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Vice-Chancellor's Court probate records, 1498 - 1957

 Sub-Fonds
Reference Code: GBR/0265/UA/VCCt.Probate

Scope and Contents

The Chancellor had successfully claimed probate of the wills of members of the University and others, known as privileged persons, from at least the early fourteenth century. Although technically the Chancellor's Court, by the sixteenth century the Vice-Chancellor presided.
The Act 20 and 21 Victoria c.77 abolished testamentary jurisdiction of all existing courts substituting for them a single Court of Probate in London with a Principal Registry and District Registries throughout the kingdom. It ordered the deposit in future of all original wills in the Principal Registry and required the transfer of testamentary records of all existing courts to the Registry concerned, Principal or District as the case may be. The testamentary records of Cambridge were transferred to the Registry at Peterborough where they remained until returned to the University Archives in 1956.

Dates

  • Creation: 1498 - 1957

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

From the Management Group:

The University Archives are generally freely available to the holder of a reader's ticket for the Manuscripts Reading Room at Cambridge University Library, West Road, Cambridge CB3 9DR. Restrictions on access are imposed on certain categories of sensitive record: financial, governmental and personal, by order of the originating body or under data protection legislation. Access information, including opening hours and how to obtain a reader's ticket, appears as part of the Library's web site (www.lib.cam.ac.uk).

Language of Materials

English

Other Finding Aids

There is an alphabetical card index to probate records available for consultation in the reading room of the Department of Manuscripts and University Archives.

Date information

DateText: bulk sixteenth to nineteenth centuries.

Finding aid date

1998-05-06 16:01:42+00:00

Repository Details

Part of the Cambridge University Library Repository

Contact:
Cambridge University Library
West Road
Cambridge CB3 9DR United Kingdom