_Churchwardens._--In an old scrap-book in my possession, I met with the
following, which, should you deem it of sufficient interest, I shall be
glad to see inserted in "N. & Q." The print appears to be about sixty or
seventy years old, and evidently from a newspaper:
"The institution of churchwardens is of remote antiquity, they having
been first appointed at the African Council, held under Celestine and
Boniface, about the year of our Lord 423. These officers have at
different periods been distinguished by different appellations,
_Defensores_, _Oeconomi_, and _Praepositi Ecclesiae_, _Testes
Synodales_, &c. In the time of Edward III. they were called Church
Reves, as we read in Chaucer:
'Of church reves, and of testamentes,
Of contractes, and of lacke of sacramentes.'
At this day they are called Churchwardens; all those names being
expressive of the nature of the office, which is to guard, preserve,
and superintend the rights, revenues, buildings, and furniture of the
church. In an old churchwarden's book of accounts, belonging to the
parish of Farringdon, in the county of Berks, and bearing date A.D.
1518, there is the form of admitting churchwardens into their office at
that period, in the following words: 'Cherchye Wardenys, thys shall be
your charge: to be true to God and to the cherche: for love nor for
favor off no man wythin thys parriche to withold any ryght to the
cherche; but to resseve the dettys to hyt belongythe, or else to go to
the devell.'"
Your readers will observe that the last is a very summary kind of sentence.
Any farther information relating to the institution of churchwardens[1]
will be esteemed by