COST OF HOUSE CARPENTRY 400 YEARS AGO.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 315, 16 June 1875, Page 3

COST OF HOUSE CARPENTRY 400 YEARS AGO.

Amongst the ancient manuscripts belonging to H, T, Wake, of Cockermouth, is one, the contents of which afford a striking contrast with the present prices of labour and materials. The document is beautifully written on vellum, and is in fine preservation. We print it verbatim, with the orthography modernised, and a few words, within parenthesis, added in explanation of a few terms that, during the lapse of time have become obsolete. The date of it is 1472, and is as follows : This indenture made between Alice Chester of Bristol, widow, sometime the wife of Harry Chester of Bristol, draper, on the one party and Stephen Morgan of Bristol, carpenter, on the other party, witnesseth that the said Stephen hath covenanted with the same Alice and him bindeth by these presents to make well, workmanly and surely of good timber and boards a new house, in the High Street of Bristol, with floors, windows, doors and partitions and all other things of timber work belonging to the same house except laths and lattices, which said new house shall be set between the tenement called the Bull on the one party and the tenement in which one John A. Cork, Corvisor (cordwainer, or shoemaker) now dwelleth in on the other party, containing in length 19 feet and 5 inches of size and in wideness 10 feet and 4 inches; and the said Stephen shall make in the said house a shop, a hall above the same with an oriel (bay window), a chamber above the hall with an oriel and another chamber above that by the feast of the Annunciation of our lady next coming for which house so to be made by the same Stephen the said Alice granteth and her bindeth by this present (writing) to pay unto the said Stephen £6 13s 4d sterling, that is to say, at the feast of the Nativity of our Lord next coming £3, at flooring of the said house 33s 4d, and at end of the same work 40s. Also it is accorded that it shall be lawful to the same Stephen to have and take as his own all the old timber of the said old house without any gainsaying of the same Alice or other for her or in her name. In witness whereof the parties aforesaid to these indentures interchangeably have set their seals. Given the 17th day of the month of November, in the 12th year of the reign of King Edward the fourth.—Hardyng. Hardyng would probably be the name of the attorney who drew up the agreement. The seal bears the impression of a sword and a large Gothic capital I.