Most family historians start with the censuses and BMD indexes, before working back through the records in the parish chest. Reaching the 16th century, and the start of parish registers, can seem like the end of your family history research. However, with a lot of hard work and a bit of luck, it is possible to take ancestors from all levels of society back deep into the medieval period. Perhaps your ancestor fought alongside William the Conqueror in 1066? Alternatively, maybe they farmed their lord’s manor, fought at Agincourt or paid the infamous 14th century Poll Tax. A wealth of medieval records survives. Try the top ten listed below to find your ancestors.

1. Heraldic visitations
If you have higher status ancestors, you may find that some of the work has already been done for you. Heraldic visitations were made by teams of royal heralds in the 16th centuries. The heralds toured England and Wales, enquiring into the descent of families who claimed gentry status. They then produced family pedigrees, which can be found in the Harley manuscripts in the British Library. You won’t need to go back to the original manuscripts to research your family, since transcripts have been published by the Harleian Society. You can find many online at thegenealogist.co.uk (see our article about them in the Discover Your Ancestors Periodical, November 2014 here) or at heraldry-online.org.uk; alternatively, try your local record office’s library.

Only higher-status ancestors will appear but, if your family are recorded, you may find a pedigree taking you all the way back to 1066. Do be cautious, since pedigrees can contain errors. Since gentry families tended to inter-marry, you should be able to cross-reference with other families to assist you. For example, in Shropshire, Anne (or Agnes) Blount of Kinlet married Richard Lacon of Willey in the early 16th century. Both families were prominent enough to be included in the visitations, allowing descendants of the couple to follow both lines.

2. Inquisitions post mortem
Try looking for wealthy ancestors in inquisitions post mortem, which were held by the Royal Escheator (a king’s official responsible for upholding the king’s feudal rights) of a county in which a deceased person held land. Their purpose was to enquire into the deceased’s landholding, the terms under which they held it and the details of their heir. The heir’s relationship to the deceased and their age are also usually given. Although only high-status individuals will be the subjects of an inquisition, you may find your lower-status ancestors listed among the jurors, who were drawn from local people.

Since manors tended to be passed down through families, you may be able to trace a chain of inquisitions back to the 13th century. The inquisition for Brian de Brompton, which was held in 1294, confirmed that he was survived by two daughters: Margaret “aged one year and more” and Elizabeth “aged nine weeks”. He held the manor of Kinlet in Shropshire. The 1354 inquisition for Edmund de Cornwall confirmed that he had acquired Kinlet from his wife, the younger daughter of Brian de Brompton. His heir was his son, Edmund, who was aged “thirty years and more”.

Inquisitions are in Latin and are held by The National Archives. Printed calendars, with abstracts in English are particularly helpful, and can be found in most record office libraries (ask for the Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem and Other Analogous Documents Preserved in the Public Record Office). They are still a work in progress, although volumes exist for the period 1236-1447 and 1485-1509. Also, keep an eye on inquisitionspostmortem.ac.uk for a project to publish inquisitions online.

3. Manorial documents
Although higher-status ancestors tend to be the most visible in the records, it is also possible to trace peasant forebears. In the medieval period, land was divided into manors, which were held by a lord. They were farmed by peasants, who will appear regularly in surviving manorial documents, most of which will be manor court rolls or manor accounts.

Since peasants tended not to be very mobile, if you can find your ancestors on a particular manor, it is likely that they will have remained there for several generations. Survival of the records tends to be patchy. You can search for what survives by using the Manorial Documents Register (this is being integrated into TNA’s Discovery search engine, discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk). A search for Kinlet in Shropshire, for example, shows that the records are held in the Shropshire Archives.

Manorial documents are great for providing detail about the lives of your peasant ancestors. The 1373-4 accounts for the manor of Earnwood in Shopshire show a William Elf who owed rent for the land he farmed, while a Roger Elf sold wood for £4 6s 8d on behalf of the lord of the manor. The Elf family were prosperous enough to also farm land in the neighbouring manor of Kinlet, where William appears with his wife Isabella in the 1381 poll tax return.

4. Tax records
They say in life that nothing is certain except death and taxes, and this was also true of the medieval period. Before the 13th century, tax liability was based on land ownership and only higher-status ancestors will appear in surviving records. From the late 12th century, lay subsidies were also charged, which were taxes levied for a specific purpose, such as to pay for the king’s daughter’s marriage. Many subsidy rolls have been transcribed and can be found in libraries and, sometimes, online at sites such as www.archive.org. The surviving records are usually held at The National Archives and you can search for them in the E179 database (nationalarchives.gov.uk ).

The most interesting medieval tax documents relate to the Poll Taxes levied in 1377, 1379 and 1381, which are usually held responsible for sparking the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381. Transcripts of the surviving documents have been published in the three volumes of Carolyn Fenwick’s The Poll Taxes of 1377, 1379 and 1381 (Oxford, 1998-2005). Only beggars and the impoverished were exempt from paying, meaning that your ancestors will feature. Records are arranged by manor, with occupations and the amount assessed listed.

Tax records can be great for getting an idea of your ancestor’s position in the community. The 1571 lay subsidy for Shropshire, for example, names Thomas and Humphrey Southall as the third and fourth wealthiest members of the community at Kinlet, with goods assessed as being worth £5 8s 4d each. Members of the Southall family appear in documents over several centuries at Kinlet, such as the farmer Henry Southall and his wife, Agnes, who paid the 1381 Poll Tax. Their descendants became increasingly more prominent and prosperous over the next 200 years.

