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Thomas Chaucer, One Man or Two?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 December 2020
Extract
In 1873 in Trial-Forwords to Minor Poems: Further Additions and Corrections Furnivall called attention to seven records under the heading “Thomas Chaucer, esquire and vintner (?1 man, or 2)”:
[1] 1399-1400. Duchy of Lancaster. Ministers' Accounts. Div. 29, Bundle 144. Payment of £20 to Thomas Chaucer for his two Annuities, due at Easter and Michaelmas, with £10 arrears.
[2] 1406, March 12. City Hustings Roll, 133. Thomas Chausers: Deed of entail on him of City lands, near St. Paul's, by his ‘consanguineus,’ William Chaumbre, cleric.
[3] 1416, February 3. Hustings Roll, 145. Release to Thomas Chaucer of the interest of Thomas Hoo and Agnes his wife in these entaild lands.
[4] 1413, June 7. Conveyance by Geoffrey Dallyng, Citizen and Vintner, and Matilda his wife, to Thomas Chaucer, esquire, and 4 other men, of a reversion in some City houses and land (no doubt as Trustees for some City Corporation).
[5] 1426, December 7. Hustings Roll, 155. Conveyance by William Manby, cleric, to Thomas Chaucers and Richard Wyot, esquires, and 4 others, clerics, of land in the parish of St. Margaret's, Lothbury, in the City of London, seemingly as Trustees for some ecclesiastical Corporation.
[6] 1428, May 20. Hustings Roll, 156. Conveyance by William atte Watir, barber, and John Cole, junior, Citizen and Vintner, of a tenement in Fleet Street to Thomas Chawsere and 12 other men—all 13 being described in one part of the Deed as Citizens and Vintners, evidently as Trustees for the Vintners' Company.
[7] 1428, June 11. Release to Thomas Chawsere and his 12 co-trustees—Thomas Chawsere and another (Lewis John), being called esquires, the rest Citizens and Vintners— of the estate of Thomas Croften, as mortgagee in possession, in the said tenement in Fleet Street.
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References
1 Furnivall, F. J., Trial-Forewords to My “Parallel Text Edition of Chaucer's Minor Poems,” Chaucer Soc., 2nd Ser., vi, 136.
2 See A. C. Baugh, “Kirk's Life Records of Thomas Chaucer,” PMLA, xlvii (1932), 461–515, where the document here referred to is noted (No. 43). The other documents here printed or noted were not known to Kirk.
3 In the Plea and Memoranda Rolls at the Guildhall for 1422, Parochia sancti Augustini, occurs the entry, “Item we endite þe rent of Thomas Chaucere for peril of falling, and the pauement of þe same Rent.” Cf. Chambers, R. W., and Daunt, Marjorie, A Book of London English, 1384–1425 (Oxford, 1931), p. 126.
4 Statutes of the Realm, ii, 155, 167 (7 and 13 Henry IV).
5 Cf. Ruud, p. 39.
6 E 159/195, membrane 3.
7 The additional words are “ ac omnimodas securitates pacis ante octauum diem Decembris vltimo preteritum forisfactas,” inserted just before the statement “prout in litteris nostris patentibus … plenius continetur,” and they are found in the letter patent as set out in sanction [7] of the record printed above.
8 A mistake for Brevia, where it is found.
9 Hennessy, G. Novum Repertorium Ecclesiasticum Parochiale Londinense (1898), p. 45, on the authority of B.M. Add. MS. 15374, f. 419. The prebend was vacated 1411–12 by death.
10 CPR, 1370–74, p. 190.
11 Thomas, A. H. Calendar of Plea and Memoranda Rolls … at the Gildhall … 1323–1364, p. 264.
12 CPR, 1374–77, p. 252.
13 CPR, 1377–81, p. 185.
14 Ibid., p. 195.
15 Ibid., p. 396.
16 Ibid., p. 392.
17 CPR, 1381–85, p. 537.
18 CPR, 1385–89, p. 432.
19 Cotton, Fasti Eccl. Hiber., ii, 128.
20 Rotulorum Patentium et Clausorum Cancellariae Hiberniœ Calendarium (1828), p. 141.
21 CPR, 1388–92, pp. 164, 277.
22 CPR, 1389–92, p. 390.
23 Close Roll, 16 Rich. II, Rotulorum Patentium et Clausorum Canc. Hibn. Calendarium, p. 150, in which he exchanged his preferment with Landulph, Cardinal of St. Nicholas, whom the Pope had made dean. Cf. Cotton, Fasti Eccl. Hiber., ii, 92–93.
24 CPR, 1399–1401, p. 381.—For a similar appointment, April 4, cf. Rotulorum Patentium et Clausorum Canc. Hiber. Calendarium, p. 156.
25 CPR, 1401–5, p. 213.
26 Cal. of Letter-Books … London, Letter-Book i, p. 26.
27 Col. of … Papal Registers, Papal Letters, v, 595.
28 CPR, 1401–5, p. 419.
29 Cal. of … Papal Registers, vi, 368–369.
30 See CPR and the Cal. of Ancient Deeds, Index, s.v.
31 See Hulbert, J. R. Chaucer's Official Life, and the Life Records, pp. 165, 171, 174.
32 CPR, 1367–70, p. 408.
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