrible hardships, Pizarro at length reached the banks of the river Napo. Here a brigantine was built, and as his men were starving in the pathless forests, the chief placed Orellana and fifty men on board with orders to descend the stream in search of provisions. Towards the close of the year 1540 Orellana started on his quest, and never returned. He reached the ocean on August 26, 1541. This adventurous voyage, the details of which have been preserved by Friar Gaspar Carvajal, one of the companions of Orellana, created a great sensation. When the news of it reached Madrid, Charles V gave Orellana a commission to conduct an expedition to take possession of the newly-discovered lands, of which he was appointed Governor. The attempt ended in utter disaster, and Orellana himself perished at sea. After his failure and death nearly a century passed before any other voyager traversed the Amazon from the mountains to the ocean.
Unpublished Documents Relating to Town Life in Coventry
Authors: Harris M. Dormer
Published: March 2007

The subject of this paper is to be found in two volumes of correspondence from royal and private persons belonging to the city of Coventry, and in one other MS., the diary of Robert Beake, mayor of Coventry in 1655. Where the original of this latter MS. is I do not know; possibly it has perished; but a copy exists in the writing of the Rev. F. J. Eld, whose father was a former mayor of Coventry, and this copy still is in the son's possession.
The Black Death in Wales
Authors: Rees William
Published: March 2007

The epidemics of the fourteenth century have been the subject of much discussion by eminent scholars, whose investigations have been supplemented by detailed studies of various localities. No considered attempt, however, has been made to trace the course of the disease within Wales, which, by reason of its isolated position and mountainous character, is frequently regarded as having largely escaped the visitation. The study of the effects of such an agent upon a society predominantly pastoral offers a subject of special interest.
The Commons' Journals of the Tudor Period
Authors: Neale J. E.
Published: March 2007

In 1914 Professor Pollard read a paper before the Royal Historical Society on “The Authenticity of the Lords' Journals in the Sixteenth Century,”1 in the course of which, by revealing how inadequate a presentation of the manuscript originals was contained in the printed journals, he showed that the original journals might be a valuable field for historical gleanings. In addition to Professor Pollard, Professor. Maitland and Mr. L. O. Pike also examined the manuscript of an Elizabethan Lords' journal;2 but in 1916 two American scholars, Professors Notestein and Usher, turned to the Commons' journals of the early seventeenth century, and in advocating a critical survey of the manuscript originals, challenged the conventional view of their authenticity which an uncritical edition of them has easily created.3 The fact is, of course, that even an accurate edition of a document—and a fortiori an inaccurate one—may destroy valuable historical evidence if it convey no clear idea of the appearance of the original manuscript. It is one thing to visualise a large folio sheet of print: a materially
Experiments in Exchequer Procedure (1200–1232)
Authors: Mills Mabel H.
Published: March 2007

“ Experiments in Exchequer Procedure ” may suggest a series of unimportant financial developments, with only a remote interest for students of medieval history, and of no value to anyone else. But finance lies at the bottom of most medieval, as well as of most modern, historical problems: the complaints of the barons in 1215 are chiefly financial in origin, while the struggle over the Charters is the central point round which our enquiry is built. Moreover, in these years changes took place in exchequer procedure which laid the foundations for the new structure which gradually superseded the old in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries—a structure different from its predecessor, though the old forms were maintained, a not uncommon feature in English administrative history.
Status of “Villani” and Other Tenants in Danish East Anglia in Pre-Conquest Times
Authors: Hudson W.
Published: March 2007

In the Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 4th Series, Vol. I., pp. 28, etc., I commented upon a thirteenth-century Survey of the Manor of Martham, Norfolk, which seemed to carry back the conditions then existing (both as regards the tenants and the agriculture) to a very much earlier period. The use of the old English word “eriung” (ploughing), to describe a full villein land, implied its continuous use from Angle times all through the Danish occupation. The universal intermixture of lands held by the two classes of villeins and sokemen (by which terms alone the tenants were called), together with the obvious inter-relation of their families, pointed to a common origin and a generally accepted equality of status which was apparently still existent in the thirteenth century. In view of the fact that the manorial conditions of compulsory service had been introduced by the Bishop in 1101 for his newly-founded monastery at Norwich, it was felt not unreasonable to date back to that period the conditions disclosed in the Survey. This would bring us to within a few years of Domesday Book, where the lands are described as almost exclusively held by freemen.
The System of British Colonial Administration of the Crown Colonies in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries Compared with the System Prevailing in the Nineteenth Century
Authors: Egerton H. E.
Published: March 2007

