Winter
Repair and correspondence
Indoors, with the tools out.
The House Year
How the year is ordered, and in what season each form falls.
This is a record of recurring forms rather than a schedule. Most of the year is cooking, travel, and the rota. Closed observances are periods during which a house receives neither visitors nor correspondence; they are ordinary and no explanation is offered for them. Days and hours are settled at each house and are not published here.
The order below is kept at the North House and reconciled in October. Days and hours are settled at each house and are not published; the register records the form, not the appointment.
The reading at each open gathering is chosen locally from the House Reader. The order of the year does not set it, and never has.
The working seasons
The seasons describe when work is possible rather than when it is owed, and they are kept locally: Cedar House and South House do not keep the northern year.
Spring
Boundaries and water
Out to the line, and what the winter did to it.
Summer
Public work and residential periods
Longer days, more people in the house.
Autumn
Harvest, reconciliation, and putting by
What is kept, and what is written down.
Entries below are marked open, members, or closed. The house year sets out the recurring forms behind them.
What the year is made of
The order of the year is sixteen recurring forms kept across the ten Houses maintaining programmes, under eight offices, all of them unpaid. Each form is one of four things, and each leaves a bounded residue in the archive: the residue is what survives the keeping, and is the only part of it a later reader will have.
- Observance
- Nine in the year
- A form kept because it has been kept. It settles nothing and decides nothing.
- Archive opening
- Two in the year
- Holdings brought out, checked against their description, and shelved again. What is opened is decided by what has gone longest unopened.
- Reconciliation
- Three in the year
- Entries set against one another. Disagreements are written down; they are not required to resolve.
- Closure
- Two in the year
- A period during which a house or the register receives nothing. What arrives meanwhile is entered afterwards, with its own date.
Winter
| Form | Kept by | Description | Access |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Open Table | An ordinary evening: quiet, a short reading, talk, and a meal. Nothing follows from coming and nothing is asked of anyone who comes.Most houses, at intervals each house settles for itself.TBL — table books One line in the house table book: the reading taken, and the number who sat down. Kept at the house. No name is written unless the person writes it.Kept by North House · Shore House · River House · Lantern House · Orchard House | ObservanceOpen | |
| The reading period | A period given to reading rather than to work outdoors. Correspondence from earlier residents is read aloud at the first evening meal.Karst House, in the deep of the winter, and in a shorter form elsewhere.RDG — reading lists One list: what was read, and what was asked for and not found. Copied to the North House at the next reconciliation.Kept by Karst House · Fell House · Reader (office) | ObservanceMembers | |
| The winter archive opening | A part of the holdings is brought out, checked against its description, and put back. What is opened is decided by what has gone longest unopened, and by nothing else.Karst House, while the benches are indoors.ACC — accession checks One check sheet per box opened: reference, condition, and any disagreement with the description. Filed with the box. Disagreements are carried to the October reconciliation.Kept by Karst House · Archivist (office) | Archive openingMembers | |
| Closed observance | A period during which a house receives neither visitors nor correspondence. They are ordinary, and no explanation is offered for them.Each house keeps one or more in the year.CLO — closure notes One note: the house, the season, and the fact of it. No reason is entered. Held with the house lists. What arrived during it is entered afterwards.Kept by North House · Fell House · Karst House · Cedar House · Briar House | ClosureClosed |
Spring
| Form | Kept by | Description | Access |
|---|---|---|---|
| The annual reading of enquiries | What has been received in the year is read through in one sitting. Nothing is decided at the reading; the reading is the whole of it.North House.COR — correspondence summaries One summary: how much was received, and how much was answered. No enquiry is quoted. Retained at the North House. The enquiries themselves are not published.Kept by North House · Correspondent (office) | ObservanceMembers | |
| The boundary walk | The property boundary, or the orchard rows, walked in full at the opening of the season by whoever is in the house.Fell House and Orchard House, and others in their own form.PRP — property notes One walked line on the house plan, and a short list of what needs mending. Kept with the property papers until the following spring, then superseded.Kept by Fell House · Orchard House · Cedar House · Custodian (office) | ObservanceMembers | |
