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BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME 
 FROM THE 
 
 SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND 
 
 THE GIFT OF 
 
 Henrg W. Sage 
 
 1891 
 
 K'A1C,3..^1, l5Wi 
 
THE KING'S SERJEANTS 
 &" OFFICERS OF STATE 
 
 WITH THEIR CORONATION SERVICES 
 
THE KING'S SERJEANTS 
 &- OFFICERS OF STATE 
 
 WITH THEIR CORONATION SERVICE? 
 
 BY 
 
 J. HORACE ROUND M.A., LL.D. 
 
 Author of " Peerage and Pedigree, " 
 etc., etc. 
 
 LONDON 
 JAMES NISBET AND CO. LTD. 
 22, BERNERS STREET 
 
 AND THE ST. CATHERINE PRESS 
 1911 
 
PREFACE 
 
 There would seem to be at the present time a very real 
 need for a work dealing with the subject of serjeanty, one 
 of the great English tenures, and with the services due 
 from those whom Domesday Book styles the King's 
 Serjeants (servientes regis). Although the materials for 
 such a study have accumulated rapidly of late, there is no 
 modern book devoted to the subject, nor, indeed, is there 
 any book which attempts to deal with it systematically, 
 in the scientific historical spirit. 
 
 Blount's ever-green little book, " Fragmenta Antiqui- 
 tatis. Ancient Tenures of Land, and Jocular customs of 
 some manors," was issued so far back as 1679, and, 
 neither in its original form nor in its later editions, does 
 it supply the want. Indeed, it touched on much that 
 ■was not serjeanty at all, while omitting a great deal that 
 is essential to a study of the subject. It is only right to 
 remember that, as Blount modestly observes, he published 
 his collection for the entertainment and relaxation of the 
 reader. He wrote, as his preface informs us, that 
 
 the studious, when weary with poring upon Littleton's Tenures, 
 and his learned Commentator, might ' relaxere fibulam ' by recur- 
 ring to these, and smile at the inoffensive mirth, both of our 
 kings, in former times, and lords of manors in creating them. 
 
 It is no systematic treatise, no classified arrangement, 
 that he sets before us, but a scrap-book, or olla podrida^ 
 ranging from the tenures, or alleged tenures of great 
 officers of state, to those of humble peasants. He jotted 
 down, in the course of his researches, undertaken " for 
 other ends," tenures " in some respect or other remark- 
 able " or " singular ". The merit of his book is that it 
 
vi PREFACE 
 
 contains some entries from records still in MS.: its defect, 
 apart from its desultory character, is that he did not 
 endeavour to identify the places to which he referred and 
 thus provided for his successors a heritage of confusion. 
 
 After more than a century had elapsed (1784) a fresh 
 edition of the wdrk was issued by a Yorkshire attorney, 
 Mr. Josiah Beckwith. In spite of his re-arrangement of 
 Blount's materials, translation, elucidation and additions, 
 it is difficult to accept the flattering estimate of his work 
 contained in the notice cited by the Dictionary of National 
 Biography. His son, upon whom he unfortunately bestow- 
 ed the names of ' Hercules Malebysse ', ^ brought out yet 
 another edition (18 15) "of a work which owes its princi- 
 pal success to the reputation of its first compiler, " in 
 which he incorporated more than three hundred fresh 
 ' tenures ' collected by his father. But, although by that 
 time there existed in print the means of correcting much 
 of its confusion, advantage was not taken of the fact, and 
 " the very great labour of research bestowed upon it 
 by his father and himself" must have been somewhat 
 misapplied. ^ 
 
 At last, however, a modern edition " of a work of such 
 established and well-merited reputation " was attempted.* 
 In 1874 Mr. W. Carew Ha2.1itt, finding the book still in 
 request, tackled the task boldly, adding "rather more 
 than a hundred new articles," largely re-writing the glos- 
 sary, correcting the errors in the text, and re-arranging 
 
 ' See. Peerage and Pedigree, II, 196-8, for the concocted document 
 explaining how " Sir Hercules Malebisse " came to take the name of 
 Beckwith in 1226. 
 
 * Under " Hallingbury de Walla ", for instance, we read that that 
 learned antiquary. Dr. Pegge, who had assisted both father and son, 
 " could not explain " de Walk. Yet he had but to refer to Morant's 
 Essex, a well-known work published so early as 1768, to learn that the 
 entry referred to the manor of Wallbury in Hallingbury. Mr. Beck- 
 with's own index, also, convicts Tiim of several absurdities, such as 
 treating "White Reding, Essex, and " Whitewthinges ("skj, Essex", 
 as different places. 
 
 ' This edition is ignored, under Thomas Blount, in the Dictionary of 
 'National Biography. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 Vll 
 
 the contents in alphabetical order under the names of the 
 localities concerned. This, which he classed among the 
 "changes, which it is hoped will be regarded as Im- 
 provements," was a most unfortunate idea. Mr. Beck- 
 with's plan had at least the merit of classifying the tenures 
 and services according to their nature, which is the right 
 principle to adopt. Mr. Hazlitt's substitution of "an 
 alphabetical arrangement " by localities, while depriving 
 us of this advantage, has not even the merit, claimed for 
 it, of " superseding the necessity of an Index of Places." 
 The one condition of its doing so was that it should give 
 the names of places in their modern forms, without which 
 it is, obviously, useless : indeed, in many cases, the result 
 is simply distracting to the reader. He would not look 
 for Ongar under ' Angre \ for Wool under ' Wells ', for 
 Heysham under ' Heschin ', for Meppershall under 
 * Maperdeshale ', for Birdbook under ' Bridebroke ', for 
 Haughley under ' Hanley ' or for Layer under ' Legre ' ; 
 nor could he guess that Lavington is entered under 
 ' Lovinton ' and under ' Midlovent ', Shelfhanger also 
 under 'Cheshanger', and Edgmond under 'Echemendon' 
 and ' Egmundun ', or that Marden in Herefordshire 
 figures also under ' Mawardyn ' and under ' Morden ' in 
 this " carefully revised " work. With regard to errors, 
 Mr. Hazlitt claimed that 
 
 Notwithstanding the errors of the former edition there are, 
 perhaps, few publications of the kind and period which are more 
 exempt from censure on that account. 
 
 He admitted, however, that "a variety of misprints and 
 other errors — a greater number, it is to be confessed, than 
 was anticipated, have been removed." I shall now show 
 by actual illustration that the whole of the revision 
 effected by the Beckwiths and by Mr. Hazlitt has been 
 so InsufBcIent that an -edition worthy of modern scholar- 
 ship has yet to be produced. And whatever difficulties 
 the former may have found in obtaining the Information 
 required, it Is strange that at so late a date as 1874 such 
 wild errors should again have appeared. But Mr. Hazlitt's 
 
viii PREFACE 
 
 main object seems to have been to make an Unfounded 
 attack on " our modern landed gentry " (pp. iv-v). 
 
 The interesting tenure by kitchen service of Ashwell 
 Hall in Finchingfield, Essex, is entered, as in previous: 
 editions, under three diiFerent heads : (i) "Ashwell Hall "■ 
 in Essex, where it is correctly given ; (2) " Hashwell (I)^ 
 Co. of Essex," where the serjeanty is entered as " being a 
 spearman^ (sic) of our lord the king;" (3) "Finchingfield," 
 Essex, where "this manor" is entered as held by "the 
 service of turning the spit " at a coronation. Pytchley, 
 with its notable hunting serjeanty, still appears disguised 
 as " Hightesty " (p. 1 6), Beaksbourne as " Buram, " 
 Springfield, Essex, as " Springsend, " Castle Hedingham,, 
 the famous seat of the earls of Oxford, as " Hougham " 
 (p. 190), and Matfen and Nafferton, Northumberland, as 
 " Manefene and Nakerton, Co. of Lincoln " ! Under 
 " Wells (recte Wool), Co. of Dorset " we find an entry 
 obviously relating to Wells, Co. Norfolk. Great Easton 
 is still entered as " East-Ham ( !), Eystan, or Eston at 
 the Mount, Co. of Essex," Chelmsford as " Cholmer," 
 and Haughley, the head of a great ' Honour,' as Hanley. 
 " Hatfield, olim Heathfield " and " Hatfield Broad Oak " 
 appear as distinct places, although they are the same : so 
 do "Lovinton" (p. 208) and " Midlovent " (p. 220), 
 " Hokenhale, Co. of Nottingham " and " Hucknall- 
 Torcard," " East Wordham " (p. 1 1 3) and " Estwerldham " 
 (p. 119), "Chenes, Co. of Surrey," and "Sheen (now 
 Richmond)." 
 
 " Torell, Co. of Essex," proves to be Little Thurrock, 
 while " Stanle and Lechampton, Co. of Norfolk," are 
 actually Stanley Regis and Leckhampton in Gloucester- 
 shire 1 "Trumpington Co. of Essex" (p. 328) and 
 "Great Tey, Co. of Essex" (p. 310) are entered as 
 distinct, though Trumpington's holding in Great Tey 
 was the serjeanty dealt with in both cases, there being, of 
 course, no such place as " Trumpington " in the county. 
 
 ' Hastilarius (turnspit) is thus ludicrously rendered, and the former 
 note on " the spear or lance reproduced." 
 
PREFACE ix 
 
 " Okenardson, Co. of Hants " is Hook Norton in 
 Oxfordshire, and " West Haured (or Heureth) " is West 
 Hendred, while " Wolvermeston alias Wulfelmelston, 
 Fingret alias Fingrey, and Gignes alias Ging-Reginse, Co. 
 of Essex, or Cambridge " prove to be Wolverston in 
 Chigwell, Fingrith in Blackmore, and Margaretting, all 
 in Essex and the subject of an important serjeanty. As 
 for persons, " John de Wenoye " (p. 119) is the " John le 
 Unz" (sic) of another entry (p. 113), the two serjeanties 
 being the same. Lastly the unfortunate error of Blount 
 that " Bures " {i. e. Bowers GifFord), Essex, was held 
 " by the serjeanty of the chandelry " (sic) is here 
 perpetuated (pp. 49, 425). 
 
 But so carelessly is the book arranged that under 
 "Cheshanger^ (sic), Co. of Norfolk" (p. 67) we actually 
 read that " William the Conqueror first gave this province 
 to Gherbord, a nobleman of Flanders," etc. etc., inform- 
 ation which obviously applies to no place in Norfolk, but 
 to Chester and its shire. 
 
 It has now been shown that more is needed than a 
 revised edition of ' Blount ', though even that is a task 
 which has not been satisfactorily performed. In printed 
 books alone there is now a field of research almost alarm- 
 ing in its extent. In addition to the Testa de Nevill and 
 Red Book of the Exchequer, those great repertories of ser- 
 jeanties, the county histories and all similar topographical 
 publications are rich in material. Nor do these exhaust 
 the list; some idea will be given by the references in the 
 present work of the sources in which information may be 
 found, among which we must now assign a leading place 
 to the great series of * calendars ', issued by the Public 
 Record Office, which are rapidly rendering available to 
 alt the contents of its ancient rolls. 
 
 Occasional error is unavoidable in all such productions, 
 and though the official edition of The Red Book of the 
 Exchequer stands probably alone among them in the amount 
 of error and of misconception which its pages have given 
 
 ' i.e. Shelfhanger. 
 
X PREFACE 
 
 to the world, the admirable ' Calendars ' and ' Feudal 
 Aids ' require, though very rarely, some correction. One 
 may be, perhaps, forgiven for adducing an instance in 
 print. 
 
 One of the drollest errors in these valuable publications 
 will be found at the end of Vol. Ill of Feudal Aids. ^ 
 Of the four serjeanties there described, one is " To find a 
 beast (averium) and a man in a ship, if the king should 
 cross the sea. " Why was " a beast " wanted in a ship 
 and what did the king do with the beast, when he had 
 got it .'' Puzzled, we refer to the text and there discover 
 that the word is not ' averium ' but ' averim ' (? ' averin ' 
 or * averun'), which may suggest to the intelligent reader 
 the familiar French * aviron ' (i.e. an oar) ! A little com- 
 mon-sense is at times a helpful thing. As a matter of 
 fact it was an oar (^avirori) that was due from the manor in 
 question, Grenche (or Grange) by Gillingham in Kent, 
 which, under the Cinque Ports system, was a non-cor- 
 porate member of Hastings (Sussex). Its name, plea- 
 santly misread by Blount as ' Grehocle, County of Sussex ', 
 appears under that form in subsequent editions of his 
 work, including that of Mr. Hazlitt. 
 
 It is not claimed that the present work, especially under 
 the conditions of its production, is wholly free from error, 
 but every effort has been made, so far as time allowed, to 
 ensure that accuracy in facts and identification of place- 
 names without which such studies are of very little value. 
 
 The author has sought, in these pages, to emphasise 
 the ' ministerial ' aspect, at least in Norman times, of ser- 
 jeanty in the King's household. This is a point of no 
 small constitutional importance, in its bearing on the 
 early development of our administrative system.^ In that 
 system the king's person occupied the central place and 
 from him there radiated all government through the 
 officers of his household. It is that system which is 
 still somewhat vividly recalled by the jealously preserved 
 
 ' Public Record Office publication in 1904. 
 ' See p. 52-4. 
 