The most learned of historians would find it difficult to add much to the sum of knowledge in treating the subject of my paper. That subject is the comparison between the administration of certain colonies in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and their administration in the nineteenth. The question is why, whereas in most colonies there has been steady progress from representative to responsible government-Lord Blachford was clearly wrong when he seemed to imply that Crown Colony government was the necessary preliminary to both these-in the West Indies, on the other hand, the tendency has been in the opposite direction, viz. from representative to Crown Colony government.
Some Aspects of Early English Apprenticeship
Authors: Dunlop O. Jocelyn
Published: March 2007

The story of apprenticeship is so interwoven with the general and industrial history of England that it is almost impossible to touch upon any portion of it without travelling over ground already well known. There are, however, certain aspects of the subject which can, perhaps, bear further investigation. It is the purpose of this paper to deal mainly with three such aspects of early English appientice-ship, namely, its flexibility, its use as an instrument of monopoly, and lastly, but most important, the continuity between the guild system and the national and compulsory system established by Statute in 1562.
The Bardon Papers. A Collection of Contemporary Documents (MS. Eg. 2124) Relating to the Trial of Mary Queen of Scots, 1586
Authors: Cotton Charles
Published: March 2007

The manuscripts of which this Paper contains an account have an interesting history. Their publication was intended sixty years ago. Unfortunately, this was never carried out, the manuscripts finding their way instead, in 1870, to the British Museum, where, under the title of the ‘Egerton MS. 2124,’ they have lain ever since more or less undisturbed.
The Peace of Paris, 1763.: Alexander Prize Essay, 1907
Authors: Hotblack Kate
Published: March 2007

The Peace of Paris is a signpost in the vast realm of possibility pointing out the paths over which the great powers of to-day have travelled. It stands at the crossways. Here the ancient kingdoms of the East met the new world in the West. The fates of Indian princes and redskin chiefs were alike decided by the white man at Fontainebleau. Their civilisations and religions alike were doomed when their lands passed under the suzerainty of his Most Gracious Majesty George III. Those who met at the signpost in 1762, and those who travel back to it along paths half obscured by the growth of two centuries, agree that it is no ordinary landmark. Contemporaries differed in their estimation of the peace, but they all agreed as to its importance. It was the great political question which agitated the courts of London, Paris, Madrid, Berlin, Vienna and St. Petersburg from the beginning of 1761 till December 1762, when the preliminaries of the peace were approved in the House of Commons by the huge majority of 319 to 65. George III. spoke of the peace as glorious. Charles Townsend praised it. Hans Stanley, one of the few good English diplomatists of the eighteenth century, defended it ably in the House. Pitt alone opposed it with any force. His speech, though familiar as a burst of oratory, has long been an enigma when treated as an historical document. Why did the great War Minister so absolutely condemn the peace which laid the foundations of the British Empire, the peace which is generally regarded as the result of his own successful policy?
Concerning the Historical Manuscripts Commission
Authors: Roberts R. A.
Published: March 2007

The audience which assembles in this room on occasions similar to the present is, most frequently, I suppose, addressed with reference to some section or phase of the subject-matter of history. As a rule, results of historical study and investigation, whether it be of a period or of a particular series of events, or of the policy or character of some statesman or famous person, or of some political movement, or the like, are laid before you. This afternoon your attention is asked while I endeavour to speak on something different, having to do with the subject-matter of history undoubtedly, but rather from the outside than the inside. I am to speak, that is to say, of certain machinery by the operation of which the crude material or pabulum of the historical student and investigator is brought to ‘market overt,’ there to be bought, I may add in passing, at a ridiculously cheap price, being sold, as all the world may note, according to a strictly mechanical method of appreciation, at the price, namely, of about threepence for each section of 64 octavo pages. This generous dealing with the public is due to a resolution of the House of Commons, passed, I am informed, about the year 1832, the members at that time being persuaded that their constituents were thirsting to purchase Blue-books if only their means permitted, and bemg greatly concerned therefore that a sufficient number of copies of all parliamentary papers should be printed so as to allow this eager desire for this form of literature to be gratified at the cheapest possible rate. And I may explain, once for all, that the Reports of the Historical Manuscripts Commission are, in form, nothing more nor less than sessional papers, which it is the privilege of members of both Houses of Parliament to receive gratuitously in ever-abounding quantities.
The Estate Book of Henry de Bray of Harlestone, Northamptonshire (1289–1340)
Authors: Willis Dorothy
Published: March 2007

