Briket—mainly 16th C

As with the surnames Braket and Breket, Briket (or Bryket) is orally distinct from the surname Broket. The ‘o’ sound in Broket is a rounded back vowel, whereas ‘a’, ‘e’ and ‘i’ are all unrounded front vowels. If your surname is Brickett you wouldn’t get called Brockett as a variant (or vice versa):

The ‘i’ and ‘o’ vowels in an emphatic short first syllable in English are not ordinarily interchangeable. Thus the words picket and pocket are not oral variants—no one says, “Take your hands out of your pickets!” Nor are hit and hot—no one says, “It’s unbearably hit today!” And if these words got mixed up in writing, they would be mistakes in spelling or script.

What about metathesis, the transposition of sounds, like aks for ask, or purty for pretty? According to surname authorities Hanks and Hodges the surname Brickett is originally “a metathesized form of Birkett”, a more common surname”.¹ This would be the reverse of purty evolving from pretty, with the new position of the ‘r’ pulling the sound of the first vowel forward a little from its central unrounded position [ɘ] in Birkett to a near-front unrounded one [ɪ] in Brickett. Indeed there are examples of the name of the same person recorded as Brykett and Byrket in the same year, see below (although these could of course have been scribal variants). Is there a Borket form of the name Birket, transposed from Broket? No. The sound of the first syllable of the names Byrkett and Burkett is the same as that of Birkett, a central unrounded vowel [ɘ]. Although the ‘o’ sound in Borket is a rounded back vowel. If instances of a surname Borket exist, they will be a variant of Birkett or the like.² However, Hanks and Hodges also distinguished Birkett from Burkett in origin (the latter deriving from an Old English name Burgheard composed of burg meaning a fort  and heard meaning hardy, brave), spawning other variants like Burkart, Borkett, Bockett and Buckett.³ Be that as it may, the oral sound of Birkett are Burkett, at least, is the same, so there is potential of them being variants of each other, or as Hanks and Hodges say being confused with each other. So might there therefore have been an oral metathesis of Broket from Borket, a variant of Burket? No. The ‘o’ sound of Borket would be a rounded back vowel, like that of Broket, however *bork- or *borck- at the beginning of an English word is not found in standard dictionaries, nor has the surname so far been found in records. If instances of a surname Borket do exist, they will be a scribal variant of Burkett or the like, as per Hanks and Hodges.

The ‘c’ in earlier handwriting can be confused with a modern ‘r’ as in a 1627 image indexed in FMP as Borket, but which actually is “Widdow Bocket an old woman” buried 11 Aug 17 in Barnet, Herts indexed as Borket.⁴

widdow Bocket an old woman [buried Barnet 1627]

Briket and Broket are also unrelated etymologically. Brickett/Birkett is given as a “topographic name for someone who lived by a grove of birch trees”.⁵ Broket meant a young male deer. Furthermore, before the 17th C at least, the two names were in the main geographically separate. The main Briket area was Bedfordshire, whereas the main Broket areas were Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Hertfordshire.  Thus, on the rare occasion that a Broket was recorded as Briket you can be fairly certain that a mistranscription or misspelling occurred, as for instance in the following examples:

1546: Probably Margaret ‘Brickett’ of Hitchin, see below.
1841: The census entry for the family of Edward Brockett of Shoreditch.
1881: The IGI transcription of the census entry for Thomas Brockett of Lambeth.

Similarly, the instances so far found of Brikets being recorded as Brokets will most likely also be mistranscriptions or misspellings, as with:

1540: TNA’s catalogue entry for Margarett of London, see below.
1544: A registered copy of a Will mentioning Thomas ‘Brokett’ of Dunstable, see below.

