John fitz Gilbert had chaplains and indeed a medicus named amongst the witnesses of his acts, members of his clerical retinue (nos 1 and 3). He also had a clerical brother, Gilbert, who was the incumbent of the church of Cheddar so we may assume that there were sources of clerical practice accessible to him. The early Marshal clerks may perhaps not have had much to do in clerical terms in comparison with the household of a count of Meulan or even an earl of Salisbury, but they do seem to have commenced the practice of archiving key family documents. When King John confirmed the office of master-marshal of the household to William Marshal (I) in 1200 he did so remarking that he had seen the act of King Henry I adjudicating it to William's predecessors, and the terms were sicut carta ipsius regis quam vidimus testatur (App. I, no. 6). So Earl William had been able to find somewhere that crucial record of the conferral of office Henry I had made to his grandfather, Gilbert (I). Likewise in his great year of 1200, when William received a flurry of confirmations of privileges awarded to his father and elder brother, for the convenience of John's chancery he was able to present copies of King Richard's charters issued to his brother.