644 SUNDRY ARTICLES. 



ai y. the dozen in 1399, and by the quire in 1379; this word 

 meaning, I suppose, that the parchment was cut into the 

 ordinary shape in which medieval books were written. It 

 would be absurd to think cc that parchment was a sub- 

 stance too expensive to be readily spared for mere purposes 

 of literature," when a quire and four leaves could be purchased 

 for >jd. Mr. Hallam, it is true, is speaking of the eleventh and 

 twelfth centuries; but though parchment might have been 

 commoner, and perhaps cheaper, one or two centuries after 

 the period on which he is commenting, it could not have been 

 unknown or inaccessible before. 



Vellum is quoted during the first quarter of the fourteenth 

 century, by the skin in 1301, when it is sold at j^., by the 

 dozen in 1307 and 1308. In the first of these years it costs 

 31. 4^. the dozen, in the second we find two prices, 6s. and 

 3*. id. All these entries are from Merton College accounts. 

 It is bought by the sextary at Bicester in the year 1326. This 

 word probably denotes a shape as well as a number. 



In 1310 Merton College buys a certain amount of paper 

 c pro registro.' This was probably cotton paper, and of the 

 same character as that of the Bordeaux Customs register in the 

 Public Record Office. The register made by the college has 

 perished. It is probable that it was used for entering the 

 books which the fellows borrowed from time to time out of 

 the college library. Such loans of books were always entered, 

 technically as indentures, but it does not seem that any 

 counterpart was delivered to the borrower. 



I have elsewhere adverted to the remarkably early specimen 

 of paper made from linen rags in the archives of this college. 

 It probably came from London, as it is a bill of spices bought 

 for a feast at Elham. This paper is very coarse and loose, 

 fragments of the original fabric being still visible in its texture. 

 The date of the bill is 1332. 



But wired and water-marked 3 paper is found soon after- 



* The earliest water-mark which I have yet discovered is that in a document bearing 

 the date 1350, and preserved in the Public Record Office. The device, which is very 



