Red Book of the Exchequer

The Red Book of the Exchequer (Liber Rubeus or Liber ruber Scaccarii) is a 13th-century manuscript compilation of precedents and office memoranda of the English Exchequer. It contains additional entries and annotations down to the 18th century. It is now held at The National Archives, Kew, London. It takes its name from its red leather binding, which distinguishes it from the related and contemporary, but smaller, Black Book of the Exchequer.

J. Horace Round wrote in 1898 that "second only in honour to Domesday Book itself, the "Liber Rubeus de Scaccario" has, for more than six centuries, held a foremost place among our national records. Prized by officials for its precedents, by antiquaries for its vast store of topographical and genealogical information, its well-thumbed pages have been scanned by twenty generations of students".

The early part of the Red Book was compiled in about 1230 by Alexander of Swerford (d. 1246), a senior Exchequer clerk until about 1220 and a Baron of the Exchequer from 1234. However, entries continued to be added to it throughout the later Middle Ages, and even down to the 18th century.

The Book contains nearly 300 separate records and texts, including "Charters, Statutes of the Realm, Placita, or other public acts, with private Deeds and Ordinances, Correspondence, Chronicles or Annals, religious, physical or legal Treatises, Topographies, Genealogies or Successions, Surveys and Accounts, precedents and Facetiae". Among them are texts of the 1166 Cartae Baronum, a survey of feudal tenure; the Leges Henrici Primi, an early compilation of legal information dating from the reign of Henry I; the Constitutio domus regis, a handbook on the running of the royal household of about 1136; the Dialogus de Scaccario, a late 12th-century treatise on the practice of the Exchequer; the Book of Fees of c.1302; a 14th-century treatise on the Royal Mint; 12th-century pipe rolls; deeds and grants of William I and Henry I; a text of Magna Carta; records of serjeanties; and forms of oaths of Exchequer officers and of the king's councillors.

The book is a thick folio volume of 345 parchment folios, measuring 13.5 inches (34 cm) long, by 9.5 inches (24 cm) wide, by 3.5 inches (8.9 cm) deep. As a result of ill-judged attempts to restore illegible text by the application of gallic acid, a few pages are now unreadable.

Despite its origins within the Exchequer, in the Middle Ages the Red Book appears to have been sometimes held in the office of the royal Wardrobe, and to have travelled with the royal household. In the early modern period, it was held in the office of the King's (or Queen's) Remembrancer, where it was stored in an iron chest. It was routinely carried into the Court of King's Bench by the Secondary (deputy official) in the King's Remembrancer's Office, to assert privilege of the Exchequer: under this privilege, the Court of Exchequer reserved the right to hear suits brought against any of the Exchequer's officers or accountants. In the 17th and 18th centuries it became well known to antiquaries, and is frequently cited in the works of William Dugdale, Thomas Madox, Peter Le Neve, and Thomas Hearne, among others.

In 1870 the Book was transferred to the custody of the Master of the Rolls, and placed in the Public Record Office. It is now held in The National Archives at Kew, London, under reference code E 164/2.

A detailed description and listing of the contents of the Red Book was published by Joseph Hunter in 1838.