The late Miss Mary Bateson examined this ‘Estate Book’ compiled by Henry de Bray of Harlestone, Northamptonshire, and in view of the fact that it was written by a layman of the late thirteenth century she considered that the rarity of such productions might give this compilation a distinct value amongst medieval economic sources.
The Exchequer Year
Authors: Richardson H. G.
Published: March 2007

When discussing the Exchequer Year in the Transactions for 1925 (4th Ser., Vol. VIII) I should have noticed certain of the contemporary endorsements on the early feet of fines. The practice of depositing in the Treasury of the Receipt of the Exchequer the foot of each tripartite chirograph commenced on 16 July, 1195, and some methodical arrangement had to be devised for preserving the feet of fines for convenient reference. The accumulation of each term and of each eyre was therefore filed separately; and the blank underside of the bottom document of each file was endorsed with an appropriate inscription, such as the following:— Cyrographa recepta anno VII, a festo sancti Michaelis usque ad Pascham:
Presidential Address: National and International Co-operation in Historical Scholarship
Authors: Tout T. F.
Published: March 2007

When I had the honour of addressing this Society a year ago, I spoke to it of our past history and hinted that I might at some future time have something to say about our present work and our future prospects. I do not wish to-day to grapple with the whole of such large subjects, but there are special reasons why I should as soon as possible call your attention to some particular aspects of them. My motives are largely practical. A movement has been maturing for some time which has for its object the promotion of international co-operation in historical work. During the last year it has reached the definite stage of creating a permanent international organisation of historical scholars for the promotion of co-operative undertakings on a large scale. It is an important movement and one which historians should have greatly to heart. It has attracted very little attention in this country and there is a danger lest we should not take our full share in the work in which we are now invited to play a part. I wish to give to it all the publicity that I am able, and to make an appeal to serious historians to do what they can to help it forward.
Illustrations of English History in the Mediæval Registers of the Parlement of Paris
Authors: Richardson H. G.
Published: March 2007

The parlement of Paris has a double interest for students of English history. In the first place, it has the interest of an institution parallel to our own parliament, with a similar origin but with a history widely divergent: of the comparative study of the two institutions I hope to say something on another occasion. In the second place the mediæval records of the parlement mirror the relations between Englishmen and Frenchmen during more than two centuries, and particularly the doings of English kings, soldiers, clergy, students and traders in France, of French renegades in the English service and of French patriots fighting the English enemy or languishing in English captivity. The existence of this wealth of material is, it would seem, practically unknown in England. The Record Commission transcripts contain nothing taken from the records of the parlement: this omission may have been due to the difficulty of access, for until 1847, when these records were removed to the Hôtel de Soubise, it was almost impossible for students to consult them. But they seem to have been unknown even to Mr. Joseph Stevenson when he was collecting materials for his Letters and Papers illustrative of the Wars of the English in France during the reign of Henry VI.
The Reforms at the Exchequer (1232–1242)
Authors: Mills M. H.
Published: March 2007

In a paper read to the Society nearly two years ago, an attempt was made to bridge the gulf between exchequer procedure under Henry II and under his grandson. By 1232 the first stage of development from the organisation revealed in the Dialogus was already complete: the exchequer had met the crisis with which it was faced on Henry II's death by the invention of new procedure, and had passed through the experimental stage under John and during Henry III's minority. The curtain was drawn up for the second act, when in July 1232 Peter des Roches became all powerful in the king's counsels. The time for a general review of the financial position, for reorganisation and for codification had already arrived. The first paper dealt with “Experiments in Exchequer Procedure (1200–1232)”: the second proposes to consider the “Reforms at the Exchequer (1232–1242)” which were the direct result of that experiment.
England and the Polish-Saxon Problem at the Congress of Vienna
Authors: Webster C. K.
Published: March 2007

It is nearly one hundred years since the Congress of Vienna met, yet there has not been produced a standard work to which we can turn with confidence for a complete and detailed exposition of transactions which rearranged the whole map of Europe. Often as its errors have been exposed and its principles criticised, the exact methods by which it sought to achieve its purposes are to a certain extent still unknown. The mass of evidence has slowly but surely accumulated, but since Sorel attempted to do once more what Thiers had already done, to write the history of the Congress from the French point of view, no historian has given us any considerable description of its work. By Treitschke and Oncken we have valuable but by no means complete accounts, and meanwhile much work has been done on parts of the Congress which makes it probable that the time has arrived for a reconsideration of its whole scope to be attempted, and perhaps some commonly accepted judgments to be revised. The fascinating articles, which Professor Fournier has given us, as preliminaries to his great work on the Congress, show how much new evidence is at the disposal of the historian.
The Pedigree of Earl Godwin
Authors: Anscombe Alfred
Published: March 2007

