| Description | Before 1540, the arrears are mainly of rents due to the treasurer, but they also contain sums owed by the priory and to the priory by its officials. They were drawn up annually on parchment rolls, sewn together at the foot, exchequer fashion. By the late 1260s, the content had settled down into three sections
1. Gavelkind rents from Canterbury, listed by parish, with a separate section for houses and shops;
2. 'Gabulum', or 'gafol', and fee farms, rents from estates, listed by estate, and also including debts owed by and to obedientaries and estate officials, listed by wardenship;
3. 'Diversis locis', being estate rents other than those in 2., listed by estate, and also including rents owed by the priory.
(See the Miscellaneous Accounts catalogue introduction for further details on these rents.) Though not so strictly ordered, this pattern of material is evident from the first arrears roll of 1230, and continues until the latest medieval roll of 1446, though by then the rents of houses and shops in Canterbury, and also vacancies of houses in Canterbury, are being entered up on separate, paper, rotuli.
After 1540, a prebendal receiver-general served for a year to Michaelmas, and then accounted in a booklet for the arrears outstanding from the estate officials - bedels, farmers, and rent collectors. These booklets were then annotated up to the audit of the following year on 25 Nov with the payments received for those arrears. After the Restoration, the format of the accounts change, with the arrears recorded in up to five sections for the farmers, bedels, hospitality due from manors, pensions, and corn rents. Arrears of the current year are noted, along with still outstanding arrears of previous years, going back a dozen years or more. |