¹ East Cheshire (London, 1877), I, 7; and cf. Roger Wilbraham, Glossary of Words in Cheshire (London, 1836), p. 6: “The principal families of the county, and much more those in the middle station of life, for the most part intermarried among each other, and rarely made connections out of the county.”

² Accounts of the Newton family will be found in the Capesthorne MS.; the Newton Cartulary; and in published works as follows: Earwaker, op. cit., ii, 267; George Ormerod, History of the County of Chester, 2nd ed. (London, 1882), iii, 593–594; Harleian Society, xviii, 185 (1580 visitations, MSS. Harley 1424, f. 114^b, and Harley 1505, f. 118^b); Harleian Society, LIX, 188 (1613 visitation); Transactions of the Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society, viii, 55; Record Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, lviii, 188 (1613 visitation, Harley MS. 1535, f. 223^a); Chetham Society, xcvii, plate to face p. 235; Sussex Archaeological Collections, ix, 317–322,337; repr. T. Herbert Noyes, Some Notices of the Family of Newton (London, 1857).

³ Ancestor of Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon.

⁴ For the descent of the Fittens, see Earwaker, i, 41; LCAS, viii, 55–56; ES, xviii, 185.

⁵ Cf. Noyes in SAC, ix, 322, n. 12: “By this marriage his descendants become representatives and quarter the arms of Massey, of Dunham Massey, Pownall, Olton, Leigh-ton, Wrenbury, Aldelym, and Cradoke; all families of great distinction in the palatinate.”

⁶ LCAS, viii, 61.

⁷ Cheshire Inquisitions post mortem preserved in the Public Record Office; quoted Earwaker, ii, 265; Ormerod, op. cit., iii, 592, n. f; and ref. in CS, xcvii, 12.

⁸ The Cheshire acre was considerably larger than the modern legally limited acre of 4840 square yards. According to Robert Holland, A Glossary of Words used in the County of Chester (London, 1886), English Dialed Society, XL, p. 3: “The Cheshire acre is 10,240 square yards, and is still in constant use among farmers, especially in the north half of the county.” “Turbary” is land from which peat-moss is cut (still used in Cheshire today).

⁹ Earwaker, i,124.

¹⁰ Out of a total of 200 tenants in 1587 the Booths had 52, the Traffords had 57, the Fit-tons had 31, and the Newtons had 11—quoted in T. Worthington Barlow, The Cheshire and Lancashire Historical Collection (Manchester, 1855), i, 28. Humfrey Newton's standard of living may be gathered from the tract “How to serve a lord” in the Capesthorne MS., printed by Furnivall, EETS32,350–360 (rev. ed. 1931).

¹¹ SAC, ix, 321 : “The very minute details of his transactions [recorded in the Cartulary] in which he was himself concerned, sufficiently bespeak his methodical character: as, for instance, in the purchase of the half of Foxwist Heath, his note informs us that ‘Reginald Willot delyvered the said Humphrey possession in the hole which is a meire dytch between the gate at the Harp-post Wood and the Mosse-pits between the waie to Widford and the way to Foxwist about 12 roods from any hedge’.”

¹² Earwaker, i, 265.

¹³ Ibid., i, 70.

¹⁴ Ibid., i, 71.

¹⁵ Ibid., i, 71.

¹⁶ Descriptions of the church are numerous: the church and the monumental figures of the Newtons are described in Earwaker, i, 65, 122, plate of monuments, p. 122, HSLC, i, 130–143, HSLC,n.s., xxviii, 33, 75; LCAS, iv, 101–102; LCAS, viii, 59–62; LCAS, xxxiii, 251; CS, XCVII, 235–236; CS,n.s., xxxii, 117; the screen alone is described in HSLC, Lxiv, n.s., XXVIII, 33 (with photograph); HSLC, Lxix, n.s. xxxiii, 50–53; the effigies alone in HSLC, LXXVI, n.s., XL (1924), 28–29; the brasses in Cheshire Notes and Queries (Stockport, 1897), n.s., II, 242–243. The parish registers only begin in 1558; see, inter alia, LCAS, xxxiii, 161–177.

¹⁷ Earwaker, i, 101. In 1587, Barlow (i, 28) estimates about 1100 inhabitants in the whole parish of Prestbury (which included both Pownall and Fulshaw, and Wilmslow, etc.).

¹⁸ Cf. Ormerod, iii, 592, n. f : “This family produced an extraordinary number of church dignitaries during the 15th century.”

