Accounting, Management and Control at Durham Cathedral Priory c. 1250-c. 1420

TL;DRAbstract

This is the first study to be undertaken with the objective of documenting and analysing the accounting records and systems of Durham Cathedral Priory, from which survives one of the largest collections of medieval accounting material in the United Kingdom. It moves beyond the traditional focus of accounting historians on manorial compoti to examine a network of non-manorial accounts and a range of accounting forms beyond the charge and discharge statement. A substantial body of non-accounting primary material is also used in the investigation including charters, registers, and general chapter and visitation records. This study finds that a culture of accounting permeated the activities of the house at all levels from the controls surrounding the receipt of the hundreds of quarters of grain consumed by the house each year to the issue of the individual daily loaf. It also identifies a complexity in the accounts not always appreciated by historians who have consequently misinterpreted a

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