Papers of the Bishops

 

 

The Church of England is run by Bishops, each governing a geographical area called a diocese or bishopric.  With people moving to live and work in different places, particularly the growth of towns and cities and factory employment, the boundaries of dioceses have changed. Harby was in the diocese of Lincoln until 1837, then Peterborough until 1926 and then Leicester.

 

In the past every few years the bishop or his archdeacon visited every church in his diocese to check on the physical condition (was the roof in a good repair) and activities (were the children receiving proper instruction in the Christian faith). He often used a paper questionnaire as part of a Visitation.

 

Building work on a church needed written approval from the Bishop and his officers, called a Faculty.

 

Here are transcriptions of the Visitations and Faculties that have survived.

 

Visitations and Faculties continue to this day as part of the governance of the church. The visitations are now usually carried out by the archdeacon.

 

The bishops also made inventories from time to time of the items held by the church.

 

Click on the links below to read the documents. They are given here with the generous permission of the Record Office for Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland, the Record Office for  Lincolnshire and the Northamptonshire Record Office

 

BISHOP OF LINCOLN

 

1553 Inventory

 

1708 Terrier

 

1718  Visitation

 

1721 Visitation

 

1777 Visitation

 

1795 Visitation

 

1832 Visitation

 

BISHOP OF PETERBOROUGH

 

1838 Visitation

 

1842 Visitation

 

1857  Visitation

 

1863  Visitation

 

1867 Visitation

 

1872 Visitation

 

1874 Faculty

 

 

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