Editing Richard Amerike (section)

==Biography==
[[File:Richard Ap Meryk name variants.jpg|thumb|Variants of Richard Ap Meryk's name as found in contemporary documents]]
"Amerike" is an anglicised spelling of the [[Welsh language|Welsh]] name ''ap [[Meurig]]'', ''ap Meuric'' or ''ap Meryk'', which means "son of Meurig".<ref name="BBC Hist"/> It was, however, only one of the many different ways that the customs officer's name was rendered, even in official documents. The "Amerike" version was noted by some modern historians because it looked like "America" and because this was how his name was spelled on a tomb brass created for his daughter in 1538.<ref>Evan T. Jones and Margaret M. Condon, ''[http://www.bristol.ac.uk/history/research/cabot/cabot-and-bristols-age-of-discovery/ Cabot and Bristol's Age of Discovery: The Bristol Discovery Voyages 1480–1508]'' (University of Bristol, Nov. 2016), p. 98 n. 13.</ref>

Ap Meryk's place and date of birth are unknown. One modern author suggests that Richard Amerike was born in 1445 at Meryk Court, [[Weston under Penyard]], near [[Ross-on-Wye]], Herefordshire.<ref name="BBC Hist"/> He may have been born earlier than this, since one of Amerike's daughters, Joan, was married to a future lawyer, John Broke, by April 1479.<ref name="ellis_clifton">A. S. Ellis, [http://www2.glos.ac.uk/bgas/tbgas/v003/bg003211.pdf 'On the manorial History of Clifton'], ''Transactions Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society'', vol. 3 (1878–79). Date corrected from MS. Retrieved 12 March 2016.</ref> While there were certainly Merricks in and around Weston under Penyard,<ref>M. Faraday, ''Calendar of Hereford Probates 1407–1550'' (2009)</ref> Richard Amerike's genealogy and connection to Merrick Court have not been verified. The only contemporary document to refer to his background states that he was from [[Chepstow]], a town in [[Monmouthshire]], [[Wales]].<ref name="auto">Evan T. Jones and Margaret M. Condon, ''[http://www.bristol.ac.uk/history/research/cabot/cabot-and-bristols-age-of-discovery/ Cabot and Bristol's Age of Discovery: The Bristol Discovery Voyages 1480–1508]'' (University of Bristol, Nov. 2016), p. 75</ref>

Little is known of the first thirty years of Ap Meryk's life. His wife, married at an unknown date, was called Lucy.<ref name="Broome">Rodney Broome, ''Amerike: the Briton who gave America its Name'' (Gloucester, 1992), pp. 165–67</ref> The latter part of Amerike's adult life was spent in, or near, [[Bristol]]. This was one of the largest ports of medieval England.<ref>E. M. Carus-Wilson, ''Medieval Merchant Venturers'' (2nd edn, London, 1967), pp. 1–13</ref><ref name="Fleming and Costello">Peter Fleming and Kieran Costello, ''Discovering Cabot's Bristol'' (Bristol, 1998)</ref> Amerike prospered as a merchant and, after 1485, as a gentleman and an officer of the Crown. He is first found in Bristol customs accounts in 1472, trading in Irish fish.<ref>Evan T. Jones and Margaret M. Condon, ''[http://www.bristol.ac.uk/history/research/cabot/cabot-and-bristols-age-of-discovery/ Cabot and Bristol's Age of Discovery: The Bristol Discovery Voyages 1480–1508]'' (University of Bristol, Nov. 2016), p. 98</ref> The published customs accounts of 1479–1480 show him continuing to trade to Ireland, but also participating in Bristol's valuable trade with Portugal and [[Bordeaux]].<ref>E. M. Carus-Wilson, [http://www.bristol.ac.uk/Depts/History/bristolrecordsociety/publications/brs07.pdf ''The Overseas Trade of Bristol in the Later Middle Ages'' (Bristol Record Society 1937)], pp. 246, 256, 263, 268, 278, 280.</ref> In other years he also traded to Spain.<ref name="Carus-Wilson">E. M. Carus-Wilson, [http://www.bristol.ac.uk/Depts/History/bristolrecordsociety/publications/brs07.pdf ''The Overseas Trade of Bristol in the Later Middle Ages'' (Bristol Record Society 1937)], pp. 150–51</ref> Amerike was a burgess of Bristol by at least the mid-1470s.<ref name="Carus-Wilson"/> Becoming a burgess would have both admitted him as a freeman of the city and marked him as a member of its political elite.<ref name="Fleming and Costello"/> By this time he was sufficiently wealthy to lend £50 towards the ransom from Breton pirates of a great-nephew of [[William Canynges]].<ref name="Carus-Wilson"/> A Bristol tax return of 1484 records that his household servants included an Icelander.<ref>David Beers Quinn, ''England and the Discovery of America'' (London, 1974), pp. 49–51.</ref> He was also buying land. By the early 1490s Amerike's main landed estate, acquired by purchase, seems to have been in [[Long Ashton]] on the Somerset side of the River Avon.<ref name="ellis_clifton"/><ref name="Broome"/>

