A contract written on parchment and dating from 1215 is to go on display in Wigan this year.
The contract which outlines a deal to rent land in Worthington near Standish, is one of the oldest records in public ownership in the country.
Archive experts believe the document dates from 1215, the year the Magna Carta was written. It comes from a pre-industrial era when most of Wigan was farmland.
The deal is between wealthy land-owner Thomas de Worthington, who owned much of modern day Standish, and Richard, son of Orm de Bleinschoc, who agreed to rent land in the Coppull area for an annual rent of five pence in silver.
Alex Miller, Wigan Council’s archive manager, said: “This is the oldest document in our archive collection and among a very small number of records of this age held across the country.
“It was written at a time when English society was very much an oral culture when it came to recording agreements and making records. People were beginning to understand for the first time that having a written record of an event or agreement was of importance for proving ownership, settling disputes and ensuring your rights and those of your heirs could be upheld.
“Although the document is not itself dated, we have worked out from information known about the lives of those mentioned that it likely dates from 1215 – the same year as Magna Carta, which will be celebrating 800 years as well in 2015.
“The contract is written in Latin on parchment – animal skin – and is essentially a contract for the rental of some land.
“The land concerned was in the Coppull area and owned by Thomas de Worthington. The terms of the contract, which describe in detail the land to be rented, gave the land over to the use of Richard, son of Orm de Bleinschoc, in return for an annual rent of five pence in silver.”
The contract is kept in Wigan Council’s archives in Leigh and is always available for the public to view. Plans to display the contract in the Museum of Wigan Life during 2015 are currently being discussed and an announcement will be made in the New Year.
