The Chartulary of St John of Pontefract: From the Original Document in the Possession of Godfrey Wentworth, Esq., of Woolley Park

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Richard Holmes
Cambridge University Press, Apr 18, 2013 - History - 442 pages
The prosperous Cluniac priory of St John the Evangelist, Pontefract, was founded around 1090 by Robert de Lacy, remaining subject to its mother-house of La Charité-sur-Loire until the fourteenth century. The charters in this two-volume work have been arranged by type: seigniorial charters; episcopal and papal charters; royal charters; and those relating to priory property, arranged geographically according to proximity to Pontefract. The chartulary is particularly valuable for topographical studies and local and family history - in many cases the names of all witnesses have been transcribed. The manuscript was originally compiled in the first half of the thirteenth century, with additions made on blank leaves over the following centuries (not included by the editor). Volume 2, published in 1902, contains charters 234-556, on local property holdings and leases, and an index to the whole work. Each Latin charter is preceded by a brief English summary.
 

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About the author (2013)

Richard Holmes is the author of Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer; Dr. Johnson & Mr. Savage; Shelley: The Pursuit; Coleridge: Early Visions, 1772-1804; and Coleridge: Darker Reflections, 1804-1834, which was a 1999 New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice and a National Book Critics Circle Awards finalist. He lives in England.

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