Charter Roll facts for kids
A charter roll was like an official diary kept by the King's office in medieval times. It recorded every important document, called a charter, that the King sent out. Think of it as a very old-fashioned government database!
How Charter Rolls Began
In medieval England, King John started something new in 1199. He set a fixed price for sealing official documents like charters and letters patent (special open letters from the King).
The very first Charter Roll was created in 1199 to keep track of these fees. It was like a fee book! This happened when Hubert Walter was the Lord Chancellor, a very important government official.
The Roll also helped keep a record of all the charters the government had issued. Other documents, like letters patent, soon got their own separate records called patent rolls. Instead of keeping these records in books, they were written on sheets of parchment (animal skin prepared for writing). These sheets were then stitched together to make long rolls, with one roll for each year.
A Break in Recording
During the time when Henry III of England was a child and too young to rule on his own, the Crown (the King's government) couldn't make any permanent grants of land or rights. Because of this, the Charter Rolls were not kept for a while. They started again in 1227 when Henry III was old enough to rule.
How We Study Them Today
The Charter Rolls from 1199 to 1216 were published in 1837. They were printed in Latin, looking very much like the original handwritten documents. This big book was called Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi asservati and was put together by T. D. Hardy.
Later, between 1903 and 1927, summaries (called calendars) of the rolls from 1226 to 1516 were published in six volumes by the Public Record Office. Historians often use the short name Cal. charter R. when they refer to these published summaries.
See Also