PREFACE xi 
 
 ceremonial on the great day of coronation, now so far 
 removed from the facts of modern life. ^ Although so 
 much has been already written, and indeed repeated ad 
 nauseam, on coronation subjects, it is hoped that, in this 
 and other respects, these pages will afford fresh and 
 interesting information. 
 
 Serjeanty was always most prominent, and attained its 
 highest expression, at the coronation of a King or Queen, 
 and its services on these occasions cannot weU be distin- 
 guished from those of the officers of state. At the coron- 
 ation of Queen Eleanor (1236), which became the great 
 precedent on the subject, these services are, all alike, 
 spoken of as ' ministerial '. ^ It has, consequently, been 
 thought better to include, so far as possible, all coronation 
 services, even when they were not strictly comprised 
 within the limits of serjeanty, and also all the offices of 
 state, although it is here contended that these were not, 
 as was supposed, of the nature of grand serjeanty. It 
 seemed desirable that some attempt should be made to 
 deal with these offices, which are of considerable impor- 
 tance, in the light of modern research. This, however, 
 has, unfortunately, delayed the production of the book 
 and has involved^ moreover, the excision of at least half 
 the chapter dealing with ' The King's Sport ' and the 
 whole of that which was devoted to ' Miscellaneous ser- 
 jeanties '. But, although this has precluded so complete 
 a survey of serjeanty as was originally intended, it was 
 felt that, at the present time, the coronation services 
 would be deemed of far greater interest. 
 
 These were dealt with to some extent in Taylor's 
 Glory of Regality (1820), and it is pleasant to be able to 
 praise the many merits of that work, produced at a period 
 when historical research was at a rather low ebb and when 
 there were no such facilities as at present for its compila- 
 tion. More recently they have been treated, under 
 
 ' See pp. 65-6. 
 
 ' " factae sunt contentiones magnae de serviciis ministerialium domus 
 Regis et de juribus pertinentibus ad eorum ministeria. " 
 
 jj 
 
xii PREFACE 
 
 ' Officers and services ', by Mr. L. Wickham Legg in his 
 English Coronation Records (1901), but with a strange ad- 
 mixture of inaccuracy and error. This was deemed an 
 additional reason for attempting the task anew. 
 
 As to the Forma et Modus a note of warning is needed. 
 In his introductory note Mr. Wickham Legg observes 
 that it " consists of a description in paragraphs of the 
 whole ceremony of coronation, and it also gives a list of 
 the principal officers connected with the coronation." 
 Of this latter he writes : 
 
 The list of oflScers at the end is interesting It will be 
 
 noticed that the hereditary offices are on the whole still in the 
 hands of the same families as hitherto. The marshalship, how- 
 ever, has already passed into the family of the Earls of Norfolk. 
 
 Now "the date," we read, "of the document must be 
 later than the beginning of the fifteenth century." And 
 yet we find that " the office of Great Almoner " is as- 
 signed in it to " Beauchamp of Bedford " (which died out 
 in 1265), the bearing of ' Curtana ' to the earl of Chester, 
 the napery to Hastings (from whom it passed in 1389), 
 and the panetry to Beauchamp of Elmley (' Duneleus '), 
 who should be described (as elsewhere in the document) 
 as Earl of Warwick. The fact is that this list is but a 
 hotch-potch one, derived, through the Liber Regalis, from 
 that old-standing precedent, the coronation of Queen 
 Eleanor in 1236.^ One must not forget to mention 
 Mr. G. W. WoUaston's very useful Court of claims : cases 
 and evidence^ to which frequent reference will be found in 
 these pages. 
 
 The most important contribution to our knowledge of 
 serjeanty as a whole has been made, as might have been 
 expected, by the History of English Law (1895), and the 
 importance assigned to it in legal works should serve to 
 remind us that it is something more than a matter of 
 
 ^ English Coronation Records, p. 172. See also p. 91 below. 
 * See also p. 341 below. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 Xlll 
 
 "jocular tenures" or of merely curious interest.^ One 
 may hope that the present volume will serve the same 
 purpose. It has had to be written at a distance from most 
 works of reference, and, owing to shortness of time, 
 under conditions of extreme pressure ; and it has been 
 frequently interrupted by illness, largely due to that 
 pressure. For the same reason I have been for the first 
 time prevented from compiling the index myself. 
 
 ' ' Bracton's Note Book ' (Ed. Maitland) and the publications of the 
 Selden Society contain some interesting suits bearing on it, and 
 Mr. Turner's volume on Forest pleas, the chief authority on the 
 subject, has a good deal of valuable information on early hounds, as 
 I found after I had originally written the chapter on ' The King's 
 Sport.' 
 
ADDENDA ET CORRIGENDA 
 
 pp. 63, 82. I find that the inferiority of the marshal to 
 the constable is vehemently insisted on by Riddell, 
 the Scottish antiquarian lawyer, who states, as a 
 " palpable truism, that in every country, including 
 England, Scotland, and Ireland formerly, the Co-n 
 stable, a transcendant dignitary, was higher than, 
 and constantly preceded the Marshal." He was 
 indignant at the ' degradation, ' at and after the coron- 
 ation of George IV, of the High Constable of Scotland 
 below the Earl IMarshal of England {Peerage and 
 Consistorial Law, 1842, pp. 277-9, 334~7)- 
 
 p. 304, 1. 16. Jdd. 'totam' before ' ejus ' and ' habuit ' 
 after ' hereditatem.' 
 
 p. 371. My suggestion that the marshal would probably 
 be associated with the spurs seems to be supported 
 by the fact that at the Scottish coronation of Charles I 
 (1633) it was the Earl Marshal of Scotland who 
 " put the spurs on his heels. " 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
 Page. 
 
 Preface 
 
 Chapter I. Introduction i 
 
 Chapter II. Serjeanty and knight-service . . 21 
 
 Chapter III. Some features of serjeanty ... 35 
 
 Chapter IV- The king's household 52 
 
 The Steward 68 
 
 The Constable 76 
 
 The Marshal 82 
 
 A marshalship at Court 92 
 
 The Catteshill serjeanty 98 
 
 The Usher of the hall (i) 108 
 
 The Usher of the hall (2) no 
 
 The Chamberlain 112 
 
 The deputy chamberlain 123 
 
 Basin and towel serjeanties 125 
 
 The Queen's chamberlain 132 
 
 The Chief Butler 140 
 
 The assistant butler 165 
 
 The Bilsington serjeanty 172 
 
 Serjeanty of ' the hose ' 177 
 
 A butlery serjeanty 183 
 
 The beer-buyer's serjeanty 185 
 
 The King's dispensers 186 
 
 The King's pantler 197 
 
 Napery service 222 
 
 The waferer serjeanty 227 
 
 The King's baker 232 
 
 The King's larderer 233 
 
 The ' Maupygernoun * serjeanty 243 
 
 The King's sauser 249 
 
xviii TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
 Page. 
 
 The scalding serjeanty 252 
 
 Turnspit serjeanties 254 
 
 The, King's tailor 257 
 
 The Wymondley serjeanty 264 
 
 Chapter V. The King's sport 268 
 
 Liam-hound serjeanties 279 
 
 ' Harrier ' and wolf-hound serjeanties . . . 284 
 
 The ' oterhunte ' 298 
 
 The marshal of the hawks 303 
 
 The keeper of the falcons 310 
 
 Chapter VI. Coronation services 318 
 
 The canopy bearers 328 
 
 The coronation swords 337 
 
 The great spurs 347 
 
 The glove and sceptre serjeanty 373 
 
 The King's champion 378 
 
CHAPTER I 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 The class of whom these pages treat were those 
 who held their lands ' by serjeanty, ' that is, by the 
 performance of some specified service, either at all 
 times or in time of war. In that work which has 
 superseded all that went before it — I speak of the 
 History of Knglish Law — its learned authors tell us 
 that in the days of which they write, " tenures are 
 classified thus : — they are either free or not free : 
 the free tenures are (i) frankalmoin, (2) military 
 ^service, (3) serjeanty, (4) free socage ; in this order 
 we will speak of them. " ^ It is needful to insist 
 on the position here assigned to serjeanty, because 
 the misconception on the subject is widespread and 
 of old standing. ^ It was a persistent delusion that 
 tenure of grand serjeanty was so noble as to rank 
 above knight-service, and to include, even, all 
 peerage dignities. * 
 
 ' Op. cit. (1895), I, 2 1 8. So also Prof. Maitland wrote of " that scheme 
 of holdings — frankalmoign, knight's service, serjeanty, socage, villeinage 
 — which [in the 13 th cent.] was becoming the classical, legal, scheme." 
 (Eng. Hist. Rev., V. 625). 
 
 ' See my Peerage and Pedigree, I, 118-128, where the matter is fully 
 discussed in my comments on Mr. Haldane's argument in the Lord 
 Great Chamberlain case. 
 
 ' This does not apply to that eminent antiquary, Madox, who knew 
 better than to hold these fantastic views. 
 
2 INTRODUCTION 
 
 This singular error is at least as old as ' Ly ttelton, ' 
 whose Tenures is doubtless responsible for its persist- 
 ence to our own time. 
 
 His name is still sacred in Westminster Hall ; and his 
 celebrated work, The Treatise on Tenures, which Coke 
 describes as '' the most perfect and absolute work that 
 ever was written in any human science, " and for which 
 Camden asserts that " the students of the common law 
 are no less beholden than the civilians are to Justinian's 
 Institutes, " will ever prevent its being forgotten. ^ 
 
 What Littleton wrote was this : — 
 
 Tenure by Grand Serjeanty is where a man holds his 
 lands or tenements of our Sovereign lord the King by 
 such services as he ought to do in his proper person to 
 the King : as to carry the banner of the King, or his 
 lance, or to lead his army, or to be his marshal, or to 
 carry his sword before him at his Coronation, or to 
 be his sewer at his Coronation, or his carver, or his 
 butler, or to be one of his chamberlains of the receipt of 
 his exchequer, or to do other like services, etc. And the 
 cause why this service is called Grand Serjeanty is, for 
 that it is a greater and more worthy service than the 
 service in the tenure of escuage. ^ For he which holdeth 
 by escuage is not limited by his tenure to do any more 
 especial service than any other which holdeth by escuage 
 ought to do : ' but he which holdeth by Grand Serjeanty 
 ought to do some special service to the King, which he 
 that holds by escuage ought not to do. * 
 
 By the time of Henry VIII the lawyers had gone 
 further and so confused the subject that they pro- 
 
 ' Foss' Judges, IV, 439. 
 
 * i. e. knight-service. 
 
 " i. e. the service due from a knight's fee was uniform. 
 
 * Tenures, sec. 153. 
 
INTRODUCTION 3 
 
 claimed "Grand Serjeanty " to be Knight-service. ^ 
 
 Serjeanty, on the contrary, was originally but one 
 tenure ; its division into ' grand ' and ' petty ' ser- 
 jeanty vsras of subsequent introduction. All ser- 
 jeanty ranked below knight-service {servitium mili- 
 tare) and above socage. There were certain rules 
 by means of which " tenure by serjeanty was kept 
 apart from tenure by knight's service on the one 
 hand and tenure by socage on the other, and even 
 in the middle of the thirteenth century it still had 
 an importance which is but faintly represented by 
 the well known sections of Littleton's book. " ^ 
 
 It is admitted in the same work that " the idea 
 of a serjeanty as conceived in the thirteenth cen- 
 tury is not one that can be easily defined we 
 
 find it difficult to mark off serjeanty from knight's 
 service on the one hand and from socage on the 
 other. " 
 
 This difficulty is due to the fact that while 
 knight-service was a fixed uniform duty, serjeanty 
 varied infinitely in kind. But in all these matters 
 we have a sure touchstone : the fiscal test cannot 
 fail. I hope to show that at the close of the 
 twelfth and in the earlier portion of the thirteenth 
 century the exchequer recognised serjeanty as a 
 separate and distinct tenure and found no difficulty 
 in obtaining returns of serjeanties as a tenure stan- 
 ding by itself. 
 
 It is easier, however, to say what serjeanty was 
 
 1 «i 
 
 ■In grand Serjeantry is included Knight Service... Grand Ser- 
 jeantry is true service of chivalry [f. e. knight service] and no diversity 
 between them, saving in the relief." (See Peerage and Pedigree, I, 158). 
 ' History of English Law, I, 271. 
 
4 INTRODUCTION 
 
 not than to give an exhaustive definition of what 
 it was. In their brilliant section on serjeanty from 
 which I have already quoted, the authors of the 
 History of 'English Law write thus : — 
 
 Now it may be impossible to bring all these very 
 miscellaneous tenures under one definition which shall 
 include them, but exclude knight's service and socage. 
 However the central notion seems what we may call 
 
 ' servantship ' Obviously in many cases the tenant 
 
 by serjeanty is a servant (serviens) ; he is steward, 
 
 marshal, constable, chamberlain, usher, cook, forester, 
 falconer, dog keeper, messenger, esquire ; he is morb or 
 less of a menial servant bound to obey orders within the 
 
 scope of his employment The notion of servantship, 
 
 free servantship seems to be as a matter of history the 
 
 notion which brings the various serjeanties under one 
 
 class name, one of the tributaries which swells the 
 
 feudal stream is that of menial service. ^ 
 
 This view may claim support, no doubt, from 
 the language of Domesday, where the tenants by 
 serjeanty are styled " servientes. " But it seems 
 to me to cover serjeanty " in many cases, " but not 
 in all. In such great -divisions of the subject as 
 " the King's household " or " the King's sport, " 
 the definition of " servantship " may, one admits, 
 apply ; but it is a straining of that definition to 
 apply it to the large class of military serjeanties. 
 Indeed its authors admit that " when a tenant by 
 serjeanty is bound to go to the war as a serviens 
 with horse, purpoint, iron cap and lance, ^ the dif- 
 
 ' op. cit., I, 267. 
 
