Record title: St Mary's
Churchwardens'
Accounts
Repository:
HRO
Shelfmark: 44M81/PW1
Repository location: Winchester
Fordingbridge was a large parish located on the river Avon and the Hampshire border with Dorset. The main road from the Dorset coast ran through Ringwood and then crossed the Avon at Fordingbridge, where it met a road coming west from Southampton. The roads thus brought a good deal of traffic through the parish. The parish church is dedicated to St Mary the Virgin.
In addition to churchwardens' accounts for 1490 to 1506, the manuscript contains notes of church collections from 1507 to 1521, inventories of church goods from 1490 and 1536, and various memoranda.
The payments to 'wynchestyr' for dancing silver in 1490–1 and 1491–2 probably do not refer to the city but instead to a person: on f [7] is an 'Item to Weynchastyr v s.' Wynchestyr may have been paid for dancing or providing dancing for the parish's own festivities at Fordingbridge, perhaps for the church ale mentioned in the 1491–2 accounts.
1490–1536; Latin and English; paper; 295mm x 105mm; 0 + 39 + 0; unnumbered; mostly good condition, though with some fading and discolouration due to damp; original parchment cover, blank.