Castle Rushen Papers

This large collection was deposited at the Manx National Heritage Library by the Custodian of Castle Rushen. Many of the documents are fragile. Whilst some have been conserved and are held with accompanying transcriptions, others are still in need of attention. The major themes of the collection are discussed below.

The collection includes a significant number of records relating to the accounts of the Castles (both Peel and Rushen) including many weekly summaries from throughout the sixteenth century. From an initial inspection of the collection, it appears that these records are the constitient parts from which the Books of Charge, Allowance and Pension (as described under the Accounts heading) were annually aggregated.

Various instructions and items of correspondence from the Lord of Man are contained in the archive. (Other items are recorded within record series such as Libri Scaccari, whilst letters sent to the Lord are most likely to appear within the Derby or Atholl papers.)

There are many papers relating to the various courts (particularly the Chancery Court) but these generally don't predate the eighteenth century. The exception is a range of ecclesiastical records dating back to the late sixteenth century. I speculate that these relate only to appealed cases or notices of sufficient import as to involve the temporal administration of the Island.

There are also a substantial number of records relating to the Highways, Harbours and also licences (for public house keepers, dogs and pedlars). These all date from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.