Yorkshire Almanac 2026

Unedited excerpt

If an excerpt is used in the book, it will be shorter, edited and, where applicable, translated.

Jhesu. — Ress’ off pagand masters, maister Wyld, presnt yerre Jorge Norman, Henre Wood, pagand masters. Bartholomew Yorke, Necollus Cure thes parsells. ij dewells cotte, ij dewell hedde, j wesseren, j chartt, the cloud, ij grett angejls wants j wing, ij trommpys, hell dure, iiij angelli, pagand dure, iiij wendows, the iren sett with iiij ropps, the weels with j rope, the trenettie hus, ij lyttell angelles, the viij chyffs, ix nalles, the trenette wants j chartt, iij wessezons, j rope, j angell. Wants j lyttell angell and ij nalls.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Comment

Comment

The editor: “The cloud would probably be the painted representation of the clouds and great glory in which the Judge would sit, forming a background to the upper part of the pageant.”

Why was the feast in decline? I’m assuming Lutheranism and the oncoming English Reformation, but I’ve done no background reading.

Easter Sunday was 1 April 1526, so Corpus Christi was 31 May.

Hell Mouth: “In 1433 it seems to have been separate from the wagon itself, set up on the street during the performance but perhaps transported from station to station on the wagon.” (Johnston 1972)

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Tags

Tags are assigned inclusively on the basis of an entry’s original text and any comment. You may find this confusing if you only read an entry excerpt.

• Catholic Church (57) W/G ·
• English Reformation (12) W/G ·
• Feast of Corpus Christi (3) W/G ·
• Guild (6) W/G ·
• Henry VIII (1491-1547) (16), ruled 1509 until his death, initiator of the English Reformation, separating the Church of England from papal authority and introducing the theory of the divine right of kings, dissolved convents and monasteries, invested heavily in the navy W/G ·
• Martin Luther (1) W/G ·
• Mercery (6) W/G ·
• Merchant (4) W/G ·
• Mistry of Mercers, York (1) W/G ·
• Mystery play (3) W/G ·
• Pageant wagon (1) W/G ·
• Theatre (24) W/G ·
• York Mystery Plays (4) W/G ·

All tags.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Comment

Comment

The editor: “The cloud would probably be the painted representation of the clouds and great glory in which the Judge would sit, forming a background to the upper part of the pageant.”

Why was the feast in decline? I’m assuming Lutheranism and the oncoming English Reformation, but I’ve done no background reading.

Easter Sunday was 1 April 1526, so Corpus Christi was 31 May.

Hell Mouth: “In 1433 it seems to have been separate from the wagon itself, set up on the street during the performance but perhaps transported from station to station on the wagon.” (Johnston 1972)

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Similar

27 May 1576: The Elizabethan Ecclesiastical Commission at York prohibits performance of a Corpus Christi play at Wakefield

13 November 1478: Edward IV orders the London merchant adventurers to allow their Yorkshire colleagues fair access to Low Countries markets for their woollen cloth

12 August 1439: Joan Cantcliffe, widow, buys a pension and a lifetime lease on a basement flat in the hall of the Mistry of Mercers, York

30 May 1415: A native God creates, in the York Mystery Plays, the first Yorkshireman and -woman

13 January 1536: Richard Layton, dissolver of monasteries, writes to Thomas Cromwell claiming that Yorkshire clergy use birth control

20 January 1536: Thomas Cromwell’s dissolvers of monasteries, Richard Layton and Thomas Legh, report allegations of whoring and theft by William Thirsk, Abbot of Fountains

21 October 1536: Henry VIII’s herald encounters part of the Pilgrimage of Grace at Pontefract

21 September 1549: Egalitarian, republican and Catholic, the leaders of the Seamer Rebellion against the Edwardian Reformation are hanged at York

25 October 1536: God stands between Henry VIII’s army at Doncaster and a superior force of Catholic rebels from the Pilgrimage of Grace, according to a Tudor chronicler

5 March 1829: Henry Burton of Hotham tells a rowdy public meeting at Beverley to petition parliament against Catholic emancipation and preserve “the Protestant constitution”

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Comment

Comment

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