The Use of Arabic and Roman Numerals in English Archives

Hilary Jenkinson

doi:10.1017/S0003581500056481

The Use of Arabic and Roman Numerals in English Archives

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 January 2012

Hilary Jenkinson

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This subject was not considered in any great detail in the work of Mr. Johnson and myself upon Court Hand because in the medieval period Arabic numerals do not appear to any considerable extent in English Archives—indeed their appearance there at any date before the late fifteenth century may be taken as fairly strong evidence of foreign influence—and concerning Roman numerals there was little to say. Moreover the subject had been recently dealt with by Dr. Hill. But in the period after 1500 Arabic figures begin slowly to fight their way into English Archives—i. e. into business writings; and since this (the Archive) class of documents is precisely that which was more or less closed to Dr. Hill it seems worth while to indicate in a preliminary sketch the types of document which may be of use to any student interested in further research along these lines; and to give the results of some tentative examination of them by the present writer, even when these are negative. The questions of interest are—where and when do Arabic figures make their entry into English Archives ? how far are they affected by being used in conjunction with the special Set Hands which were such a feature of Archive writing in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries? how far do they retain any of the primitive forms ? and can these be used at all as criteria for dating ?

Type: Research Article
Information: The Antiquaries Journal , Volume 6 , Issue 3 , July 1926 , pp. 263 - 275

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003581500056481 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1926

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^{page 263 note 1} Johnson, C., and Jenkinson, H., Court Hand Illustrated … : Clarendon Press, 1915Google Scholar.

^{page 263 note 2} Hill, G. F., The Development of Arabic Numerals in Europe (reprint with additions of a paper printed in Archaeotogia): Clarendon Press, 1915Google Scholar. This furnishes an excellent bibliography of the subject, but three books published since require mention—Barnard, F. P., The Casting Counter and the Counting Board, Smith, D. E., History of Mathematics, vol. II, … and Early English Text Society (ed. Robert Steele) Extra Series 118, The Earliest Arithmetics in English.

^{page 263 note 3} There were seven which had definitely distinguished and known characteristics—the Text, the Bastard or Bastard Secretary, the Secretary and the Set Hands of the Law Courts (which fall into two groups of large and small writings), the Chancery, the Pipe Office and the Office of the King's Remembrancer. The Lord Treasurer's Remembrancer's Office has also hands which are distinctive, but I do not include these in the list.

^{page 264 note 1} e.g. the Pipe Rolls in the 12th century, the Receipt and Issue Rolls early in the 13th, the Wardrobe and Household Accounts in the 13th and 14th, and so forth. The great series of Enrolled Accounts are in origin only portions split off from the Pipe Rolls, and though they show certain differences of accounting form these are not fundamental. The same may be said of the various long series of Original Accounts which will be found in the class of Exchequer (K.R.) Accounts, etc.

^{page 265 note 1} The Issue Books, for example, continued to use Roman numerals down to their abolition in 1816, developing some curious forms, and the Receipt Books only abandoned them a few years previously.

^{page 265 note 2} For an account of these see Giuseppi, M.S., Guide to the Public Records (1914), vol. I, p. 118Google Scholar, and the authorities there cited.

^{page 265 note 3} To take only one example, the Creditors' Books of the Lord Steward's Department, in the time of Charles II.

^{page 265 note 4} See E.E.T.S., op. cit., Introduction.

^{page 265 note 5} Ibid., p. 66, reprinting Robert Recorde, The Ground of Artes …, 1543.

^{page 265 note 6} To the Editor of E.E.T.S., op. cit., p. v.

^{page 265 note 7} Smith, op. cit., p. 188.

^{page 266 note 1} They occur in the titles of his Multum in Parvo and Magnum in Parvo: Shelley (c. 1710) has fine plates in two of his books : and they appear in Bickham's work about the same time.

^{page 266 note 2} See, for a random example, those in Chancery Miscellanea 6/4, dated c. 1400. In this case the numerals are, of course, Roman.