A good overview of the surname Brickett, and its variations and mis-transcriptions, was registered with the Guild of One-Name Studies by Dr Penelope Christensen of BC Canada. You can download a Word version here. She “found only 101 Bricket(t)(s) in the 1881 census for England and 338 births registered there 1837-2005 (with only 5% not spelled Brickett)”. This makes it a much less common name than Brocket(t), of whom there were c 330 in the 1881 census for England, and over 1,400 births registered there 1837-1992. Christensen’s table Major centres of Bricketts in England according to parish registers—although not giving numbers—showed concentrations of Bricketts in towns in several southern English counties. Some of the counties were also home to Brokets, but not so much the towns. For instance in Hertfordshire Bricket(t)s were recorded only in St Pauls Walden 1563-94—see below—and St Albans 1571-1781, neither of which were home to more than a few Brokets. But these are broad-brush geographical observations, and the data on this webpage attempts to make some finer distinctions.

The main focus of this page is to try and distinguish between the 16th C Brokets of Hertfordshire and the Brikets of Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire. In addition, this page also lists various other early instances of Brikets to confirm the distinction between them and Brokets.

Contents of this page:

Bedfordshire Brikets
Hertfordshire Brikets
Common Pleas cases
Kings Bench cases
British History Online records
Other 16th C records

Bedfordshire Brikets

Christensen’s table Major centres of Bricketts in England according to parish registers listed the following Bedfordshire towns and dates:

Dunstable 1558-1793
Harlington 1634-1781
Toddington 1687-1763
Sharnbrook 1721-74

While Bedfordshire was a major Broket centre in the 17-19th C—recorded in 32 parishes—Sharnbrook was the only parish in this Briket list of 4 where Brokets are also found in the register—8 entries 1784-1811, apparently all of a single family, see the separate page.

Thomas Brickett of Dunstable / Dunstaple 1544-73

5 records have so far been found of Thomas. The 1544 one with little doubt was an instance of Brikett being misspelt in a registered copy of a Will as Brokett.

1. 1544: He was bequeathed a featherbed in the Will of John Geffray of Dunstable, made 2 Jun, pr 16 Jun 1544.⁶ The Will was a simple one, bequests comprising:

The only known Thomas Broketts alive at this time were not from Bedfordshire, but from the Hertfordshire clan, younger sons of Edward of Broadfield and Letchworth Esq and John of Swaffham Bulbeck Esq. That either of them was ever of Dunstable would be an unlikely coincidence.

2. 1547: At this time Thomas was married to Margaret, as shown by a Common Pleas action in which Thomas Brykett and Margaret his wife sold a messuage in Dunstaple to George Ackeworth Esq, paying 6s 8d to the Exchequer as the fine for the licence.⁷

3. 1563: At this time Thomas was occupying a “tenement on the north boundary of Dunstaple called the White Harte“, as shown by a Deed Poll of Henry Beacham, son and heir of William Beacham of Dunstaple, mercer, which begins+Read more

4. 1573: Thomas had died by 7 Oct this year as shown by probate on this date of the Will of Thomas Brickett of Dunstaple, written 29 Jan 1572, proved 7 Oct 1573.⁹+Read more
His [presumably 2nd] wife was Winifred. His daughters and son ‘in law’ probably meant what we call step daughters and son, children of Winifred by a previous marriage. As shown by his Will, his brother was Roland.

5. 1573: On 22 October Thomas, bailiff of Dunstable, was declared an outlaw in Hertfordshire for non-payment of a debt, as shown by the following Kings Bench case.+Read more

The defendant was outlawed because he failed to appear, successively, in court, despite several proclamations. The court may not have known that he was dead. The choice of the county to the sheriffs of which orders were sent to enforce an action lay in the hands of the plaintiff.¹¹

Other Bedfordshire Brikets

1556: Will of Roger Lody of parish of Luton, husbandman, written 3 Mar 1556, proved 5 Oct. 1556 “To daughter Helen Brickett 2 quarter of barley, and to her two children Thomas and Agnes a sheep each.”¹²

1667 11 Mar: Constables’ presentments for the Hundred of Manshead included one for Dunstable, in which John Bricket, Amos Clarke, Michael Shrowsbury presented Edwife Chester, Thos Hawkins, Richard Snoxell, Wm Chambers and Richard Couley for not going to church for 1 month.¹³ John Bricket being a constable for Dunstable suggests he might have been related to Thomas of Dunstable, d 1572, above.

