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Biography

Taverner’s election for Lyme in 1417 may be attributed to his close connexion with the Brooke family, who owned land in and around the town and at this date were responsible for the payment of the fee farm at the Exchequer. In 1414 he had acted as attorney for Sir Thomas Brooke* in a case of novel disseisin arraigned before the Dorchester assizes, and many years later in 1432 he was to be associated with Brooke’s widow in a conveyance of estates in Dorset, Somerset and Northamptonshire to Ralph Bush*. Then, in 1438, along with Brooke’s son and heir, the (Sir) Thomas who had sat for Somerset in the same Parliament to which he himself had been elected, he was involved in transactions concerning the Chideok and Bush estates in Dorset. That same year he made a quitclaim to Sir Thomas of all of the Brooke family lands of which he had been a feoffee. When Sir Thomas made his will in 1439 he named Taverner as one of those ‘trew servandys’ who were to be given lordship and friendship by his widow in the face of the ‘malice’ of his children. Otherwise, nothing is known of Taverner beyond his appearance at Ilchester for the Somerset election to the Parliament of 1432.

JUST 1/1529 m. 16; Dorset Feet of Fines, ii. 308, 318. 357; CCR, 1435-41, pp. 87-88, 189; CPR, 1441-6, p. 34; Fifty Earliest Eng. Wills (EETS lxxviii), 130; C219/14/3.

Ref Volumes: 1386-1421

Author: L. S. Woodger

Notes