This second volume of documents from the extensive medieval archive of the vicars choral of York Minster provides an edition of charters from the earlier 13th century onwards relating to the vicars' property in Yorkshire (the first volume having concentrated on their property in the city of York), together with texts describing the process by which four parish churches (one of them in Hampshire) were appropriated to the vicars in the 14th and 15th centuries.
The latter documents are especially detailed, and include grants of advowson, archiepiscopal confirmations consequent on inquiries (with witnesses testifying on the vicars' poverty in 1332 following the disruption caused by Scottish invasions and in 1351 after the Black Death), descriptions of the manner in which the churches were physically handed over, and ordinations of vicarages.
Drawing also on the vicars' financial accounts, the introduction to the volume sets the acquisition of both city and Yorkshire property in the context of the vicars' fluctuating economic fortune, which reflected on general changes in urban prosperity and more specifically impinged on the vicars' ability to maintain a common life. The charters relate to the Vicars' property in Yorkshire, and to their holdings of appropriated churches (including the church of Nether Wallop in Hampshire). The editor's introduction examines the reasons for the Vicars' acquisitions, and places them in their economic context. NIGEL TRINGHAM is lecturer in history, University of Keele.