¹⁹ This view is most vigorously advanced by Gollancz, Select Early English Poems IV (London, 1922), pp. vi-vii; see also Foster, EETS166, xii. There is no dispute about the dialect: Moore, Meech and Whitehall, Middle English Dialed Characteristics and Boundaries, Univ. of Michigan Publications in Lang, and Lit., xiii (Ann Arbor, 1935), p. 52; Serjeantson, RES, iii, 326; etc. Laurence Booth was at various times Chancellor to Queen Margaret, Chancellor of Cambridge University, Keeper of the Privy Seal, Bishop of Durham and Archbishop of York.

²⁰ Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire, LXXVI, n.s., xl, 28–29.

²¹ Earwaker, i, 122; and HSLC, LXXVI, n.s., XL, 49, notes.

²² HSLC, LXIV, n.s., xxviii, 75 : “Newton of Pownall got his pun more easily when he displayed a fine new tun of gold in his green scutcheon.” Newton could have claimed a fourth tun, for in his shield in the Jesus chapel is the lion of Oulion; see Earwaker, I, 123. The Fit-tons of Gawsworth, related to the Fittens of Bollin, also used a pun in the motto “Fit onus levé”; James Crösten, Nooks and Corners of Lancashire and Cheshire (Manchester, 1877), p. 111.

²³ Earwaker, ii, 265, n. j : “Also heere it appears that the armes of Neuton was iij papini-oes w^th a cheveron, and the seale a papinioy, howbeit a question is whether is more of aucthoritie to beare azure iii popinioes betwene a cheveron gould aft^r the picture or gould a popinioy vert aft^r the seale. Or a tunne siluer in sable aft^r the name, because it may be seene for[e]most of all colo^rs and metalls; or iij tunnes because of Newton Milton and Phi ton to whom I am heire, or azure a tunne of gould because the richest of all metalls and colours, or siluer iij cheverons gules as Neuton [in] longdendale beires. Also I did see a deede sealed w^th the papinioy looking to the left as if it sate one the right hand of the man was the seale of Olyuer Neuton w^th seale Thomas Neuton his grandfath^r sealed the deede of Neuton, w^ch ringe was of gould, and when the said Olyuer was deade then the seale was a popinioy & then there [it] was dynged and the[n] Humfrey graued a tunne in it.” Also quoted in LCAS, viii, 59; HSLC, LXXVI, 49 notes. Brooke, HSLC, i, 139, does not understand the point of the pun. For punning mottoes of Cheshire families see Cheshire Notes and Queries, ii, 201, quoting from T. Hughes in Cheshire Sheaf.

²⁴ HS, LLX, 188.

²⁵ HS, XVIII, 185.

²⁶ Newton's contemporary Henry Bradshaw, a monk of Chester, it will be recalled, commenced his Life of St. Werburgh with an acrostic on his name.

²⁷ E.g., witness of the will of Nicholas Jodrell of Yeardsley in 1528, RSLC, xxx, 65.

²⁸ Earwaker, i, 121. But Newton apparently never attended a university.

²⁹ Ormerod, iii, 598, so described his effigy.

³⁰ Barlow, i, 130.

³¹ Earwaker, ii, 160.

³² SAC, ix, 321. Humfrey profited by this visit, however; the note continues: “hee said if he could do me a pleasure, he would gladly; and I desired him to get his mother to seal me a release of Newton Heath and other lands as appears by the deed, and he said he would; so I wrote a release and gave him, and he brought it to me from her with special tokens sealed, and she asked again wherefore it was made; and the said Reynold answered again and said, ‘for dread lest the said Thomas should claim ought of Humphrey Newton or put him to trouble, because he troubleth Willots for their lands’.” Piers Legh refers to this suit (1508) in his will in 1539, RSLC, xxx, 74. There are actually few deeds relating to Humfrey Newton in the Cartulary; after this deed of 1501 there is a hiatus to 1564.

³³ Earwaker, i, 121. His son had a similar lawsuit: see HSLC, Lxxiii, n.s. xxxviii, 189210; incidentally, Humfrey Newton was exempted in 1498 from serving on juries (Pleas Roll 13 Hen. VII; noted by Ormerod, iii, 594).

³⁴ RSLC, lxx, 52. This must refer to our Humfrey, for his second son, Humfrey Newton, was of Fulshaw.