 ' There is an example of this service in the tenure of the manor of Hoo 
 Hall (or Martells) in Rivenhall, Essex. Felicia Martel was found, in 
 1252, to have held it " by serjeanty of finding a moiety of an esquire in 
 the King's army, within England, with doublet, lance, and iron cap. 
 
INTRODUCTION 5 
 
 ference between his tenure and knight's service 
 seems to resolve itself into a mere difference betw^een 
 one kind of armour and another or one position in 
 the army or another. " ^ It is also admitted that 
 " we find many men Mrho are said to hold by ser- 
 jeanty and are bound by their tenure to do other 
 services which are not so distinctly menial, that is 
 to say, are not so closely connected with the King's 
 household. " ^ 
 
 But even services " connected with the King's 
 household " present a problem of their own. In 
 name, indeed, they may savour of servantship, but 
 in practice they, or many of them, have been 
 always posts of honour, posts held by gentlemen 
 and even by great nobles. As early as the close of 
 the tenth century Duke Richard of Normandy 
 would have none, Wace tells us, but gentlemen in 
 his household. 
 
 Ne vot mestier de sa meisun 
 Duner si a gentil home nun. 
 Gentil furent li chapelein, 
 Gentil furent li escrivain, 
 Gentil furent li cunestable, 
 E bien puissant e bien aidable ; 
 Gentil furent li senescal 
 Gentil furent li marescal 
 Gentil furent li butteiller, 
 
 for 40 days. " (Ca/. of Inq., I, No. 239). "Doublet" here rightly 
 translates the Latin word formed from the French "pourpoint." Morant 
 wrongly combined it with lance, producing the phrase " purple lance, " 
 which is reproduced in Hazlitt's edition of Blount's Tenures, (p. 259), 
 with the delightful suggestion that " A purple lance was perhaps one with 
 a banner or pennon of that colour attached to it." (p. 431). 
 This serjeanty affords a clear example of partition (see below). 
 
 * Op. cit., p. 268. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 263. 
 
6 INTRODUCTION 
 
 Gentil furent li despensier. 
 Li chamberlence e li ussier. 
 Furent tuit noble chevalier, 
 Chascun iur orent liurisuns ^ 
 E as granz festes dras * e duns. ' 
 
 Although, in this case, we may make some all- 
 owance for tradition, I should be the last to rely on 
 Wace for an epoch so remote from his own. But 
 he is, of course, good authority for the days in 
 which he wrote (the reign of Henry II), and those 
 immediately preceding them, and his list, in which 
 we recognise the well-known officers of state, is of 
 value if it does but reproduce the ideas of that 
 period. 
 
 The fact that, even at the present day, the Royal 
 household still contains, not only — of the officers 
 named by Wace — a Lord Steward, a Lord Cham- 
 berlain, and Gentlemen Ushers, but Women of the 
 bedchamber. Grooms-in-waiting, and Grooms of 
 the bedchamber, all of them aristocratic posts, * 
 illustrates the difficulty one has in apprehending the 
 status of " the King's Serjeants " {servientes) in the 
 eleventh and twelfth centuries. At times described 
 as the King's ministers [ministri) — their office was 
 always a ministerium — they have developed, in 
 administrative history, into the " ministers " of to- 
 
 ' These were the " liberationes, " reckoned /^r (AV« (" Chascun iur"), 
 of the Constitutio domus regis, to which we shall come below. 
 
 ' These were the ' robes ' and fees to which we find the officers of the 
 King's household entitled. 
 
 ^ Roman de Rou. 
 
 * See The Royal Household, 1 837- 1 897, by W. A. Lindsay Q. C, 
 Windsor Herald, described as " an account of those who have had the 
 honour to wait upon Her Majesty's person, " and including Reports of 
 Ceremonies. 
 
INTRODUCTION 7 
 
 day, who are, technically, still the King's ' secret- 
 aries ' for the various administrative departments. 
 For all power radiated, in theory, from the person 
 of our Lord the King. In constitutional practice, 
 as we all know, the administration passed out of the 
 hands of the great household officers ; but this 
 change was gradual. 
 
 Though the real work of governing the realm has 
 fallen to another set of ministers, whose offices are not 
 hereditary, to the king's justiciar, chancellor and treasurer,^ 
 still the marshal and constable have serious duties to 
 perform. ^ 
 
 Even in actual Court duties there was a similar 
 development. The hereditary holder of a house- 
 hold office delegated to a deputy with the same 
 title the actual discharge of its functions, which he 
 himself assumed more and more rarely until at last 
 he officiated only at the great solemnity of a Coro- 
 nation. As early as 1236, at the coronation of 
 Queen Eleanor, we already find that this process 
 had for its result the co-existence of a chief butler, 
 assistant butler, and deputy assistant butler.' At the 
 present day we see it illustrated by the simultan- 
 eous existence of a Lord Great Chamberlain, a 
 Lord Chamberlain, and a Vice-Chamberlain. The 
 office of Lord High Steward has, from an early 
 date, been only revived for special occasions, such 
 as a coronation, the Lord Steward having taken his 
 place as the permanent officer. How early this 
 
 ' But the chancellor and treasurer were, both of them, members of the 
 King's household under the Norman Kings (J.H.R.). 
 * History of English Law, I, 263. 
 ' See the section on the butler's office in this work. 
 
8 INTRODUCTION 
 
 process began it is riot easy to say, but it extended, 
 from at least the thirteenth century, to inferior 
 offices in the household. For we find tenants by 
 serjeanty then already returned as bound to perform 
 their service at a coronation only. The tenant of 
 Addington by kitchen service ' finds ' a cook to 
 perform it. In later days, under Edward III, the 
 lady of the manor of Sculton Burdeleys still hblds 
 " by service of coming to the King's coronation 
 with a knife and axe to perform the office of lard- 
 erer, " but at other times, we may be sure, the 
 larder knew her not. 
 
 The keen and persistent contest for this office of 
 larderer ^ illustrates the eagerness to claim a com- 
 paratively menial office, and so does the assertion, 
 to the last of the coronation banquets, of the right, 
 in virtue of tenure, to act as towel-horse to the 
 sovereign. ^ 
 
 There were not even fees to act as an attraction. 
 Dukes and Earls have claimed, and mostly claimed 
 in vain, to act as " Serjeant of the silver scullery, " 
 but in that coronation office they had at least the 
 privilege of making off with the plate. 
 
 The atmosphere of a Court has always tended to 
 foster a servile spirit. Even the saintly bishop 
 Andrewes, a man sprung from the trading class, 
 did not hesitate to say of James, that " most high 
 and mighty prince " who was perhaps the most 
 unseemly monster that has ever sat upon the English 
 throne, James, under whom his " rise was rapid, " ^ 
 
 ' There were three claimants at the coronation of George IV and one 
 at that of Edward Vir(see the section on ' the King's larderer '). 
 ' See the section on ' Basin and towel seqeanties.' 
 ' See his life by his panegyrist, Canon Overton, in the Diet. Nat. Biog. 
 
INTRODUCTION 9 
 
 that he was " inspired of God." ^ It was something, 
 surely, of the same spirit that led men to fight 
 for the privilege of holding the King's basin while 
 he washed his hands. ^ " We observe, " say the 
 learned authors of the History of English Law, " that 
 all these offices, if we regard only their titles, have 
 something menial about them, " 
 
 It may be long since the predecessors in title of these 
 men really cooked the King's dinner or groomed the 
 King's horses : but they glory in titles which imply, or 
 have implied, that their duties are of this menial kind ; 
 nor is it always easy to say when or whether the duty 
 has become honorary. When the Conqueror gives half 
 a hide of land in Gloucestershire to his cook (D.B. 1 62b), 
 it were bold to say that this tenant did not really roast 
 and boil (1,263). 
 
 The illustration is not a happy one. Far more 
 striking would have been the fact that members of 
 the mighty Norman houses of Bigodandof GifFard 
 held, in succession, an Essex manor by the service 
 of scalding the King's swine. ^ 
 
 My real criticism, however, is that, when we 
 refer to the passage vouched, we find that Domesday 
 speaks, not, as alleged, of the King's gift, but of the 
 gift of Earl William. * If we would find the 
 Conqueror's cook and the lands given him by his 
 
 ' This is one of those awkward facts to which Green's Short History 
 has given a wide circulation, to the mingled rage and despair of the party 
 that appeals to Andrewes. 
 
 - It led the Chamberlain of Normandy, under Henry II, to employ, 
 as will be shown below, physical violence. 
 
 * See the section on ' the scalding serjeanty.' 
 
 * " Hanc dedit W(illelmus) com(es) cuidam coquo suo. " This was 
 the great William Fitz Osbern, earl of Hereford, who held a quasi-pala- 
 tine position in the West of England. 
 
lo INTRODUCTION 
 
 master, we must seek, him, not in any of the cooks 
 named as such in Domesday — for it is not proved 
 that they were the King's — but in a pre-Domesday 
 record, which enables us to trace our man. 
 
 We have the actual charter of the Conqueror 
 which tells us how he made provision for one of his 
 cooks, not indeed by carving a serjeanty out of the 
 lands at his disposal, but at the cost, Alas ! of a 
 bishop and his monks. Surrounded by men bearing 
 great names of the Conquest, he informs Osmund, 
 Bishop of Salisbury, E(dward) the sheriff, and all 
 the thegns (taints) of Wiltshire, that, at his entreaty 
 and in his presence, the bishop of Winchester has 
 granted to William Escudet, his cook (coco meo), 
 for his life, the land which Wulfward Belgisone had 
 held in ' Alwoditon. ' ^ We turn to Domesday and 
 there find, under ' Awltone ' (Alton Priors) — which 
 was, as the charter states, " de yictu monacho- 
 rum, " — that in that manor William ' Scudet ' holds 
 three hides of the bishop. ^ 
 
 It is rare indeed that a Domesday entry can be 
 explained by means of a pre-Domesday charter ; 
 and to find William naming and providing for the 
 future of his cook is of some human interest. We 
 are also now enabled to identify the William Scudet 
 who is entered among the King's Serjeants {servientes 
 regis) in Wiltshire, as holding a substantial manor 
 at Westbury, with his cook. Nor was even this 
 the limit of this favoured cook's possessions. He 
 was provided for, it is to be feared, at the cost not 
 only of the monks of Winchester, but of the nuns 
 
 ' Calendar of Charter Rolls, III, 345. 
 
 ' This would date the charter 1078-1085. 
 
INTRODUCTION 1 1 
 
 of Romsey. For we detect him in a Romsey 
 charter granted by Henry I, at a great Westminster 
 crown-wearing early in his reign.^ 
 
 The cook has placed two of his daughters in that 
 aristocratic abbey, and the King informs the Wilt- 
 shire authorities that he confirms their father's 
 ' restoration and grant ' of the lands given with them 
 to the abbey.^ What is the meaning of these 
 terms ? We learn it on turning to Domesday 
 Book, where we find that on both the Abbey's 
 Wiltshire manors a ' William ' was holding land 
 which should not have gone out of its demesne.* 
 There had been an act of reparation when his 
 daughters took the veil. * 
 
 There may yet, possibly, come to light records 
 of the actual creation of serjeanties before Domes- 
 day. In any case it is clear from the great record 
 that there were many in existence when the survey 
 was made. As this is a point of some importance 
 in its bearing on the early origin of the system, it 
 seems desirable to adduce definite cases in which 
 the serjeanties of later days can be identified in 
 Domesday. Somewhat capricious though it is in 
 its method, the great survey evidently intends to 
 distinguish serjeanty as a thing apart. The King's 
 Serjeants {servientes regis) are so classified under 
 
 ^ There were present Count Eustace of Boulogne and David -i (of 
 Scotland) the Queen's brother (fratre regine). The latter is wrongly 
 given and indexed as " fratre Reginaldi " {fbid., II, 103). 
 
 " " Habere in dominico suo terras illas quas Willelmus Escuet (sic) de 
 eadem ecclesia tenuit et quas ipse Willelmus predicte ecclesie reddidit et 
 concessit cum filiabus suis ; et quicunque aliquid tenet de predicta terra, 
 precipio ut ad ecclesiam redeat " {fial. of Charter Rolls, II, 103). 
 
 ' " Non poterant ab aecclesia separari." 
 
 * The charter of Henry I w^as confirmed by Henry II. {Ibid., p. 10). 
 
