This account book is one of only three extant for rural parishes in Wiltshire dating from the reign of Henry VIII and it is by far the most detailed. The English reformation in microcosom is vividly documented in these pages. First the removal of the altar in 1550, the setting up of two altars in 1553 and then their removal again seven years later as the religious pendulum swung back and forth. The book records parish expenditure and sources of income such as church ales and annual shepherds supper
