Alisdair Dobie offers a meticulously researched and well-written book that considers the evolution and purpose of the accounting systems and records at the Benedictine Cathedral Priory at Durham between 1083 and 1539. It will appeal in the main to historians of finance and business, but will also be of great interest to historians of medieval monasticism. This book differs from previous books on the monastic economies at Durham and elsewhere: rather than focusing upon a particular section of the considerable surviving archive, Dobie has utilised selected documents representative of the entire surviving corpus of records at Durham. He sets out to analyse the purpose of the records themselves, the ways in which the keeping of financial records developed at Durham over time and whether accounting systems and historical financial documents had a direct impact upon management and administration of the Cathedral Priory throughout the 460-year history of this house. He concludes that this was certainly the case and that the monks of Durham adapted and modified their record-keeping systems throughout the period, kept accurate, balanced accounts, closely monitored arrears and debts and used historical accounts for comparison, particularly when evaluating the assets of the priory. This challenges a number of existing perspectives on the economy of Durham Cathedral Priory, some of which, the author believes, were founded upon erroneous research that had misinterpreted the arithmetic methods used in the accounts while others had analysed only a small sample of documents.

The book has seven chapters. The first two are largely contextual, taking into account that some among the target audience may have only a limited knowledge of the medieval Church and monastic economy. There is a detailed section introducing the reader to the function of a cathedral priory in medieval England, the local and wider significance of Durham Cathedral Priory and the complexities of the monk obedientiary system. Through this system, which varied considerably from place to place, monk officials or obedientiaries administered departments within a religious house on a day-to-day basis. The accounting records that they produced, in the form of compoti, status, rental and other documents, constitute a significant archive of more than 4,500 documents at Durham. It is a selection of these that are the focus of the following three chapters. Because of the great volume of surviving records, the author has used a sampling strategy for his study. For example, he has analysed one bursar’s account for approximately each decade between 1278 and 1536, tabulating the totals for these in Chapters Four and Five. These are considered alongside other obedientiary and manorial accounts, with rentals and surviving status, in which the assets of an office were listed by the incoming and outgoing obedientiary and all are evaluated in the context of external sources that were designed to reform monastic accounting, such as the papal injunctions, statutes of the General Chapter of the Benedictine Order and the surviving records from visitations. He identifies a growing standardisation in accounting form and practice at the end of the thirteenth century, and a parchment trail that enabled auditors to track money and produce so that they could verify that accountants were trustworthy and, in the case of produce, evaluate their average monthly and weekly requirements. Using the accounts of the granator, he establishes that it was possible for the auditors to cross-reference the quantities and produce sent from the various manors to this office and follows them through the records on to the accounts of the baker, brewer and pantler. He proves that at Durham historical financial records were tools of reference used in budgeting, and that they were used retrospectively to predict future yields and income. A significant finding by the author is that the monks of Durham frequently used the long hundred when calculating both grain and monetary values. A failure to appreciate this in previous studies, and failure to take note of the arrears recorded in the accounts, led earlier historians not only to misinterpret the data but also to make unjust allegations of poor arithmetic on the part of the medieval accountants.

This excellent book offers a new perspective on the Durham accounts and on monastic accounts in general, and the clear appendices highlight the amount of material that has yet to be unearthed from this rich archive. The sampling strategy used here allows the author to explore the relationship between patterns of administration that emerged over time at Durham and the financial records generated by these processes. Primarily concerned with the history of the accounting systems at Durham, the comprehensive approach used offers a template for further research not only at Durham but also for monastic archives elsewhere. It makes an important contribution to existing knowledge, which will be of significant value for those who are currently undertaking research in this area, and, additionally, for those new to the subject area it offers an essential guide to the many complexities of medieval accounting.