Download Credit Finance in the Middle Ages: Loans to the English Crown, c

this document was supplied by the depositor
and has been modified by the HDS
SN 6880 - Credit Finance in the Middle Ages: Loans to the English Crown, 1272-1340
In 2007 the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) awarded Professors Adrian Bell and
Chris Brooks a major research grant (RES-062-23-0733) to investigate the early and innovative use of
credit finance by a succession of English medieval monarchs, working with a full time Research
Associate, Dr Tony Moore. The credit arrangements between the three Edwards and Italian merchants
were crucial for financing England’s ambitious foreign policies and providing for the smooth running
of governmental administration. Such loans enabled the Crown to protect itself against predicted and
unpredicted fluctuations in future taxation revenues. Substantial data on the credit system during this
period survive mainly within the well-kept records of the English Exchequer. The master dataset
presented here gives details of all the transactions between the English kings and the Italian merchant
societies extracted from these sources.
For more information about the project, or to use the online historical interest rate calculator
developed to analyse this data, see http://www.icmacentre.ac.uk/medievalcredit/
Structure of the dataset
Field
id
reference
date_range_start
date_range_end
date_range_standard
description
notes
merchants
credit_debit
total
value_£
value_s
value_d
value_m
Description
Unique identifying number for this transaction
Reference to the relevant historical source. See table below for key
The earliest possible date for the transaction (often the date of issue of
the historical source, for instance where the king ordered a payment to
be made by the merchants) or the start of a date range
The latest possible date for the transaction (often the date of issue of the
historical source where it acknowledges a payment already made) or the
end of a date range
Either the date_range_start or date_range_end, if only one of those two
is known, or the mid-point of a date range
Text description of the transaction
Any further information about the source or the transaction
This field denotes whether the transaction involves: the Ricciardi; the
Frescobaldi; the Bardi; the Peruzzi; or the Bardi and Peruzzi jointly.
Whether the transaction involved a payment from the king to the
merchants (CR - i.e. a credit to the royal account) or a payment made
by the merchants to the king or to a third party on the king’s behalf (DB
- i.e. a debit against the royal account)
The sum involved in the transaction, expressed in the units used in the
source (usually £, s, d, ob (halfpence) and qd (farthings) sterling but
sometimes in other currencies such as florins or livres tournois). All
values have been converted into their sterling equivalents, either using
the exchange rates quoted within the historical document, or a suitable
rate for that period, as set out in the notes field
The number of £ sterling involved in the transaction
The number of shillings sterling involved in the transaction
The number of pence sterling involved in the transaction
The number of marks sterling involved in the transaction (the mark was
a unit of account equivalent to two-third of £1/13s 4d/160d)
value_modern
The value of the transaction expressed as an integer (to two decimal
places), using the formula value_£ + (value_s/20) + (value_d/240) +
(value_m/1.5). This is intended to facilitate calculations.
Principles of the dataset
A systematic search of the relevant classes within The National Archives (TNA) at Kew for all
sources pertaining to loans made to both sovereign and private borrowers has now been completed.
The details of all the transactions between the kings and the merchants were identified, transcribed
and entered into a number of separate databases tailored to the particular historical sources and
merchant societies. These were used to track the advancing of loans and subsequent repayments and
thus to estimate the balance of the king’s account over time. They formed the basis for our
reconstruction of the relationship between the king and each of the merchant societies. Subsequently,
the key details of every single unique transaction were then entered into a master dataset, made
available here.
The key principle was to divide the interactions between the king and the merchants into distinct
transactions, each of which was classified as either a credit to the king’s account or a debit against the
king’s account. We aimed to collate all the sources to avoid double-counting the same transaction.
Where we are sufficiently confident that two or more sources refer to the same transaction, these are
combined into one entry in the dataset with references to all the sources. Unfortunately, the surviving
sources are not complete. There are substantial gaps in the chronological coverage. Moreover, some
of the enrolled accounts give periodic totals for money advanced by or repaid to the merchants. These
will include many (of not all, depending on the accounting conventions in use) of the individual
transactions datable to that time period. In this master dataset, we have not attempted to integrate the
evidence for individual transactions with these accounting totals, since this would be a subjective
exercise. Users wishing to calculate advances/repayments in a given time period will need to take
account of the potential for double-counting, based on their own scholarly understanding of the
sources and of the accounting practices.
Source material used
The most obvious source for the relationship between the English Crown and its Italian bankers is the
final accounts themselves, which were generally enrolled on the Pipe Roll (TNA E 372) and its
duplicate, the Chancellor’s Roll (TNA E 352). The more legible of these two texts have been selected
for inclusion in this volume. Unfortunately, there are perhaps surprisingly few comprehensive
accounts between the king and the merchants to be found. These are the Ricciardi account for 12901294; the Frescobaldi accounts for 1294-1310, and the Bardi account for 1294-1313. This means that
such accounts only exist for twenty-four of the seventy years covered by the project. It is clear that
accounts were held at other times, as is amply demonstrated by the survival of documents produced
during those accounts, as well as references in other sources.