The last surviving son of Earl Godwin was named Wulfnoth. He had been kept prisoner by King William the Conqueror, and was released on William's death, but only for a short time. His name was not a common one, not more than fourteen persons who bore it in the eleventh century being recorded in Searle's ‘Onomasticon Anglo-Saxonicum,’ and only about nine in the tenth. The name of Wulfnoth is purely Old English. So, too, are the names of some of the other children of Earl Godwin—namely, Lêofwine, Êadgŷth, Ælfgifu and Êadgifu. But the names of Earl Godwin's other sons, Swegen, Harold, Tostig and Gyrth, are Dano-Norwegian in immediate origin. Even the name of Harold is Scandinavian, the true Old-English and West-Saxon form being ‘Hereweald.’
The System of Account in the Wardrobe of Edward I
Authors: Johnson Charles
Published: March 2007

The word “Wardrobe” has associations for the modern The Wardrobe. historian which he will find very misleading if he takes them back to the end of the thirteenth century. Even at the beginning of the reign of Edward I, the Wardrobe included all the Household departments (i.e. those called in modern times by the names of the Lord Steward, the Lord Chamberlain, and the Master of the Horse), and besides these the Household troops, and something more or less corresponding to the Army Clothing Department. Towards the end of the reign, when everything was on a war footing, it comprised the War Office and the Admiralty as well. Indeed it is hardly too much to say that it included all the spending departments except the Office of Works. It thus controlled a very large number of sub-departments, some of which acquired administrative independence in the following reign, in the Treasurership of Walter de Stapledon.
The English Colony in Rome during the Fourteenth Century
Authors: Re Emilio
Published: March 2007

The middle of the fourteenth century, not only in Italy but throughout Europe, marked a period of crisis and of momentary retrogression.
Charles V and the Discovery of Canada
Authors: Biggar H. P.
Published: March 2007

To Canadians, and perhaps to English people as well, it will come as a surprise to learn that in the sixteenth century an Emperor of Germany laid claim not only to Canada, but also to the region now embraced within the borders of the United States. The basis of the claim was a bull issued by Pope Alexander VI in 1493.
The Forthcoming Bibliography of Modern British History
Authors: Tedder Henry R.
Published: March 2007

The title of the paper as it appears in the sessional programme, ‘Concerning Historical Bibliography,’ is somewhat vague. What I have to say this afternoon chiefly concerns the forthcoming ‘Bibliography of Modern British History,’ which owes its inception to Fellows of the Royal Historical Society. It is not necessary for me to describe the extensive literature published in various countries and at various times on the subject of Historical Bibliography, as retrospects have been the theme of several papers read by me to the.Library Association, some as far back as 1885, when I first submitted to that body ‘Proposals for a Bibliography of National History,’ since approved, amplified, and improved by Mr. Frederic Harrison and by Dr. G. W. Prothero in addresses before this Society.
The Embassy of William Harborne to Constantinople, 1583–8
Authors: Rawlinson H. G.
Published: March 2007

The Turkey Company, one of the many commercial ventures started during the reign of Elizabeth, was first organised in order to break the monopoly in Eastern commodities which had fallen into the hands of the Venetians, to the great detriment of English trade. The early history of the Turkey Company has already been submitted to detailed investigation, and need not be recapitulated here. The object of the present paper is to throw some light upon an aspect of the subject which has hitherto received little attention, namely, the part played in the foundation of the Company by William Harborne, our first Ambassador to the Porte, but for whose courage and perseverance the whole enterprise must have fallen to the ground. His services to the Turkey Company may be compared to those of Sir Thomas Roe to the East India Company; but whereas the journals and diaries of the latter have been worthily edited, those of Harborne remain almost entirely unknown. Harborne, during his six years at Constantinople, kept up a close correspondence with Lord Burleigh, Sir Francis Walsingham and Mr. Secretary Davison. He was a voluminous but not an elegant letter-writer: his style is so cumbrous and involved that at times it is difficult to understand exactly what he means, and one is tempted to wish that he had written in Latin.
The Political Theory of the Indian Mutiny
Authors: Buckler F. W.
Published: March 2007

