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1. ‘Coram’ as authorization in the Henry III Fine Rolls 1216–1224

In the fine of the month for August Beth Hartland, in advance of the publication of the first volume of the Henry III Fine Rolls by Boydell and Brewer in the autumn, examines one aspect of the enrolment of the fines (and other chancery documents), revealing the need for further research in thirteenth-century chancery practice; a need which the project aims to help supply.

⁋1The editing process draws one’s attention to details – editing the Fine Rolls is no exception. Indeed, in editing the roll for 3 Henry III (1218–9), one is struck by the sudden occurrence of what appear to be multiple forms of authorization following the witness clause of the fines – in particular the use of both ‘per’ and ‘coram’ in fines which have also been attested (‘teste’) by one or more witnesses. The structure and form of the entries on the Henry III Fine Rolls has been described in the Editorial Conventions. These conventions note that ‘significant numbers of writs on the rolls, after the witness, place and date clause, have a note indicating, in various combinations, on whose authority and in whose presence, they were issued … In these clauses “per” and “coram” are standard and we have translated them as “by” and “in the presence of”’. Whilst these terms are standard their meaning is not fully understood. David Carpenter has noted that ‘Letters in the fine rolls, as in other chancery rolls, are intermittently said to be “per” the king himself, the council, a minister or group of ministers. Per in this context presumably means in some way authorized by. The authorizer can also be the witness of the letter. Letters can also be authorized in the presence of coram one or more minister. The whole subject of these notes needs further study’. ¹ The purpose of this article is to explore the particular use of one of these terms in the Fine Rolls for the first eight years of the reign of Henry III (1216–1224), to see what light, if any, can be shed on the scribal use of this term. ²

⁋2Historians have long been interested in the witness lists of charters ³ for these can be used as a guide to the attendance of nobles and others on the king, at least until 1292 when the Chancery became physically separated from the royal household. ⁴ The consensus of opinion, in the case of witnesses to charters, is that the witnesses so named were actually present to witness the charter. The alternative opinion, that witnesses might only represent a ‘constructive presence’, has lost the fight. ⁵ This debate over the true presence of witnesses at the making of a charter should alert us to the possibility that use of the term ‘coram’ in the authorization clauses of fines and other chancery instruments may not indicate the actual presence of the men apparently said to be present. Historians have, however, assumed that men said to be ‘coram’ were present. A similar assumption is made with respect to ‘per’ when the manner of authorization is not qualified in some way, such as ‘per litteras’, which indicates that the instruction to make the chancery instrument was communicated in some way other than by direct word of mouth. Indeed, important analyses of the shifting balance of political power within the government during the minority of Henry III have rested upon these assumptions. ⁶ Table 2 (below) goes some way to demonstrate the accuracy of this interpretation – as it shows, the combined use of ‘teste’, ‘per’ and ‘coram’ by the chancery clerks tended to group around particular dates, dates which were in fact major occasions such as meetings of the king’s council and the opening of Exchequer sessions. Nevertheless, lacking the equivalent of the Dialogus de Scaccario for the Exchequer to guide us, historians of the Chancery must keep in mind that the authorization notes to chancery instruments still remain among the mysteries taken by chancery clerks to their graves. ⁷

⁋3As stated earlier, ‘coram’ is conspicuous by its presence in a good number of the authorization notes of the fines for 3 Henry III. The use of ‘coram’ was not an invention of the chancery clerks of the minority, however: the formula had certainly been used in the Chancery of King John (see Table 1, below). ⁸ This is to be expected as the death of a king in the midst of civil war would hardly have been the occasion for changes in chancery personnel or practice, not that chancery practice was fossilized at this early stage in the development of enrolment. ⁹ Indeed, as the footnotes to the table indicate, three instances from John’s patent rolls which have been included in this table are actually instances of ‘presente’ or ‘presentibus’ rather than ‘coram’. These instances, deriving as they do from a period when chancery practice was still evolving, have been included here on the presumption that the meaning conveyed by ‘presente’ is the same as that conveyed by ‘coram’.

⁋1As the table shows, ‘coram’ typically occurs in the authorization notes in one of four ways

⁋1Pleasing as it may be to tabulate the occurrence of ‘coram’ in this way, can these figures be used to tell us anything about chancery practice, the process of making fine, or the jostling for position of those at the helm of government during the minority? We must be clear that these figures cannot be taken as definitive. Not all original letters and writs produced by the Chancery were enrolled, and neither were all the details, including notes of authorization, on originals always transcribed by the enrolling clerks. ¹⁸ These figures do, however, demonstrate that ‘coram’ was used in combinations with ‘teste’ and ‘per’ prior to the minority of Henry III. Striking as the ‘sudden’ occurrence of such notes in 3 Henry III may be in the context of the reign of Henry III, they were not an invention of the minority government. Is it, then, going too far to use them as a guide to the vying for power between the regent, William Marshal, the justiciar, Hubert de Burgh, and the king’s tutor, Peter des Roches, in 1218-19, for example?

⁋2The answer to such questions, of course, depends on what we believe the various terms to represent. David Carpenter has noted that authorization notes were more commonly recorded by chancery clerks at times of ‘political uncertainty’. ¹⁹ Sadly we lack chancery rolls for the Interdict during John’s reign, a period during which the practice of chancery clerks might well have been instructive. Nevertheless, the unbroken series of chancery rolls for the period 1216-1224 are probably a more reliable guide to chancery practice.

