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Henry Neville's Bond-Maturity Schedule, 1598-1599

Mixed Ready evidence packet

Verified Sourced Facts

Royal Berkshire Archives D/EN/F6/1/5 is an unsigned private schedule headed:

A note of my bonds when they growe due

It contains nine maturity entries whose written sums total £1,709. The first-person wording and preservation among Sir Henry Neville's correspondence and memoranda make Neville the probable debtor. The leaf does not name or sign him, and its hand has not been independently authenticated.

The public catalogue endpoint returned a temporary gateway error during the 2026 re-audit. The shelfmark remains the archival locator; the transcription below is controlled from the manuscript photograph rather than catalogue text.

Controlled Transcription

To S^r John Spencer — 215^li — 12 febru: 1598

To D^r [Best/West?] — 210^li — 12 Novemb: 1598

To M^r [Parrie?] — 215^li — 12 februar: 1598

To M^rs [Parrie?] — 215^li — 6 februar: 1598

To richard waynwright — 107^li 10^s — 6 febr: 1598

To M^r rafe newbery — 102^li 10^s — Augusti 1598

To my cosen [garret/garnet?] — 220^li — 29 Martij 1599

To W^m More — 109^li — Maij 1599

To M^r Wood — 315^li — 15 Novem [17? febr: 1598 cancelled]

The August and May entries omit a day. Mr Wood's original February maturity was cancelled and replaced by 15 Novem; the replacement has no year. The cancelled day looks most like 17, but the deletion prevents certainty.

This re-audit corrects an important inherited error. The second line is not a ditto Spencer entry: it reads D^r followed by a surname ending in est. The initial capital remains bounded as [Best/West?].

Date Sequence

The February 1598 entries use the English legal year and correspond to February 1599 in modern year numbering. The secure sequence is:

Modern placementCreditor entryAmount
August 1598, day absentRafe Newbery£102 10s
12 November 1598Dr [Best/West?]£210
6 February 1599Mrs [Parrie?]£215
6 February 1599Richard Waynwright£107 10s
12 February 1599Sir John Spencer£215
12 February 1599Mr [Parrie?]£215
29 March 1599cousin [garret/garnet?]£220
May 1599, day absentWilliam More£109
15 November, year absentMr Wood£315

The £1,600 Plus £109 Pattern

Every written figure can be compared with a round multiple of £100:

Written amountRound comparison baseDifferenceDifference as share of base
£215£200£157.5%
£210£200£105%
£215£200£157.5%
£215£200£157.5%
£107 10s£100£7 10s7.5%
£102 10s£100£2 10s2.5%
£220£200£2010%
£109£100£99%
£315£300£155%
£1,709£1,600£1096.8125% aggregate

This is a real numerical pattern and a useful search method. Researchers should look for instruments with principals of £100, £200, or £300 as well as for the full maturity figures. It is not yet an interest calculation. The leaf never uses the words principal, interest, penalty, consideration, or usury, and the execution dates and conditions of the bonds are absent.

Two contemporary books establish the legal and moral vocabulary without solving this schedule. William West's *First Part of Symboleography* describes obligations in terms of the thing due and its time, place, and manner of payment. Thomas Wilson's *Discourse upon Usury* calls an “ouerplus or excesse aboue the principal” usury. Neither work establishes that the £109 difference here is interest.

Creditor Reading and Identification Audit

Sir John Spencer

S^r John Spencer is secure, but the schedule supplies no office, residence, or occupation. The wealthy former lord mayor and Sir John Spencer of Althorp are both chronological candidates. The leaf cannot choose between them.

Dr [Best/West?]

The title is D^r, not d^o. The surname's final est is visible, while the initial capital can reasonably be read as B or W. No identity should be built on this line until another document supplies the same name in a more distinct hand.

Mr and Mrs [Parrie?]

The schedule has separate £215 maturities for a man and woman with the same uncertain surname, six days apart. Direct inspection favors [Parrie?], but the medial strokes remain difficult. Thomas Parry and Dorothy Brooke form a reasonable Berkshire search path; they are not identified by the leaf.

Richard Waynwright

Richard Waynwright is a secure full-name reading. He is not Richard Washington of Windsor, the obligee in the adjacent but separate 1593 obligation. The inherited Waynman comparison is therefore withdrawn.

Rafe Newbery

M^r rafe newbery is secure. Ralph Newbery the London printer-publisher is a serious candidate because of the exact name and date. The DNB entry records that Newbery was master of the Stationers' Company in 1598 and that his name appeared on major publications of the period. The schedule gives no trade or address, so a bond or receipt for £100 or £102 10s due in August 1598 is still required.

The former claim that Ralph Newbery himself had a Waltham St Lawrence connection is removed. It was not established by the source used here and risked conflation with other Newberys in Neville's estate network.

“my cosen [garret/garnet?]”

The kin term is clear; the surname is not. Its middle strokes permit garret or garnet, so both the kinship and spelling must be tested.

The Garrard route has a genuine genealogical basis. Robert Cooke's *Visitation of London*, printed p. 5, shows Mary, daughter of Sir John Gresham, married to Sir Thomas Rowe, and their daughter Elizabeth married to Sir William Garrard of Dorney. Neville's maternal Gresham descent makes this a rational affinity to investigate. It does not identify the creditor or define the word cosen.

Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger is a separate spelling-and-date lead, not a family identification. The DNB entry) records the forms Marks Garratt, Marcus Garrard, and Marcus Garret. The GrECI portrait record dates Neville's portrait to 1599 and attributes it to Marcus Geeraerts the Younger with a question mark.

The coincidence warrants an account search, not a portrait-payment claim. The object record supplies no March commission date; the schedule supplies no forename or occupation; cosen is unexplained; and the surname may instead read Garnet.

William More and Mr Wood

W^m More and M^r Wood are secure but too common for identification from this leaf. Wood's maturity alteration is important because searches must test both the cancelled February date and an unassigned 15 November.

Relation to the Proposed Wadley Purchase

The schedule belongs to the same archive file and year as the memorandum for a proposed £9,800 purchase of the Wadley leasehold complex. The £1,709 maturity total is about 17.44 per cent of that proposed price. This demonstrates scale, not purpose. No creditor entry names Wadley, Unton, Knightley, Wentworth, or Shellingford, and archival adjacency cannot establish that these bonds financed an estate acquisition.

Research Program

  1. Search the Neville, Unton, Parry, Spencer, More, Wood, and related Chancery

    2. papers for both each full maturity figure and the round comparison base.

  2. Search for Dr Best and Dr West without choosing between them in advance;

    3. compare the capital with another securely named document in this hand.

  3. Compare the repeated [Parrie?] form against securely named Parry documents,

    4. then look for paired £200 or £215 obligations.

  4. Search Stationers' Company, probate, and business records for a Newbery

    5. instrument due in August 1598.

  5. Build the Gresham–Rowe–Garrard affinity from visitations, wills, and marriage

    6. settlements and identify adults who could be called Neville's cousin.

  6. Search Audley End and Gheeraerts provenance or conservation files for a

    7. portrait commission or payment, while keeping this route separate from the family-Garrard hypothesis.

  7. Search Mr Wood under both the cancelled February date and 15 November,

    8. without supplying an unsupported November year.

Publication Rule

Publish the controlled text, explicit uncertainty, and numerical pattern. Do not turn Newbery, Parry, Garrard, Gheeraerts, Spencer, Best, or West from a search candidate into an identified creditor without an underlying instrument or independent transaction record.

Public Sources