| Residential periods | Periods of three to twelve days worked at a house: the kitchen, the rota, the repairs, and whatever the house's work happens to be that week.Houses that hold places on the rota.ROT — rota sheets One sheet per period: the work carried, and the hours entered by the steward and not by the member. Entered to the member's account and retained until the account is closed.Kept by North House · Shore House · River House · Rota Clerk (office) | ObservanceMembers | |
| The register closure for correction | The register is closed to entry while the previous year's additions are read against one another. Nothing is added while it is shut, and what waits is entered in the order it arrived.The North House, for as long as the correction takes.REG — register closures One closure note: what was shut, and the count of entries held over. Held permanently. The held-over entries carry their original dates.Kept by North House · Archivist (office) | ClosureClosed |
Summer
| Form | Kept by | Description | Access |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Journal goes to press | The edition is closed, corrected, and printed. Corrections received after the closing are carried to the following number.Orchard House.JNL — press papers One closing sheet: the contents as printed, and the corrections carried forward. Bound with the file copy of the edition and held permanently.Kept by Orchard House · Reader (office) | ObservanceMembers | |
| The common quiet | A silence kept from midnight to noon on one day of the season. Work continues; conversation does not.River House, and in other forms elsewhere.HSE — house books One line in the house book, written after it has ended and not before. Kept at the house.Kept by River House · Lantern House | ObservanceMembers | |
| Survey and conservation work | Forest survey, bindings and boxes, water logs, and the ordinary maintenance that the winter makes impossible.Cedar House, South House, and the houses with land or bindings to keep.SUR — survey logs One log per site: readings taken, work done, and work deferred. Kept in series so that a year may be set against the year before it.Kept by Cedar House · South House · Custodian (office) | ObservanceMembers | |
| The summer opening of the deposits | Deposits made by people outside the Institute are unpacked, listed, and shelved. Nothing deposited is interpreted at the opening; the listing is the whole of the work.Shore House, while the drying room is warm enough to use.ACC — accession lists One list per deposit: extent, condition, and the terms the depositor set. Published in the catalogue when the terms allow, and held closed when they do not.Kept by Shore House · Archivist (office) | Archive openingMembers |
Autumn
| Form | Kept by | Description | Access |
|---|---|---|---|
| The reconciliation of the Common Record | The year's entries are set against one another and their disagreements written down rather than resolved.Shore House, in the week after the shop closes for the winter.REV — revision notes One revision note: what was added, corrected, withdrawn, or restored, and what still disagrees. Published with the edition. Earlier revisions are retained and not overwritten.Kept by Shore House · Archivist (office) · Treasurer (office) | ReconciliationMembers | |
| The correction period | Matters standing open between members are read through with a steward and either settled, held open in writing, or let go. A matter may be closed without agreement, and often is.Each house, for its own matters, before the October review.MEM — matters memoranda One memorandum per matter: what was said to have happened, what was agreed, and what was not. Held closed. Only the count of matters, and no part of their substance, leaves the house.Kept by North House · Briar House · Steward (office) | ReconciliationMembers | |
| The reading of the 1976 letter | The letter is read aloud once in the year. Those attending a house for the first time are welcomed at that reading and are not introduced by name.North House.HSE — house books One line: that it was read, and by whom. Kept at the North House with the letter's own file.Kept by North House · Reader (office) | ObservanceOpen | |
| The October review | The household lists are reviewed on paper, the fuel fund argued over, and the rota set for the winter.River House, and each house for its own lists.MIN — review minutes One minute of two pages: the lists as amended, and the arguments recorded in one line each. Copied to the North House and held permanently.Kept by River House · Treasurer (office) · Rota Clerk (office) | ReconciliationMembers |
A house keeping a closed observance receives nothing until it has ended, and what arrives during it is entered afterwards as though it had arrived then.
This order is the houses’ own. The circles keep their own and are not bound to it, except for the annual return and the two reconciliations they share with their house.