Poser 320 - Testament dative, 1700

This week's poser is taken from the testament dative of Alexander Forbes, writer (or lawyer) in Edinburgh, 22 March 1700 (National Records of Scotland CC8/8/81 page 102).

This part of the testament inventory deals with the debts owed to Mr Alexander Forbes and we have transcribed the first two lines for you.

In The First ther wes Restane awane to the s[ai]d vmq[uhi]ll
Mr Alex[ande]r Forbes the tyme of his deceise fors[ai]d and omitted

Look out for the terminal –is symbol, for quantities of money and also for fillers like the symbol at the beginning of line 4. There are also lots of abbreviations eg s[ai]d, prin[cipa]ll and li~ for pounds. These come about because the clerk is writing a number of stock words and phrases over and over again. To make life easier he contracts them but they are still recognisable by other readers. To find out more about wills and testaments go to our testaments page.

Download a printable version of this week's poser, PDF, 139KB, new window

This week's question: which three landowners owed Mr Forbes money?

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Answer to this week's poser