³⁵ Extracts in SAC, IX, 312–342, repr. Noyes, Some Notices c, pp. 4–11; Earwaker, ii 263,264 (footnotes i, e). The Cartulary has a rude poem by Richard Newton, f. 20^a (printed with other short extracts in Earwaker, ii, 264; also SAC, ix) : “Mem. There was a Ryme by one hechin neuton, w^ch was the first Ric. [ob. 1336], whose sonne called Ric. [ob. 1397] was married [before 1390] to one sibill, the Dougf of W^m downes [divorced 1394 for nearness of relationship] :

Sometime there was in Neuton a hipping Hechin [a limping Richard Hee hadd oxen and Ky[n]e and Corne for the maistrie Fatt Boars in thee Stye whiles that they might stand Good steedes in his Stall well I astande. Now there is come to this towne a lorde

Sebott withe her loude cry [Sibyll

Shee wakens me so early

That vnd^r of the day

that I noe Sleepe may.“

(Text corrected with glosses from Noyes, op. cit., pp. 7–8.) For “hipping” cf. Will of Randle Pickmere of Middlewich 1525 “at the Hypping stones” (RSLC, xxx, 163). Noyes (SAC, IX, 322), not knowing of the Capesthorne MS., consequently disregards the claims of Humfrey Newton as a poet, and mentions only Thomas Newton [1542–1607] : “This Richard was not, however, the only poet, or the best of whom the family can boast. His descendant Thomas Newton … enjoyed the reputation of being one of the best poets of his day” (ibid., p. 319, n. 11). See also Earwaker, ii, 260–262.

³⁶ BS, Lix, 29 (Harley MS. 2142, f. 80^a).

³⁷ T. Worthington Barlow, Cheshire (Manchester, 1842), p. 23, quotes Dr. Gower's account of Booth as “a very intelligent and careful collector”; and in similar tone so Ormerod, i, xxxix.

³⁸ HS, LIX, 247–249; Earwaker, ii, 407.

³⁹ Furnivall, EETS,32 (1868, rev. 1931), pp. 350–360 (includes a 5-line verse sotelty, p. 358). There is a possibility that Elias Ashmole, brother-in-law of Peter Mainwaring, who got the Newton estates by his marriage to Catherine Newton, may have seen the MS. See “Impressions of Armorial Seals of Cheshire Gentry … 1663” in Bodleian Library, Ashmole MS. 1138, f. 89; discussed HSLC, LXXI, n.s. xxxv, 73. Roger Dodsworth used the original deeds at Pownall Hall, rather than the Newton Cartulary. See his MSS in the Bodleian Library, vol. xxxi, f. 197; noted Earwaker, ii, 263, n. 1.

⁴⁰ Earwaker, i, 122; ii, 264.

⁴¹ Second Report, Royal Com. of Historical MSS (1877), p. 80 (with a long list of the contents).

⁴² Sir George Armytage and K. Paul Rylands in RSLC, LVIII, vii, ix; Italian Relation of England; Brown, Register of M. E. Religious Verse i,466; and perhaps Ormerod (see i, xli).

⁴³ Dr. R. W. Hunt makes available to me the Bodleian description of the MS.

“In Latin and English, on paper and parchment; 402 225 mm. xxiv+165 leaves (vii-xxiv, 131–145 blank); bound in half morocco, 19th century. There are two main parts:

A. 1. (fol. 1–75). Legal memoranda, copies of deeds, notes on families in E. Cheshire, rental of Newton, 14–20 Henry VII (fol. 24), with memoranda on the management of the estates, Fitton deeds (fol. 49), and the tract ‘For to serve a Lord’ (fol. 66). Interspersed are many miscellaneous notes, of which the following may be mentioned: a (fol 8v) To lerne to set a harpe; b (fol. 9v) Measurement of the fote of Jesu Christ; c (fol. 17v) Indulgences to be obtained at various churches in England; d (fol. 18) A prayer found in a copy of the Miracles of our Lady at Newark, beg.: Virgo fecunda piissima, e (fol. 19v) Letter of Adam Mottram, precentor of Salisbury to John Pigot (cf. fol. 10);f (fol. 21) A vision in a traunce of John Newton of Congleton, dreper and sherman, 1492; g (fol. 26v) Gode proverbes to set in ye border of ye halle; h (fol. 31v) Gifolium from a legal treatise; i (fol. 34v) Forms of grace before and after meals;/ (fol. 62v) Letter of Robert Preston.