1671: John Bryckett paid for 3 hearths in 2 houses in the 1671 Hearth Tax for Dunstable. He was presumably the same John who was Constable in 1667.

Hertfordshire Brikets

Margaret ‘Brickett’ of Hitchin 1546

The entry at the top of the verso side of the first page of the Exchequer Survey of the possessions of the former Carmelite Friary in Hitchin of 11 Apr 1546 stated;

“Margaret Brickett Wydowe holdethe at the Wille of the lorde one tenement with a Garden therunto belonginge lying in Bullestrete payeing by the yere viijs”.¹⁴

Bull Street was another name for part of Bridge Street, which was where at that time William Brockett’s Die House was situated. Indeed William’s house was mentioned in the immediately preceding entry in the Survey, at the foot of the recto side of the first page:

“John Munnes occupiethe a nother tenement there [Brydgestrite] with a gardene thereunto belonging lyenge between the tenement of William Brockett of the West side & the tenement of Thomas Eldrington one the Easte side…”

Here are images of the spellings of the two surnames, William’s first and Margaret’s second:¹⁵
+

Although the two pages are written in a similar overall style, a number of different shapes of individual letters suggests that they could have been written by different scribes in the Exchequer scriptorium when writing up the fair copy from field notes. In the images above, for instance, the shapes of the B, c, k and e are different and even perhaps the double t shape. Be that as it may, the listing of a Brockett followed immediately by a Brickett looks suspiciously like a scribal error, especially considering that no other Brikets have been found in Hitchin records from earliest times through to 1598, nor subsequently up till modern times. Similarly, for a Brickett widow and a Brockett man to hold property in the same small 16th C street seems unlikely. This therefore was probably an instance of Brockett being wrongly or badly written up in and/or from from field notes as Brickett. Several mistakes—or corrections—had been made on the first page, so it is possible that a mistake was also made with Margaret’s surname, and that she was actually Margaret Brockett. The note-taker in the field may well have been different to the scribe or scribes writing the fair copy in the Exchequer. There was a widow Margeret Broket living in Hitchin in 1524. Of course it could be that she was a lone Briket who came to Hitchin as a widow and happened to live near William Broket. But it seems unlikely.

The Exchequer Survey was no doubt the source for the section of a large grant by the king three months later in July 1546 of various priories and large properties to Edward Watson, of Rockyngham, Northhants, and Henry Herdson, Skinner of London, including “the site and chief mansion of the late priory of Friars Carmelites of Hychen, Herts, with buildings … and messuages …” The spelling of some of the names was slightly different than in the Exchequer Survey—Myners for Munnes, Brokett for Brockett and Bryket for Brickett—but otherwise the wording of the grant was clearly a slightly abbreviated version of the Survey.¹⁶

Margaret BRICKETT is mentioned again in conjunction with the former Carmelite Priory property— amongst the Delme-Radcliffe papers,¹⁷ which mentioned a messuage in Bull Street in the occupation of Margaret Brickett. This document is undated but Ralph Radcliffe bought Hitchin Priory in 1553, so the document was probably drawn up shortly after that. Again, it is probable that the 1546 Exchequer Survey was the source document from which the details here—like Margaret Brickett’s name—were copied.

Robert and Grace Brickett of Barley, Hertfordshire, d 1566 and 1593

There was a well-to-do Briket couple in Barley, Hertfordshire, recorded in the second half of the 16th C. Barley is only c 20 m NE of Hitchin but it is not obvious how Robert could have been a member of the early 16th C Broket clan of Hertfordshire. Robert’s Will shows that he was probably the Attorney recorded in the Common Pleas actions of 1559 below. His origins have yet to be discovered—he isn’t apparently recorded as a student in Cambridge, nor in the Inns of Court.¹⁸ Their Wills suggest that Robert and Grace had no surviving children of their own, but that Grace had children from an earlier marriage. So Robert may have come from London or elsewhere to marry an eligible Barley widow, apparently holding property on her own account.