12 INTRODUCTION 
 
 Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset, Devon, 
 Leicestershire, and Warwickshire. Under Oxford- 
 shire they are grouped as the King's ministers^ 
 {ministri). I cannot agree, however, with the 
 authors of the History of English Law, that " when 
 elsewhere we meet with ' Famuli Regis ' we may 
 suppose that this is but another name for the 
 Servientes and Ministri" (I, 269). On checking 
 their references, which are to the second (the 
 Eastern counties) volume of Domesday, I find that 
 the tenants by serjeanty are not grouped as ' famuli, ' 
 and that the word denotes only individual Crown 
 officers of a subordinate kind. In the Eastern 
 counties, as in others where they are not formally 
 grouped apart, we can usually distinguish the true 
 Serjeants, where any existed, towards the end of the 
 survey. 
 
 Another group, which is found just before or 
 after them, is that of the King's thegns {taini). 
 The meaning of this phrase has been sometimes 
 misunderstood, as by Eyton ^ and by Professor 
 Maitland. The latter scholar, dealing with ' the 
 thegns ' and the ' nature of thegnship, ' held that, 
 according to Domesday, 
 
 the relation between thegn and lord Is no longer conceived 
 as a menial, ' serviential, ' or ministerial relation. The 
 Taini Regis are often contrasted with the Servientes Regis. 
 The one trait of thegnship which comes out clearly on 
 the face of our record is that the thegn is a man of 
 war. ' 
 
 ' Under Wiltshire they are grouped partly as ministri and partly as 
 servientes, which proves that these terms were indifferently used. 
 ' See my Domesday Introduction to the Fictoria History of Somerset. 
 ' Domesday Book and Beyond, pp. 162-163. 
 
INTRODUCTION 13 
 
 But when the vocations are named, we find 
 ' King's thegns ' who are priests, huntsmen, for- 
 esters, goldsmiths, reeves, bedels, falconers, cham- 
 berlains, and interpreters. It is even possible, we 
 shall see, to find among them a cook whose lands 
 were afterwards held by kitchen serjeanty, and a 
 goldsmith whose manor, in later days, was associated 
 still with his craft. Indeed, it is by no means clear 
 that Domesday did intend to contrast the ' Serjeants' 
 with the ' thegns.' The Surrey schedule has at the 
 end the entry " Oswoldus, Teodricus, et alii 
 servientes regis, " but the corresponding heading in 
 the text is " Terrae Oswoldi et aliorum tainorum. " 
 The real distinction I take to have been that by 
 " taini " were meant men of English birth, or at 
 least of English domicile before the Normans came. 
 In the case of Hertfordshire the heading in the 
 text " Terra Tainorum regis " is actually equated in 
 the schedule by the entry " Derman et alii Anglict 
 regis. " And a study of the whole record confirms 
 this view. 
 
 We may now turn to those serjeanties which can 
 be- traced back to the time of the Domesday Sur- 
 vey. Several of them will be dealt with, in detail, 
 in this volume. After the name of each tenant I 
 have placed in brackets the tenure by which his 
 land was subsequently held. 
 
 Surrey : — Odard the crossbowman [balistarius) 
 of Moulsey (crossbow service) ; Tezelin the cook 
 (kitchen service). 
 
 Hampshire : — William the archer [arcuarius) 
 of Bentley (archer service) ; Geoffrey the marshal 
 
14 INTRODUCTION 
 
 of East Worldham (marshalsea) ; Miles the porter 
 (porter service at Winchester castle)\ 
 
 Dorset : Osmund the baker (baker service). 
 
 Somerset^: — John the usher (usher service). 
 
 Devon : — William the porter (porter service at 
 Exeter Castle). 
 
 Cambridgeshire : — Erchenger the baker (baker 
 service) . 
 
 Essex : — Walter the cook (kitchen service) . 
 
 Suffolk : — Ralf the crossbowman {balistarius) of 
 Burgh (crossbow service). 
 
 These, it must be remembered, are cases in w^hich 
 Domesday happens to name the vocation of the 
 tenant, w^hich is contrary to its practice. There 
 are also cases in w^hich it is possible, without this 
 help, to trace back the serjeanty to 1 086, but that is, 
 of necessity, a difficult and laborious undertaking. 
 
 The principle of serjeanty was, no doubt, the 
 grant of land in return for service, when the lack 
 of ready money made the payment of wages in 
 cash a matter of comparative difficulty. Great 
 escheats to the crown under the Norman kings 
 provided abundance of land from which fresh 
 serjeanties were created ; but the process seems to 
 have slackened under their successors and probably 
 died out about the end of the twelfth century, or, 
 at latest, in the reign of John. Grants of land were 
 still made as rewards for service to the Crown, but 
 
 ' See also my Domesday introduction to the Victoria History of 
 Hampshire. (I, 429-432). 
 
 ^ Also in Dorset and in Wilts. 
 
INTRODUCTION 1 5 
 
 it was no longer a condition of tenure that the 
 grantee should continue to serve in the same capa- 
 city. For instance, the crossbowman would no 
 longer be required to render crossbow service.^ 
 
 We may glance at two examples in illustration 
 of this statement. The first is that of Master Urri 
 (or Orri) 'the engineer ', the second is that of Adam 
 de Gurdon. The former is of interest as having 
 the charge of the siege-train of John. When John 
 crossed to Normandy in 1201, he wrote from 
 Bonneville (8 June) to Geoffrey Fitz Piers bidding 
 him assign to "our beloved Master Urri" {TJrricus) 
 as much land in Wickford and Canewdon, Essex, 
 as had been forfeited there by Henry of Essex, and 
 give seisin to his attorney, as Urri was accompany- 
 ing him to construct his siege engines {ingenia 
 nostra)^ so that he could not leave the King.^ In 
 view of this record evidence it is difficult to accept 
 the 'R.ed Book statement that Wickford was given 
 him (as " balistarius") by Richard I ; but a plea 
 roll of 6 Ric. I ' (i 194-5) records Urri 'Arbelaster' 
 as impleaded for Wickford, and a plea of 24 
 Hen. Ill (1239-40) shews us the King's advocate 
 stating that 
 quando manerium de Kanewodena cecidit in manum 
 
 Dom. Regis Ricardi dedit idem Dom. Rex manerium 
 
 illud cuidam Magistro Orry ingeniatori suo, et post 
 
 mortem ipsius Magistri Orry habuit Alanus Orry man- 
 erium illud. * 
 
 ' It may here be mentioned that there was usually some ambiguity in 
 the word ' balistarius, ' which was used both for a crossbowman and for 
 one who worked siege engines (baltsta). 
 
 ^ Rot. de Lib., 3 John, p. 14. 
 
 ' Cited by Morant. 
 
 ^ Br adores Note Book, case 1275. 
 
1 6 INTRODUCTION 
 
 The point, however, is that Urry and his heirs held, 
 not by serjeanty, but by knight-service. ^ 
 
 John took Master Urri w^ith him on his expedi- 
 tion to Ireland in 1 2 1 o, where the ' engineer ' ac- 
 companied him to the siege of Carrickfergus in the 
 north-east of the island, with a small body which 
 formed the precursor of the corps of royal artificers, 
 afterwards the Royal Engineers. It consisted of 
 Master Osbert ' Petrarius,' with three comrades, in 
 charge of the Petrariae or stone-throwing engines for 
 battery. Master Pinel with six miners, and Master 
 Ernulf with five more, Aubrey the sapper [fossator), 
 Nicholas and four other foreign carpenters, and Ralf 
 of Prestbury with eight English ones. ^ 
 
 Adam de Gurdon, who was provided for by a 
 grant of lands at East Tisted, Hants, was also ■ — 
 although the fact seems to have escaped notice — 
 an officer in John's host. Early in 1204 he is 
 found in command of the crossbowmen, as William 
 de Vernon was of the archers.^ It is interesting to 
 find that John obtained crossbows from Genoa, for 
 at Crecy, it will be remembered, the crossbowmen 
 of the French host were Genoese.* 
 
 ' See the Red Book entries and the Inq. p. m. on Richard ' Orricus ' 
 (31 Hen. Ill) and on his sisters Isabel (33 Hen. Ill) and Maud 
 (34 Hen. III). 
 
 * Rot. de Prest. It must be remembered that mining operations at 
 that time consisted of undermining an angle of the walls and then firing 
 the timber supports which supported the roof of the mine. 
 
 ^ " Ade de Gordon (sic) et sociorum suorum balistar' et Willelmi de 
 Vernun et sociorum suorum archer'." {Rot. de Lib., 5 John, p. 78). The 
 grant to him of lands at Tisted worth £ 1 2 a year terms him Adam " de 
 Gurdun ' balist(ario) nostro " {Ibid., p. 89). It will be remembered 
 that John pledged himself, in the Great Charter, to banish, as soon as 
 peace was restored, " omnes alienigenas milites, balistarios, " etc. 
 
 * " Liberate de thesauro nostro Johanni balistario de Genua iiij" m. 
 
INTRODUCTION 17 
 
 Mr. Joseph Bain, in his learned paper on Sir 
 Adam Gurdun of Selborne,' could only suggest that 
 "he was probably one of John's mercenary soldiers 
 from France, as the surname is not unknown in 
 Gascony. " He was certainly holding land in 
 Hampshire as early as 1207/ and may have done 
 so earlier still/ His estate at Tisted was held by 
 serjeanty till 1254, when the service was changed 
 to that of half a knight, but there seems to be no 
 description of the serjeanty beyond that of supplying 
 a Serjeant in the host for forty days. 
 
 A great change was effected in the serjeanties in 
 or about the year 1250, when Robert Passelewe, 
 the deputy treasurer, conducted, at the head of 
 a commission, an enquiry throughout the coun- 
 try, into the performance of their services and the 
 alienation of their lands. The result of this enquiry 
 was the great " arrentation " of which the record is 
 largely preserved in the pages of the Testa de Nevill 
 and forms one of our most valuable sources of in- 
 formation on the serjeanties. 
 
 The system adopted for dealing with the state of 
 things which had arisen was to set out clearly the 
 alienated portions of the lands (which were liable, 
 in strictness of law, to forfeiture) and then to allow 
 their holders to compound, either by paying a 
 money rent, by way of " fine ", or by rendering a 
 
 pro balistis quas nobis portavit de Genua." (Ibid.): Roger " de Genua, 
 balistarius noster, " was being paid \\d.. and afterwards 6d. a day in 
 1204, and Roger "archerius de Genua" was given 40 marcs to com- 
 pensate him for his losses in coming to the King. {Ibid., p. 100). 
 
 ' Genealogist, (N.S.) IV, i et seq. 
 
 ' Rot. de Fin., 9 John, p. 449. 
 
 ' r. C. H., Hants, III, 30. 
 
1 8 INTRODUCTION 
 
 fractional quota of knight-service. Then the lands 
 which had not been alienated either remained char- 
 ged with the old service of the serjeanty or had it 
 changed into knight-service. In the latter case, of 
 course, the serjeanty came to an end. All this 
 requires to be made very clear, because it led, we 
 shall find, even the learned Madox into supposing 
 that land could be held, at the same time, by ser- 
 jeanty and by knight-service. It is to Blount's 
 credit that he noted, the previous century, in his 
 Tenures^ that this " arrentation " had extinguished 
 many serjeanties. It seems to me, however, that 
 this was overlooked in certain cases where it was 
 desired to claim, at a later date, that the old service 
 had survived. 
 
 The authors of the History of English Law de- 
 scribe the " arrentation " thus : — 
 
 Robert Passelew was sent through England to "afrent" 
 the alienated serjeanties, that is to say, to change the 
 tenure from serjeanty into knight's service or socage. 
 One instance out of a very large number will serve to 
 show what was done. Walter Devenish held land by the 
 serjeanty of finding three arrows when the king should 
 hunt on Dartmoor ; he had alienated parts of the tenement 
 to sub-tenants, his services were now changed into a rent 
 of three shillings, one third of which was to be paid to 
 him by his sub-tenants {Testa de Neville 197).^ 
 
 Both statements are erroneous. Walter's services 
 were not changed, but remained those of the ser- 
 jeanty, ^ and the annual three shillings was the 'fine' 
 
 ' Op.cit., I, 315-316. 
 
 * " Et dictus Walterus faciat servicium prenominatum pro parte sua 
 que non est alienata." This was the regular formula where the service 
 was not changed. A real case of change (to knight service) at Aston 
 Clinton, will be found in the next section. 
 
INTRODUCTION 19 
 
 for the alienated portions. Nor did their tenants 
 contribute one third of that fine : what they paid 
 (to Walter) was a third of the annual value of their 
 holdings, namely 3s. 5d., ^ which actually exceeded 
 the fine. That is how the system worked. It is 
 almost incredible that a record can have been so 
 carelessly read. 
 
