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The Cartulary of Chatteris Abbey Edited by CLAIRE BREAY, 1999 Woodbridge, The Boydell Press xiii + 479 pp, L50 ISBN 0 85115 750 5
The publication of cartularies is of great value to the medieval researcher, as they throw light not only on the religious house concerned, but on local society, estate management, patterns of benefaction and religious practice. Chatteris Abbey was a Benedictine nunnery, and Claire Breay's edition of its cartulary with a full and annotated transcription is particularly welcome as relatively few nuns' cartularies have survived. The cartulary was the work of one main scribe, working sometime between 1428 and 1456, who may have been Henry Buckworth, vicar of Chatteris; the cartulary opens with a request for prayers for him and the abbess, Agnes Ashfield. The cartulary contains documents from the twelfth to the early sixteenth century, and the arrangement is primarily topographical. Seventeen charters were copied twice, and Dr. Breay suggests that the abbey archives may have been somewhat disorganised. Most of the copies omitted witness lists, and this presents problems for the dating of the documents; moreover, many of the donors are obscure. None of the originals of the cartulary charters survives, although one original charter has been located at St John's College, Cambridge, and is printed at the end of the cartulary. The edition includes a thorough and judicious introduction on the abbey itself, its endowment, and the management of...