The Will of Robert Brickett, Gentleman of Barley, written 10 May 1566, proved 10 Jul 1566 was as follows:¹⁹+++Read more

The Will of Grace Brickett, Gentlewoman and Widow of Barley, written 8 Apr 1589, 6 Mar 1593 was as follows:²⁰+++Read more

Talking of St Margaret’s Barley, Chauncy said, “In the Middle [apparently of the chancel], on another Stone, there is this. Hic jacet Robertus Bricket Generosus, qui obiit decimo die Junii Ann. Dom. 1546, et Aetat. suae 49.”²¹. i.e. “Here lies Robert Bricket gentleman who died 10 Jun 1546 aged 49.” 1546 was obviously an error. A parochial history of Barley by the brothers Frere dated 1890 recorded a 1747 account as saying: “In the middle aisle lies a grey marble before the pulpit, which has this inscription on a piece of brass ‘Hic jacet Robertus Bryckett Generosus, qui obiit decimo die Junii Ann. Dom. 1566, et Aetat. suae 49’, and added that Bryckett’s inscription “is now being restored to its proper place in the church after some years of absence” however there is no sign of that.²²

But if Robert was 49 when he died, he would have born c 1517.

Chauncy also listed among the benefactors to Barley parish: “Robert Bricket gave an House rented at £3 to the Poor of this Parish.”²³

Grace, Widow, was recorded in the 1567, 1571 and 1572 subsidies for Barley, assessed at 3s for 60s, 6s 8d for £4 in goods, and 4s for £4 in goods respectively, as follows:²⁴

+++

+++

The Job Brocket, Curate of Barley 1674-1700, was unconnected.

Saint Paul’s Walden

St Paul’s Walden is a village about 5 miles south of Hitchin. In the mid 16th C it was a tiny settlement of perhaps 25 households.²⁵ The parish Registers date from 1558/9 and were kept neatly during the period Brickets were there, recording the following:

“Thomas Bricket sonne of William Bricket was baptized the 22 Aug 1563” [buried Aug 1563]
“Thomas Bricket sone of William Bricket was buried the 25 August 1563” [baptized 22 Aug 1563]
“1563. William Bricket and Ede’ Diensley were married the 18 Octo.” [Edith was buried 1577, William married again 1578, and was buried 1595.]
“William Bricket sonne of William Bricket was baptized the 14 Decem’ 1564” [buried 1575]
“1575 William sone of William Bricket was buried the 19 Januar'” [baptized 1564]
“John Bricket sonne of William Bricket was baptized the 25 Aprill 1568”
“Richerd Bricket sonne of William Bricket was baptized the 24 Maie 1571”
“Edith Bricket wife of William Bricket was buried the 25 Maie 1577” [married 1563]
“1578 William Bricket and Joan Pease were married the 21 Julie” [William was buried 1595. No further record of Joan in St Pauls Walden.]
“John Bricket sone of William Bricket was baptized the 18 Febr’ 1580/81”
“Bridget Bricket daughter of William Bricket was baptized the 2 June 1583” [buried 1586]
“Bridget Bricket was buried the 20 Octob: 1586” [baptized 1583]
“Joan Bricket daughter of William Bricket was baptized the 8 Aprill 1590” [buried 1591]
“Joan Bricket daughter of William Bricket was buried the 1 April 1591” [baptized 1590]
“William Bricket an housholder was buried the 1 Januar: 1594/5”

Comment: The square brackets contain assumptions, on the premiss that the entries show a single family, the father marrying twice and 5 of the 7 children dying young. Not all events of course necessarily made it to the parish registers, especially in these earliest years. A burial of the first son John (bap 1568) is perhaps an example—unless a 13 year gap meant the couple were happy to have two called John.

Thomas’ baptism (and burial) before the first marriage wasn’t too unusual in those days. It’s difficult to entertain the possibility of 2 William Brickets fathering children at the same time in such a tiny settlement.

