The Norwich Chamberlains Accounts 1539-40 to 1544-45
- Submitting institution
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The University of East Anglia
- Unit of assessment
- 28 - History
- Output identifier
- 182636123
- Type
- B - Edited book
- DOI
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- Publisher
- Norfolk Records Society
- ISBN
- 978-0-9957736-2-2
- Open access status
- -
- Month of publication
- October
- Year of publication
- 2019
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
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- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- Yes
- Double-weighted statement
- The chamberlains’ accounts of sixteenth-century Norwich are a crucial and highly valued source of evidence, yet none has previously been published in its entirety. The six accounts presented (with introduction by Rawcliffe, glossary and appendices) add to existing knowledge about urban finance, government and culture, topography, infrastructure, and buildings. The chamberlains used parchment rolls, grouping entries together in long paragraphs which were sometimes messy and hard to decipher and the edition relies on Rawcliffe’s extensive paleographic experience as well as her knowledge of the historical context.
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- The Norwich chamberlains accounts are a crucial source, yet none has previously been published in its entirety. In minute detail, they tell us how the city strove to deal with the issues before it. A slump in the textile trade, unemployment and less consumer spending meant that Norwich's troubles of the 1540s were compounded by additional concerns. The 1507 fires, still vivid in the memory of older inhabitants, placed a burden on housing stocks. Population growth led the city’s MPs to request parliamentary relief. The resulting 1535 statute gave civic authorities the right to require landlords to repair housing or face fines or forfeiture. Increased civic control over local buildings came on the eve of the dissolution of the monasteries, bringing Blackfriars to the city. The addition of the Guildhall galvanized the construction industry. The brick‐by‐brick details are among the most copiously recorded expenditures of the ensuing years. When the plague of 1544/5 brought poverty‐stricken survivors to the city, extraordinary steps were taken to manage the profusion of beggars and regulate food supply. Increased taxation to support Henry VIII's military campaigns, the authorities cut back expenses wherever they could. They cancelled the traditional annual guild pageant in 1544, cut back on the annual dredging of the river Wensum, as well as paving and cleaning of the streets. Rawcliffe's meticulous editing and illuminating introduction offer the scholar a first‐hand primer in the intricacies of civic governance at a time of rapid change. The volume also offers four colour plates, a general glossary, list of dates and three appendices to support the text: an indenture describing the chamberlain's duties, one chamberlain's expenses during Kett's Rebellion of 1549, and an inventory of the city's moveable goods in 1552.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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