The word ‘organ’ frequently appears in the plural in late medieval sources, although left singular by Chaucer. A ‘payre of orgonys’ was mentioned by Sandwich (1444) and others, indicating a single instrument, probably with only one manual. By 1650–70 (Evelyn, Pepys) a ‘pair of organs’ might be a one- or two-manual instrument. The word ‘double’ has been used in various contexts in reference to English organs. ‘Doble regalls’ (St Peter Cheap, London, 1555) may indicate the presence of a bass stop or long compass in the bass. ‘Dowble pryncipalles’ (All Hallows, Barking-by-the-Tower, 1519) refers to the provision of two similar independently drawing principal ranks at each pitch, an interpretation confirmed by two soundboard fragments discovered in Suffolk in 1993 and 1995. ‘Double’, used as a prefix to a stop name since the 18th century, refers to a stop sounding an octave below unison pitch. ‘Double organ’ was the term used in the 17th century to describe an instrument with two manuals, as in the contract with Thomas Dallam for the organ at Worcester Cathedral, built in 1613–14, and in other documents thereafter. This is also what is meant in the voluntaries for double organ popular from about 1640. In some voluntaries, ‘double’ is the registration term for Great organ, ‘single’ for the Chair organ.
STEPHEN BICKNELL