Agricultural History Review, Volume 51 Part 2 (2003), p. 229

Volume I of the Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem preserved in the Public Record Office, covering the reign of Henry III, was published as long ago as 1904. It is therefore something of a shock to be reminded that calendaring of the fifteenth-century IPMs remains on-going, with the reigns of Henry VI and Edward IV outstanding. In part this is because of the sheer mass of documentation to be processed but it also reflects the widespread historical perception that the IPMs are of dubious reliability and the later IPMs especially so. To have promoted such a view of one of the most comprehensive and useful of all sources bearing upon issues of land-ownership, property, and land-use during the later middle ages must rank as one of the most remarkable own goals ever scored by historians. This detailed calendar of 964 IPMs and related documents from the last five years of the reign of Henry V (1418–22) is therefore very much to be welcomed. The sheer wealth and variety of the information that it summarizes, concerning landlords and their heirs, tenants and their holdings, rents and services, buildings and their value, mills and other assets, and much else besides should go a long way towards reinstating these fifteenth-century IPMs as an important source, not least by greatly facilitating their use. Indeed, the detail and consistency of the information given in this, the twenty-first volume in the series, is far superior to that provided in the earliest volumes. Over a hundred pages of indexes also make it very easy to locate relevant people, places, and subjects.

Here is information for virtually every county in England and a cross section of almost 450 land-owners. The latter range from the duchess of York and earls of Devon and of Oxford at one social extreme to individuals as humble as William Appelyerd of East Carleton in Norfolk (who died possessed of half a messuage and 13 acres of arable) at the other. In contrast to the earliest IPMs, dating from the reigns of Henry III and Edward I, it is the properties of the lay gentry, rather than the aristocracy, that dominate this calendar. Women also feature more prominently and account for over a quarter of those recorded. Of the men, almost a third are described as knights, a sixth as esquires, and half had no title at all. Imperfect though the IPMs may be, without them many of these lesser landowners and their properties would be unrecorded. With the publication of this excellent calendar there is no longer any excuse for them passing unnoticed.