COLYTON

A number of rates survive for this market town located six miles south-west of Axminster and three miles north of Seaton. The Dean and Chapter of Exeter were the patrons of the parish church. The fall of the Courtenay family with the execution on 9 December 1538 of Henry Marquess of Exeter brought substantial local independence to Colyton; in 1547 the Crown sold the manor to twenty residents of the town (see p.000). Colyton has the most explicit quote regarding taxation in this period. In 1637 Richard Drake, a gentleman, complained that he was slandered when Joan Sincock said ‘Joan Dodge is thine whore and if that my cunt had been as good as Joan Dodge's I had not paid so much to the rate’.

37. COLYTON, Church Rate, 1579

DHC, 1585F/14/8a

Note: This rate has been written on two pieces of paper which were folded and stitched with brown thread to make up pages measuring 8 inches in width and 12 inches in length. Half of one of the pieces of paper has not survived. The document includes expenses notably for communion bread and wine, the recording of christenings, marriages and burials, and twelve pence ‘paid to the bellfounder in earnest’.

The accompe made by William bocknolle of puddelbrydge and Robert Dolbere of cadden Wardens in the yeare of our Lord god 1579 as followethe

Recepts

38. COLYTON, Church Rate, 1618

Colyton Feoffees Archive, Colyton Town Hall, Great Book, page 9

Note: This book, which has not been paginated, measures some 17 inches in length and 11¾ inches in width. It is part of a small collection of manuscripts which have not been lodged by the feoffees in the Devon Heritage Centre. This page is headed ‘The account of John Tirlinge & Edward Michell then Churchwardens’. Included in the receipts is income from seat rentals, knells and graves. A list of payments follows including for communion bread and wine.

39. COLYTON, Poor Rate, 1639

DHC, 1585F/14/9c

Note: This rate is incorporated within a churchwarden account in which there are three copies dated (A) 9 June, (B) 1 September and (C) 26 June. Rate C has been edited below. Rate A has additional entries for those who occupied lands and tenements which belonged to Walter Yonge and other men and women.