 It is a rather interesting little serjeanty. There 
 is the usual duplicate version of the ' arrentation ' 
 on p. 198, from which we learn that Roger de 
 Mirabeir had forfeited it for homicide, and Henry III 
 had then transferred it to Walter with the same 
 service. This is absolutely accurate. Henry's 
 charter is duly found in the Calendar of Charter 
 Rolls ^ (16 March 1229) and we find that Walter 
 le Deveneis was no other than the ' physician ' of 
 Hubert de Burgh. The ' Skyredon ' of the Testa 
 becomes ' Skiledon ' in the charter, so one cannot 
 wonder that it baffled the Record Office editor. It 
 is, I have ascertained, Skirradon in Dean Prior, on 
 the south-eastern edge of Dartmoor. It was held 
 in 121 2 (and circ. 121 8) by David de Scyredun,' 
 whose ' ancestors ' were then alleged to have held it 
 ' since the Conquest.' In a legal sense they may 
 have done so, for among the Devon ' thegns ' in 
 Domesday we find Alvric {Aluricus) holding a 
 virgate and a half in ' Siredone ' and ' Essaple, ' 
 which latter is clearly the ' Sapesleg ' held with 
 Skirradon by David. Alvric may well have been 
 
 1 « 
 
 " Ita quod dicti tenentes respondeant eidem Waltero de tercia parte 
 valoris ten' sui (sic) quilibet eorum secundum porcionem suam. 
 ' Vol I, p. 92. 
 ' Testa, pp. 195, 196. 
 
20 INTRODUCTION 
 
 one of the English huntsmen retained by William. 
 It should be observed that this was an absolutely- 
 typical case of ' petty ' serjeanty, which John 
 defined in the Great Charter (12 15) as the service 
 " of supplying us with knives, arrows or the like." ^ 
 Yet as late, at least, as 1250 it remained, we have 
 seen, a serjeanty and had not sunk into socage. 
 
 ' History of English Law, I, 304. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 SERJEANTY 
 AND KNIGHT-SERVICE 
 
 It has been urged above that the distinction 
 between these two tenures is one on which insist- 
 ence must be laid. For, although the works of 
 Maitland have made that distinction clear, the con- 
 fusion on the subject is so persistent that it will 
 not easily be dispelled. 
 
 The most striking instance, possibly, of that 
 confusion was Mr. Haldane's argument, before the 
 Committee for Privileges, in the Great Chamber- 
 lain case : — 
 
 if they were services of a higher degree, of a military 
 nature, then you had knight's service, and it was petty 
 serjeanty (serjeanty, of course, really comes from serviens), 
 the work of a knight. ^ 
 
 But, apart from this example of ' clear thinking,' 
 we have the statement in what is now the standard 
 work on Magna Carta^ that grand serjeanties were 
 not liable " as a rule to payment of scutage. " ^ 
 This is a relatively trifling slip, but if any serjeanty 
 had been liable to scutage, the tenure would have 
 been thereby proved to be, not serjeanty, but 
 
 ' See my Peerage and Pedigree, I. 119. 
 * McKechnie's Magna Carta, p. 68. 
 
2 2 SERJEANTY AND 
 
 knight-service.^ More surprising is the classifica- 
 tion, under the head of ' serjeanties,' in a Record 
 Office Publication, of such services as " to maintain 
 5 knights in the King's army for 40 days " ^ or " to 
 provide two horsemen ^ at his own charge in time 
 of war " or " to find three knights with horses, 
 arms," etc.* If this classification were right, there 
 would be an end of my case. But, when we refer 
 to the text, we find no mention of serjeanty. In 
 the first entry (abbot of Sherborne) the words 
 
 are : — " De feodis militum baroniam suam, pro 
 
 qua baronia faciet servicium f[eod'] duorum m[ili- 
 tum]. " * In the third (abbot of Glastonbury) the 
 words are, " per baroniam, " and it is notorious that 
 both abbots held by knight-service.* The inter- 
 mediate entry relates to William of Higford, one 
 of Fitz Alan's tenants by knight-service.' 
 
 The touchstone by which, in practice, the two 
 tenures were distinguished was the payment of 
 scutage. As is justly observed in the History of 
 English Law, — 
 
 Bracton's rule is clear, namely that if the tenant owes but 
 one hap'orth of scutage (licet ad unum obolum), his tenure 
 is military, and this rule is fully borne out by pleadings 
 
 and decisions. This point is important ; the small 
 
 yeoman often holds his little tenement by a tenure which 
 
 ' See below. 
 
 ^ Feudal J ids (1900), II, 624. 
 
 ' The word is equites {i. ^.' knights). Ibid. IV, 226. 
 
 * Ibid (1906), IV, 604. 
 
 ° What makes the error the more extraordinary is that on the oppo- 
 site page we have a precisely similar entry on the abbot's knight service, 
 which is carefully separated from the heading " de serjauntiis " lower 
 down. 
 
 * Lib. Rub., pp. 213, 222. 
 ' See Testa, p. 49 b. 
 
KNIGHT-SERVICE 23 
 
 is nominally and legally the same tenure as that by which 
 the knight holds his manor. ^ 
 
 If a tenant was liable to scutage, his tenure could 
 not be serjeanty, and if conversely, it was serjeanty, 
 he was not liable to scutage. 
 
 The three leading cases illustrating this point are 
 those relating to the tenure of Addington, of 
 Langton, and of Comberton. The Addington 
 serjeanty will be dealt with in its own place,^ but 
 the point here is that, in 1234, its tenant, William 
 Aguillon, was charged with scutage in arrears, and 
 pleaded that he did not owe it, as he held by 
 serjeanty. A jury of twelve knights found that 
 his plea was true, and he was thereupon pronounced 
 to be not liable to scutage. For this case we are 
 dependent on the Pipe Roll of 1234, the relative 
 extract from which is printed in Madox* Exchequer. 
 This I place below on the left, and on the right the 
 version printed in the T^ed Book of the Exchequer, 
 where the editor accepts the date " 1236" (20 
 Hen. III). This version is obviously corrupt, as 
 will be seen on attempting to parse it from the 
 word " utrum. " It is only given in the Ked Book 
 to lead up to the jest that the Pipe Roll of 1 161 
 ought to be thrown into the Fleet Prison.' 
 
 But I print it here because it has been appealed 
 to as " a most decisive statement " against me, and 
 as a " legal decision " that the roll of 1 161 records 
 " the Scutage of Toulouse. " ^ 
 
 ' Op. cit., I, 257. 
 
 ' See the section on ' the Maupygemoun serjeanty.' 
 ' " Quod rotulus Regis Henrici projiceretur in Gaiolam de Flete, 
 tanquam convictus per XII." 
 
 ' " A most decisive statement in the course of an important case that 
 
24 SERJEANTY AND 
 
 Surreia. Willelmus Aguilon, Anno xx Regis Henrici, filli 
 
 qui habet heredem Barthol- 
 omei de Cheney in uxorem, 
 debuit unam marcam de 
 scutagio de Kery, sicut 
 supra continetur, et xxs de 
 finibus et scutagiis sicut 
 continetur ibidem, et xx5 
 de scutagio Pictavias sicut 
 continetur ibidem, et xs de 
 scutagio de Elveyn sicut 
 continetur ibidem. Sed non 
 debet summoneri ; quia 
 recognitum est per precep- 
 tum Regis coram Baronibus 
 de Scaccario per sacramerita 
 xij militum ejusdem com 
 
 Regis Johannis, prascepit 
 Rex attingere rotulum regis 
 Henrici vij" per xij milites 
 juratos, utrum Willelmus 
 Agulun qui habuit unum 
 (sic) heredem Bartholomei 
 de Cheym (sic) ; licet in 
 eodem rotvdo continetur, in 
 comitatu Surreiae, quod 
 dictus Bartholomseus res- 
 pondet de una marca pro 
 militi (sic) cum scutagium 
 esset Tolosae assisum ad 
 duas marcas ; propter quod 
 videbatur ipsum facere ser- 
 vitiumdimidiimilitis. Venit 
 itatus quod non debet ser- jurata et dicit quod Barth- 
 
 vicium militare de terris 
 quas tenet in hoc comitatu 
 de hereditate dicti Barthol- 
 omei de Cheney in Adin- 
 tone, sed serjanteriam, scil- 
 icet inveniendi unum cocum 
 in coronatione Regis ad 
 
 olomaeus et predecessores 
 sui et successores nunquam 
 fecerunt militare servitium, 
 sed servitium serjanteriae, 
 videlicet, inveniendi unum 
 cocum in coquina domini 
 Regis die coronationis suae 
 ad faciendum quod Senes- 
 callus praeciperet, etc. etc. 
 (Red Book, p. 754). 
 
 faciendum cibum, qualem 
 senescallus Regis preceperit, 
 in coquina Regis (Madox, 
 fromP.R. 18 H.III). 
 
 It will be seen that the actual record, the one 
 printed on the left, does not contain a word about 
 the scutage of Toulouse and that the " legal decision" 
 had nothing in the world to do with the purpose 
 
 was argued before the Barons in the 20th ("sic J year of Henry III 
 
 no one on this occasion seems to have doubted that the Scutage entered 
 on the Roll was the Scutage of Toulouse, and this legal decision may be 
 fairly regarded as establishing the fact beyond dispute." CLik Rub., 
 d. clxxxiii). 
 
KNIGHT-SERVICE 25 
 
 of the scutage on the Roll of 1 1 6 1 . Swereford's 
 careless version on the right, merely repeats his 
 own assertion that this was the scutage of Toulouse. ' 
 
 Such is Mr. Hall's " legal decision " that Swere- 
 ford's assertion was right. 
 
 The Langton case is thus stated by Madox in 
 his Exchequer : — ^ 
 
 There were also some serjeanties which paid Escuage. 
 
 Joan, late wife of Thomas de Ludelawe was charged 
 
 for the manor of Langeton with several Escuages of the 
 armies of Scotland, assessed in the 28th, 31st, and 34th 
 years of King Edward I, as if it had been holden of 
 the King by the fourth part of a Knight's Fee : she 
 alleged that the Manor of Langeton was a member of the 
 Manor of Scrivelby, and that the manor of Scrivelby with 
 its members was holden of the King by Grand Serjeanty, 
 and not by knights service : hereupon, the King by his 
 writ commanded the barons that if it appeared to them 
 that the manor of Scrivelby was holden of the King by 
 Grand Serjeanty and that the manor of Langeton was a 
 member of the manor of Scrivelby, and that Joan and 
 her ancestors had not formerly paid escuage for the said 
 manor of Langeton, then they should discharge her of the 
 said demanded scutages. 
 
 One is very loath to correct Madox, that great 
 and learned antiquary who deserves our gratitude 
 and respect ; but he has seriously mistaken the 
 issue. The question raised was whether (South) 
 Langton, Lines., was a member of the Manor of 
 Scrivelsby, which manor (it was alleged) was held 
 by grand serjeanty. We are not told the result, 
 but Joan's claim was wrong. The Testa proves 
 
 ' " Fuitque assisum ad ij marcas pro exercitu Tholosae " CLii. Rub., 
 
 p. 7.) 
 
 ' Citing Mich, brev., 9 Ed. II, rot. 1 3 a. 
 
26 SERJEANTY AND 
 
 that South Langton was held by knight-service of 
 the Marmions, who held it of the Crown, ^ and in 
 the " Inquisition " on Philip Marmion, the last of 
 his line, it is dealt with as quite distinct from 
 Scrivelsby. ^ 
 
 This was about a quarter of a century before 
 Joan's claim, and in the interval (i 303) it had been 
 returned as held by knight-service, ' as it was again 
 in 1 346. * It is clear, therefore, that Joan's claim 
 failed. In 140 1-2 Scrivelsby " cum membris " 
 was returned as held by grand serjeanty, but South 
 Langton, again, as held by knight-service. * 
 
 The Comberton case was derived by Madox from 
 the same source.* This serjeanty will be dealt with 
 under " Hawk and falcon «erjeanties. " 
 
 Philip de Hastang being charged with escuage for the 
 manor of Comberton in the County of Cambridge, showed 
 to the King by his petition that the said manor was 
 holden of the King by service of keeping the King's 
 falcons and not by knights service. Hereupon the King 
 by writ ordered the Barons, if they found it to be so, to 
 discharge him of the escuage. " 
 
 In all this, it will be seen, there is nothing about 
 a tenement being held by both tenures. The 
 question was whether it was held by the one tenure 
 or the other.^ 
 
 ' Testa, pp. 332, 338. 
 
 ' See the section on " the King's Champion." 
 
 ^ Feudal Aids,lll, 146. 
 
 * Ibid., -p. 235. 
 
 ' " Heredes Philippi Marmion tenent in South Langton dimidium 
 mil. de domino rege in capite." (See Ibid., p. 246 for both entries). 
 
 ' " Pasch. brev., 9 Edw. II." 
 
 ' I am not prepared to say that a tenant by knight-service could not 
 grant land to a man to be held of him by serjeanty, or conversely, a 
 
KNIGHT-SERVICE 27 
 
 It is the more strange that Madox should have 
 thus erred because he immediately proceeds : — 
 
 But if lands were holden by serjeanty only (and no 
 Knights Service was annexed) they were not to pay 
 escuage. 
 
 And he then cites the Aguillon and other cases 
 proving that tenure by serjeanty, when established, 
 secured ipso facto immunity from scutage (' escu- 
 age'). 
 
 Madox's error is due to his misunderstanding of 
 two distinct classes of records. We will take his 
 deductions from those classes separately. 
 
