Catalogue description Chancery: Extract Rolls

Rolls of extracts taken from Chancery rolls to serve as convenient sources of evidence in courts of law.

They relate chiefly to grants made by the Crown. It is unlikely that the first of them was made before 1242, though an extract roll for the earlier reign of King John is known to have existed. The most complete sequence in this series covers the first 25 years of Edward III's reign, and those extracts are taken from the full range of Chancery rolls: charter, patent, fine, close and Gascon rolls.

Rolls not concerned with Crown grants have a foreign bias: the Anglo-Scottish marriage treaty of 1290, truces reached with the French, measures taken against aliens, and copies of five letters from the Emperor Frederick II, 1238-1241.

Many of the documents are of the reign of Edward II, illustrating his conflict with the barons (styled Contrariants), outbreaks of which in 1316 and 1318 led to his having to 'resume' Crown grants made to his factotum Piers Gaveston and his entourage. In 1324 the king's fortunes recovered, and he granted away his opponents' forfeited possessions to his allies, particularly the Despenser family.