The “Mutiny” was the summary of the rise of the British in India, and, as the cry of the Sepoys at Meerut was “Delhi, Delhi,” it is in Delhi that the key to a political theory must be sought. The scope of this paper is limited, therefore, to the light thrown upon the subject by “the proceedings of the trial of the King of Delhi.” Its object is to examine afresh this document as a test for a theory of the relations between the East India Company and the Mughal Empire, and consequently of the nature of the rise of the British in India.
Marriage Settlements in the Eighteenth Century
Authors: Habakkuk H. J.
Published: March 2007

In the early eighteenth century, the arrangements by which the English aristocracy and gentry commonly provided for their families conformed to a standard pattern, the strict settlement, in which the essential questions were settled at the marriage of the eldest son. Not only was his immediate maintenance fixed and his wife's jointure, but the provision for the children of the marriage—how much they were to receive, in what form and when—was decided at the same time. In its essentials, the marriage settlement first secured that the family estate should in each generation descend to the eldest son. It did this by limiting the interest in the estate of the father of the husband and, after him, of the husband himself, to that of a life-tenant, and entailing the estate on the eldest son to be born of the marriage. Secondly, the marriage settlement empowered both the father and husband to raise jointures for their respective wives and portions, i.e. capital sums, for their daughters and younger sons when they married or came of age; sometimes rent charges were provided for younger sons.
Anglo-Scottish Relations, 1603–40
Authors: Wedgwood C. V.
Published: March 2007

Clarendon, in his History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England, states that the disturbances in Scotland which preceded- the Bishops' Wars came as a shock to the English councillors of King Charles I. It seems probable that they came as a shock to King Charles himself. The unexampled authority that his father James VI had succeeded in establishing for the Crown in Scotland—an authority Which he continued to exercise at long range when he became king of England—was something which Charles I had learnt to take for granted.
Pope Boniface VIII and The Commune of Orvieto
Authors: Waley D. P.
Published: March 2007

A constant source of discord within the States of the Church during medieval times was the absence of clearly-defined territorial boundaries between the control of the self-governing communes of the Patrimony and that of the papal authorities. Disputes arising from this cause embittered for several centuries the relations of the papacy with some of the principal towns of the Patrimony, among them Spoleto, Gubbio, and Orvieto. The subject of this paper is an episode in the papacy's quarrel with the last of these communes.
Presidential Address: Deeds and Seals
Authors: Plucknett T. F. T.
Published: March 2007

One of the more pleasant aspects of academic life is the informal chat between a professor and a young historian when they plan together a very necessary and illuminating book. It will be agreed that the subject is of high interest from several points of view, that the material is adequate—indeed, abundant, and that it might well prove to be a magnum opus upon which a respectable reputation could be built. Some of the main problems of the subject will be briefly indicated, some daring guesses will emerge (of course, suitably qualified with the remark that ‘there may be nothing in it, but it might be worth looking into’), and a wealth of references will be given to the more obscure foreign periodicals.
The Idea of a Mercantile State
Authors: Judges A. V.
Published: March 2007

The chief purpose of this paper is to formulate a question. What, to put the matter briefly, have we in mind when we talk of the mercantile state; and what functional value is possessed by our ideas about it when we are engaged in the processes of reconstructing the political and economic life of the centuries in which it is commonly believed to have flourished? Various meanings have been given to the words mercantile system and also to the more austere mercantilism which German scholarship has coined for us to use when we wish to attempt a distillation of the policies attributed to practitioners of that system. Most of us would doubtless be ready to admit that these terms of art of the economist have been useful in bringing large groups of facts and theories into focus; and therein lies their justification. But the concepts which they awkwardly try to express have had a steadily diminishing utility in recent years as our knowledge has advanced, and (like other premature generalisations in the history of ideas) it would seem that they are being perpetuated because we shrink from generalising anew.
English and Čech Influences on the Husite Movement
Authors: Betts R. R.
Published: March 2007

This paper is a preliminary study of the relative indebtedness of the Husite movement in Bohemia to the English reformers of the latter half of the fourteenth century on the one hand, and the native Čech predecessors of Hus on the other; but it will also raise questions of historical method and of the influence of nationalism on modern historiography, which will perhaps justify the infliction on you of a subject remote from the topics usually discussed by this Society, and one which you will perhaps deem arid and uninvitingly recondite in itself.
The Last Years of the Court of Star Chamber 1630–41
Authors: Phillips Henry E. I.
Published: March 2007

On 31 May, 1641, in the House of Commons, Edmund Prideaux, the member for Lyme Regis, reported the findings of the Committee on the Star Chamber in a Bill for the abolition of that Court.

