MERW Codebook – Medieval Londoners

MERW Database: Codebook

The following Codebook offers brief descriptions of each field in the Medieval England Religious Women Database (MERW). The first set of fields summarizes aspects of the individual’s appearance in the specific source used for this record; the second set of fields includes data about the individual’s family, as given in the specific source for this record; and the third set of fields provides information on the specific source for this record. This codebook is modelled on the Codebook for the Medieval Londoners Database.

1. Fields	Contents
Record ID	A unique five-digit number assigned to each record in the database.
Person ID	A unique whole number assigned to each individual who appears in the database. This number appears in every record for that individual. When a record is possibly but not definitively associated with a known individual, the record is shaded pink and a P is entered in the Record Type field (see below).
Title	The rank or status for the individual as stated in the original source for this record, in modern English.
Document Name	The individual's name as written in the original source.
Standard Name	The individual's name as written in standardized modern English (rendered as surname, forename). If a woman is known only by a family relationship, it is assumed for her Standard_Name that she shares her male relative’s surname. If the surname is unknown, insert three underscores in its place.
Identifier	Codes that aid in searches. A record may have more than one code. O = orphan R = religious profession V = widow/er W = woman
Occupation	This field notes the woman’s religious profession, e.g., nun, anchoress, vowess, as denoted in the original source for this record.
Occupation Flag	These codes indicate the quality of the information in the Occupation field. D = occupation explicitly stated in the original primary source d = occupation stated in a secondary source that cites a primary source P = there is sufficient evidence in the source to surmise a probable occupation
Obedientiary Office	The woman’s specific office or role within her religious house.
Monastic House	The monastic house to which the woman is attached. Refer to the Standardized List of Monastic Houses for standardized orthography.
County	The medieval county in which the monastic house is located.
Activity	Summarizes the individual’s activity as delineated in the original source. MERW's practice is to align closely with the original source material and in some cases the activity field may be a straight transcription of the record source, including the primary and secondary source abbreviations, enclosed in round brackets, used by the source. On rare occasions MERW makes an editorial comment, whih is enclosed in curly brackets.
Year Flag	Indicates the degree of certainty about the year noted in the original source material. aft = after this year bef = before this year by = by this year c. = circa this year d. = died this year occ = occurs this year ? = year is uncertain
Year	The year that the activity recorded in the source occurred. If there is a date range, the first year is entered here.
Date Range	The complete date range over which an activity occurred. It can include year/month/day ranges or simply year ranges.
Document Date	The date (rendered year/month/day) of the activity or event recorded in this source.
Will	Used when the individual is mentioned in a will in the original source for this record. E = executor H = heir/ess M = mentioned in the will (typically a male family member's) T = testator
2. Family Fields	Content
Family Name	The standardized name for the woman's family member mentioned in the record.
Family Relationship	The woman's familial relationship noted in this record. The codes refer to the (typically male) relation of the woman, who is named in the Activity field. B = brother F = father H = husband M = mother U = uncle
Family Identifier	Codes defining features of individual family members of the religious woman. G = gentry (used if a woman's father was titled) K = (urban) knight N = member of the nobility W = woman
Status Marker	Used for the citizenship status (if a Londoner) or other status marker (if not a resident of London) of the woman’s family / father, as defined by the Fam_Relation code.
Office	Used for the civic office held by the family member in this record. This includes MPs.
Craft	Used for the guild status held by the family member in this record.
Craft Office	Used for the craft office held by the family member in this record.
Link Bio	Links to an online biography of the family member in this record.
Related Links	Links to related external sites, including the URI of this person if s/he is in Medieval Londoners Database.
Record Type	Allows for more information about the type of record. P = the individual is probably linked to the assigned Person_ID but this link is not yet confirmed. Note that this code does not appear in the online MERW, but the entire row is colored pink X = cross-reference
3. Source Fields	Content
Source	The source from which the record was taken. See Sources and Abbreviations for full bibliographic information.
Source URI	This links to an online version of the source used for this record, if available.
Contributor	The name of the person who has contributed or given us permission to use the raw data in this record; they are also listed in Acknowledgements.
Cataloguer	The surname, initials of the person who manually entered the record for the database.