Chetham Society

Chetham Society

Formation	1843
Type	Historical Society
Legal status	Charity
Purpose	Historical Study and Research
Headquarters	Manchester, United Kingdom
Location	Chetham's Library
Region served	Lancashire, Cheshire, and Greater Manchester
Official language	English
11th President	Prof. Paul J. Fouracre
Website	www.chethamsociety.org.uk

The Chetham Society "for the publication of remains historic and literary connected with the Palatine Counties of Lancaster and Chester" is a text publication society and registered charity (No. 700047) established on 23 March 1843.

History

The Chetham Society is the oldest historical society in North West England. It was founded by a group of gentlemen (including the lawyer James Crossley and the clergymen Thomas Corser, Richard Parkinson, and Francis Robert Raines), who wished to promote interest in the counties' historical sources. The society held its Foundation Meeting on 23 March 1843 at Chetham's Library, in Manchester, which was established in 1653 by the will of the philanthropist Humphrey Chetham. The society became a registered charity in 1988.

The Chetham Society was amongst the earliest antiquarian and historical societies to be established in Britain during the nineteenth century, and appears to have been modelled, in part, on the Durham-based Surtees Society founded in 1834. During its early years, the Society enjoyed the support of patrons such as the Prime Minister of the day Sir Robert Peel, the Bishop of Chester, the Earls of Balcarres, Burlington, and Derby, Lord Stanley of Bickerstaffe, Lord Francis Egerton, as well as several other peers and MPs who became Members. Many distinguished historians and scholars have been involved in the life of the Society, including John Eglington Bailey, John Parsons Earwaker, Edward Hawkins, Henry Hoyle Howorth, George Ormerod, Frederick Maurice Powicke, William Stubbs, Thomas Frederick Tout, and Joseph Brooks Yates, amongst many others.

Membership

Membership of the Chetham Society is open to all individuals and institutions interested in the various historical and literary aspects of Lancashire and Cheshire.

Publications

For more than 170 years, the Chetham Society has maintained a regular output of valuable works of scholarship that make significant contributions to the study of the history of North-West England. Since 1843 the society has published more than 275 volumes in three series. The Old Series (O.S.) ran from 1843 until 1893 (comprising 116 volumes); the New Series (N.S.) commenced in 1883 and ended in 1947 (totalling 110 volumes); and the Third Series (T.S.) began in 1949 (volume 51 was published in 2013). In recent years (particularly since the inauguration of the Third Series in 1949) the society's focus has tended to shift away from its traditional role of publishing original primary texts and towards that of publishing scholarly secondary analyses.

Recent volumes have included:

Presidents

3

Vice-Presidents

3

General Editors

3

See also

• Chetham's Library
• Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire
• Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society
• Lancashire Parish Register Society

References

Notes

Bibliography

External links

• Chetham Society Website
• Archives Hub: Chetham Society Archive
• Chetham's Library: List of Chetham Society Publications
• Chetham's Library
• Royal Historical Society: List of Chetham Society Publications

• Levine (2003), p. 42
• Hawkins (1844)