council were returned in a roll. As tous les points q touchent les articles desuzditz est respondu en le point entre en un roule sur lordenance faite par le conseil sur les ditz articles et articles suauntz." In this case, as in most others when the same method was followed, petitions and responses have been irrecoverably separated.'

Sometimes, in a way that was followed also with the private petitions, transcripts were made from the original membranes considered by the council. The distinguishing feature of the transcript is that both petitions and responses are in the same handwriting. While the original responses were often written in an irregular, unclerkly hand, the copies were made by a professional scribe. In these cases the entire manuscript is made by the council or by its direction. A good example of a state paper of this kind is one, dated March 24, 1318, which embodies a report from the bishop of Worcester which was sent to the council for its consideration. In a number of articles in the usual form it gives an account of certain judicial processes which were being drawn into the court of France, involving ministers and other subjects of the king of England in Aquitaine. Some of the recommendations of the bishop, who had been one of the king's proctors at the court of France regarding these cases, were that an effort should be made to have a joint commission appointed by the king of England and by the king of France to deal with the cases in dispute; that penalties imposed on the appellants should not be exacted provided they would withdraw their appeals; that in regard to certain cases request should be made for delay in the hope of a permanent peace.

Throughout the period under review the method described, of petition and response, was the most usual mode in council proceedings. In some ways it is the most satisfactory kind of record, for. it reveals more clearly than any other the steps by which the council came to its decisions. Better than any other does it distinguish the council from Parliament, for the process is totally different from anything shown in the records of Parliament. The document of petitions when completed with the responses was considered to be fully binding as an expression of the will of the king and council.

There is a noteworthy set of responses sent to Gascony about the year 1314, bearing the endorsement, avisamenta consilii Regis super quibus petitur tangens Regi. (Diplomatic Documents, Chancery, p. 398.) There is a series of recommendations as to problems of Ireland, which contains no responses. (Parliamentary Proceedings, VII. 19.)

2 It describes itself as follows. Dominus T. dei gratia Wigornensis episcopus liveravit Elie de Jonestone infrascriptos articulos portendos dicto domino Regi, cancellario, et thesaurario suis et ceteris de consilio ad quos pertinet super hiis consulere et remedia adhibere. Diplomatic Documents, Chancery, 250.

This was expressed with regard to a series of petitions received in the sixteenth year of Edward III. from the prelates and barons of Ireland. "The king ordained that these should be diligently examined by the council and answer made, to be written after each petition, and then the king commanded that the answers with the articles should have full force with the penalties contained therein." The petitions, with the answers and ordinances made thereupon, were then sent back to Ireland to be observed.2

The method of petition and response, however, was not the only method of council proceedings. A different, though not necessarily a more mature, form was observed when the things agreed to were recorded in the shape of minutes or resolutions, without reference to any petition or address. Such minutes containing recommendations, ordinances, or drafts of ordinances, were written always upon single and detached membranes, usually in a series of brief articles, as in the previous examples, with a preference for the less formal French language rather than the Latin, and are indicated by phrases like fait a remembrer que, accorde fust par le conseil, or avis est de conseil. In some cases the appearance of the writing suggests that the articles were put down at different times, as the decisions were made, and sometimes space is left for more.

It is remarkable that some of the earliest records of the council should be of this kind. Thus there is an ordinance, apparently of the ninth year of Edward I.—accorde est par le Roi e par sun conseil-protecting from legal liabilities those who were going on service to Wales.3 Of the year 1299 there is a very clear record of an act, stated to be ordinatum per Regem et consilium suum, awarding sums of money to various Gascons who had lost their lands in the king's service. The document is remarkable in that it gives the names of the councillors, six in number, who were responsible for the measure. Of the same general form is an ordinance by the council, of the twenty-fourth year of Edward I., called "de statu religiosorum de potestate regis Franciae," which relates to alien priories, forbidding them to exist within thirteen miles of the sea or other navigable waters. 5

.5

In the first and second years of Edward II. there are some notable ordinances relating to the government of Scotland, directing appointments to offices, salaries, military equipment, and like matters." A

1 Calendar of Close Rolls, 16 Edw. III., 508.

2 Ibid., 516.

3 Parliamentary Proceedings, I. 21-30.

Chancery Miscellaneous Rolls, 5/5.

5 Parliamentary Proceedings, II. 22.

6 Diplomatic Documents, Chancery, 217 and 809.

great many of the proceedings relate to Ireland. Of the sixteenth year of Edward III. there is the draft of an ordinance concerning the government of Ireland, which claims to be merely the "advice" of the council. The extended and completed ordinance may be found upon a printed roll of the same year. A larger number could be produced relating to Gascony.

2

3

Of small instruments which are merely the drafts of single orders made by the council or with its sanction, to be issued as letters under the great seal, there exists an indefinite number. If it be thought that the memoranda here described may have been written by some councillor for his personal use rather than by the council's own direction, there is sufficient proof to the contrary in occasional statements upon the membranes, such as le conseil ad cy escrit son avis and cestes notes furent faites par le conseil.

