[Bell Historians] Help with entries in the 1552 inventory

[Chris Pickford]

Basically means in proportion, I think.
Chris

Sent from Outlook for Android<https://aka.ms/AAb9ysg>
________________________________
From: Bell-historians <bell-historians-bounces at lists.ringingworld.co.uk> on behalf of Richard Smith via Bell-historians <bell-historians at lists.ringingworld.co.uk>
Sent: Thursday, April 23, 2026 11:01:18 AM
To: bell-historians at lists.ringingworld.co.uk <bell-historians at lists.ringingworld.co.uk>
Cc: Richard Smith <richard at ex-parrot.com>
Subject: Re: [Bell Historians] Help with entries in the 1552 inventory



On Thu 23/04/2026 10:26, bill at hibberts.co.uk wrote:
> I have been looking at a number of 1552 inventory entries recently (as
> transcribed in Stahlschmidt Surrey Bells) and there is some language I
> don’t understand. Here are three examples:
>
> Compton: Item iij bells in the steepull the best bye estimacion vc and
> the residew under after the rate
>
> Cranleigh: Item iiij bells hanging in the steple the best waieth xviic
> and the reaste one under another according to the rate
>
> West Horsley: Item four gret bells in the steple the best by estimacion
> xiiijc the rest under after the rate.

I would interpret each of these as saying that the tenor (the 'best'
bell by weight) is specified weight (5 cwt, 17 cwt, and 14 cwt,
respectively), and that the other bells are proportionately lighter in
the expected manner for a tuned ring of bells.

RAS

_______________________________________________
Bell-historians mailing list
Bell-historians at lists.ringingworld.co.uk
https://lists.ringingworld.co.uk/listinfo/bell-historians
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ringingworld.co.uk/pipermail/bell-historians/attachments/20260423/8fcbfce7/attachment.htm>