The absence of extant final accounts can be remedied, to some extent, by the survival of numerous
rolls of particulars prepared during the course of the accounting process (mostly within the Exchequer
Miscellanea, TNA E 101). The enrolled accounts themselves frequently refer to further details being
given in such rolls (sicut continentur in rotulo de particulis). These rolls can contain valuable
additional detail omitted in the more concise final accounts.
These can be supplemented by enrolled accounts dealing with particular sources of revenue received
by the Italian merchants, rather than comprehensive royal bank statements. Most of these can be
found in the rotuli compotorum section of the Pipe and Chancellor’s Rolls and the enrolled Customs
Accounts Rolls (TNA E 356).
Moreover, the accounting process was only one part of the royal financial system. Although the royal
clerks do not seem to have kept any kind of running balance for the king’s treasury, the Exchequer of
Receipt had developed a series of documents recording incoming and outgoing monies. Monies
received were recorded in the Receipt Rolls (TNA E 401). Since so much of the credit provided by the
Italians was provided through the wardrobe, however, the Receipt Rolls do not provide a full picture
of their loans.
The Exchequer also kept records of payments made and received in the form of the Issue rolls (TNA
E 403). Orders for payments to be made, including repayments to the merchants, were entered in the
Liberate rolls (TNA C 62). Once a writ of liberate had been paid in full and returned, a copy was
recorded in the Issue rolls, in a single-column format. Where a payment towards a writ of liberate had
been made, but the writ had not been discharged in full, this was noted on the Memoranda of Issue
rolls in a double column format). During Edward II’s reign, these two types of Issue roll were
combined into a single roll. Later, the increasing use of tallies of assignment led to a closer
correspondence between the Receipt and Issue rolls, since a tally issued to a royal creditor, for
example, on the issues of the customs of London, would be entered both as a receipt and as an issue.
Finally, numerous royal orders survive that provide more information about particular transactions.
These include royal letters patent or close to the merchant societies either ordering them to make
payments on the king’s behalf or acknowledging that such payments have been made, or similar
letters to royal officials to deliver royal revenues to the merchants.
Key to references
Reference
Accounts
BL
CCR
CPR
Roles Gascons
TNA
TNA C 47
TNA C 62
TNA E 101
TNA E 352
TNA E 356
TNA E 372
TNA E 401
TNA E 403
TNA E 404
Wardrobe 1285-1286
Wardrobe 1286-1289
Source
Accounts of the English Crown with Italian Merchant Socities, 12721345, ed. A. R. Bell, C. Brooks and T. K. Moore (Kew, List and Index
Society, 2009)
British Library
Calendar of Close Rolls
Calendar of Patent Rolls
Rôles Gascons, ed. F. Michel and C. Bémont (3 vols, Paris, 18851906)
The National Archives
Chancery Miscellanea
Chancery Liberate Rolls
Exchequer Miscellanea
Exchequer Chancellors Rolls
Exchequer Customs Accounts Rolls
Exchequer Pipe Rolls
Exchequer Receipt Rolls
Exchequer Issue Rolls
Exchequer Warrants for Issue
Records of the Wardrobe and Household 1285-1286, ed. B. F.
Byerley and C. R. Byerly (London, 1977);
Records of the Wardrobe and Household 1286-1289, ed. B. F. Byerly
and C. R. Byerly (London, 1986)
Notes on currencies, units and measurements
The pound sterling (£) consisted of 20 shillings (s) each of 12 pence (d). The accounts also refer to
halfpennies (obolus) and farthings (quadrans), which could either be penny coins cut in half or into
quarters, although the mints did issue a small number of such coins.
The mark (m.) was a unit of account equivalent to 13s 4d, or two-thirds of £1. Although the royal
accounts generally use pounds, shillings and pence, marks seem to have been frequently used by the
merchants. For example, document 20, a list of payments made by the Frescobaldi, has columnar
totals in marks rather than £.
Most Exchequer accounts were converted into sterling but, as mentioned above, one of the main
services provided by the merchants was balance transfers to the continent. As a result, they are
numerous references to foreign currencies in the sources.
The most frequently-occurring non-English currency in the documents is the livre tournois (Latin:
libra turonensis), used in most of France. The livre tournois came in two forms; by far the most
common was the petit tournois (libra parvorum turonensium or libra nigrorum turonensium). The
French kings also issued a larger silver coin, the gros tournois (gros turonensis or just gros), which
was supposed to be valued at 12d petit tournois.
There are also several mentions of pollards and crockards (alternatively described as ballards), which
were counterfeit English coins produced in the Low Countries that began to circulate in England in
large quantities at the end of the thirteenth century. The rate of exchange between sterling and
pollards/crockards was set at 1:2 by Edward I at Christmas 1299.
The accounts also refer to transactions using a number of different gold currencies. The most common
were gold florins of Florence (florenus or florens dor). One possible source of confusion is that florin
could sometimes be used as a generic term to refer to any gold coin. Other identifiable gold coins
were the French écu (Latin: florenus de scuto or scutus) and pavillons (florenus de pavilli). There is
one reference, c.1299, to ‘deners dor de France’, valued at 6s 6d sterling, or equivalent to two florins.
These can be identified with the Masse d’or, issued by Philip IV between 1296 and 1310.