As previously noted, more than four-fifths of HLS Ms 41 is devoted to a unique, and early (i.e., pre-Statham), ‘abridgement’ of Year Book cases. Whether all of the cases in the ‘abridgement’ are, in fact, abridgements of cases that were at the time available in Year Books arranged by year and term is a question that in our present state of knowledge we should not be quick to answer. The use of this manuscript in the various editions of the Year Books of Richard II by the Ames Foundation has shown that whatever may have been situation at the time that the collection was made, the manuscript now contains a number of cases that are not available in any of the surviving manuscripts arranged by year and term. Also, some of the abridgements of cases in Ms 41 that are available surviving manuscripts arranged by year and term contain elements (sometimes whole issues) that are not in the manuscripts arranged by year and term. It is separately foliated, in Arabic but of considerable antiquity, with numbers running to 429. It is now bound separately in three physical volumes, but this binding is of recent vintage, and the divisions between the physical volumes are basically arbitrary.¹

The ‘abridgement’ reports cases from the reigns of Edward III through the beginning of that of Henry VI. The work bears some resemblance to Statham, but is, so far as we are aware, unique. It was first was noted by Professor Sir Percy Winfield.² Professor Plucknett was, we believe, the first to suggest that the abridgement is, in fact, a combination of two abridgements.³ A much more elaborate study by Mr. Rogers confirmed this basic suggestion and made a number more. The manuscript is indeed a combination of two ‘abridgements’, the first containing cases from the early years of the reign of Edward III and the second containing cases from the later years of Edward III through the first year of Henry VI. Rogers, however, already realized that the simple suggestion that folios of the early Edward III cases had been encased in folios of the later cases, making new quires which were then bound together in more or less alphabetical order did not fit the evidence. All three scholars were hampered by the fact that the manuscript was bound so tightly that a collation had to rely to some extent on guesswork (though Rogers’s collation was remarkably accurate).⁴

The rebinding of the manuscript allowed us to prepare a map of the quires of the manuscript, which are included at the end of the digital images presented here. The ‘metadata’ that accompanies the digital display of the manuscript gives the foliation and the quiring, with the numbers in brackets where we have supplied them, a beginning of a list of marginal headings and indications of the regnal year and term from which at least one of the cases on the folio come. This list of folios with their quiring is also presented below with hyperlinks to the digital display. The list below contains some notes indicating where the foliation is problematical, where the quire map may be somewhat misleading, and a preliminary indication of the different hands and styles that are at work. Work on this project is ongoing. The Foundation hopes to be able to present a full list of cases in the manuscript, but it will take some time to prepare it. In the meantime, we would appreciate hearing from anyone who has identified cases in the manuscript or has been able fill out even pieces of what is now a sketchy indication of the contents of this remarkable manuscript.

What we have done so far suggests that previous conjectures about how the manuscript was put together were not quite right. (We hasten to add that everyone who has previously looked at the manuscript did so in the pursuit of different and much larger projects.) We offer here the evidence that is now before us, and an hypothesis that will require further investigation.

The later cases chronologically, beginning, it would seem, in 38 Edward III and running through Easter, 1 Henry VI (1364-1423),⁵ have a distinctive style. The entry itself begins with an indication of the regnal year and term; the margin gives us the heading under which it is gathered for each case, quite consistently on the cases that appear on the recto, less consistently on the cases that appear on the verso. There are relatively few elaborating notes or cross-references; there are relatively few entries that begin ‘Nota’. The earlier cases chronologically, beginning, so far as we have so far discovered, with 3 Edward III with entries found as late as 47 Edward III (1330–1373),⁶ also have a distinctive style. The entry does not contain the regnal or term. This appears, if at all, in the margin, normally without any indication of who the king is. Most of the cases begin ‘Nota’. The marginal notes can be quite elaborate, and cross-references are common. The headings that relate the earlier cases to those of the later cases normally appear at the top of the page. The marginal headings in the earlier cases usually tell what writ is involved, a fact that frequently is not what caused the case to appear in this collection of cases.