A. 2. (fol. 75–91). Medical treatises originally an independent manuscript in a different hand, a (fol. 75) Commentary on Egidius Corboliensis, De urinis in English, beg. : T. … ye tretis of urine in pese short manere and ye first chopitelle; b (fol. 83) A partial translation into English of Trotula, De passionibus mulierum, beg. : Uhan god ye maker of all thinges in ye first ordinannce; c (fol. 86v) Recipe, beg. : Aurum potabile fades in hunc modum; d (ibid.) Extract, beg.: De confectione ducentem (sic) hominem in senectutem; e (fol. 87) Medical remedies in Latin, beg. : De his que valent ad purgandum, and in English (fol. 87rv) beg. : For rubynge over a mannes arme;/ (fol. 89) A regement of dietynge for the mygrem secundum Reyns, beg. : Take yarowe, and other remedies added by H. Newton.

B. (fol. 92–130). Verse and other collections of H. Newton, a (fol. 92v) Poems, mainly by H. Newton; b (fol. 95) Manus palmiste; c, (fol. 96–101r, 104v-105v) Ornamental letters and beginnings of petitions copied by H. Newton from the models written on parchment fol. 112–119; d (fol. 102) Treatise, beg. : Quid est carta? Carta est quoddam feoffamentum; e (fol. 122) Table of the planets;f (fol. 123, 124v-127, 128v) Recipes for making inks and colours, beg.: If ye will make blak ynke; g (fol. 123) Extracts on physiognomy, beg.: Aristotle in a boke yt he calis Secretum secretorum; h (fol. 124) Proportio ymaginis undarum, beg. : Primo longitudo faciei debet participari; i (fol. 127) Names of the books of the Bible, in verse, beg.: Genesis, Ex., Le., Nu.; j (fol. 128) Recipe for cooking rabbit, beg.: For to take conys; k (ibid.) Extract takyn out of ye boke of schrift yt ye VII dedly synnys are in and this is taken out of ira, beg. : What sey we of hem y t délites yaym in swerynge.“

⁴⁴ For many years the MS was “stowed away in confusion” in a hayloft (Furnivall, EETS32, Ixxii, 349).

⁴⁵ In editing these texts, the crossed double ll, and the tailed n and m are not distinguished further.

⁴⁶ Humfrey's grandfather Oliver was in London at the time of the plague and died there in 1453.

⁴⁷ J. P. Oakden, Alliterative Poetry in Middle English, Manchester Univ. Publications, xviii [i.e. xix] (1930, 1935), i, 10–11.

⁴⁸ University of Michigan Publications in Language and Literature, xiii; Moore, Meech and Whitehall: “Middle English Dialect Characteristics and Dialect Boundaries” (Ann Arbor, 1925).

⁴⁹ Serjeantson in RES, iii, 66–67.

⁵⁰ See examples cited in books mentioned in notes 47–49; also R. J. Menner, Sir Gawain (1922), p. 6.

⁵¹ Robbins, MLN, LVIII, 361–366.

⁵² E.g., xxii, 28 bat listen to layke; Gawain 1111 And bat yow list for to layke. xxii, 2930 Rise vp … Arayke down radly; Gawain 1076 And rys and rayke3 benne; Gawain 1735 ros hor vp radly rayked hir beder; Patience 89 benne he ryses radly and raykes bylyue.

⁵³ This is the only poem in the MS to use the old-fashioned pronoun ho, which, insofar as the poem is full of restricted dialect words, implies the use of ho in the North as late as 1500. In the other poems in the series the pronouns she, sho, scho, are used.

⁵⁴ See Wager, PQ, xv, 377–383.

⁵⁵ See Baugh in Essays and Studies in Honor of Carleton Brown (New York, 1940), pp. 176–181.

⁵⁶ See Brown, MLN, Liv, 131–133.

⁵⁷ Ed. Padelford and Benham, Anglia, xxxi.

⁵⁸ I will shortly issue a study of this MS.

⁶⁹ Brown, Religious Lyrics of the XIV Century (Oxford, 1924), pp. 134–136.

⁶⁰ James Ryman, one of the very few Franciscan writers in English in the 15th century, wrote 163 songs and carols, preserved in Camb. Univ. Lib. MS. Ee. 1. 12 (dated 1492). These “closet hymns” have been edited by Julius Zupitza in Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen und Litteraturen, LXXXIX (1892), 167–338, and, with some omissions, by Richard L. Greene, The Early English Carols (Oxford, 1935), passim.

⁶¹ See Robbins, “Two Middle English Satiric Love Epistles”, in MLR, xxxvii, 415–421.