There was at once a commotion. Before the Speaker had an opportunity to put the question for the engrossment of the Bill, Mr. Coventry, member for Evesham, rose to his feet to complain that the Committee had exceeded the bounds of its prescribed duty in bringing in such a Bill. Sir Robert Hatton thereupon desired that the original instruction for committal might be read, and, on this being done, it was found that Coventry was correct. On the previous 1 April, a Bill for the “ Reforming of the unlawful Proceedings ” of the Court had been given its second reading. It was consigned to the Standing Committee on the Star Chamber.
Forfeitures and Treason in 1388
Authors: Clarke M. V.
Published: March 2007

My interest in the forfeitures of 1388 was first roused by an examination of the printed inventories of the reign of Richard II, undertaken in the hope of finding references to pictures painted for the king. The examination was necessarily brief, as there is little in print except Gloucester's great inventory of 1397, a few wills, some short lists in the calendars of Close Rolls and the inventories, chiefly of forfeitures, published in Palgrave's Kalendars and Inventories of the Treasury. Palgrave naturally suggested a search in the Record Office, and I soon became aware of a considerable body of material there, relating to the forfeitures of 1388. Though none of it turned out to be directly useful for my original enquiry, it seemed to have sufficient historical interest to deserve discussion.
English Neutrality in the War of the Polish Succession
Authors: Lodge Richard
Published: March 2007

The Royal Historical Society, with the assistance of Mr. J. F. Chance, Mr. Wickham Legg, and Dr. D. B. Horn, has rendered and is still rendering valuable assistance to the study of diplomatic history. The most direct service so far has been the issue of a series of volumes giving selections from the Instructions to British envoys at foreign courts between 1689 and 1789. I devoutly wish that some well-timed benefaction might enable us to make these volumes more complete and less selective. In the meantime, while we cast envious eyes upon the sumptuous volumes which have been published in France, and upon the still more complete series issued before the War by the Imperial Society of Russian History, we have to be grateful for what this Society can give us. Its latest contribution is Mr. Legg's third volume of Instructions to our ministers in France, which was sent out to Fellows of the Society last month. The present paper was provoked by that volume, which I read in proof, and is designed to be a commentary upon that part of its contents which refers to the so-called War of the Polish Succession (1733–5). The contentions which I put forward represent convictions formed long ago, but these convictions have been strengthened and vivified by the documents in this volume. Limits of time forbid quotations from other authorities, but anyone who may desire a more detailed study can turn to Professor Vaucher's Robert Walpole et la Politique de Fleury (1731–1742), where ample references can be found.
The Humanitarian Movement of the Early Nineteenth Century to Remedy Abuses on Emigrant Vessels to America
Authors: Walpole K. A.
Published: March 2007

There are few more remarkable developments during the nineteenth century than the movement overseas from the United Kingdom, which was to people first the backwoods of Canada and later the other Dominions. The history of this great exodus has been written only in part and one aspect has been practically neglected—the story of the Atlantic passage. Not only does this form a most important chapter in the history of emigration, but it also reveals an aspect of the humanitarian movement which has never been emphasized. It is therefore proposed in the following pages to trace the efforts made to secure the enactment of laws enforcing humane conditions on the passage to America, to follow the steps taken to secure the efficient administration of these laws, and to consider whether these efforts led to any radical improvement.
The Career of Waleran, Count of Meulan and Earl of Worcester (1104–66)
Authors: White Geoffrey H.
Published: March 2007

M. Depoin begins his brief account of Waleran by remarking that his “existence mouvementée pourrait faire l'objet d'une thèse attrayante, ou serait mise en relief la vie d'un grand feudataire anglo-francais au XIIe siecle.” As his suggestion has been neglected on both sides of the Channel, I have ventured to attempt the task.
”The Canningite Party”
Authors: Aspinall A.
Published: March 2007

It is well known that between 1801 and 1809 the Tory Party broke up into several groups led by Addington, Grenville, Wellesley, Perceval, and Canning, which were divided partly by personal, partly by political differences; and that the two-party system was temporarily superseded by the group system. Much new information concerning the smallest but the most distinguished of these various connexions is to be found in the Huskisson, Liverpool, Granville, Harrowby, Harewood, and other papers in public or private hands, which have recently been made accessible to the historian.
Parliament and ‘Bastard Feudalism’
Authors: McFarlane K. B.
Published: March 2007