 It is said above that Escuage was paid out of Knight's 
 Fees. There were also some Serjeanties that paid Escuage. 
 Simon Puncard paid half a mark Escuage {sic) for his 
 Serjeanty. Robert de Orton paid xxs. Escuage {sic) for 
 his Serjeanty. -^ 
 
 As it was actually the distinctive mark of 
 serjeanties that they did not pay " escuage, " we 
 turn to the writer's notes for the evidence on which 
 he relied, and we there find that there is nothing 
 about " escuage " in either case ! The fact is that 
 Madox was here misled — precisely as Mr. W. H. B. 
 Bird has been similarly misled^ — by the heading 
 of his records : in one case it was " De Finibus 
 militum et scutagiis," and in the other, "De Finibus 
 et scutagiis militum. " But the actual entries run 
 only " dimidia marca de Simone Puncard qui tenet 
 
 tenant by serjeanty enfeoff a man to hold by knight-service. This would 
 not affect the tenure in caplte. 
 
 ' Exchequer, I, cap. XVI, sec. 3. 
 
 ' See Peerage and Pedigree, II, 67. Mr. Bird assumed that " one 
 would not expect to find a tenant in thanage under the heading ' De 
 finibus militum.' " 
 
28 SERJEANTY AND 
 
 per serjanteriam, " and " Robertus de Orton debet 
 xxs. pro serjeanteria sua. " These payments are 
 not styled " escuage." ^ 
 
 Let us continue the quotation : — 
 
 But peradventure these Serj can ties were also holden 
 by military tenure. For sometimes Knights' Service was 
 annexed to a Serjeanty ; that is, lands were holden both 
 by Serjeanty and by the service of a knight's fee or part 
 of a knight's fee. For certain lands, parcel of the ser- 
 jeanty of William de Paris in Ayston and Clinton, Richard 
 de Crokel the tenant was to do the service of the thirtieth 
 
 part of a knight's fee ; and for certain other lands, 
 
 parcel of the same serjeanty, William de Paris was to do 
 the service of one knight's fee, and to provide for the 
 King in his army, whithersoever he should go, one 
 Serjeant with two horses for xl days at his own charges. 
 For certain land belonging to the serjeanty of Godfrey le 
 Fawkener in Hurst, the tenant John Hereberd, was to 
 do the service of the sixtieth part of a knight's fee. 
 
 The error of Madox in this case is more incom- 
 prehensible than in the other. For these are 
 simple instances of serjeanties " arrented " by 
 Robert Passelewe in 34 Hen. III,^ from the records 
 of which year his evidence is taken. The arrent- 
 ation of the serjeanty of Aston Clinton, Bucks, 
 occupies no less than tw^o columns of the Testa 
 (pp. 254-5), and we there read that, as its lands had 
 been largely alienated, they were dealt with in three 
 portions thus : — (A) William de Paris is to do 
 the service of one knight for the portion remaining 
 
 ' An extremely striking instance of these misleading entries is found 
 on the Pipe Roll of 8 John, under Lancashire, where the heading is 
 " Fines et scutagia militum de VIP scutagio," though thegns, drengs and 
 Serjeants follow. (Farrer's Lancashire Pipe Rolls, pp. 204, 210.) 
 
 ' See Exchequer, I, cap. II, sec. 5, and p. 17 above. 
 
KNIGHT-SERVICE 29 
 
 in his hands/ while (B) Richard de Crokele, for 
 himself and several holders of small portions is to 
 do the service of the thirtieth part of a knight's fee, 
 and (C) William is to pay the Crown ^5.11.0. 
 a year for all the other alienated portions, the 
 holder of each of which is to pay him a third of 
 its annual value towards that sum. ^ 
 
 Again, in the case of the Hurst serjeanty, Robert 
 the Falconer had held the land " by the serjeanty 
 of keeping a cast.,., of 3 falcons at the King's cost,"' 
 but his son and successor, Godfrey, had his serjean- 
 ty arrented, * when John Herberd and his wife, who 
 held thirty-five acres of it, compounded by fine to 
 hold it by the service of the fiftieth (or sixtieth) of 
 a knight's fee. 
 
 In these cases, which are very numerous, tenure 
 by serjeanty was exchanged for tenure by knight- 
 service. That land should be holden " both by 
 serjeanty and by the service of a knight's fee " is a 
 contradiction in terms. 
 
 We can now turn to another and most impor- 
 tant aspect of the matter. This is the evidence 
 that the Crown authorities treated the two tenures 
 as distinct and obtained returns of them as such. 
 
 ' William's mother, Nicia de Clinton, had died in 3 1 Henry III 
 holding this serjeanty by the service described, but when William him- 
 self died in 4.0 Hen. Ill (;. e. after the arrentation), he is entered as 
 having held " by service of i Knight's fee " (See the Inq. p. m. on each). 
 
 A generation later, Ela Countess of Warwick is entered as holding 
 Aston Clinton as one knight's fee (Feudal Aids, I, 85); but in 1346 
 exemption is claimed for the Manor " quia tenetur per serjancyam." 
 (J bid., p. 123). This illustrates the confusion caused by arrentation. 
 (Compare p. 18 above). 
 
 * Compare p. 18 above. 
 
 ' Cal. of Inq., Henry III, No. 835 ; Testa, p. 217. 
 
 * Testa, p. 216. 
 
30 SERJEANTY AND 
 
 My first instance is the carucage of 1 198, for 
 which the serjeanties received separate treatment, 
 as being distinct from the knight's fees\ A separ- 
 ate enquiry into the holders of them, and their 
 payments, followed ^ As I have observed of the 
 King's Serjeants, " occupying as they did an inter- 
 mediate place between those who held by military 
 service and those who did not, they were not strictly 
 within the scope of the taxes which affected either." * 
 The result was a composition [Jinis). 
 
 My next example is the great Inquest of 1212. 
 For this we have the actual writ, quoted under 
 Staffordshire, in the Testa (p. 54) : — 
 
 precipimus tibi quod sine dilacione... diligenter inquiri 
 facias, sicut melius inquiri poterit, de omnibus feodis 
 militum et omnimodis tenementis... que de nobis tenentur 
 in capite, in balliva tua per militare servicium vel per 
 serjantiam qualemcunque^ et qui ea teneant, et per quod 
 servicium. 
 
 This writ is immediately followed by returns head- 
 ed : — I. " Isti tenent per servicium militare" 
 2. " Isti tenent per serjantiam " [Testa^ p. 54). 
 
 The third and most important example is afford- 
 ed by the writs and returns of 1236. It is the 
 most important, because it distinguishes serjeanty, 
 
 '■ " sergenterise vero domini regis, quas non erant de feodis militum, 
 excipiebantur, sed tamen imbreviabantur et numerus carucatarum terras 
 et valentize terrarum, et nomina servientium." (Hoveden, IV, 47). See 
 my paper on "The Great Carucage of 1 198" in Eng. Hist. Rev. (1888), 
 III, 501-510, cited in Hist, of Eng. Law, I, 270. 
 
 ^ De serjentariis domini regis, quis eas habet, et per quem, et qui 
 finem non fecerint ad auxilium domini regis et qui fecerunt, et finis 
 capiatur." (Ibid., IV, 62). 
 
 ' E. H. R., Ill, 509. 
 
 * See, for this, my paper on " The Great Inquest of Service, 1212," 
 in The Commune of London and other studies, pp. 261-277. 
 
KNIGHT-SERVICE 31 
 
 not only from knight-service above it, but also from 
 socage belov7 it, and for the further reason that it 
 proves the distinction at this later date to be still 
 well defined. I have not dealt v^ith this return 
 before, and the point may have escaped notice. 
 
 In 1235, the King had been granted an " aid " 
 for the marriage of his sister Isabel of two marcs 
 from every knight's fee. Owing to the scattered 
 nature of fiefs he did not feel satisfied that everyone 
 had paid, and on 20 May 1236 he issued a writ 
 to the Sheriffs commanding a searching enquiry. 
 Its terms are known to us from its recital by the 
 Sheriffs of Norfolk and Suffolk^ and of Northum- 
 berland ^ to whom, as to other Sheriffs, it had 
 been addressed. The Sheriff was first required to 
 send on to the " barons " whose honours had their 
 caput within his county the King's letters calling 
 for detailed returns from them, and was then direct- 
 ed to prepare a triple return himself. This return 
 was to comprise (i) All those who held only a single 
 knight's fee or any fraction of one, and (2) all those 
 who held (A) by serjeanty or (B) by socage,' with 
 full particulars of the localities of these tenements 
 and of the nature of the serjeanties. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 282. 
 
 » Ibid., p. 388. 
 
 ' " Et quum plures alii sunt in comitatu tuo- qui singularia feoda et 
 minora de nobis tenent in capite, quibus non scribimus, tibi praecipi- 
 mus quatinus, in fide qua nobis teneris, nomina singulorum illorum qui 
 talia feoda de nobis tenent in comitatu tuo et in quibus villis feoda ilia 
 sint, per literas tuas patentes citra predictum terminum significes praedic- 
 tis baronibus nostris de scaccario et similiter nomina omnium illorum qui 
 de nobis tenent per serjantiam vel socagium et ubi et in quibus villis sint dicte 
 serjantie et socagia, et quales sint ille serjantie, distincte et apte, ita curiose, 
 et diligenter premissa omnia exequens quod ad te propter negligentiam 
 tuam capere non debeamus." 
 
32 SERJEANXY AND 
 
 This writ is followed, for East Anglia, by the 
 Sheriff's return giving the particulars demanded and 
 carefully divided into three sections: (i) Knight's 
 fees ; (2) socage tenements ; (3) serjeanties. When 
 the nature of these returns has once been grasped, 
 we can detect them under other counties. Thus 
 we have the corresponding Sheriff's return for 
 Staffordshire/ For Northamptonshire we can de- 
 tect the corresponding return on pp. 27-8 of the 
 Testa, for the Sheriff expressly says at the end that 
 he had directed the bailiff of the Soke of Peter- 
 borough (which he could not deal with) to supply 
 the particulars required.^ Again we detect the 
 sheriff's returns for Oxfordshire on pp. 1 1 7-8 of 
 the Testa : — 
 
 Viris venerabilibus et discretis dominis baronibus de 
 scaccario domini Regis Vic' Oxon' salutem. Mitto vobis 
 nomina illorum qui singularia feoda vel minora tenant in 
 capite de domino Rege in com' Oxon'. 
 
 Mitto etiam vobis nomina omnium illorum qui de 
 domino Rege tenent in cupiteper socagium vel per serjantiam^ 
 et quales sint serjantie et in quibus villis sint dicta 
 socagia et serjantie. 
 
 The formula, it will be seen, is reproduced with 
 precision. 
 
 Here then we have definite evidence that even 
 so late as 1236 the three tenures were still well 
 
 ' " Inquisito facta per vie' Stafford' (i) de militibus qui tenent singu- 
 laria et minora feoda de domino Rege in capite et (2) de tenentibus (A) 
 per socagium et (B) per serjantiam, et ubi et in quibus villis." Testa, 
 p. 52. 
 
 ^ " Preterea mandatum est ballivo abbatis de Burgo Sancti Petri quod 
 nobis significet nomina omnium tenencium de domino Rege in capite in 
 balliva sua tam per servicium militare quam per serjantiam et socagium 
 secundum formam precepti domini Regis quod inde suscepit." 
 
KNIGHT-SERVICE 33 
 
 recognised as distinct, although the severance by 
 John's Charter (12 15) of serjeanty into two classes 
 was alleged to have rendered petty serjeanty 
 ' socage in effect.' 
 
 It may perhaps be thought that I have unduly 
 laboured the point that tenure by serjeanty was a 
 thing wholly apart from tenure by knight-service, 
 but I have already demonstrated the inveterate 
 confusion on the subject ; and as final and amazing 
 illustration of the fact, I will cite a passage from 
 Prof Oman's Art of War in the Middle Ages (1898). 
 After vainly attempting to reinstate the old theory 
 of knight-service, which had been exploded by 
 myself,^ showing that he did not even understand 
 such a well-known phrase as vetus feoffamentum^ and 
 betraying further confusion,* the present Chichele 
 Professor tried his hand at serjeanty. 
 
 A sub-tenant with a few hundred acres of land would 
 probably have been called by a chronicler of the time of 
 Henry la" miles," by a chronicler of the time of John 
 or Henry III a " sergeant," and by a chronicler of the 
 time of Edward III a squire (armiger or scutifer). The 
 condition of the three men would have been much the 
 same, but the name changed thrice (p. 365). 
 
 To this is appended an illuminating note as 
 follows : — 
 
 That sergeant originally means... a landed mihtary 
 
 dependent who is not a knight, is well shown we are 
 
 dealing with sub-tenants and not merely small tenants 
 in chief. 
 
 Those who have followed me as far as this must 
 
 * See History of EngRsh Law, I, 238-239. 
 
 * See my Commune of London and other studies, pp. 57-60. 
 
34 SERJEANTY & KNIGHT-SERVICE 
 
 by now be aware (i) that the "landed" Serjeants 
 they have met with were not sub-tenants ; (2) that 
 these " landed " Serjeants were " small tenants in 
 chief; " (3) that they were not always, or even 
 usually, military ; (4) that a tenant by serjeanty was 
 from the first distinct from a tenant by knight- 
 service, and that the latter was still a "miles" under 
 John and Henry III as he was under Henry I. 
 
