The first commission is dated the "seventeenth day of November In this fourth yeare of the reigne of Sovraigne Lord James the Second by the grace of God ... 1688." The second commission is dated "the 23rd day of July in the first yeare of the Reigne of our Soveraigne Lord and Lady King William and Queen Mary ... 1689." Both commission the same man, one Anthony Mingay, of Norwich, as a lieutenant in the "Regiment of the trained bands of the City of Norwich." The Mingays were an important merchant dynasty in Norwich that dates back to at least the reign of Queen Elilzabeth I. Mingay's first commission was issued during the reign of James II. In the Glorious Revolution of 1688 James was forced off the throne in favor of William and Mary, of the House of Orange (Mary was the daughter of the Catholic James II, but was herself a Protestant; she married her first cousin William III in 1677); the commission was re-issued in this new reign. Norfolk's commission as Lord Lieutenant of Norfolk lapsed with the departure of James II, and all of the commissions he had issued under James II lapsed as well, necessitating the second commission in 1689. [Notes from John Mustain].
