Monument record 638/25 - Bakehouse

{1}A partly illegible indenture of 1239 recorded an agreement between Walter fitz Simon and the prior which may have allowed Walter to move an oven or bakehouse (furnum) located in the court of William de Baldock and to set it wherever he wished on his own land in Daventry. The tenants of the monastery were to bake at this oven or at another of Walter’s ovens.
Suit of oven was an important manorial right and always strictly upheld. In the late 12th and early 13th centuries Thomas de Pistrina and William de Pistrina were named as witnesses to property transactions and seem to have been influential townsmen. In the lay subsidy of 1301 the former paid 2s 11d in tax, one farthing less than Adam Molend’, and only the lords of the Over and Nether Manors and John Neel paid more, albeit by a considerable margin. John at ye bachous, John de Pistrina (perhaps the same man) and William Bachous witnessed conveyances in the first half of the 14th century. A list of the burgage tenants of the Over Manor drawn up in the late 14th century named Robert Weston as holding a burgage next to ‘le bachous’.

In 1571 the bakehouse stood on the south side of High Street next to the malt mill, and was evidently still in the same position when it, together with the ancient horse mill, malt mill and ovens, were sold to Mr William Mumford in 1786. At the view of frankpledge in October 1502 Thomas Wolfe held the common bakehouse and was amerced one shilling for taking excessive lucrum. He was also listed among the seven butchers and was the one man who sold fish. In April 1503 he was again named as selling meat and fish but the common bakehouse was now held by William ?Gonysford. At the October court three men were ordered to repair ‘le backehowse well’ by the feast of All Saints (1 November).

<1> Ballinger J.; Foard G., 1999, Northamptonshire Extensive Urban Survey: Daventry (Medieval/Post Medieval/ Industrial), Section 3.1.2.6 Bakehouse (Digital archive). SNN100501.

Record last edited

Apr 28 2008 9:52AM