Difference between revisions of "Entring Clerk's Vade Mecum"

Revision as of 15:41, 14 May 2015

by William Brown

The Entring Clerk's Vade Mecum
Title not held by The Wolf Law Library at the College of William & Mary.
Author	William Brown
Editor
Translator
Published	London:
Date	1678 or 1695
Edition	Precise edition unknown.
Language	English
Volumes	volume set
Pages
Desc.	8vo.

William Brown (fl. 1671-1705) was an English legal clerk and writer, little known aside from producing several manuals and compendiums in the late seventeenth century. His place and date of birth and the circumstances of his childhood are unknown. Brown likely took up his clerkship shortly after the Restoration and held that position until at least as late as 1704.^[1] Because this was not a high status position, he most likely did not receive his education at any of the Inns of Court.^[2] His date of death is unknown but there is some evidence indicating that he died in October of 1712^[3]

The Entring Clerk's Vade Mecum, a compendium for lawyers and law clerks, contains a dedication to Thomas Robinson, chief prothonotary of the Court of Common Pleas whom Brown had been serving under for sixteen years by 1678.^[4] The title was one of many "books of tutorials for the aspiring clerk, books of precedents, and manuals for public officials" Brown produced.^[5] George Wythe owned at least two Brown titles, The Entring Clerk's Vade Mecum and Modus Intrandi Placita Generalia.

Evidence for Inclusion in Wythe's Library

Listed in the Jefferson Inventory of Wythe's Library as "Brown’s Entering clerk’s Vade mecum 8vo." and given by Thomas Jefferson to Dabney Carr. The precise edition owned by Wythe is unknown. Octavo editions were published in 1678 and 1695. George Wythe's Library^[6] on LibraryThing states as much and does not list a specific edition. The Brown Bibliography^[7] lists the first edition (1678) perhaps based on the existence of that edition in Jefferson's library.^[8]

As yet, the Wolf Law Library has not purchased a copy Brown’s The Entering Clerk’s Vade Mecum.

References

1. ↑ Stuart Handley, "Brown, William (fl. 1671–1705)," Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004- ), accessed December 6, 2013.
2. ↑ Ibid.
3. ↑ Ibid.
4. ↑ Ibid.
5. ↑ Ibid.
6. ↑ LibraryThing, s.v. "Member: George Wythe," accessed on May 14, 2015.
7. ↑ Bennie Brown, "The Library of George Wythe of Williamsburg and Richmond," (unpublished manuscript, May, 2012, rev. May, 2014) Microsoft Word file. Earlier edition available at: https://digitalarchive.wm.edu/handle/10288/13433.
8. ↑ E. Millicent Sowerby, Catalogue of the Library of Thomas Jefferson (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1983), 2:286-287 [no.1926].