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England (Counties as in 1851-1901) => England => Sussex => Topic started by: bishopsb on Saturday 22 September 07 02:24 BST (UK)

Title: Cellarers' Roll of Battle Abbey 1275-1513
Post by: bishopsb on Saturday 22 September 07 02:24 BST (UK)
Does anyone know anything about the Cellarers' Rolls of Battle Abbey 1275-1513?  I'm wondering what kind of information it contains and also if it is written in Latin. 
Thanks in advance!
Title: Re: Cellarers' Roll of Battle Abbey 1275-1513
Post by: sillgen on Sunday 23 September 07 16:15 BST (UK)
If you google Battle Abbey Roll you get various hits - as below.   It also appears to be on ancestry.co.uk

"List of 551 names supposedly representing the Norman barons who fought at Hastings and for whom Battle Abbey was founded.

Oldest copy of this list. For further discussion of other versions of the so-called Battle Abbey Roll and the relation between the Auchinleck text and that published by John Leland in his De Rebus Britannicis Collectanea, see Smyser and the study by the Duchess of Cleveland, who resided at Battle Abbey: C. L. W. Stanhope Powlett, The Battle Abbey Roll, 3 vols (London: Murray, 1889).

Edition:
H. M. Smyser, 'The list of Norman Names in the Auchinleck MS' in Mediaeval Studies in Honor of J. D. M. Ford, U. T. Holmes and A. J. Denomy (eds) (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1948): 257-287.

Is this the one?
Andrea
Title: Re: Cellarers' Roll of Battle Abbey 1275-1513
Post by: bishopsb on Sunday 23 September 07 18:38 BST (UK)
This is interesting.  And thanks for the ancestry tip, I did find an index there.  It would seem that The Duchess of Cleveland (who lived at the abbey in, I think, Victorian times) extracted surnames from these very old documents for the purpose of determining Norman lineage.

I had found that the rolls contain "records of "wine bought for St Martin's feast and other occasions for guests, or "for wine at Martinmas, Christmas, and the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as well as a 1382 record for "distributing to the poor on St Martin's Day," which would mean little genealogical interest. 

Perhaps these documents contain various information.  The wine records are likely though, as my understanding of a cellarer is a person who supplies wine and food at the monastery. 

I keep thinking the original must be Latin given the date and that they are pertaining to a monastic community. 
Title: Re: Cellarers' Roll of Battle Abbey 1275-1513
Post by: sillgen on Monday 24 September 07 20:35 BST (UK)
Just looking at the Archive CD site that is closing down and noticed that they have a CD of a book of English Surnames that contains the Battle Abbey Roll.   Most stuff half price.
http://www.rod-neep.co.uk/acatalog/sitemap.html
I have just spent a fortune!
Andrea