The Primitive Methodists founded their circuit based on Norwich in 1826, after a few years of impromptu meetings a more formalised setting was achieved in 1832 with the building of a chapel in the Lakenham area of the expanding city. Although the circuit is based upon the city these entries show residences across a wide range of Norfolk, albeit with a preponderance in the city and its suburbs. There are many entries for those areas notable for nonconformity in the county such as Carleton Rode, Tibenham, Diss and Wymondham.

Three registers cover the period of this transcript and the books are confusing to say the least. There would appear to have been two parallel registers from the start of the circuit, one of these registers was then terminated in 1870 only to become the register of the Wymondham circuit. Care has been taken to ensure that no entries are duplicated but the cutoff date has been assumed to be the first entry for April 1870 where a notable change of handwriting occurs. Because of these parallel registers the numbering used is a counter prefixed by a reference alluding to the Norfolk Record Office catalog. Register 1 - FC41/1 is a nonstandard ruled book with 10 entries across a double-spread of pages, Register 2 - FC25/230 is a similar ledger and is the book which passed to Wymondham, Register 3 - FC79/1 is a normal parish baptism register format with 8 entries per page. Register 1 & 3 are filmed on Microfilm MF1727; Register 2 on Microfilm MF1600 both in the collection of the Norfolk Record Office. Both films are relatively modern and the images are the best achievable considering the poor state of the early registers. A word must be said about the quality of handwriting and clerical accuracy. There are many differing hands involved in these entries and most are barely literate (it would appear), spelling is highly idiosyncratic and has been left as written, the date sequence is indicative of books which have been made up of entries entered in retrospect and doubt must be raised as to the accuracy of that process & in addition there are numerous examples of clerical error such as baptism date before birth date, missing entry detail including in some instances child's name and or surname; there is even a lady named "William" in these entries.

As a consequence of the poor clerical state of these entries users are advised to treat the details as indicative; there is also because of the poor handwriting a strong likelihood of transcription misreading having occurred - this dataset definitely carries a health warning!