See also our article on tax records in issue 3 of Discover Your Ancestors, and the article about the 17th century hearth tax on page 118 of this issue.

5. Domesday Book
The famous Domesday Book was itself a tax document, compiled on the orders of William the Conqueror in 1086 in order to provide a survey of landholding in England. Although only the very highest status members of society are listed, you may find that your ancestor appears. Even if not, Domesday provides fascinating details about the manor on which your ancestors lived, both after the Conquest and in the time of Edward the Confessor. Copies are easy to obtain and you can also view it online at thegenealogist.co.uk. Kinlet, for example, was held in 1086 by Richard of Brampton, who is likely to have been an ancestor of the Brian de Brompton who died in 1294. At that time, the manor was made up of 23 households.

6. Church monuments
Although few medieval graves survive in churchyards, most churches from the period will include memorials to deceased parishioners. Before the Reformation, most people believed that, after their death, their soul would spend time in purgatory. This period could be reduced by the prayers of the living and, over the centuries, increasingly elaborate tombs were built in order to illicit the prayers of observers.

If you have higher-status ancestors, it is well worth visiting their local parish church, as you may just find a memorial. Table tombs, showing a recumbent effigy of the deceased, were particularly popular, as were memorial brasses. In both cases, the monuments should provide you with a representation of your ancestor and an inscription with some details of their life. The children of the deceased also commonly appear as ‘weepers’, which are small figures depicted on the tomb. The 11 children of Sir John and Katherine Blount appear on two sides of their tomb chest in Kinlet Church, for example.

7. Military records
Until 1660, England had no standing army, with soldiers instead raised to fight in particular military campaigns. A surprising number of military records survive, for all ranks of soldiers. For the Battle of Hastings itself, try Anthony Camp’s My Ancestors Came With the Conqueror, which includes a list of names taken from the medieval Battle Abbey Roll, detailing the higher-status men who came to England with William the Conqueror in 1066. You can also find records relating to the Hundred Years War of the 14th and 15th centuries (including Henry V’s Agincourt campaign) online at medievalsoldier.org. This lists all known individuals who fought, from lowly archers to noblemen.

You can also look for muster rolls, which contain details of the men available to fight in a particular area. J Gibson and A Dell’s Tudor and Stuart Muster Rolls (Federation of Family History Societies, 1989) gives details of what exists from the 16th and 17th centuries and where you can find it. Earlier muster rolls are rarer and tend to be less detailed, although you may find them at your local record office. Some later militia muster rolls (17th and 18th centuries) can be found at thegenealogist.co.uk .

Military records can be great for cross-referencing with other sources. A knight named Brian de Cornwall appears in the muster roll database at medievalsoldier.org as a man at arms during an expedition to France in 1373-4. A search for the men serving under his captain, Sir Walter Hewitt, shows a number of men with names that appear alongside Brian de Cornwall’s in the 1381 poll tax return for Kinlet in Shropshire.

8. Wills and probate
Wills survive in England from the ninth century onwards and deal with the deposition of property on the death of their owner. Although medieval survivals are rare, by the 16th century even quite lowly members of society sometimes left a will. They are great for providing information on your ancestor, their relatives and friends, as well as details of their way of life. Bequests of beds and bed linen were particularly common in the 16th century, for example, while jewellery and clothing were also often passed down through the family. Do bear in mind that only a small percentage of people left a will.

Wills tend to be fairly scattered through various archives and your starting point should be your local record office. An index to wills from the Prerogative Court of Canterbury from 1384-1858, along with images of the original documents, can be searched at www.thegenealogist.co.uk; the site also has other collections of wills organised by county.

9. Chancery records
Chancery cases can provide detailed information on your ancestors, with the Court of Chancery existing from the late 14th century. Cases were conducted in writing, with a plaintiff issuing a Bill of Complaint which set out the detail of their claim. The defendant would then submit a written answer, before both parties were given the opportunity to amend or add to their statements. A list of questions to be put to the witnesses would then be drawn up, with witness statements produced. Finally, if the case proceeded this far, a decree or order would be made.

Chancery records from before 1558 are held by The National Archives and have been very well catalogued. You can search for them using the Discovery Catalogue (discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk) and then visit to view the original. Search results will also provide you with a summary of the case, often with details of the relationships between the parties. Old books of Chancery proceedings transcriptions from 1377 to 1660 can also be searched at thegenealogist.co.uk .

It was common for multiple members of a family to be involved in litigation. For example, in the early 16th century John Blount, Esquire, and his wife, Katherine, who was described as the granddaughter and heir of Humphrey Peshall, Esquire, brought a case against John’s brothers, Edward and Walter, for the detention of deeds relating to Kinlet and other family estates.

10. Monastic records
The church was a major part of life in medieval England, with monasticism thriving until the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 16th century. Many of the records of religious houses survive, including chronicles and charters. Try searching UCL’s Monastic Archive Database (ucl.ac.uk) which provides the details and locations of the surviving records. You may find that your ancestor is recorded as a donor to their local monastery, or leased lands from them.

Taking your family tree back into the medieval period takes hard work and patience. Try the records above, before tailoring your research to the specific circumstances of your family. It is entirely possible to take one, or more, branches of your family all the way back to 1066.