‘Edward I’, said Stubbs, ‘had made his parliament the concentration of the three estates of his people; under Edward II, Edward III, and Richard II, the third estate claimed and won its place as the foremost of the three.’ While the resounding emphasis is Stubbs's own—his common sense was of the kind called robust—the sentiment expressed was then and for long afterwards the traditional one. It is only of late years that opinion has swung to the opposite pole and maintained with an equal want of compromise the absolute insignificance of the commons in the political struggles of the later middle ages. The first open challenge to tradition came, I think, from Professor J. E. Neale in 1924. Mainly concerned to trace the growth of free speech in parliament under the Tudors, he found himself confronted with a medieval background to his subject which seemed to him at variance with the course of its later development. The prologue, as it were, anticipated too much of his play. In a bold attempt to refashion it, he outlined a theory which did not at first attract much attention from medievalists, but which has recently, thanks to Mr. H. G. Richardson, begun to enjoy a considerable vogue among them.
Presidential Address
Authors: Tout T. F.
Published: March 2007

One of the most invidious duties of the President of the Royal Historical Society is the obligation to deliver an annual address to his constituents. This obligation is perhaps the harder, since he is absolutely free to talk about anything that he likes, provided only that it has some relation, near or distant, to things historical. This year the obligation comes upon me with particular severity, because I am working night and day in seeing through the press two more volumes of a book whose composition has lain heavily on my soul for the last twenty years, and I must conclude this task speedily, since in ten days I am sailing for the United States of America and shall, therefore, have to crave leave of this Society to neglect my duties to it until I come back in the Fall. Under these conditions, I shall have, for several months, to say good-bye to those administrative records with which I have lived for the best part of a generation. Parting from old friends is always a sad thing. One is prone to dwell upon such an occasion on their more endearing and attractive qualities, even when in daily association we are sometimes too apt to regard them as tedious, dull, and unprofitable. Accordingly I do not think I can do better to-day than pay a tribute to the records to which I owe nearly all my material, and suggest to you that they are not nearly so tedious and dull on intimate acquaintance, as they seem to be to those who have only a casual knowledge of them.
The Public Record Office and the Historical Student—A Retrospect
Authors: Stamp A. E.
Published: March 2007

It is a curious coincidence that to-day should have been fixed for me to read a paper on my memories of the Public Record Office, for I entered as a junior clerk on 9 March, 1893, so that when I left the office this afternoon I had completed exactly thirty-five years' service.

At that time Sir Henry Maxwell Lyte had been Deputy-Keeper for just over seven years; one volume of the Calendar of Patent Rolls (1327–30)had been published, and the late Mr. W. H. Stevenson had just finished the first volume of the Calendar of Close Rolls (1307–13). The Patent Rolls have now been completely calendared from the reign of Henry III to the end of the reign of Edward VI, and the Close Rolls to the end of the reign of Henry V, although the whole of the latter calendar has not yet been published.
A Study in the History of Clare, Suffolk; with Special Reference to its Development as a Borough (Alexander Prize Essay, 1928)
Authors: Thornton Gladys A.
Published: March 2007

Clare is situated in the south-west corner of Suffolk, in the valley of the Stour River. At the present day it is only a village, for its market is no longer held; yet its history shows that in earlier times it was of considerable importance, especially during the medieval period, when it was a favourite residence of the Clare lords. The town then had a busy market and a flourishing cloth-making industry; and at one time it seemed possible that Clare might attain full development as a borough, possessing as it did some burghal characteristics. In the following pages it is proposed to study in detail the history of Clare as a seignorial borough during the Middle Ages, and its subsequent development.
The Work of Gregory of Tours in the Light of Modern Research
Authors: Wallace-Hadrill J. M.
Published: March 2007

It is now three years since Wilhelm Levison, one of the last of the great Monumenta editors, died at Durham. Among the tasks he left unfinished were two of major importance to those whose concern is with Frankish studies. The first, a much-needed edition of the Lex Salica, he seems to have brought no nearer completion than had his predecessor, Bruno Krusch, or any other of the long line of Monumenta scholars who broke their hearts in the attempt to unravel it. The second, the completion of the new Monumenta edition of the Historia Francorum of Gregory of Tours, to supersede that of Arndt and Krusch, was a good deal further advanced. In fact, the text itself had already appeared in print under the name of Bruno Krusch alone, although it was an open secret that a great part of the burden of editing had fallen on Levison's shoulders. What remained—and still remains—to be published is the critical introduction, w*here Levison is under-stood to have developed views on the manuscript tradition that owed less to Krusch than to Krusch's own master, Wilhelm Arndt. While this introduction remains unpublished it is hazardous for others to proceed very far with work based on the text of the Historia Francorum. My own intention here is to do no more than to present an interim report on some of the ways in which historians have been using Gregory in the twenty years since the publication of Dill's and Dalton's books; for they were the last English scholars to whom Frankish studies seemed important for themselves. My debt to them is great.
The Electorate and the Repeal of the Corn Laws
Authors: Kitson Clark G. S. R.
Published: March 2007

