ANCIENT LONDON CUSTOM

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 68, 22 March 1935, Page 8

ANCIENT LONDON CUSTOM

SURNAME AS SIGNATURE. Sir James Bell, the retiring Town Clerk of the City of London, whose briliant service has been the subject of appreciative references by the Lord Mayor and members of the City Corporation, signed all notices with his surname alone.—Bell. in so doing, writes a representative of the Observer, he followed, as his predecessors did, a custom which has been traced back to John Carpenter, the famous Common Clerk of the fifteenth century, who was one of the four executors of the will of Richard Whittington, and in 1436 was elected one of the representatives of the City in Parliament. lu the Record Room at Guildhall among the treasured archives of the city is the great Libra Albus, or White Book, containing the mosE intimate details of the city’s affairs and laws, written in the fine script of the period on beautifully illuminated pages. This book, which must have taken some years to compile, was completed in the last mayoralty of Richard Whittington. Right across the flyleaf in large script, illuminated by a floral scroll, is inscribed just the surname of the Common Clerk—Carpenter. When the book, in its oak and brass binding, was examined a few weeks ago, the letters of the name were measured. The height of the initial C was found to "be IJin., of the remaining letters £in. and the whole width of the name Thus John Carpenter inscribed his surname boldly on the flyleaf of this historic volume, and thus through five centuries the custom for the Town Clerk of the City of London to sign official notices with his surname alone has been duly carried on.

One thing, however, while particularly appropriate to his work on the Libra Albus, was peculiar to John Carpenter, and that was his title ‘‘Secretary” to the City. It has been borne by no other civic dignitary either before his time or since.