 We have here, obviously, not merely ignorance 
 of the fact that it depended on the tenure of the 
 " few hundred acres " whether a man held them as 
 a miles or a serviens, and whether he owed the 
 service of the former or of the latter, but also con- 
 fusion between the tenant by serjeanty, bound to 
 perform certain service in respect of his land, and 
 the soldier [serviens) hired at a penny a day when 
 the knight was hired at eightpence. This hired 
 serviens is found on the rolls from the early years 
 of Henry IPs reign precisely as he is in the 
 chronicles of the reign of John. ^ 
 
 One should not perhaps expect accuracy from so 
 fecund a writer, but when an Oxford historical 
 professor betrays such confusion as this, it cannot 
 be needless to insist that the tenures of the 
 " knight " and of the " serjeant " were not only 
 wholly distinct, but involved also distinct services, 
 which the touchstone of scutage kept apart at the 
 time of which he here treats. 
 
 ' See my Feudal England, pp. 271-272, 283. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 SOME FEATURES OF SERJEANTY 
 
 Owing to the diverse character of its service it 
 was not possible to apply to serjeanty the same 
 uniform system of taxation that was applied to 
 knight-service. It was not, we have seen, liable to 
 scutage, nor did it contribute to the three aids that 
 were so distinctive of military tenure [servicium 
 militare). But to certain feudal incidents it was no 
 less liable. Relief, for instance, had to be paid on 
 succession to a tenement held by serjeanty, and the 
 burdens of wardship and " marriage " affected it 
 no less than the knight's fee. 
 
 The relief, at first arbitrary, came to be limited 
 by custom to one year's value of the tenement : it 
 was the wardship that gave trouble. If a dead man 
 had held a small tenement in chief by serjeanty, and 
 a considerable estate, as an under-tenant, by knight 
 service, the king claimed rights of wardship over 
 the whole in virtue of the former tenement. This 
 claim, which affected the overlord of the other 
 land, was explicitly abandoned by the Great 
 Charter, so far at least as affected a certain class of 
 serjeanties, which became thence known as hold- 
 ings by " petty " serjeanty. The clause was this: — 
 
36 SOME FEATURES 
 
 Nosnon habebimus custodiam heredis vel terre alicujus, 
 quam tenet de alio per servicium militare, occasione ali- 
 cujus parve serjanterie quam tenet de nobis per servicium 
 reddendi nobis cultellos yel sagittas vel hujusmodi. 
 
 It is justly observed in the History of English Law 
 (I, 304) that " The term ' small serjeanty ' seems 
 one which is not yet technical, and the nature of 
 those serjeanties which are too trivial to justify the 
 royal claim is indicated in the rudest manner." 
 The point, however, which I wish to make, and 
 which, so far as I know, has not been made before, 
 is that we have here an instructive parallel to that 
 cleavage of the barones into the " greater " and the 
 " lesser " which had its origin, similarly, or at least 
 its recognition, in a clause of the Great Charter. 
 By that clause " a rough division was drawn some- 
 where in the midst, but the exact boundary was 
 necessarily vague ; " ^ " the line between great and 
 small has been drawn in a rough empirical way, and 
 is not the outcome of any precise principle." ^ I 
 wish to emphasise this point because of the well- 
 known difficulty that has been experienced by those 
 who have striven to discover the real distinction 
 between a ' greater ' and a ' lesser ' baron, ^ It is the 
 old difficulty of the lawyer striving, as ever, to sub- 
 stitute a date and a fixed line for a gradual differ- 
 entiation. 
 
 It is doubtful if even the great Bracton really 
 
 ' McKechnie's Magna Carta, p. 295. 
 
 ^ History ofEngRsh Law, I, 260. 
 
 ' See my Peerage and Pedigree, I, 359, and The Commune of London, 
 pp. 252-3, where I quote a charter of 1 190, which speaks of the greater 
 barons (majores barones) of the City of London, in illustration. 
 
OF SERJEANTY 37 
 
 understood the working of the new distinction in 
 practice. ^ Littleton certainly did not, and has 
 misled all who have followed him ; but by his time 
 the lawyers had contrived to introduce their con- 
 fusion. His classification is this : — 
 
 Tenure by Petit Serjeanty is where a man holds his 
 land of our sovereign lord the King by giving to him 
 yearly a bow, or a sword, or a dagger, or a knife, or a 
 lance, or a pair of gloves of mail, or a pair of gilt spurs, 
 or an arrow, or divers arrows, or other small things 
 belonging to war. ^ 
 
 And such service is but socage in effect, because such 
 tenant by his tenure was not obliged to go, or do anything, 
 in his proper person, touching the war ; but to render 
 and pay, yearly, certain things to the King, as a man paid 
 his rent. ^ 
 
 It is justly observed of this in the History of 
 English Law that " we cannot say that ' petty ser- 
 jeanty ' has necessarily any connexion with war, or 
 that petty serjeanty is ' but socage in effect. ' " 
 (I, 262). 
 
 For legal historians serjeanty presents two points 
 of great interest in the alleged inalienability and 
 impartibility of tenements held by this tenure. As 
 to the former one can add little to what has been 
 so well explained in the History of English Law, * 
 and I will only supplement it by a very notable 
 allusion, in 1203, to the custom of England, as the 
 
 ' See his Note Book, and Prof. Maitland's comments on Case 743. 
 As I read the case, the point at issue seems to have been whether the 
 tenure was " petty" serjeanty or not. There is no need to question the 
 name " Waveringe, " for the serjeanty is found in Testa, p. 219. 
 
 * Tenures, Lib. II, cap. 9, Sec. 159. 
 ' Ibid., sec. 1 60. 
 
 * See Vol. I. (1895), pp. 270, 315-6, and cf. Plac. Abb., p. 48. 
 
38 SOME FEATURES 
 
 ground for this restriction. The serjeanty is that 
 of Robert Falconer. 
 
 et si quid predictus pater ejus de predicta terra aliena- 
 verit, id juste et secundum consuetudinem Angl\te\ revocari 
 faciatis. ^ 
 
 The alleged impartibility is a more difficult 
 question and one which is by no means only of 
 academic interest. In the famous contest for the 
 office of Lord Great Chamberlain, at the opening 
 of the late reign, this doctrine was the very essence 
 of Lord Ancaster's claim. ^ Expressed in syllogistic 
 form, the proposition would run : — 
 
 Serjeanties are impartible. 
 
 The Great Chamberlainship is a serjeanty. 
 
 Therefore the Great Chamberlainship is impartible. ' 
 
 The major premiss I doubt, and the minor I 
 deny. Let us, however, see what impartibility 
 means. It is alleged that in the case of a tenement 
 held by serjeanty it is not inherited by co-heirs, 
 jointly, but passes to the eldest daughter (or sister) * 
 as an undivided whole. This eldest co-heir is 
 sometimes spoken of as having the asnecia [droit 
 d'amesse) . 
 
 The authors of the History of English Law 
 appear, at first sight, to accept this contention as 
 
 ' Rot. de Ltl., 3 John, p. 72. 
 
 * See Peerage and Pedigree, I, I18, 122-124. 
 
 ' The above passages prove, I think, that I here fairly reproduce the 
 argument of Lord Ancaster's leading counsel (Mr. Haldane) ; but ia 
 the Printed Case it was urged, more cautiously, that " the law relating 
 to Grand Serjeanty applied"... "the office of Great Chamberlain, 
 though an office in gross, is held by the tenure of Grand Serjeanty. " 
 
 * Or other senior co-heir. 
 
OF SERJEANTY 39 
 
 valid, at least for early days. But their language 
 is guarded : — 
 
 We find that a tenement held by serjeanty is treated as 
 inalienable and impartible... We have pretty clear proof 
 that so late as John's reign it was thought a serjeanty 
 could not be partitioned among co-heiresses ; the eldest 
 daughter would take the whole.... 
 
 Of the serjeanties he [Glanvill] here says nothing ; of 
 them it were needless to speak, for a serjeanty is the most 
 impartible of all tenements, impartible (so men are saying) 
 even among daughters. 
 
 It is Bracton's opinion that a tenement held by serjean- 
 ty ought not to be divided, and this opinion seems to 
 have been warranted at all events by the practice of an 
 earlier age.^ 
 
 We have, it may at once be said, evidence that 
 this contention was advanced, this allegation made. 
 But was it so held ? 
 
 When we scrutinise the cases on which the 
 learned authors rely, we find them practically 
 reduced to one, that of the Beaksbourne serjeanty. ^ 
 This was a case in which the senior co-heir and 
 her husband claimed a carucate of land in Livinge- 
 bourne, ' Kent, in 1201, against William de Bee, 
 who held it, but was only the representative of a 
 junior co-heir. * The former claimed the whole 
 land as serjeanty, descendible to the eldest daughter.* 
 
 ' op. cit., I, 270; II, z66, 273. 
 
 * Plac. Abbrev., pp. 34, 39 ; Select Civil Pleas (Selden Soc.), 112. It 
 was also cited as proof of the eldest daughter's right in the Great Cham- 
 berlain case. 
 
 ' Now Beaksbourne. 
 
 * The pedigree appears to be that Avice was eldest co-heir of the 
 eldest co-heir, and William de Bee heir of a junior co-heir. 
 
 * " Ipsi totum petunt et... dicunt quod terra ilia est serganteria 
 Domini Regis, et ipsa Avicia de primogenita est." 
 
40 SOME FEATURES 
 
 Early in 1203 they returned to the attack, but it 
 seems to have been overlooked that they now shifted 
 their ground. They no longer claimed the whole, 
 nor did they mention serjeanty. They claimed only 
 forty acres, as the lady's rightful share of the inher- 
 itance, though repeating that she w^as the senior 
 co-heir. ^ 
 
 It w^as now^ their opponent's turn to plead that 
 the land was held by serjeanty, and therefore 
 impartible — and to produce a charter of Henry II 
 granting the serjeanty to his father, husband of the 
 junior co-heir. ^ This, it will be seen, was exactly 
 parallel to the determination, in later times, of the 
 abeyance of a barony by the prerogative of the 
 Crown. This point is new. 
 
 It is clear that the plaintiffs again failed, even in 
 their modified claim, for William de Bee ('Bethe') 
 is found holding the whole subsequently * and 
 Richard de " Bek " after him, * and the place 
 retains their name (Bek's [Beaks] Bourne) to this 
 day. This, then, is hardly the case one would 
 select to prove that " the eldest daughter would 
 take the whole. " * 
 
 ' " Sicut jus et racionabilem porcionem Avice... in Limingeburn sicut 
 eas que earn contingunt ex racionabili porcione sua de terris que fuerunt 
 Rogeri de Burnes avunculi... et desicut A. fuit primogenita, et ipse 
 Willelmus de postnata" (Plac. Abbrev., p. 39). 
 
 * " Et Willelmus dicit quod terra ilia est de sergeanteria Domini Regis 
 et non debet partiri, et profert cartam Domini Regis Henrici patris, in 
 qua continetur quod ipse concessit et dedit Hugoni de Becco minister- 
 ium... et precepit quod idem Hugo habeat et teneat, et heredes sui, 
 ministerium illud cum terris " etc. 
 
 ^ Testa, p. 219. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 216. 
 
 ' There is another leading case, of much later date, against the right 
 of the eldest co-heir. This is that of the King's Champion. The 
 
OF SERJEANTY 41 
 
 But, it may be urged, the case at least supports 
 the view that a serjeanty could not be divided. It 
 is doubtful, hovs^ever, if this view is borne out by 
 the early evidence of records. We have, at the 
 same period, the instance of a Herefordshire Ser- 
 jeanty at Marden, where the husband of the eldest 
 daughter has to pay forty shillings (1204) to avoid 
 partition being made \ The Givendale serjeanty 
 of crossbow service ^ affords a clear instance of par- 
 tition between co-heiresses, and so does the North- 
 umbrian serjeanty of hereditary coroner, and the 
 Rivenhall serjeanty referred to above. ^ 
 
 In later days ( 1 442) , a striking instance is afford- 
 ed by the curious Kentish serjeanty of holding the 
 king's head when he crossed the channel. This 
 was adjudged to be Grand Serjeanty (servicium 
 Magnce Serjantice), and the two daughters and co- 
 heirs of John Baker, who had held it, were alike 
 charged with relief on their succession. * 
 
 The Serjeanty of Runham, Norfolk, with its 
 unique render, seems to afford a clear case of par- 
 tition. Walter de Evermue held it by the service 
 of two muids of wine and 200 pearmains. ^ An 
 Inq. p. m. on Walter de Evermue in i Edw. I 
 
 senior co-heir, in that case, vainly urged tesnecia, it being decided that 
 the manor of Scrivelsby, held hj the junior co-heir, carried the office. 
 
 ' "Rannulfus de Mahurdin debet xl/. ne partitio fiat de terra quas fuit 
 Willelmi de Mahurdin, quam ipse tenet de Rege per serjanteriam, eo 
 quod ipse in uxorem habet primogenitam filiam ejusdem Willelmi " 
 (Pipe Roll, 6 John, rot. 2 d.). 
 
 ' See below. 
 
 ' See p. 4. 
 
 ■* See the relative record cited in Madox' Baronia Anglka, p. 245. 
 
