Difference between revisions of "New Precedents in Conveyancing"

Revision as of 15:20, 6 July 2015

by Nathaniel Pigott

Pigott's Conveyancing
Title page from New Precedents in Conveyancing, George Wythe Collection, Wolf Law Library, College of William & Mary.
Author	Nathaniel Pigott
Editor	{{{editor}}}
Translator	{{{trans}}}
Published	London: Printed by H. Lintot for J. Worrall
Date	1742
Edition	Second
Language	English
Volumes	{{{set}}} volume set
Pages	iv, 576, [26]
Desc.	Folio (31 cm.)
Location	Shelf L-5
	[[Shelf {{{shelf2}}}]]

Bookplate of John Clarke Stoughton, Wymondham, Norfolk, front pastedown.

Nathaniel Pigott (1661-1737) was a barrister and counselor at law. He was admitted to the Inner Temple in 1683 and called to the bar in 1688.^[1] In 1689 he refused to take the required oaths of supremacy and allegiance and receive the sacrament.^[2] As a result, he was vacated on the grounds that he was a Roman Catholic.^[3] In 1690 his suspension was removed although he was still prescribed from pleading a case in court.^[4] Pigott was the last Catholic called to the bar until 1791.^[5]

Pigott practiced as a chamber counsel and conveyancer.^[6] He acted as a trustee for conveyances, furnished legal opinions, and offered legal and business advice.2 Experts agree that Pigott had a particular expertise in conveyance.^[7] Many of his clients were also Roman Catholics, therefore his expertise in conveyancing was particularly important to the preservation of their estates.^[8] Roman Catholic estates were vulnerable to claims from potential protestant heirs and from threatened sequestrations by the crown.^[9]

Two of Pigott’s manuscripts, A Treatise of Common Recoveries, their Nature and Use and New Precedents in Conveyancing, were published after his death.^[10] These texts remained standard authorities for the remainder of the eighteenth century.^[11]

Evidence for Inclusion in Wythe's Library

There is no doubt that George Wythe owned this title—a copy of the second (1742) edition at the Library of Congress includes Wythe's bookplate and manuscript notes which may have been made by him.^[12] Thomas Jefferson listed "Pigott's conveyancing. fol." in his inventory of Wythe's Library, noting that he kept the volume himself. He later sold it to the Library of Congress. Not surprisingly, all four of the Wythe Collection sources (Goodwin's pamphlet^[13], Dean's Memo^[14], Brown's Bibliography^[15] and George Wythe's Library^[16] on LibraryThing) list the second edition of New Precedents in Conveyancing. The Wolf Law Library purchased a copy of the same edition.

Headpiece, first page of text.

Description of the Wolf Law Library's copy

Bound in contemporary calf with blind rules to boards, raised bands and lettering piece to spine. Includes armorial bookplate of John Clarke Stoughton, Wymondham, Norfolk on front pastedown and an early owner annotation, "15^s Brookes Catalogue 1790", and the intials "rlf" on front free endpaper. Purchased from The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.

View the record for this book in William & Mary's online catalog.

See also

• George Wythe Room
• Wythe's Library

References

1. ↑ F. A. Inderwick, “Bench Table Orders,” in A Calendar of the Inner Temple Records (London: Chiswick Press, 1901), 248.
2. ↑ Richard G. Williams, "Pigott, Nathaniel (bap. 1661, d. 1737)" in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, accessed December 4, 2013.
3. ↑ Ibid.
4. ↑ Ibid.
5. ↑ Ibid.
6. ↑ Ibid.
7. ↑ Ibid.
8. ↑ Ibid.
9. ↑ Ibid.
10. ↑ Ibid.
11. ↑ Ibid.
12. ↑ E. Millicent Sowerby, Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson, 2nd ed. (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1983), 2:292 [no.1940].
13. ↑ Mary R. M. Goodwin, The George Wythe House: Its Furniture and Furnishings (Williamsburg, Virginia: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library, 1958), XLIX.
14. ↑ Memorandum from Barbara C. Dean, Colonial Williamsburg Found., to Mrs. Stiverson, Colonial Williamsburg Found. (June 16, 1975), 4 (on file at Wolf Law Library, College of William & Mary).
15. ↑ Bennie Brown, "The Library of George Wythe of Williamsburg and Richmond," (unpublished manuscript, May, 2012) Microsoft Word file. Earlier edition available at: https://digitalarchive.wm.edu/handle/10288/13433.
16. ↑ LibraryThing, s.v. "Member: George Wythe," accessed on June 28, 2013.