^{page 267 note 1} Mellis, John, A Brief Instruction and Maner how to keepe Bookes of Accompts …, 1588 : Mellis says this had been printed by Hugh Oldcastle in 1543.

^{page 267 note 2} Survivals of a date before 1600 are rare, and those that we have are all of private origin. The earliest books kept after the new method by a Public Department, so far as I know, are of the late seventeenth century.

^{page 267 note 3} For a good example of such mixture see the List of Fines in a Court Roll (Court Rolls 165/8) of the reign of Charles I in the Public Record Office.

^{page 267 note 4} It took two centuries for the Italic to come anywhere near ousting the Secretary decisively.

^{page 267 note 5} From the contemporary foliation to Chancery, Entry Book of Decrees and Orders 1, of the year 1545.

^{page 268 note 1} Cp. a note by Mr. W. J. Hemp in Archaeologia Cambrensis, 6th ser., 18, 320.

^{page 268 note 2} From Stale Papers Foreign, Entry Book 163, of about 1580.

^{page 269 note 1} Stanton near Broadway (Worcestershire).

^{page 269 note 2} By Mr. E. A. B. Barnard to whom I am indebted for this example.

^{page 270 note 1} I have to thank the Master of St. John's College, Cambridge, and Mr. F. P. White for enabling me to secure this illustration.

^{page 270 note 2} Dy. of Lane, Depositions, 51/59.

^{page 270 note 3} From Admiralty, Viet. Dept., Ace. 48, dated 1665–6.

^{page 271 note 1} Down to the early eighteenth century the Writing Masters were still recommending a differently cut pen and a different hold for the Secretary and other old fashioned hands and for the Italic.

^{page 271 note 2} C. Parl. Roll, 147, in which it is a unique feature.

^{page 271 note 3} Plate xxxvi, f is also from a book written in a rough Bastard, but not, I think, by the same hand.

^{page 271 note 4} P.C. 2/3 and P.C. 2/6.

^{page 272 note 1} From E. 121/4/8, a Survey of Royal Lands in 1650.

^{page 272 note 2} From E. 405/241 (a register of the Exchequer of Receipt), f. 31, 32.

^{page 272 note 3} In T. 70/17, a record of the African Company of 1691.

^{page 272 note 4} Op. cit. Mellis distinguishes these columns by the letters q″, q, and c : but I have not seen these symbols employed elsewhere. The q″ is presumably a derivative of q^a.

^{page 272 note 5} Dy. of Lancaster, Knights' Fees, 1/11 f. 90 tercia pars quadrantis.

^{page 272 note 6} I am indebted to Professor Baldwin for calling my attention to a number of these: e. g. in Ministers Accounts, 615/9837 of 43, 44 Edward III, ibid. 732/12033 (6, 7 Henry VI) and ibid. 403/6074 (21, 22 Edward IV).

^{page 272 note 7} As I am informed by Dr. G. F. Hill.

^{page 272 note 8} In E. 121/3/4 in a Certificate of the Sale of Crown Lands, f. 1650: ‘The one Moyetie thereof, being One hundred Nynetie Nyne poundes two shillings and three pense halfe peny three quarters of a farthing, is to be payd in ready money …’

^{page 274 note 1} British Museum, Additional MSS. 32469. I am indebted for this and a number of other examples to Mr. S. J. Madge, F.S.A.

^{page 274 note 2} A number of examples will be found in Augmentation Office, Miscellaneous Books, 173 and 174.

^{page 275 note 1} From Common Pleas, Plea Rolls, 637, 701 and 817 and Recovery Rall, I.

^{page 275 note 2} From Exchequer, L.T.R., Declared Accounts, 603 ; dated 1649.

^{page 275 note 3} Hughes, A., Crump, C. G., and Johnson, C., edition of the Dialogus de Scaccario (Oxford, 1902), p. 39Google Scholar; Citing Robert Recorde, Ground of Artes.

^{page 275 note 4} From E. 403/1701 (an Issue Book of the Exchequer of Receipt) under date 10 May, 1605, etc.

^{page 276 note 1} Exchequer, K.R., Miscellaneous Books, Series I, 27.

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