OF COLONIAL MARYLAND 23

issue proclamations setting forth the instructions which often were
exhortations to colonists to prove land rights before a certain date,
extra instructions in regard to procedure with manors, more specific
directions as to who should be allowed to take up grants and where,
and so on. These are to be found recorded in the early Patents, or
in the Council Proceedings for that period.

CONTENTS OF PATENTS, WARRANTS AND PROPRIETARY
LEASES SERIES

The first type of Maryland land record proper to be found is the
record of entry. These include entry records of people who came in
1633, but the earliest date of recording is not till a few years later.
The earliest ones, as may be observed on the first pages of Liber I
of the Patents, are bare reports of arrival in the colony, such as:

Came into the Province 28th November 1637 in the ship
called the Unity of the Isle of Wight—Mr. John Lewger, who
transported his wife, his son John aged 9 years, Martha Wil-
liamson, Ann Pike, and Mary Whitehead, Maid Servants,
Benjamine Cobby, Phillip Linnis, Thomas Furston, and a Boy
Robert Serle aged 12 years.

This type of entry was a little too simple because it did not state
the exact number of persons transported. Since land was granted
according to the number of persons brought in the entries had to be
more specific, as appears a little further on in the record:

Entered by John Lewger, Secretary, brought into the Prov-
ince in the year 1637, John Lewger, senior, Ann his wife, John
Lewger, Jr. aged 9 years—Martha Williamson, Ann Pike, Mary
Whitehead maid servants Benjamin Cobby &c. the same per-
sons mentioned in the entry of arrivals, and others to the
number of 22.

The latter type of entry is supposed to be an official admission or
proof of the claims of the various parties to land proportionate to
the number of persons brought in by them. At a later date, 1662,
these entry records were ordered to be made under oath. ²⁷ They
came to be called "proofs of rights'' and in their definitive form
read:

28 July 1671 Came John Brown of St. Mary's County and
proved his Right to fifty Acres of Land it being due to him for

²⁷ Kilty, p. 76; Council Book HH, p. 148.