PYGOT, Simon

Evidently related to John Pygot, a leading Lynn burgess of the mid fifteenth century,10 KL/C 7/3, 4. The exact relationship is unclear and there may have been two John Pygots. Simon purchased the freedom of the town, paying the customary entry fine of 40s., in June 1439.11 KL/C 7/3, f. 106v. Assuming that he had not originally come from outside the borough, his mode of admission suggests he was a younger son, since eldest sons of burgesses were granted admission by reason of their birth. By this date he was already renting cellars and chambers from the local Trinity guild, and he continued to lease property from this institution in subsequent years. He himself became one of its brethren soon after gaining his freedom, and he served a term as one of its scabins a few years later.12 King’s Lynn bor. recs., accts. scabins Trin. guild, 1438-9, 1440-1, 1463-4, 1467-8, 1468-9, KL/C 38/17, 18, 20-22. He also joined the guild of Corpus Christi, of which he was treasurer in the later 1440s and from which he subsequently rented a chamber on Lynn’s south quay.13 Ibid. treasurers’ accts., Corpus Christi guild, 1459-61, KL/C 57/34, 35. Described as a ‘merchant’ in the royal pardons he obtained in 1455 and 1458,14 C67/41, m. 19; 42, m. 3. Pygot had trading interests in the Baltic, Low Countries and elsewhere in Europe. In 1442 he and over 20 other merchants from Lynn complained to the borough council about illegal charges and extortions which the king of Denmark’s officials had imposed upon them, prompting it to appoint certain burgesses as envoys to negotiate with that king.15 KL/C 7/3, f. 153v. His main exports were grain and woollen cloth but he imported a range of commodities, including timber, ‘pavyngtyles’, bowstaves, soap, fish, oil, wine and Swedish iron.16 DKR, xlviii. 343; E122/96/35, 37, 40. He also dealt in raw wool. In October 1458, for example, he bought eight sarplars (large bales) of it from a London merchant who would sue him for non-payment two years later.17 CP40/799, rot. 333. Later, on several occasions in the 1470s, he bought wool (and malt) from Roger Townshend†. By this date he had known Townshend, a large-scale sheep-farmer in west Norfolk, for a number of years, since Roger had sued him in Chancery the previous decade in connexion with a debt (a quarrel which evidently did not destroy their business relationship in the long term).18 C.E. Moreton, Townshends, 84, 244; C1/28/181. Another of Pygot’s business interests was a tavern patronised by Thomas, Lord Scales, and other visitors to the borough. It was run by his wife, Matilda, whom the borough authorities reprimanded in January 1459 for selling wine at 12d. per gallon, instead of 10d., the price which they ordered her to charge in the future.19 King’s Lynn bor. recs., chamberlains’ acct. 1446-7, KL/C 39/56 ; KL/C 7/4, p. 118.

Like other MPs for Lynn, Pygot rose to high office in the hierarchy of the borough. Within months of becoming a burgess, he began a term as one of its chamberlains; a few years later he joined the council of 24; and in 1454-5 he served a term as mayor. He also held office under the Crown, for in the late 1450s he was a j.p. and customs collector. As a prominent burgess Pygot was assigned many miscellaneous tasks by the borough. In August 1450, for example, the corporation appointed him to treat with Lynn’s residents for ‘le mannyng oute de shippes’ (possibly in connexion with royal demands for vessels to serve the Crown).20 KL/C 7/3, f. 285. In the same month he and other burgesses participated in discussions about the borough’s fee farm with its feudal lord, Walter Lyhert, bishop of Norwich,21 Ibid. f. 286v. and nearly 25 years later he represented it in negotiations with Lyhert’s successor, Bishop Goldwell, for the right to farm his tolls and courts at Lynn.22 KL/C 7/4, pp. 321-2. Like the bishop, Lord Scales, a peer with estates in west Norfolk, was a frequent visitor to the town, and Pygot was one of the burgesses who took responsibility for entertaining him when he visited at Christmas 1444.23 KL/C 7/3, f. 196. Later, during the politically tense autumn of 1459, Scales (an important supporter of the Lancastrian regime) sought recruits for the King’s army from Lynn. In response, the borough sent Pygot and others to his manor at nearby Middleton to discuss these demands.24 KL/C 7/4, p. 127. Pygot was also involved in military matters in early 1461. In January that year he helped to supervise the placing of guns around the walls of Lynn, and in the following April he was one of those assigned to inspect the men and materials available for its defence, testimony to the uncertainty which existed in Norfolk in the immediate aftermath of Edward IV’s accession.25 Ibid. 145, 157, 321-2.

