On Saturday, April 30, 2016 at 5:49:22 PM UTC+1, Peter Cockerill wrote: > Dear Colleagues,> I have a quotation from a medieval manuscript on the ancestry of the Peck family of Wakefield. Sadly however no source cited! Any suggestions for a researcher to find the original manuscript welcome or is there another route?> Peter > From: Peter Cockerill via [gen-medieval@rootsweb.com] Sent: 01 May 2016 16:31 >> The following extract is from The Law Quarterly Review Vol 38 October 1922 page 464ff By WA Peck; >> >> 'We learn more from a manuscript record compiled in the sixteenth century by a member of the family, who writes; I toke this Raymembaransays owtt of divers other boks wythe yt Rentall of my lands syns the thmy yt I dyd occwpy Anno dni 1533. >> The first of my hawnsytwrs of my name that I can find of was in King Richard the Second days on Rychard Pek & Margett his wife and he bowght in hys lyfe thym sartn lands in Halyfax & Gledelyfe and he & hys wife had usshew thre sons yt is say Rychard, John & Thomas & dyed att Halyfax God hayfe Mersey on hys sowle. [FH records 414 Richard Peck husband of Margaret, 417 son Richard, 418 son Thomas , 403 son John] >> 'And hys son Rychard Pek was a man of Lawe and marryd Ellyn Kynge and he had no usshew wt her & she was sister to Sr John Kynge wecker of Halyfax. And the sayd Rychard Pek bowght fayre lands in King Henry the Syghts [sixths] thym & also byffore bowthe in Wakefield Halyfax Sowthe Howrom, Shelfe Hawle and in other playssys & dydd att Halyfax yt last yere of ye Rayne of Kynge Henry the Syght [probably 1461 rather than 1471] & was beryd att Halyfax Jesu hayfe mercy on hys sowle. [FH record 417] >> John Pek hys Border marrd Isabell Lacye dowghtter of John Lacy of Cromwell bothom and had usshewe wtt her fowre sons Rychard Robartt Thomas & John & the same John Pek dyed att Halyfax byfoe Rychard Pek hys brother ytt was ye man of law God hayfe mercy on hys sowle. And Thomas Pek thayre brothe was a prest.' [FH record John 403, Richard 396, Robert 406, Thomas 405, John 413] >> This brings us to firmer ground as the above can be checked by reference to the pedigrees recorded in the Heralds' Visitations.' >> >> My thanks to you all. >> Peter >> ________________________________________ This is a real puzzle. I had hoped the quotation would be an extract from a title deed of some recognisable sort - googling the names of the parties, place and date plus the document type would have a good chance of bringing up an entry in an archival catalogue. But it turns out the document is of a sort whose description in a catalogue is less easy to predict. The author's forename is not stated, the date is uncertain (either 1533 or an uncertain date some years after 1533), the place(s) it might be associated with in a catalogue are uncertain (probably Halifax or Wakefield, but possibly elsewhere, and maybe nowhere) and, most awkwardly, it is unclear how the document might be categorised in a catalogue (as a Remembrance? a Memorandum? Or a pedigree or genealogy? A commonplace book? Or was it part of the Rental it refers to? or ...). The author seems to have been a descendant of the first Richard Pek (married to Margaret) and to have been living in 1533. It isn't clear to me whether he wrote the MS in 1533, some years after he came into occupation of his estate, or wrote it some years after 1533, that being the year he came into occupation. If the latter then 1533 would presumably be either the year his father (or other antecessor) died or the year he came to his majority and was given livery of his inheritance - in which case he would probably have been born in or before 1512. Or just possibly it was the year he bought his lands. Anyway, looking at the Peck pedigree Flower's 1563-4 Visitation of Yorks, it seems the author might have been John Peck, son and heir of Richard Peck (d. 1516) and his wife Alice Mydleton, which John married Jane Anne, or perhaps John's son and heir Richard, who married Anne Hothom, or one of John's other sons. If it were possible to trace the subsequent ownership of the author's lands down to the 20th century, when landowners began to deposit their muniments in record offices, then one might hazard a guess as to the current whereabouts of the Peck deeds, which might include the MS in question. I don't know enough about the Pecks or their lands to do this, but someone more familiar with the family might be able to. I do notice that (i) the Law Quarterly Review article which so infuriatingly quotes from the MS but fails to identify it goes on to say that a Peck property in Wakefield called Haselden Hall 'is said (in Taylor's 'History of the Rectory Manor of Wakefield') to have been sold by another Richard Peck to George Savile in the reign of Elizabeth'; and (ii) that the Savile of Rufford deeds at Nottinghamshire Archives include a 'List of lands bought from Richard Pecks by George Savile' in c.1600 (DD/SR/227/72). It's a long shot but the sought-after MS may just possibly be among the Savile muniments. Matt Tompkins