The Guild House was the headquarters of the Guild of St. Anne, a charitable

and religious guild established by Walter Cook in 1413. At its height it had

over 3,000 members, including many senior churchmen and most of the local

gentry In 1416 Walter Cook founded the College of Knowle, a religious

establishment providing a communal life for the resident priests. Both

Guild and College were dissolved at the Reformation in 1547 and their

property confiscated; but the second Guild register (1451-1535) miraculously

survived and is now in Birmingham Reference Library. It is a world-renowned

source for the early history of the Shakespeare family.

Roy Family Genealogy

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