Pygot began his parliamentary career late in the reign of Edward’s predecessor. In November 1459 he was elected to the controversial Coventry Parliament which attainted Richard, duke of York, and his allies. The Parliament was a short one, for he and William Pilton* alias Reynold, his fellow MP, were absent from Lynn for just 41 days and returned home on Christmas Eve. Perhaps mindful of the difficulties some of their predecessors had encountered in trying to secure their wages as MPs, they had obtained £5 from the borough before setting out but it is not clear if they ever received the further £3 4s. they claimed on their return.26 Ibid. 131; M. McKisack, Parlty. Repn. English Bors. 91. Pygot’s return to the Commons of 1461 followed two abortive elections. Parliament was originally to have opened in the summer of that year but the King’s need to deal with his opponents in northern England had forced him to postpone it. By then, however, the electors of Lynn had already named Henry Thoresby* and William Caus† as their MPs. At a fresh election on the following 2 Sept., they chose two new representatives, Walter Cony* and Henry Bermyngeham*, only for Parliament to be postponed again. Finally, they selected Pygot and Bermyngeham at a third election held five weeks later.27 KL/C 4, pp. 159, 162, 167.

During the Parliament, Pygot was obliged to defend a suit in the court of common pleas where Henry Smyth of London sought repayment of a loan of £10. Smyth alleged that Pygot had borrowed the money from him in the City in September 1457 but Pygot denied owing that sum; the plea roll does not indicate the circumstances of the alleged loan.28 CP40/802, rot. 344. On at least five other occasions Pygot participated in parliamentary elections at Lynn as an elector, those of 1445, 1455 (over which he presided as mayor), 1467, 1469 and 1472.29 KL/C 7/3, f. 199; KL/C 7/4, pp. 54, 241, 268, 305. Whether he also attested the formal returns into Chancery for these elections is impossible to determine: only some of the returns in question survive and, in any case, none of those still extant name the attestors.

During 1472 Pygot was involved in discussions with a mason about his borough’s plans to build a new chapel in honour of the Trinity in Lynn’s parish church of St. Margaret.30 KL/C 7/4, p. 301. Later that decade he received his last new official appointment in the borough, that of one of its coroners, although he remained on the council of 24, whose members served for life. Still on the 24 at Michaelmas 1487, he was no longer a councillor a year later, indicating that he had died in the meantime.31 Ibid. 543, 555. It is not known if he left any heirs.

Apart from his tavern, the evidence for Pygot’s holdings in Lynn is fragmentary. He had received seisin of two messuages (probably shortly after acquiring them) in 1446,32 CP25(1)/170/190/208. and during the early 1460s he had paid the Trinity guild an annual rent of 20s. for a tenement next to ‘le Bulstake’.33 KL/C 38/20. He may also have acquired tenements in Lathe Street,34 Derbys. RO, Okeover mss, D231M/T470-1, 474. and possibly a messuage formerly owned by William Pilton, who had offered him the option of purchasing it for £60 in his will of 1471.35 PCC 1 Wattys (PROB11/6, ff. 3v-4). Finally, in February 1481 Pygot conveyed a tenement by the Great Ouse, with an adjoining building and quay, to Thomas Gayton, William Marche† and John Peers, although it is unclear whether he did so as an owner or feoffee.36 CAD, i. C991.