[Footnote 78-1: [From Fenn, ii. 330.] Fenn supposes with great
probability that this letter was written in 1484, the year of
Margaret Paston’s death. No earlier date is possible, seeing that
even in 1484 John Paston’s eldest son was only in his seventh
year, and he had at the date of this letter two sons capable of
being sent on messages; so that, if anything, we should be
inclined to put it later. But we know of no later death in the
family that could have occasioned the writing of such a letter,
and the time of Margaret Paston’s death and of the proving of her
will agree very well with Fenn’s hypothesis. From the calendar
prefixed to an old MS. missal in the possession of the late Mr. C.
W. Reynell, I found that she died on the 4th November 1484. Her
will was proved at Norwich on the 18th December following.]
[Footnote 78-2: Widow of William Lovel, Lord Morley, who died the
26th of July 1476.--F.]
[Footnote 79-1: Sir Miles Stapleton died in 1466. His widow
Catherine seems to have married in the following year Sir Richard
Harcourt of Ellenhale (Blomefield, ix. 321), but, according to a
practice not uncommon at that time, she may have retained the name
of Lady Stapleton.]
[Footnote 79-2: ‘Places of worship’; _i.e._, in families of
distinction.]
[Footnote 79-3: To make up accounts.]
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