Monastic records

Religious houses were also a fertile source of medieval documents, many of which fortunately survived the Dissolution of the Monasteries under Henry VIII. Cartularies have already been discussed. As well as preserving copies of the charters of their benefactors, religious houses often recorded the dates of their deaths. These notes were usually connected with the commemoration of the anniversary of death, so that - irritatingly for the genealogist - the yeare of death is often omitted. Often, the monks also wrote accounts of their founders' families, which are among the earliest English family histories. Unfortunately, they are also among the worst - J.H.Round describes them as a 'class of narratives notoriously inaccurate and corrupt' - and they should be treated as secondary sources to be confirmed (or otherwise) by the records. A number of them were printed, with many charters and other material, in Dugdale's Monasticon.

As well as being among the first family historians, monks were among the earliest political and military historians. Medieval monastic chronicles developed from brief notes of important events for each year, into detailed narrative accounts of historical events. Of course, the medieval historians can hardly be expected to be accurate about events that were distant from them in either time or space. The chronicles are most valuable when they are contemporary, and particularly when the writer benefits from local knowledge. Though the chroniclers' focus is obviously on events that are 'notable' in some way, their narratives are sufficiently detailed that they mention many of the knightly, or manor-holding, classes. They may also include references to relatively obscure local events, especially if the interests of the monastery were involved. One example that deserves to be singled out, because it contains so much genealogical information about the Norman aristocracy in the otherwise barren period immediately after the conquest, is the Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis, an English-born monk of St Evroult in Normandy.