The 1595 burial of William was the Last Bricket entry in the register up to the end of the book in 1653, and beyond. It looks as though Joan then moved to Hitchin where a Joan Bricket was buried 1598. No records of a Joan Brocket have been found in Hitchin prior to 1598, nor of a Joan Bricket in Hertfordshire 1560-1640 apart from this one in Hitchin 1598.

It isn’t known what became of Richard (bap 1571) or the second John (bap 1581). They weren’t recorded in Hitchin or other Hertfordshire parishes. Maybe they drifted to London, or got press-ganged into the navy?

Other Hertfordshire Brikets

1564-5: Elizabeth ‘Brichett’ and Edmund ‘Birchett’ were baptised in Harpenden. These were mistakes in FamilySearch’s transcription of the Harpenden Parish Register. The original register shows that the surname in both entries was actually Brockett. But see the burial record of Margery in 1610, mentioned below.

1581: Margaret Brickett was married in Great Wymondley to Thomas Everett. FamilySearch and FindMyPast have a record transcription of a marriage between Margaretam Brickett and Thomam Everett in Great Wymondley on 9 Oct 1581.²⁶ FamilySearch’s source is their own England Marriages, 1538–1973 Database, described as an “Index based upon data collected by the Genealogical Society of Utah, Salt Lake City” and an “Index to selected England marriages. Only a few localities are included and the time period varies by locality.” FindMyPast’s source is FamilySearch.

Great and Little Wymondley …

1598 20 Jul: Joane Bricket was buried in Hitchin. “The 20 daye was buried Joane Bricket”.
It looks as though Joan was the second wife of William Bricket of St Paul’s Walden, a village c 5 m S of Hitchin. William died in 1595, and his widow Joan appears to have moved to Hitchin.

1610 18 May: Margery Brickatt was buried in Harpenden. The Harpenden Parish Register recorded the burial of “Margery Brickatt theighteenth of May. 1610.” Here, the original register undoubtedly spelt the surname Brickatt. A microfilm of the entire Harpenden Parish Registers 1562-1677 is available on FindMyPast and this Broket archivist has searched through it all carefully. It contains no other Briket entries. The two from 1564-5 mentioned above are modern mistranscriptions. In 1606 and 1609, however, it recorded the baptisms of the first two sons of John and Dorothy Brockett, the brother of Elizabeth and Edmund, baptised in Harpenden 1564-5. Perhaps Margery was a daughter of John and Dorothy who died as an infant in 1610, and a clerk misspelt her surname as Brickatt. They had a daughter Margaret who reached adulthood, but who was apparently born later than 1610. Alternatively, Margery was an actual Briket, the only one of her name to have lived in Harpenden in the 16th and 17th C.

Common Pleas cases²⁷

1535-62: Six or more records concerning debts—either owing or owed—have so far been found for William Bryket/Byrket Yeoman of Northamptonshire.²⁸ The interest in him is that he was a contemporary of William Brokett Yeoman of Hitchin who died 1556, and to be sure that misspellings of the Broket surname as Briket didn’t occur, it is necessary to investigate the known records of any 16th C William Brikets. In particular, the 1536 record concerning a debt William was chasing from a Butcher in Hitchin, when looked at in isolation seems like a potential misspelling of Broket. If in some records he could be recorded as William Byrket, rather than Bryket, then maybe a William Brokett could have been recorded as William Brykett? However, taking the records as a group gives no reason to suspect that any of them individually concerned William Broket, the 1536 one included. In half the six cases he was dubbed ‘of Thorpe Waterfeld, Northamptonshire’. Thorpe Waterfeld (Thorpe Waterville) is a village some 15 m W of Huntingdon and 35 m NNW of Hitchin. However, the livestock mentioned in two of the cases—a thousand ewes in 1546 and 120 in 1562—suggest he may well have been a livestock dealer, and if so it would have been natural to do business in an important market town like Hitchin. Fleck and Poole published late 19th C photographs of the large sheep market there.²⁹ William Broket of Hitchin was a Maltster. This William of Thorpe Waterville may have been related to William Brickett, Butcher of Essex of the next generation, recorded in 1590. In sum, it is unnecessary to link records found so far of this William Briket to William Broket of Hitchin, including the 1536 one. +Read more

