Churchwardens' accounts are a form of record maintained by the

churchwarden A churchwarden is a lay official in a parish or congregation of the Anglican Communion, Lutheran Churches or Catholic Church, usually working as a part-time volunteer. In the Anglican tradition, holders of these positions are ''ex officio'' mem ...

s of a

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in com ...

where expenses, activities, and events of the parish are recorded. Churchwardens' accounts are sometimes found in association with the parish register, which records ritual matters. These records have been extensively utilized to study European history, particularly during the medieval period and the

English Reformation The English Reformation began in 16th-century England when the Church of England broke away first from the authority of the pope and bishops Oath_of_Supremacy, over the King and then from some doctrines and practices of the Catholic Church ...

. England has the highest proportion of surviving churchwardens' accounts.

Description

The

, the oldest officer position within Christian

es, was generally elected by an urban congregation once a year at

Easter Easter, also called Pascha ( Aramaic: פַּסְחָא , ''paskha''; Greek: πάσχα, ''páskha'') or Resurrection Sunday, is a Christian festival and cultural holiday commemorating the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, described in t ...

. According to historian Beat Kümin, a churchwarden's role was analogous to that of a

chief executive officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a chief executive or managing director, is the top-ranking corporate officer charged with the management of an organization, usually a company or a nonprofit organization. CEOs find roles in variou ...

, with lay congregants comprising the parish's "shareholders" and the masters or

feoffee Under the feudal system in England, a feoffee () is a trustee who holds a fief (or "fee"), that is to say an estate in land, for the use of a beneficial owner. The term is more fully stated as a feoffee to uses of the beneficial owner. The use ...

s comprising the parish's "board". Among their duties were managing the parish's accounts. The accounts recorded both the expenses and income of the parish, often indicating which parishioners were renting from the parish. Churchwardens were also responsible for annually certifying the accuracy of parish registers before they were submitted to the

bishop A bishop is an ordained member of the clergy who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance and administration of di ...

. Churchwardens' accounts are sometimes found in association with parish registers. Churchwardens' accounts appear in medieval and post-

Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major Theology, theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the p ...

Europe, including both

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

and

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the State religion#State churches, established List of Christian denominations, Christian church in England and the Crown Dependencies. It is the mother church of the Anglicanism, Anglican Christian tradition, ...

parishes. On the

British Isles The British Isles are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner Hebrides, Inner and Outer Hebr ...

, churchwardens' accounts are most prevalent in England, followed by Wales and Ireland, but are not readily found from Scotland. Overall, England has the highest proportion of churchwardens' accounts. The

Borthwick Institute for Archives The Borthwick Institute for Archives is the specialist archive service of the University of York, York, England. It is one of the biggest archive repositories outside London. The Borthwick was founded in 1953 as The Borthwick Institute of Histori ...

collection of accounts date from the late 14th century through to the 1980s. The 17th century produced an increasing number now held in that collection, with the majority coming from the 18th and 19th centuries. While some English accounts were made in Latin into the 18th century, the majority were written in the vernacular.

Historical significance

The role of churchwardens' accounts in the study of life within particular parishes has been significant. In the context of English history near the beginning of the 16th century, Kümin described them as "promis ngunrivalled insights into the public lives of the vast majority of the population", as the one thing most Englishmen had in common at the time was that "they were parishioners". Historian Clive Burgess criticised the usage of churchwardens' accounts, saying that historians with agendas engaged in uncritical acceptance of churchwardens' accounts and that the role of the churchwarden within parochial governance had become overstated. The value of churchwardens' accounts to

genealogist Genealogy () is the study of families, family history, and the tracing of their Lineage (anthropology), lineages. Genealogists use oral interviews, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family ...

s is diminished relative to other parish records as the accounts were rarely indexed. In England, the historical value of churchwardens' accounts has seen efforts to establish a database collecting them to improve accessibility and encourage their utilization. In 2012, researchers at the Warwick Network for Parish Research's annual conference called for the establishment of such a database. Reprinted editions of churchwardens' accounts have been produced. Churchwardens' accounts have been used extensively by historian

Eamon Duffy Eamon Duffy (born 9 February 1947) is an Irish historian. He is the emeritus professor of the History of Christianity at the University of Cambridge, and a fellow and former president of Magdalene College. Early life Duffy was born on 9 Februa ...

in his books '' The Stripping of the Altars'' (1992) and '' The Voices of Morebath''. In the case of ''The Voices of Morebath'', Duffy extensively relied upon the 16th-century accounts of Sir Christopher Trychay, the vicar of Morebath's parish, which had been reprinted.

Patrick Collinson Patrick "Pat" Collinson (10 August 1929 – 28 September 2011) was an English historian, known as a writer on the Elizabethan era, particularly Elizabethan Puritanism. He was emeritus Regius Professor of Modern History, University of Cambrid ...

criticised the "misleading, if conventional", characterisation of Trychay's records as "churchwarden's accounts", as they were a broader set of records beyond those generally maintained by churchwardens.

References

{{Portal bar, Christianity, Catholicism, History, Books, England Catholic canonical documents Christian manuscripts Genealogy Manuscripts by type Medieval manuscripts