Source: http://merlin.csufresno.edu/~bm063/langley/cartular.htm

The Langley Cartulary

The Langley Cartulary (British Library, Harleian MS. 7) was compiled for William Langley, esquire, of Knowlton in Kent , late in the reign of Edward IV. It deals not with William's patrimony, however, but with the estates of the West Midland Langleys of whom his mother, Isabel de la Pole, was the last surviving representative. She was, in fact, the niece and sole heir of John Langley whose will was proven on 23 November 1459 . Her marriage to Walter Langley of Knowlton, the head of a hitherto unrelated family of the same name, seems to have been deliberately designed in order to preserve the estates in the name of Langley .

A curious feature of this Cartulary is that the greater part of the property to which it refers was not only not in the hands of the man who had the Cartulary compiled, but was virtually irrecoverable by him. John Langley had been able to pass on to his namesakes the bulk of his family's muniments but only part of the property they had once enjoyed. Most of the Warwickshire estates, for example, had long since passed out of Langley hands.

While the content of the Cartulary was basically determined by these muniments, it was also modified by the family arrangements of the Kent Langleys themselves. Walter Langley died between 25 February and 9 March 1470 . During the next twelve months Isabel closely regulated the descent of her property by means of feoffees. After her death her youngest son, John, was to have her father's manors of Potcote and Grimscote, Northants. Of her uncle's manors, Edmund was to have Over Siddington and Siddington Langley, Glos., and William Langley, her eldest son, those of Chesterton and Turkdean, Glos., Oldbury, Salop., and the Warwickshire manors of Shortley and Atherstone-upon-Stour. On 11 May 1474 , following their mother's death, William exchanged Atherstone for Potcote and Grimscote and acknowledged Edmund's title to Siddington. Siddington and Atherstone deeds, no doubt, passed to William's brothers with the estates; they form no part of the Cartulary.

The manuscript was compiled from deed-boxes and similar sources with little or no attempt at reorganisation. Documents were transcribed as they came out of box or sack. Eight sections can be distinguished possibly representing eight separate collections. These are:

1. Nos. 1-44 dealing mainly with Turkdean, Fairford, Brightwell and Ewelme.

2. Nos. 45-101 dealing mainly with Chesterton (with three additions in the later hand).,

3. Nos. 102-164 dealing with Potcote and Grimscote, together with provisions made for the succession to Langley estates during 1470-74 (and a few additions, including the terrier, in the later hand).

4. Nos. 165-175 dealing with Sawston, Cantab., and Harlington, Beds. (These are, in fact, deeds of the Kent Langleys.)

5. Nos. 176-261 dealing with Coventry and environs including Shortley.

6. Nos. 262-292 taken from a deed-box and dealing exclusively with Coventry .

7. Nos. 293-530 the largest collection, taken from a sack and dealing with a variety of places including Coventry and environs; Ashover, Derbyshire; Ashcott, Greinton and Walton, Somerset; Bicester and Bignell, Oxon; Baddesley Ensor, Harborough Magna, Long Compton, Stareton, Shipston-on-Stour, Tanworth, Warwick, Wolfhamcote and elsewhere in Warwickshire; and Uffcott, Wilts.

8. Nos. 531-566 dealing mainly with Dorsington, Milcote, Weston-on-Avon and Wolfhameote.

It is unlikely that great use was made of the Cartulary. Though the marginalia indicate that it was studied in its day, it does not appear to have been used to initiate action for the recovery of lost Langley estates. Indeed there was little time to do so. William Langley died leaving one son aged about 11, who died childless on 3 November 1518 . His heirs were the three daughters of his uncle, Edmund Langley. Of the subsequent history of the manuscript virtually nothing is known. A piece of paper and a scrap of parchment affixed to an odd folio at the beginning of the Cartulary bear the names Butler and Jerome Fytzherbert respectively. It almost certainly became the property of the seventeenth century antiquary Sir Sirnonds D'Ewes and passed to the Harleian Library with his collection in 1705.

The history of Shortley and Chesterton in the later fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries points to what was no doubt a common course of action in the case of disputed lands: violent occupation followed by enfeoffment to uses, preferably involving the socially more powerful. Though legal process might ultimately triumph it took time, money, and an extremely tenacious litigant.

John Langley, who had taken a prominent part in the re-acquisition of Shortley and Chesterton, continued the process of recovery. He sued Sir Reginald de Grey for the manor of Turkdean in the summer of 1423 and in the same year opened proceedings for the recovery of Langley lands at Brightwell. In both cases he was successful though litigation was slow. He seems to have had some knowledge of the law. He conducted his own suit against Reginald de Grey, while his will speaks of a book of statutes and another register bought from his sister Margery, wife of the serjeant-at-law William de la Pole. He possessed seven manors, viz. Siddington Langley, Over Siddington (which he purchased from one John Stonehouse), Chesterton, Turkdean, Shortley, Oldbury and Atherstone, with property at Sevemhill and Bridgnorth in Shropshire, at Tarlton, Fairford and Lechlade in Gloucestershire, and minor lands in Oxfordshire and Berkshire . A rough indication of his landed income can be gained from the inquisitions post mortem of his successors. Property worth £75. 6s. 8d. is recorded. Adding Atherstone-upon-Stour (worth £14 in 1274) and allowing for undervaluation John's income can hardly have been short of £ 100 per annum. In short he was a substantial member of the West Midlands squirearchy.

John Langley was dead by 23 November 1459 . In his will he made provision for the souls of his father and mother, and arranged for a marble stone to commemorate his grandfather in the church of Atherstone-upon-Stour, but there is no mention of a wife or children. Thus it is with deliberate foresight that his niece Isabel was to convey the property to the Langleys of Knowlton.

Even so, name and property were not to remain united for long. Though Isabel left three adult sons, the line was not to endure. John Langley was succeeded at Atherstone-upon-Stour by his daughter Elyn. She and her husband conveyed the property to Sir Richard Empson in 1496. Edmund Langley died in April 1490 and his son Waiter in October 1502. The boy's heirs were his three sisters. They and their husbands formally divided his property on 3 April 1506 . William Langley, the commissioner of the Cartulary, died as early as 10 February 1483 and his son John, the last of the name, on 3 November 1518 .