Dr Dean Irwin, our visiting fellow, is a leading scholar on the Anglo-Jewry in the Middle Ages. He is a member of the advisory board of the Jewish Historical Society of England and a board member of the MedievalJewishStudiesNow! blog. He also advised Professor Wilkinson on the ‘Jewish Life in the Middle Ages: Lincoln and Beyond Project’, funded by the 2023 QR Collaborations scheme at the University of Lincoln in partnership with the Lincolnshire Archives, for which Simon Neal produced a hand list of documents relating to the medieval Anglo-Jewry in the Lincolnshire Archives. Dr Irwin is currently working with Joshua Outhwaite, Tash Jenman and Luka Liu on a new research initiative to reconstruct the lives of Lincoln’s Jews, employing the extant records. Regular updates from the group can be found on ‘X’ by clicking here. The group will also provide publish there findings on this page. In this first dedicated blog, Dr Irwin introduces the Lincoln Jewry and the records for studying this community in 1290.
The Records for Lincoln’s Jews in 1290
The Lincoln Jewry was one of the oldest Jewish communities in medieval England. Established during the so-called ‘Anarchy’ of King Stephen’s reign (1135-54), it quickly became a leading centre of Jewish communal, business, and intellectual life in England. In seeking to identify the personnel of the community, and reconstruct biographies of them, we have chosen to take the end of the community’s history as our starting point. On 18 July 1290, Edward I promulgated the Edict of Expulsion, which required that all Jews leave the England by All Saints Day (1 November). Although they were given safe conducts to the ports, and affordable passage out of the country (for themselves and their possessions) anything which remained defaulted to the Crown. The Valor Judaismus documents, as Robin Mundill termed them, detail the nature and extent of Jewish debts and property holdings. A scrutiny roll, summarising the particulars of all the debts which were held in the Lincoln archa, a has been preserved (TNA E 101/250/12). Equally, details of those properties which were held by Jews in Lincoln at the time of the Expulsion. It is this latter evidence that we have taken as out starting point. Inevitably, this provides an incomplete list of Jewish property holdings 1290. Some Jews will have obtained a licence to sell their property during the Summer of 1290, while others will be omitted for various reasons. Even so, this provides a fixed point at which we can establish the identities of at least some Jews who held property in Lincoln at the time of the Expulsion. These are also the most likely individuals to appear in other records series which be explored in the future to reconstruct the lives (or, at least, careers) of the individuals.
In the weeks before the Expulsion, the Crown began the process of valuing the property which was about to come into its hands. On 12 September, at Nottingham, Robert Burnell (Edward I’s chancellor) handed a writ ‘for extending the houses and tenements of the Jews of Lincoln’ to a clerk of the sheriff of Lincolnshire (CCR, p. 145). This was followed, on 4 October, by a series of orders to the sheriffs, witnessed by the treasurer. These primarily deal with the archae (and so will be dealt with by us at a later date) but they also instructed that the sheriffs inquire into the extent and value of property in Jewish hands. The order to the sheriff of Lincolnshire has survived (TNA E 101/249/27, no. 25), as has the return from Lincoln (TNA E 101/249/27 no. 27). Although undated, this was conducted by a jury of twelve local people, probably in late October. The 4 October order required that the sheriff appear at Westminster on the quindene of St Martin (25 November) to account for the value of the property. Given that, in 1290, 25th fell on a Sunday that was, presumably done on 26th. This was presumably the source by which Jewish property at each centre was entered onto a central list (TNA E 101/249/30, Lincoln: mm. 3–3d).
There was something of a lull in activity in the month the immediate aftermath of the Expulsion while this process was underway. This changed with the appointment, on 20 December 1290, of Hugh of Kendal to ‘value and sell all the houses, rents and tenements which late belonged to the king’s Jews’ (CPR, p. 410). A week later, on 27 December, Lincoln was listed in Hugh’s valuation as having Jewish property worth £173 (TNA E 101/249/1). Thereafter, he set about divesting this resource with gusto. Helpfully, a list which provides details of those grants in summary has been preserved (TNA C 67/4). This typically provides the name of the Christian grantee, and former Jewish owner, the location of the property (town, parish, and sometimes street), and value of the grant. The first grants came on 27 December 1290 but it was not until 15 January 1291 that the first grant of Lincoln property was issued, followed by one grant on 20 January, seven grants on 20 February, four grants on 27 March, and one grant on 10 April (TNA C 67/4 mm. 4, 3). It took the Crown less than six months to divest itself of Jewish property in Lincoln. Taken together, the former Jewish properties in Lincolnshire (both Lincoln and Stamford) were sold for £141 (JMR, no. 1221). The annual rents for the property continued to be paid for a considerable time. As late as 15 February 1466, Edward IV granted these ‘diverse small sums exacted yearly at the Exchequer’ to the mayor and citizens of Lincoln (CCR, pp. 499-500). This was confirmed by Richard III on 14 November 1484 (Birch, pp. 138-42).
Reference abbreviations:
- Birch = Walter de Gray Birch, The Royal Charters of the City of Lincoln (Cambridge, 1911).
- CCR = Calendar of Close Rolls.
- CPR = Calendar of Patent Rolls.
- JMR = Medieval English Jews and Royal Officials: Entries of Jewish Interest in the English Memoranda Rolls, 1266-1293, ed. and trans. Zefira Entin Rokéah (Jerusalem, 2000).
- TNA = The National Archives.
- E = Exchequer.
- C = Chancery.