D - The Financial Position of the College at the Death of the Lady Margaret

Summary

An interesting document of 1509 yielding authoritative information on this subject has been discovered amongst the manuscripts preserved in the Bodleian Library; the reference it bears there is Cambridgeshire Charters, No. 39, and the short particulars given of it by Mr Madan in Notes on Bodleian Manuscripts relating to Cambridge, p. 31, are ‘Christ's College, Roll of receipts and expenditure, 1508–9’. There is no duplicate found in the muniment room of the college, and the writer is under obligation to Dr W. M. Palmer for providing him with a rotograph of the beautifully written original. The document is on paper and measures about 350 × 250 mm., being of similar size to others of about the same period relating to arrears, etc. which are preserved in the muniment room of the college; it is written in abbreviated Latin and a rough translation preserving all the figures and other essentials is here given.

It must be noted that we are not dealing with an end-of-year statement of actual receipts and actual expenditure; nor are we confronted with one of those half-yearly statements of account which it was the Master's duty to present to the fellows for audit, of which many have been transcribed in the foregoing pages. This document presents a statement for the complete year ending at Michaelmas 1509 of the aggregate annual values of all lordships, manors, lands and tenements belonging to the college (without regard to the question of whether they have been received or remain in whole or in part in arrear), and of all outgoings to be taken therefrom in respect of those upon the foundation, Master, fellows, scholars and servants, their stipends, commons and clothing.