The later cases are all written in a similar script. It may not all be by the same hand, but it could be. The script seems to be more of the late fourteenth century than of the early fifteenth, but there is nothing to suggest that same hand that wrote the entries for 38 Edward III did not also write those of the cases from 1 Henry VI . A number of different hands seem to have been at work on the earlier cases. Some of these hands are indistinguishable in style from the hand of the later cases, but some of them have characteristics that we associate with the fifteenth century rather than fourteenth. These are quite prominent in the later entries of the earlier cases.

The quiring of the manuscript is unusual and of some interest. There are 53 quires of different sizes, of which 37 are numbered. The manuscript begins with an unnumbered quire. The second quire is numbered ‘2’, and the numbering proceeds in order to the end of the manuscript, the last quire, except for the tabula, being numbered 37. Unnumbered quires are inserted throughout the manuscript. If we ignore the unnumbered quires, the numbered quires have headings that proceed pretty much in alphabetical order from ‘appelle’ to ‘weythername’. There are a number of short or blank pages.⁷ The author (or his clerk) was clearly leaving space for additional entries under most of the headings. The numbered quires always begin with entries of the later cases. The vast majority of them begin a new heading.

The inserted quires tend to break the order of the headings, though the headings tend to be the same as or close in alphabetical order to those on the numbered quires. The vast majority of the inserted quires contain earlier cases; frequently they contain nothing but earlier cases.

A relatively simple explanation of what is happening here is that the author of the collection of the later cases (or a later owner) broke up the manuscript of the later cases and inserted quires from another collection of earlier cases. The problem with this explanation is that the earlier cases are found not only on the inserted quires, they are also found in the numbered quires. There are fewer of them than there are on the unnumbered quires, but there are far too many to allow one to explain their existence simply by saying that the author of the later cases found a few earlier cases. Also, where the earlier cases appear in the numbered quires they show the same distinctive style and the same difference of script that they show where they appear separately.

The following hypothesis will account for the evidence that we have before us: There can be little doubt that the work as we have it began with the later cases and the numbered quires. (Whether it was ever bound in that form is a more difficult question to answer; the quires could have been numbered but unbound.) The scheme of headings had been fixed, and a substantial amount of material had already been entered. At this point the author (or, perhaps, a later owner, but I am inclined to think that it was the author) either discovered a manuscript of the earlier cases or decided to incorporate one that he already knew about into his work. That manuscript did not, however, have the same scheme of headings that he had. He probably did not own that manuscript. Hence, he had that manuscript copied and incorporated into his work. Where a heading from the manuscript of earlier cases would fit in the blank pages that he already had, he had the copiest put it there. Where it would not so fit, he had it copied onto a separate quire.⁸ More than one copiest was employed, hence, the different hands. The entire work was then bound in the order that we now have it and foliated. (The foliation and the tabula, which seems to be roughly contemporary with the foliation, could have been done later, but not much later. The further away that we get from 1423, the less useful the manuscript would have been.)

Our author continued to add later cases even after the earlier cases had been incorporated into his manuscript. There are a couple of places where a later case has to be continued after an intervening batch of earlier cases. There are, interestingly enough, no places where the converse is the case. The fact, however, that there are very few situations where a case has to be divided, coupled with the fact that the original quire numbers are still there suggests that the manuscript of the later cases was not only planned but also substantially completed before the earlier cases were added.

We have not attempted at this stage to correlate our findings with Rogers’s, much of which depend his identification the scripts used in the earlier part of the abridgement. He did not suggest, as we have, that one of hands at work in the earlier part is the same as that at work on the later part. Rogers’s work is easily available in the electronic archives of the Law Library Journal, and now that the manuscript is also available online, others may form their own conclusions. The Ames Foundation would welcome communication on the topic.