 '"per servicium duorum modiorum vini et cc de permeyns"... 
 " per duo modla vini et cc piromagii " {Testa, pp. 283, 294) ; "per 
 duo mqdia vini et cc piromagnis " {Lib. Rub., p. 459). 
 
42 SOME FEATURES 
 
 (127 1 -2) records that his heirs are the three daugh- 
 ters of JoUand de Evermue, and gives the service 
 as " two measures {mutarum) of wine and 200 pears 
 called ' pearmains ' yearly at the Exchequer. 
 This version is repeated a few years later. ^ In 
 1327 Walter de Billingeye, representative of one 
 of the three co-heirs, is found to have held a third 
 of the manor " by service of a third part of two 
 measures of wine and of zoo pirarum de Permeyns." ' 
 And in 1335 a lady is similarly found to have held 
 a third of the manor " by petty serjeanty, " viz. 
 a third of the above service. * The partition, 
 therefore, of the service as well as of the land is 
 clearly established. 
 
 In all cases of serjeanty we have to keep in view 
 the double character of the inheritance, namely, 
 the land itself and the service or office by discharge 
 of which the land was held. These two factors 
 are the " ministerium et terra " of the Pipe Roll 
 of 1 1 30. In the case of the Marshalship of the 
 Hawks ' it seems very doubtful whether John's 
 charter did not sever that office from the land and 
 make it an hereditary office in gross. In that of 
 the marshalship held by Juliane, wife of William 
 Fitz Audelin {temp. Hen. II), it is certain that the 
 lands of her serjeanty * were divided between her 
 co-heirs. Again, in that of the forestership of 
 Gillingham Forest, which was held in chief by 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq., II, No. 32. 
 ^ Ibid., No. 160. 
 ' Ibid., VII, No. 59. 
 
 * Ibid., No. 7 1 2. 
 ' See below. 
 
 * See "A marshalship at Court" below. 
 
OF SERJEANTY 43 
 
 serjeanty early in the 1 4th Century, the holder left 
 as his heirs four daughters, ^ between whom the 
 lands were equally divided by the King's order, 
 though the actual office went to the eldest alone. 
 
 There is another aspect in which the problem 
 may be viewed. When the lands held by perform- 
 ance of the service are found (from whatever 
 cause) in the hands of two or more holders, who 
 should perform the service ? This was the issue 
 raised in the Duke of Buckingham's case, which 
 has been much discussed and which I have dealt 
 with fully in another place. * The Duke {temp. 
 Hen. VIII) held two out of the three manors 
 which it was alleged (though wrongly) were held 
 by the service of acting as Constable of England. 
 This position should be deemed akin to those 
 arising before Courts of Claims when portions of 
 one original serjanteria were in more hands than 
 one. At the Coronation, for instance, of George IV, 
 the right to serve as larderer was allowed in res- 
 pect of three of the old manors then in three differ- 
 ent hands, and from the time of Richard II holders 
 of various portions of the barony of Bedford have 
 been jointly found entitled to serve as almoner. ' 
 In such cases the selection was left by the Court 
 to the King, a virtual revival of early practice. * 
 
 This brings us to the point of transition. Can 
 
 ' Amice, wife of William de Bogelegh, Elizabeth, wife of John Cley, 
 Alice, wife of William Chonnesone, and Michaele, wife of John de 
 Rondes. (See for details of this case my paper in Ancestor, I, 252-254.). 
 
 ^ Peerage and Pedigree, I, 147-166. 
 
 ' See below. The Office of Chief Butler presents some analogy in so 
 far as claimed in respect of one of the Norfolk manors, but in the case 
 of that office there has been no allowance of joint right. 
 
 * See p. 40 above. 
 
44 SOME FEATURES 
 
 we distinguish, from an early date, between offices 
 in gross, inheritable as of fee, and offices attached to 
 certain lands, which lands were held by the service 
 of discharging them ? 
 
 investigation proves that there has always been 
 a tendency to assume that, if the holder (by inher- 
 itance) of an office in gross also held certain lands, 
 the lands were held by discharge of that service. 
 Where it can be shown, as it sometimes can, that 
 the lands were held by knight-service before the 
 office was acquired, or conversely that the office 
 was held before the lands were acquired, we can, 
 with absolute certainty, disprove that assumption. 
 
 There are two instances in point. It is known 
 that the hereditary office of Great Chamberlain was 
 first bestowed on the De Veres by Henry I towards 
 the close of his reign, and that it was unconnected 
 with the tenure of land. It is also known that 
 their barony (with its caput, Hedingham Castle) 
 had been held by them from the Conquest and was 
 held by knight-service. Nevertheless, it was clearly 
 shown in the Great Chamberlain case that this 
 office was found in " Inquests after death " to be 
 attached to their barony, ^ the reductio ad absurdum 
 being reached when Richard Harlackenden — whose 
 father, the earl's steward, had purchased Earl's Colne 
 on the dissipation of their estates, — was found, 
 under Charles I, to have held that manor by ,the 
 grand serjeanty of being Chamberlain of England.^ 
 The other instance illustrates the converse state of 
 
 ' As early as 1264 this was found of Castle Hedingham and several 
 other of their manors on the death of Hugh, earl of Oxford. 
 
 * " Per magnam serjantiam essendi magnus Camerarius Anglia;. " 
 
OF SERJEANTY 45 
 
 things. The Duke of Buckingham's case rested 
 on the assumption that three manors were held 
 jointly by the service of acting as Constable of 
 England, but I have been able to show that two of 
 these manors had been acquired by his ancestors at 
 a later period than that at which they obtained the 
 office. ^ 
 
 With regard to another officer of state, the 
 Marshal, Coke states that the Marshalship ever 
 passed by the grants of the King, and never be- 
 longed to any subject by reason of tenure, as the 
 stewardship and constableship of England sometime 
 did.'' He is mistaken in his illustration, for the 
 two great offices he cites were not, as a fact, so 
 held. The marshalship, however, was certainly 
 believed, at least as early as 1243, to be connected 
 with the tenure of Hampstead Marshal. But this 
 belief also was, in my opinion, wrong, on the 
 ground that the Marshals held the office before they 
 can be actually proved to have held this manor. ' 
 
 It was very candidly stated in Lord Ancaster's 
 "Case" (1901) that "the offices of Steward, Con- 
 stable, Chamberlain, and Marshal were all granted 
 in fee," though this would remove them (accord- 
 ing to the authors of the History of English Law) 
 from the category of serjeanties. It was also 
 admitted that, in spite of definite allegations, — 
 
 It is, however, very doubtful whether the great offices 
 of State were really attached to manors except in the 
 sense that manors were granted as maintenance. Such a 
 
 ' Peerage and Pedigree, I, 151, et seq. 
 
 " Institutes, 128. 
 
 ' See the section on the Marshal below. 
 
46 SOME FEATURES 
 
 tenure has often been alleged and occasionally found by- 
 juries. No mention of manors occurs in the grants of 
 the offices, though certain manors have always descended 
 to the persons who succeeded to the offices and came to 
 be considered as appurtenant thereto. 
 
 On the subject of these offices of state the authors 
 of the History of English Law speak with some 
 caution. 
 
 Some of the highest offices of the realm have become 
 hereditary, ' the great officers are conceived to hold their 
 lands by the service or serjeanty of filling these offices. 
 It is so with the offices of the King's steward or senes- 
 chal, marshal, constable, chamberlain, etc. (I, 263). 
 
 If this passage may be construed as implying that 
 such conception was wrong, there is nothing to be 
 said ; but we are left in some doubt as to what their 
 meaning was. I cannot find that they dealt, ex- 
 plicitly at least, in any portion of the work, with 
 such offices as apart from land : under " Serjeanty " 
 alone are they mentioned. And the authors, we 
 must remember, recognise " serjeanty " only in 
 connexion with the tenure of land. 
 
 One had not, therefore, the advantage, in 1902, 
 when the question was raised as to the descent of 
 an hereditary office in gross, that of the Great 
 Chamberlain, of any direct expression, on their 
 part, of opinion on the subject. They name it 
 only in connexion with land, and it was common 
 ground with the claimants that it had no such 
 connexion. All that can be said is that, at least, 
 
 ' This phrase is not a happy one ; it implies that these offices were 
 hereditary in the blood, though the authors' meaning, evidently, is that 
 they were annexed to the tenure of certain lands. 
 
OF SERJEANTY 47 
 
 they do not countenance the view so confidently- 
 advanced, on behalf of Lord Ancaster, that the 
 office, or its tenure, was serjeanty. ^ 
 
 In default of such guidance, recourse was had to 
 the descent of analogous offices of state. " The 
 history of these offices," it was urged, " is extreme- 
 ly relevant. " ^ This, no doubt, is so, if only it 
 were kept apart from the law, or alleged law, of 
 descent in the case of tenure by serjeanty. * What 
 we have to remember is that these great offices 
 were not held by serjeanty, and that, even if they 
 were, the law that such tenure involves descent, 
 without partition, to the eldest alone of the co- 
 heirs is by no means established as fact. 
 
 In this Volume it is not proposed to deal at great 
 length with the history of these offices, but rather 
 to treat them in relation to the true serjeanties and 
 to examine the view generally, but, I think, wrongly 
 held that they were annexed to the possession of 
 certain fiefs or manors. It is probable that this 
 view was suggested or supported by the fact that 
 deputies or subordinates of these officers, whose 
 
 ' The only relevant passage would seem to be that in the section on 
 " Incorporeal things, " where we read, under " Offices as things, " that 
 " If ' offices ' are to fall within the pale of private law at all, if they are 
 to be heritable and vendible, perhaps we cannot do better than treat 
 them as being very like pieces of land " (II, 1 34). To this, however, it 
 might be replied that the Great Chamberlainship, though heritable, was 
 not " vendible. " It was, indeed, the essence of Doddridge's famous 
 " opinion " on the descent of the office, under Charles I, that, though 
 held in fee simple, the office could not " be transferred over to any 
 other blood." (Collins' Precedents, p. 188). 
 
 ^ Lord Ancaster's " Case. " 
 
 ' The offices of steward, constable and marshal were those selected as 
 parallel, but that of chief butler was omitted. One must point out, 
 therefore, that insomuch as it did not descend to the eldest co-heir, its 
 evidence was unfavourable. 
 
48 SOME FEATURES 
 
 services are described by the same names, did un- 
 doubtedly hold lands by the performance of such 
 services. But the great offices, on the contrary, 
 appear to have been held in fee. With one of 
 them, the office of chief butler, I shall deal some- 
 what fully, because the right to it w^as keenly 
 disputed barely ten years ago, w^hile its origin and 
 descent appear to stand in need of historical 
 treatment. 
 
 A few remaining points may here be touched 
 on. In the first place, the serjeant had no power 
 to alter the character of his service. In Wiltshire, 
 for instance, Richard Danesy was charged with 
 converting his larder service into a military ser- 
 jeanty without warrant. ^ But with the King's 
 permission more than this could be done. Tenure 
 by serjeanty could be converted into knight-service, 
 and vice versa. ^ 
 
 Again, there is a point of some consequence for 
 coronation claims. If, it may be asked, a pur- 
 chaser can acquire a tenement conferring the right 
 to render a Coronation service, how can the Crown 
 protect itself against an unwelcome claim ? In 
 early days, at least, the restraint on alienation 
 afforded an efficient bulwark ; but even now it is 
 amply protected. In the first place, a long series of 
 precedents proves its right to appoint a deputy, 
 acceptable to itself, by whom the service may be 
 actually performed ; in the second, it can fall back 
 
 ' " Dictus Ricardus mutavit servicium suum predictum (custodire lar- 
 darium domini Regis) in aliud sine warranto ad inveniend' domino Regi 
 unum servientem equitem et armatum " etc. {Testa, p. 146). 
 
 * See the cases cited by Madox in Baronia Anglica, pp. 32-33, and 
 compare that of Wigan the marshal. 
 
OF SERJEANTY 49 
 
 on its absolute dispensing power. In the " Duke 
 of Buckingham's c^'&t" {temp. Henry VIII), the 
 judges, when deciding that the office of Constable 
 " should have continuance in the Duke " (in virtue 
 of two manors), held also that " the King at his 
 pleasure may refuse the service of the Duke in 
 exercising of the said office. " ^ In this decision 
 they were clearly right, as is proved by a series 
 of precedents extending from the coronation of 
 Edward III (as I shall show) to the present day. 
 I am now able to produce evidence that Edward 
 dispensed, at his coronation, with the service even 
 of the King's champion, while, as to the present, 
 the action of the CrOwn in dispensing with the 
 Coronation banquet, for the last eighty years, has 
 swept away, in practice, most of the " services, " 
 although reserving, in theory, all rights and privi- 
 leges. ^ Nor is the change limited exclusively to 
 those services which had to be performed outside 
 Westminster Abbey. The claim of the Barons of 
 the Cinque Ports to carry the canopy over the King 
 in the procession ' extended to the nave of the 
 Abbey, and their rights were keenly discussed in 
 the Court of Claims for the Coronation of Ed- 
 ward VII. ^ Asked by the President : — 
 
 Suppose it should not be His Majesty's pleasure to 
 
 ' