One of the Durham rolls is thirteen yards in length and nine inches in breadth. Consisting of nineteen sheets of parchment, it was executed on the death of John Burnby, a Prior of Durham, in 1464. His successor, Richard Bell, who was afterwards Bishop of Durham, and the convent, caused this roll, commemorating the virtues of the late Prior and William of Ebchester, another predecessor, to be circulated through the religious houses of the entire kingdom; and inscribed on it are the titles, orders, and dedications of no fewer than six hundred and twenty-three. Each had undertaken to pray for the souls of the two priors in return for the prayers of the monks at Durham. The roll opens with a superb illumination, three feet long, depicting the death and burial of one of the priors; and at the foot occurs the formula: _Anima Magistri Willielmi Ebchestre et anima Johannis Burnby et animæ omnium defunctorum per Dei misericordiam in pace requiescant._
The monastery first visited makes the following entry: _Titulus Monasterii Beatæ Mariæ de Gyseburn in Clyveland, ordinis S. Augustini Ebor. Dioc. Anima Magistri Willielmi Ebchestre et anima Johannis Burnby et animæ omnium defunctorum per misericordiam Dei in pace requiescant. Vestris nostra damus, pro nostris vestra rogamus._ The other houses employ identical terms, with the exception of the monastery of St. Paul, Newenham, Lincolnshire, which substitutes for the concluding verse a hexameter of similar import. It is of some interest to remark that, apart from armorial or fanciful initials, the standing of a house may be gauged by the handwriting, the titles of the larger monasteries being given in bold letters, while those of the smaller form an almost illegible scrawl. The greater houses would have been in a position to support a competent scribe--not so the lesser; and this is believed to have been the reason of the difference.
Almost, if not quite, as important as the roll just noticed is that of Archbishop Islip of Westminster recently reproduced in _Vetusta Monumenta_.
After the tenth century it appears to have been the custom in some monasteries, on the death of a member, to record the fact; and at certain periods--probably once a year--the names of all the dead brethren were inscribed on an elaborate mortuary roll in the scriptorium, before being dispatched to the religious houses throughout the land.