⁋3We must always bear in mind, however, that chancery practice in the enrolment of fines and other instruments was not guided by any rigid pro forma at this stage; and even if it were, the practice of employing non-Chancery clerks on chancery business as the court itinerated around the country could have led to anomalies in the rolls. ²⁰ In fact, however, it does not appear that particular combinations of attestation/authorization notes are associated with particular centres and thus, potentially, with particular clerks. Neither does there appear to be a correlation between the type of business recorded in particular fines, letters close or letters patent, nor indeed with their import, and the use of authorization notes: a writ of protection was likely to be witnessed by the king in the presence of his ministers as was a grant made to the advantage of the king’s brother. What does appear to be the case, for ‘coram’ at least, is that particular combinations of attestation and authorization notes congregate around certain dates – in other words, on a given day, and days consecutive to it, the same formula tends to be employed, reinforcing the notion that the notes describe a process that was actually occurring before the chancery clerks. Let us return to 3 Henry III and the combination of ‘teste’, ‘per’ and ‘coram’ shown on the graph. As Table 2 demonstrates, this combination achieved its peak occurrence in early November 1218 – there were thirteen instances on 9 November alone. This was no chance occurrence. This was the day on which the king’s new seal was inaugurated and, as David Carpenter has noted, the sense of responsibility for it felt by its new keeper, Ralph de Neville, led to ‘the large numbers of notes which suddenly appear in the chancery rolls recording on whose authority royal letters were issued.’ ²¹ These notes were ‘“chancery up”, designed to protect the Chancellor and the Chancery staff by indicating on whose orders they had acted.’ ²²

1.4. Table 2: Combination of ‘coram’ with ‘per’ and ‘teste’ in the close, fine and patent rolls of 3 Henry III

⁋1Key: WM=William Marshal, earl of Pembroke, regent; PR=Peter des Roches, bishop of Winchester, king’s tutor; RM=Richard Marsh, bishop of Durham; WE=William de Sainte Mere Eglise, bishop of London; WB=William Brewer; HB=Hubert de Burgh, justiciar; WC=William of Cornhill, bishop of Coventry; L=Papal Legate; SL=Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury; KC=king’s council.

⁋1It seems clear that attestation clauses and authorization notes such as those mapped out in Table 2 give us a window onto who the men at the heart of government during the minority of Henry III were. But do they give us a window onto what these men were doing? It is generally held that the most important of these actions was the act of witnessing. To quote again from the Historical Introduction, ‘the job of witnessing the letters … meant acting as their ultimate authority’. ²⁵ If to witness a letter was to take the main responsibility for the content of a letter or a fine, did it follow that those men who authorized a letter ‘per’ bore a different level of responsibility for it than those who authorized ‘coram’, when both formulae were employed? This question is not directly addressed in the analyses of the minority examining the shift in attestation and authorization patterns following the death of the Marshal in April 1219. We read that Peter des Roches ‘lost ground within the central administration’ because he attested and authorized fewer letters on his own than his rival Hubert de Burgh, not because when they jointly authorized letters ‘the most usual formula’ was ‘per’ Hubert and ‘coram’ Peter. ²⁶ Nevertheless, unless these terms describe distinct actions, the notion that they conveyed different levels of responsibility is hard to shift – it was possible for a letter or fine to be authorized ‘per’ more than one individual (see, for example, 10 Nov, Table 2), so why otherwise invent two terms to describe what may have been essentially the same role? The increased use of ‘coram’ following the decision to allow the king control of his own seal (see Graph, 8 Henry III), may also offer support to this view. The new dominant formula was ‘teste me ipso/Rege, coram Hubert de Burgh, the bishop of Bath and the bishop of Salisbury’: possibly it was necessary to suggest that de Burgh’s control over government had lessened in the aftermath of his unpopular policy to resume the royal castles? ²⁷ It is one thing, however, to suggest that ‘per’ and ‘coram’ had different weight, and quite another to suggest that the individual who authorized a letter or fine ‘per’ carried more weight than the man who authorized it ‘coram’. If this were so, it would be difficult to explain how two letters close were authorized ‘per justiciarium, coram rege’ in March 1234. ²⁸

⁋2But did ‘per’ and ‘coram’ describe the same action? ‘Per’ was not always followed by the name(s) of an individual(s); authorization ‘per’ did not have to be personal or even in person. It could be ‘per breve/litteras Regis de parvo sigillo’, ²⁹ ‘per consilium’, and so on. The assumption, however, is that when letters were authorized ‘per X’ the authorization, and/or instructions, were given directly. ³⁰ In other words, when a chancery instrument was authorized ‘per Hubertum de Burgo’, Hubert was physically present. But if the instrument was authorized ‘per Hubertum de Burgo, coram episcopo Wintoniensi’ where was Peter des Roches, the bishop of Winchester, and what was his role? David Carpenter has suggested that this formula ‘implies Peter’s watchful presence at Hubert’s elbow’. ³¹ Does it imply more than physical presence though? Are some of the documents in this table authorized ‘coram’ by more than one individual simply as a reflection of the number of men present? Maybe so; certainly in the early fourteenth century deeds made ‘coram’ could mean just this. ³² And, in this scenario, does the distinction made between ‘per’ and ‘coram’ indicate that the men who authorized ‘per’ were not present at the actual making of the chancery instrument? ³³ What is clear is that the exact meanings of the authorization notes are as much a mystery now as they were when T.D. Hardy edited the rolls of John’s reign in the early nineteenth century. Nevertheless, we can be clear that rather than necessarily indicating competition within the government, the combined use of ‘per’ and ‘coram’ in the authorization notes of chancery instruments points to the power-sharing and sharing of responsibility that was critical to the successful navigation of points of heightened political uncertainty during the minority of Henry III.