In 2012 the NMCT Trustees awarded a grant, which was generously supported by the Pilgrim Trust, to Norfolk Record Office for the conservation of the Aylsham Lancaster Manor Court Roll.
The roll is one of a long series of records from the court of the manor which extend from 1446 to 1846; prior to its conservation it was the only record of the court which was unavailable through condition - denying researchers access to information about Aylsham during the whole of Henry VIII’s reign. The roll, which consists of 131 parchment rotulets, was in very poor condition: most rotulets had suffered severe dehydration and were delaminating, resulting in loss of large parts of the text and the writing surface. The main challenge was to develop a treatment which was minimally interventive yet which improved the stability of the document.
Conservation took 24 months and was completed in 2014; as a result the roll is now available to researchers for the first time.
Some of the many researchers now studying the roll have commented:
"The restored court roll has been incredibly useful. Covering as it does such a long period (nearly the whole of Henry VIII's reign), it contains wonderful examples of economic growth in Aylsham in such an important time of change. The 16th century saw the influx of several major Norwich merchants, extending their trade outlets to the successful market town and changing the make-up of the traditional tenant families. Towards the end of the reign, the infilling in the market place sped up with the granting of many strips of ground from 'the lord's waste' to allow more stalls and presumably more fixed shops. The digitised versions that have been so carefully created are so clear that many surnames and place-names in the manor are now understood where previously readings were uncertain or illegible. So far the roll has been used for one article (The First White Horse in Aylsham Millgate) published in the Aylsham Local History Society Journal Vol 10 No 4 Aug 2015; it will feature centrally in the first of three articles we are writing on the use of early modern sources (again for the Journal). Perhaps more importantly we are relying heavily on it for our next book (due out late 2016) which will attempt to explain the dispersed settlements in the parish - the outlying areas and enclosures of heath lands.
The project was one of the best archive conservation projects ever undertaken - not just for learning from the text but the additional understanding of the physical nature of the materials used has opened up so many avenues of scientific research. Many congratulations to all involved and to the NMCT for their support of such vital work."
The project has indeed been useful in terms of conservation research and training: it was the focus of several training seminars and the techniques developed as part of the project were disseminated at the East Anglian Conservators' Forum in December 2015 (see image to the right).
Images courtesy of Norfolk Record Office.
The East Anglian Conservators' Forum learning about the techniques used in the Roll's conservation.
The roll before conservation.
The roll before conservation.
