SNN116857 - Town and Crown: the Governance of Later Thirteenth-Century Northampton

During the twelfth and thirteenth centuries Northampton was one of the most important towns of England and yet, as a result of a series of catastrophic fires, little survives of its medieval built heritage and the borough archives also suffered grievoulsy. Nonetheless important records do survive, somewhat scattered in the National Archives, at the Bodleian Library, in Northamptonshire Record Office and elsewhere. In the first part of the volume the relationship between the crown and the burgesses of Northampton in the later thirteenth century is discussed, particularly in relation to the governance of the town, its financial management and the maintenance of judicial systems. The second part of the volume presents some key documents relating to thirteenth-century Northampton, including a unique group recording payment of the town's farm while it was in the king's hands in 1293-4, and also Northampton's early custumal. There is a revised chronological list and 'biographies' of Northampton's thirteenth century mayors and bailiffs.