Yorkshire Almanac Joan Cantcliffe, widow, buys a pension and a lifetime lease on a basement flat in the hall of the Mistry of Mercers, York

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

Maud Sellers. 1918. The York Mercers and Merchant Adventurers 1356-1917. Durham: Surtees Society. Get it:

Unedited excerpt

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

This indenture witnesseth that John Fox, master of the hospital of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Blessed Mary the Virgin, in Fossgate, York, with the common consent and assent of the master and constables of the gild of mercers of the city of York, hath granted and let unto Joan Cantcliffe of York, widow, one tenement within the hospital aforesaid, which Abraham Colton lately caused to be built, and one garden to the same annexed, with an entry leading to the river Foss, and one bed in the said hospital, and four pence in silver, to have and to hold the aforesaid tenement and garden with the entrance and four pence in silver, to be paid to her weekly or her assigns for her whole life. And moreover the aforesaid Joan shall not sell or alienate the aforesaid bed nor fourpence weekly to be paid to her or her assigns, but the said bed and fourpence shall maintain and take to her own proper use. Yielding to the aforesaid John, master and his successors being masters three shillings and four pence, at the terms of, etc. And the aforesaid master and his successors shall repair and sustain the aforesaid tenement at their own proper costs and expenses during the whole life of the said Joan. [Clause against waste by the said Joan.] In testimony whereof to one part of this indenture in the possession of the said Joan, the said John, master of the hospital, hath put the common seal of the said hospital, and the master, of the guild of mercers aforesaid, hath put the common seal of the said guild of mercers, and to the other part remaining with the said John, the master, the said Joan hath put her seal, dated the twelfth day of August, 1439.

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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

A mistery/mystery was a trade guild or company.

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Comment

A mistery/mystery was a trade guild or company.

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31 May 1526: Properties for the Corpus Christi performance of the (moribund) mystery play of York’s Mistry of Mercers

11 April 1827: York’s medieval Company of Merchant Adventurers asks a court to prevent John Harwood, a Petergate druggist, from selling foreign goods without membership or a licence

23 February 1832: The son of the landlord of the Five Lions Inn, Walmgate, York is carried across the River Foss by a runaway Galloway pony

15 November 1444: A survey of the boundaries of York

24 May 1669: Abraham Sharp (16), later mathematician and astronomer, undertakes not to fornicate for the next eight years and is apprenticed to a York textile merchant

27 February 1390: Robert de Ellerbeck, mercer, walks into York Council on the Ouse bridge with a question for a certain Ralph del See

7 March 1615: A great thaw begins in York – heavy flooding along the Ouse and Foss, followed by four months drought

8 November 1662: The Leeds corporation authorises the formation of trade guilds

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

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Comment

Of all the entries in this almanac, this is the most arbitrary. Peter Meredith, via Margaret Rogerson (Playing a Part in History: The York Mysteries 2009):

There are five key dates that establish our understanding of the functioning of the Play: 1377, 3 the first record of any kind; 1399, the first list of the stations* (the places in the city streets at which the Play was performed); 1415, the first clear statement of its scope and structure; 1433, the date of the Mercers’ indenture that illuminates the nature of the pageant wagon; and 1463-77, the writing of the Register that provides us with almost the complete text of the Play. Perhaps one should add to those 1569, the date of the last performance (Meredith 2000).

But I have no idea whether this text was created or reached this form before or after 1415, though my negligible knowledge of the historical linguistics suggests 15th century York dialect (hence “native God”), exhibiting features from both further south and north. However, if you are prepared to join me in self-deception, then we do know that Easter was 31 March in Julian 1415, and Corpus was thus 30 May.

“Course”/”courses” is ugly, but Canon Purvis’s translation of the first quatrain gets the job done:

In heaven and earth the course is seen
Of five days’ work even unto the end,
I have completed by courses clean;
Methinks the space of them well spent.
(Purvis 1957)

My mistranslation of “fere” is a tribute to Les Dawson:

Les Dawson might have disagreed with the great Canon Purvis' translation of "fere" in his popular version of the York Mystery Plays. ("I discovered the wife's got asthma. Thank God – I thought she was hissing at me.") pic.twitter.com/Zrac5r4Oua

— Leeds' Singing Organ-Grinder (@elorganillero) May 19, 2024

For all the lack of proper dating, I am glad this entry has ended my flirtation with Archbishop’s dating of the creation of Adam Eve to Friday 28 October 4004 B.C.:

And upon the sixth day (October 28, which is our Friday) the living creatures of the earth took their creation, as well going, as creeping creatures. And last of all, man was made and created after the image of God, which consisted principally in the divine knowledge of the mind, and in the natural and proper sanctity of his will. And he forthwith, when all living creatures, by the divine power, were brought before him, as a lord appointed over them, gave them their names, by which they should be called. Among all which, when he found none to help him like to himself, lest he should be destitute of a fit companion, God taking a rib out of his side, while he slept, fashioned it into a woman, and gave her to him for a wife, establishing, withal, a law of marriage between them; then blessing them, he bade them wax and multiply, and gave them dominion over all living creatures, and for them all he provided a large proportion of food and sustenance to live upon. To conclude, sin being not yet entered upon the world, God beheld all that he had made, and, behold, it was exceeding good. And so was the evening, and so was the morning of the sixth day (Ussher 1658).

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