The manner of record thus described, of ordinances and resolutions, is less distinctively of the council than the former one of petitions and responses. The same general form was followed in the ordinances of great councils and parliaments. From the words ordinatum est per consilium alone one cannot tell which council is

It is clear and satisfactory only when the names of the councillors who drafted or assented to the acts are given. In the fourteenth century this was not commonly done. Under Edward I., strange to say, the names were stated more frequently than in the next reigns. In the later years of Edward III. the practice began of appending the names to the memoranda which passed the council. This became the regular way by which acts of the council were authenticated. In no case, however, during the reigns of Richard II. or Henry IV. were the names written as signatures; they were inscribed in the same hand as the rest of the manuscript, without doubt by the clerk. In 1422 it was enacted that the clerk of the council should write the names. It was about this time that signatures appear. In 1424 it was enacted that "the names of thassenteurs be writen of their own hand." 196 The ordinances of 1426 were said to have been subscribed by the lords of the council with their own hands. The earliest instance that the writer has hap

Parliamentary Proceedings, VII. 13.

2 Calendar of Close Rolls, 16 Edw. III., 508.

3 A schedule of council orders, on matters relating to the war with France and Scotland, may be found in Chancery Miscellaneous Rolls, 1/20.

It is necessary to explain this point in detail, for a quite wrong impression

has been given by Nicolas, Proceedings of the Privy Council, II. xxvi.

5 Ibid., III. 18.

5 Ibid., 150, 216.

Per dominos de consilio suis propriis manibus se subscribentes, ibid., III. 221.

pened to find of autograph signatures by the members of the council occurs in the second year of Henry VI. As most of the council records of that time now remaining are transcriptions, it is impossible to say how generally this practice was followed.2

Taking now into consideration the council memoranda of whatever kind, whether responses or resolutions, it is a further step to inquire for what purpose they were made and how they were used. Now and again one finds a suggestion upon a bill to the following effect: ceste bille fut livere depar le Roi et le conseil et sur ceo fut bref fait. To be carried into effect it was necessary for the orders of the council to be embodied in letters or writs either of the great seal or of the privy seal.

Letters of privy seal were the most direct means of expressing the will of the king or of the council, the keeper being one of the most constant attendants. Some of these bear the stamp of the council's sanction by the conventional attestation, per consilium. Many of them, however, bear evidence of being written in the council or by its direction. There exist a number of writs of privy seal that are warrants directed from the council to the chancellor for the issue of letters of the great seal. Council warrants are on file beginning with the fifteenth year of Edward III., although here and there are earlier ones to the same effect. As these writs invariably bear the date and place of the council's action, and are more likely than other notes to give the names, they have a special value as records.

Letters of the great seal, including letters close and patent, were used for the more formal administrative orders. Sometimes upon a council paper one finds a statement like the following: Cestes notes deing escrites furent faites par le conseil le Roi et mandees a la chauncellerie pour engrosser. From notes of the council, whether an endorsement of a petition, a writ of privy seal, a memorandum, or other communication, the chancery issued the letters desired. This is the meaning of the recurring phrases of attestation to be found throughout the calendars of close rolls and patent rolls, by council, by petition of council, and the like. A comparison of letters of the great seal, such as are given in the printed rolls, with writs of privy seal and other council minutes, shows that with the neces1 British Museum, Cotton MSS., Vespasian, C. XIV. 246.

2 Other examples of signed council memoranda of the fourth year of Henry VI. are: Public Record Office Museum, Pedestal 15; Cotton MSS., Cleopatra, IV. 26, 27, 28, 30, 32.

Warrants Privy Seal, 19 Edw. III., file 1538.

• Warrants Privy Seal, files 1538-1548.

5 Parliamentary Proceedings, VII. 13.

sary change of form, with the addition of explanatory phrases, and with the greater redundancy of official Latin, the chancery faithfully reproduced the data of the original draft. That the clerks of the chancery were expected to fill in the minor details is many times stated upon the original memoranda, which say, "as is more fully contained in letters patent." Particularly as to the dating, it is important to observe, the letter close or patent gives not the date and place of its own issue, but those borne upon the letter of privy seal or other previous draft. Thus the letters of the great seal are an indirect or secondary record of the council proceedings, but are not on this account the less useful.

Upon one of the council ordinances is an inscription that it was delivered to the keeper of the rolls of the chancery to be enrolled.1 Certain it is that a large number of council ordinances are to be · found upon the various chancery rolls, including the close rolls and the patent rolls, the Gascon rolls, the parliament rolls, and others. The same is true of enrollments in the exchequer. Upon one of the memoranda rolls it is told how the treasurer, delivering an ordinance of the council, directed it there to be enrolled. . Here and there throughout the rolls of Edward I. are to be found small membranes, which are original memoranda of the council. Upon one of them is the statement: ista cedula liberata fuit per cancellarium in pleno consilio apud Evesham in cancellaria irrotulanda.3 Instead of being transcribed they were merely attached to the roll. That the council could thus command the rolls of the chancery and of the exchequer is a reason why it did not have a roll of its own.

The records of the action of the council, then, appear in as many as four stages:

1. The original memoranda of the council, the chief purpose of which, as appears in this connection, was not to form a record, but to serve as drafts for the ensuing letters and enrollments, and for the practical use of the officers and clerks who had to follow them. For this reason they were made often in duplicate, and in one case at least there were as many as ten copies issued ;*

1Et memorandum quod tertio die Augusti anno regni Ricardi secundi secundo ista cedula liberata fuit per consilium custodi rotulorum cancellarie pre

dicte irrotulanda. Parliamentary Proceedings, IX. 8.

In the Memoranda Roll K. R. of the Exchequer, 3 Edw. II., Trinity term, is the following entry: Memorandum quod Johan de Sandale thesaurarius liberavit hic septimo die Augusti hoc anno quandam ordinationem factam per Regem et consilium suum super compto garderobe . . . et eam precepit inrotulari in hec verba, etc.

3 Close Roll, 29 Edw. III., m. 14.

Parliamentary Proceedings, I. 21-30.