Finding new rellies

[Olde Crone]

TIP: If you are faced with Manorial documents (or any other kind of document for that matter) in Latin - ask at the desk if anyone has translated it. Very often they have! If not, ask if there are "mirror" agreements - they may have been already translated if the family was more important than yours!

I have been very lucky that nearly all the Manorial documents I've used, were in English. The Holdens must have had something against Latin......

OC

[Merry]

That all sounds very exciting Phoenix!

What sort of people get a mention in these manorial records? Can you give some examples of what they might say?

[Olde Crone]

Merry

Most of mine have concerned either land agreements or marriage agreements but there are some other oddities, like an estate administration book, which gave details of crop yields, in-house discipline and best of all Courts Leet, which make utterly riveting reading. (If not actually furthering one's own personal research, lol).

One very early document (1200s) noted, in amongst other day to day stuff, the birth of "my sonne" which I found very moving for some daft reason.

OC

[JBee]

So envious of those who can go back so far. Most of mine stuck in early 1800's with no property or wills to find.

[Kit]

Very happy for you Phoenix. Enjoy sorting it all out.

[Nell]

Pleased for you Phoenix. I hope to get up to Norfolk Archives again some day. I was in Norwich on Friday but only for a shopping trip.

[Merry]

Originally Posted by JBee

So envious of those who can go back so far. Most of mine stuck in early 1800's with no property or wills to find.

Same here Julie. As soon as I don't have a place of birth from the census to go on, most of my lines dry up.

[Phoenix]

I started my research on my mother's side, where burials often gave maiden names for the mothers of old men, so thought everything would be easy. All my father's side seem to die in the 1840s, without a clue as to where they came from (and those that I can get back all seem to have come from parishes where the church records were destroyed in fires and manorial stuff is in private hands).

Please bear in mind that this is the first full day of research I have done since the old record office burned down 1st August 1994!

Manorial records are a bran tub. First, the rcords might not survive. Then they might be in different repositories in three or four different counties. What you want is someone using their will to direct who gets the copyhold. The will is then almost certainly in English, copied into the records, and often not survivng anywhere else.

To find out what might be available, follow this link: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/mdr/ and if the county you are interested in is indexed, go to advanced search, enter the name of the parish, and see what comes up.

[Olde Crone]

I agree with that Phoenix - I know that a huge chunk of stuff is in private hands, I even know where it is, but fat chance of ever getting hold of it.

Another useful chunk is in the RC archives at Stoneyhurst. Some is online but most isn';t and again, no chance of going and having a good old rummage.

However, nil desperandum! I recently found online the details of a Will which was previously in private hands (a solicitor) and for which I had been asked £130 + VAT!

OC

I am so envious Phoenix. Mary Callow (Carlow) the Norwich ancestor of my OH, her baptism is still unfound, despite having her parents' names on about 50 trees on Ancestry. Earlier generations all seemed so easy to find until Kite found a married Mary Callow (think the name was Smith) with her mother on the censuses and "my" Mary had been sent as a convict to Australia in the 1820s. I don't know whether the trees on Ancestry have just copied each other or whether they never tried to trace the mother in the census. I looked the other day at the Ancestry trees, hoping just one would have other info, but sadly not ..