1538: Essex. Trespass in a close. Richard Bonyng, Elizabeth his wife, Thomas Wylborowe, Joan his wife, Robert Proo, Margaret his wife, and Alice Brykett widow , were all suing Richard Luntley of Ramsey, Husbandman.⁴²

1559: Robert Bryckett/Brykkett acted as attorney for Thomas Martyn Esq at Westminster in 1559 in a suit of trespass against Thomas Harryson late of Cotnam, Cambridgeshire, Gent, but the defendant appeared in person when the case was finally tried at Cambridge in 1561.⁴³

1559 Trinity: Robert Bryckett acted as attorney in two cases at Westminster, one for Robert Newporte and the other for Sir Robert Chester. The latter has “Bedds” in the margin, but this only indicated which sheriff would be dealing with the court’s orders.⁴⁴

1559: Easter: Middlesex: Robert Spycer of Orford, Suffolk, gent and Juliana his wife, late Juliana Brickett widow.⁴⁵ For Juliana’s outlawry/waivery see below.

Kings Bench cases⁴⁶

1558 Michaelmas. Lincoln: Roland Bryckett v John Dowse.⁴⁷ Roland was the brother of Thomas Brickett of Dunstable.

1559 Trinity: Middlesex. Walter Bryckett v Hugh Sheldon.⁴⁸ Probably the Waltar of 1557.

1560 Michaelmas: Waivery of Juliana Bryckett widow: “Juliana Bryckett of the parish of St Leonard in Shordyche in the county aforesaid widow waived the day and year abovesaid for certain trespasses and contempts contrary to the form of the statute enacted concerning good behaviour, whereof they are indicted as appears by the writs abovesaid (Queen’s writs of Michaelmas term in the 2nd year of the reign of lady Elizabeth now queen of England).⁴⁹ Assuming that Juliana was the same widow mentioned in the case brought against her husband Robert Spycer in Easter 1559 above, that she was still referred to by the name Brickett in Michaelmas 1560 is explainable by the lengthy process leading up to outlawry. She would have been described exactly as in the writ that started the proceedings against her, which presumably predated her marriage to Robert Spycer.⁵⁰

1562: Northants. William Bryckett v John Alcock in Marshalsea. See above.

1573 22 Oct: Outlawry of Thomas Brickett, Bailiff of Dunstable.

1587-90 Michaelmas: Outlawry of Margaret Brickett of Westminster spinster.⁵¹ Following spinster are the two words “seruus eius”, presumably as the servant of the lady Vawce wife of the said lord Vauce on the previous line; all recusants.⁵²

British History Online records

Other 16th C records

1540: Margarett Briket, London. This was an instance of Briket being wrongly catalogued as Broket.

The UK National Archives holds a document which their catalogue describes as a certiorari writ,⁵³ in which Christopher Bryghttyff brought a complaint against Martin Bowez and [William] Lackeston, sheriffs of London concerning an action of debt by Margaret Broket, London. It notes that these sheriffs held office in 1540. The document is faded and mutilated in places but a close-up photograph under u/v light of the only occurrence of Margarett’s surname shows it to have been Briket not Broket:⁵⁴
+

1557 18 May: Chancery Order re an action brought by Waltar Brickett—Probably the Walter of 1559:⁵⁵+Read more

1590 7 Oct: A Certificate of residence showed William Brickett, Butcher, to be liable for taxation in Essex, Hundred of Barnstaple, residing in the parish of Great Bursted, assessed for 10s on £10 in goods.⁵⁶ He is hardly likely to have been the William of the 1535-62 Common Pleas cases above.

1599: The Muster of July recorded Christopher Brickett archer in Bermondsey,⁵⁷ and Arthur Brickett in Woking.⁵⁸

Page Last Updated: May 25, 2023