I Must start by saying that everything in this paper must be subject to correction from two quarters. Mr. Norman Gash has written but not yet published a book entitled Politics in the age of Peel, which will be a study of the representative system in the twenty years after the Reform Bill, and which will explain to us very much that we need to understand. Secondly, all generalizations about elections are open to correction, indeed are normally in urgent need of correction, by those historians who are prepared to make a more or less intensive study of local conditions in some district. Failure to realize the significance of local conditions vitiates the value of some of the conclusions in that otherwise useful book, Mr. Seymour's Electoral Reform in England and Wales, but it has vitiated other books of more general reference than Mr. Seymour's. In fact we have all been content to describe far too much of the history of the nineteenth century in the terms of the play of a few principal actors posturing before a back-cloth painted with conventional figures, the landlord, the manufacturer, the artisan and worst of all a mass of undifferentiated ciphers without faces which we are pleased to call the middle class. The local historian, and only the local historian, can tear this cloth aside. What he will reveal will not always be a decorous picture; the artist best suited to portray it is obviously Hogarth more often than seems appropriate for the background to such highly respectable figures as Lord John Russell, Sir Robert Peel, John Bright and William Ewart Gladstone.
George III and the Politicians
Authors: Pares R.
Published: March 2007

George III's opinions on politics and the constitution have usually been contrasted with those of some people called ‘the whigs’. The contrast and even the terminology are no mere invention of historians. Quite early in the reign, politicians were already reviving the terms ‘whig’ and ‘tory’, and using them no longer, as in 1760, to denote certain groups of men who called themselves whigs and tories, but to indicate differences of opinion between people hitherto called whigs, about the constitutional rights of the Crown and their proper exercise. “Whigs called other whigs by the name of tories, and ‘pure’ whiggism was increasingly identified with a kind of anti-monarchism which may or may not have been a whig principle in earlier times but was not often expressed openly in 1760. This identification had proceeded pretty far by 1780, the date of Dunning's famous resolution; and two years later, when George III made Shelburne his prime minister without consulting the cabinet, Fitzpatrick thought it natural to say, ‘If this is suffered, there is an end of whig principles.’
The Organisation of Indentured Retinues in Fourteenth-Century England
Authors: Lewis N. B.
Published: March 2007

The fourteenth century is an important period in the history of aristocratic retinues in England not only because it was a period of some considerable activity on their part, but because it was one in which their leaders, adapting themselves to the general change in the structure of society, began to develop new forms of retinue organised on the principle of personal contract in place of the old feudal principle of tenurial loyalty.
The Camden Society, 1838–1938
Authors: Johnson Charles
Published: March 2007

The Camden Society, of which this Society is the heir and representative, was founded in 1838, and it is only fitting that some record of its history and achievements should mark the present year. It would have been an appropriate task for the sole surviving member Dr. Hubert Hall, our director, who is not only a living link with the old Society, but has himself carried on its work and its traditions as the editor–in–chief of our Camden Series. It is at his instigation that I stand here this evening, and I must ask his indulgence and that of this Society for whatever sins of commission or omission I may be guilty of.
The First House Of Bellême
Authors: White Geoffrey H.
Published: March 2007

Roger de montgomery, 1st earl of Shrewsbury, married Mabel de Bellême, the heiress of a great house which held the castles of Bellême and Alencon, Domfront and Sées, with widespread lands along the southern marches of Normandy, not only in that duchy but in the kingdom of France and the county of Maine. The importance of the family is attested by its inclusion in L'Art de Vérifier les Dates; but the standard account in that great work was superseded in 1920 by the detailed history of the lords of Bellême published by the Vicomte du Motey. Unfortunately the author's enthusiasm for his heroes overran his discretion; and as Orderic, our leading authority, paints most of them in the blackest colours, du Motey made a bitter attack on his accuracy and even on his veracity. Moreover, he made no attempt to grapple with the chronological difficulties inherent in the received descent, nor did he show any critical idea of the comparative value of his authorities; whilst his own lively imagination added picturesque details to what might otherwise have been a “bald and unconvincing narrative”.