Page 1 NOTES ON DATABASE OF INFORMATION FROM SELECTED BERKSHIRE PROBATE INVENTORIES, 1550-1670 COMPILED BY C.R.J. CURRIE ORIGINS The data were collected in 1971 as part of research for a doctoral thesis [C.R.J. Currie, 'Smaller Domestic Architecture and Society in North Berkshire, c. 1300--c. 1650' (Oxford University D. Phil. thesis, 1976)]. It was in addition to other more detailed transcripts and extracts of inventories which have not been computerized. Th probate and administration inventories of the Archdeaconry of Berkshire (then in the Bodleian Library, MSS. Wills Berks., but in 1984 in Reading: Berkshire County Record Office), were searched to find, for the periods 1550-60, 1570-80, 1600-10, 1620-30, and 1660-70, all identifiable inventories of deceased from the following parishes and townships, mainly in the eastern part of the Vale of White Horse: Appleford Appleton Ardington Ashampstead Aston Tirrold Basildon Brightwell Cholsey Didcot Drayton Fyfield East Hagbourne West Hagbourne East Hanney West Hanney Harwell East Hendred West Hendred Kingston Bagpuize Lockinge Marcham Milton North Moreton South Moreton Moulsford Radley Sotwell Sparsholt Steventon Sutton Courtenay Tubney Little Wittenham Long Wittenham NOTE: Each period is thus of 11 years. Since the year was reckoned from Lady Day, the first hendecade covers 25 Mar. 1550-25 Mar. 1561, and similarly thereafter. The following information was recorded for each inventory: Box or reference number (only a few inventories had then been given piece numbers) Date of appraisal (or failing that, date of probate or grant of letters of administration) Forename and surname of deceased Place (parish or township) Status or occupation of deceased, if given (data from wills not included) Names of rooms listed, whether in the house or possibly detached Whether the inventory appeared incomplete (or the deceased was apparently not a householder) Total valuation as given (not checked by summing individual items) Whether a will inventory or an administration inventory Page 2 COMPUTERIZED FORMAT: PROCEDURE The data were put onto a TRS-80 microcomputer in 1983--4, in order to allow fuller quantitative analysis rather than to be able to retrieve individual inventories. The database includes one or more files for each sample period and one record for each inventory. The order follows that of the 1971 MS. notes; the original inventories were not re-examined. OMISSIONS The following information was omitted, mainly for reasons of space: Whether date given is of appraisal or probate Reference or box no. (deducible from the printed key) Whether inventory related to a will or an administration of intestate's goods (deducible from the order within the file: see below). VERSIONS All the files were reformatted in late 1984 to permit easier analysis. Both sets of files will be included in the deposit at O.T.A. STRUCTURE OF THE ORIGINAL FILES The files are arranged by period. Each has a filename of up to 8 letters in the form PER[ OPENING DATE ][A,B,C...] and the extension RAW: e.g. PER1600A/RAW (TRS-80 format), PER1600A.RAW (CP/M format). There are no headers or titles. Each file is in ASCII code, blocked, carriage-return delimited, with 1 record per inventory and 151 bytes per record (plus the carriage return (TRS-80 format) or carriage return - line feed sequence (CP/M format), making a total of 152 or 153 bytes per record. The order of entry followed that of the MS. notes, which corresponds with that in the original boxes. Within each period the inventories are arranged: A. Will inventories, by initial letter of testator's surname (not necessarily alphabetically), and within each letter by date of probate; B. Administration inventories, by initial letter and date. Page 3 RECORD STRUCTURE of /RAW FILES Each record contains the following 20 fields. Character fields are left-justified, numeric right-justified. FIELD BYTES COLS. CHAR./NUM. COMMENTS 1. FORENAME 8 1-8 Char. 2. SURNAME 15 9-23 Char. 3. YEAR 7 24-30 Char. 4. MONTH & DAY 6 31-6 Char. 5. PARISH/township 16 37-52 Char. 6. STATUS or occ- 12 53-64 Char. WOMAN added upation for nondescript females 7. DOUBTFUL 1 65 Char. 0= O.K., 1= room list incomplete or inventory otherwise doubtful (e.g. not house- holder) 8. No. of HALLS 2 66-7 Num. listed 9. No. of KITCHENS 2 68-9 Num. 10. No. of PARLOURS 2 70-1 Num. 11. No. of BUTTERIES 2 72-3 Num. 12. No. of CHAMBERS 2 74-5 Num. Includes 13 13. No. of CHAMBERS 2 76-7 Num. clearly UPSTAIRS 14. No. of LOFTS 2 78-9 Num. 15. Names of OTHER 35 80-114 Char. Includes barns ROOMS mentioned and stables if given 16. TOTAL of rooms 3 115-7 Num. Excludes barns and stables 17. COMMENTS 20 138-37 Char. Includes quali- fiers of other fields e.g. 'NEW C', 'APPLE L', 'PROB. NOT HOUSEHOLDER' 18. POUNDS 5 138-42 Num. 19. SHILLINGS 3 143-5 Num. 20. PENCE 6 146-51 Num. To two decimal places; point at column 149 ABBREVIATIONS: in field 5, parish names may be abbreviated (e.g. Sutton C. for Sutton Courtenay); such abbreviations should be self-explanatory. In field 6, H. indicates husbandman, L. labourer, W. widow, and Y. yeoman. In fields 15 and 17, B indicates buttery, C chamber, H hall, HO house, K kitchen, L loft, P parlour, RM room. Page 4 STRUCTURE OF REFORMATTED FILES Each reformatted file has the same filename as the corresponding original file, but with the extension RFM, e.g. PER1600A/RFM. Each record is of 150 bytes net (151 or 152 gross), with the following fields: FIELD BYTES COLS. CHAR./NUM. COMMENTS 1-11. Forenames- 73 1-73 As RAW As RAW files Butteries files 12. CHAMBERS 3 74-6 Num. Includes 13 and 15; lengthened. 13. CHAMBERS 2 77-8 Num. UPSTAIRS 14. LOFTS 2 79-80 Num. 15. SERVANTS' 2 81-2 Num. Includes men's, CHAMBERS maids', folk's, and hinds' chambers 16. DAIRIES 2 83-4 Num. Includes dayhouses and milkhouses 17. OTHER ROOMS 35 85-119 Char. Still includes names of servants' chambers and dairies 18. TOTAL ROOMS 3 120-2 Num. As before 19. COMMENTS 20 123-42 Char. As before 20. POUNDS 8 143-50 Num. Accurate to two decimal places; point at col. 148 FILE MANAGEMENT The files were prepared with the Aids-III data management package, which only runs on the TRS-80. As the records are in ASCII code and are in effect tables they can be scanned with most text editors, or analysed with a spreadsheet program which can read data from text files. Those who consult the database may find that they need to write access programs for their own particular purposes. The above information should suffice to enable them to do so. 26 January 1985