I suppose the editor of the Lichfield Calendar is familiar with that court's clerical habits, but 'vacat' in the margin of a court record normally means that the entry has been vacated, meaning voided, annulled, cancelled. I wouldn't expect to see it written next to an entry to indicate that the will it related to was missing - it would indicate that the grant of probate or administration or whatever had been cancelled. Matt Tompkins -----Original Message----- From: ramaix <ramaix@orange.fr> To: warwick <warwick@rootsweb.com>; JeffButler <pateena@iprimus.com.au> Sent: Thu, 1 Nov 2012 13:07 Subject: Re: [WAR] Lichfield Wills According to the Preface to the Lichfield Calendar of Wills 1516-1652, which you can find on line by Googling, it means the wills are missing. The Preface also gives a lot of other general information. "For the period covered by the present volume there are no registered copies of Wills in the Registry, with the exception of two small volumes embracing the Wills in Series I. and II. of this Calendar, and a few that are registered in the Ecclesiastical Books of the Consistory Court, and are now preserved in the Diocesan Registry. The original documents are for some periods prior to 1600 very irregular, and in a few instances, notably 1596, 1548, and in some of the letters for 1558 and 1559, are almost all missing. Many of the documents are also missing for the years 1628 and 1629, and from the note "vacat" which is added to many names in those years, in evidently contemporary handwriting, they would seem to have been missing at no great length of time after proof." MAR in France. > Message du 01/11/12 12:53 > De : "Jeff Butler" > A : warwick@rootsweb.com > Copie à : > Objet : [WAR] Lichfield Wills > > > What do the letters vacat. stand for after a person name when looking for a will. > I am looking at Lichfield Wills and Administration 1629 but after the person name it has vacat > Thank you > Jeff