When Amerike traded as a merchant, he would have used a distinctive [[merchant's mark]] to identify his goods. Unfortunately when Amerike shipped on the ''Trinity'' of Bristol for a voyage to Andalucia in 1480 the purser, whose private accounts survive, failed to record the mark of Amerike, or indeed of any other merchant shipping.<ref>T. F. Reddaway and Alwyn A. Ruddock, 'The Accounts of John Balsall, Purser of the ''Trinity'' of Bristol', Camden Miscellany XXIII (Camden Society, 4th Series, 1969), pp. 1–28</ref> The mark associated with Amerike in modern times<ref name="Broome"/> belongs to a different man, living a century later.<ref>Alfred E. Hudd, ''Bristol Merchant Marks'' (reprinted 1915 from the ''Proceedings of the Clifton Antiquarian Club'', vol 7 part 2) p. 86, mark 480</ref>

In 1485 Richard Amerike was appointed to the customs service in Bristol's neighbouring port of [[Bridgwater]], with the post of controller of customs. This should have meant that he dwelled within the confines of the port (which included [[Minehead]] and [[Combwich]]), but whether he did so is unknown. In September 1486 Amerike became one of the customs officials in Bristol, holding the post of King's Customs Officer, known as a "Customer", from 1486 until December 1502.<ref name="auto"/> During his period of office he was several times accused of malpractice, including false accounting, and was obliged to pay a substantial sum of money to the King, [[Henry VII of England|Henry VII]], for his pardon.<ref>Evan T. Jones and Margaret M. Condon, ''[http://www.bristol.ac.uk/history/research/cabot/cabot-and-bristols-age-of-discovery/ Cabot and Bristol's Age of Discovery: The Bristol Discovery Voyages 1480–1508]'' (University of Bristol, Nov. 2016), p. 76</ref> As a customs officer Amerike could not hold high civic office since this was forbidden by Statute but at the first election after he had ceased to be Customer, he was appointed as one of the city's two sheriffs. He died in post, probably around December 1503, and was replaced as sheriff by Robert Thorne.<ref>[http://www.uh.edu/waalt/index.php/Bristol_Officials_1500-1549 'Bristol Officials 1500–1549'] WAALT, University of Houston. Retrieved 14 March 2016.</ref> Amerike's precise date of death and place of burial are unknown.<ref name="Broome"/> His heirs were his daughters, only one of whom is known. Joan (or Jane) Broke (née Amerike) (d. 1538) lies beside her husband, John Broke, in the church of [[St Mary Redcliffe]], Bristol. Their tomb brass names Richard Amerike as her father, and once included the arms of both Broke and Amerike.<ref>John Baker, ''The Men of Court 1440–1450'' (Selden Society, 2012) Vol 1, p. 369</ref> This is now missing. Some two centuries after the armorial scutcheon disappeared, the arms of Amerike were described as "paly of six, or and azure, on a fess gules, three mullets argent".<ref name="ellis_clifton"/><ref name="Broome"/>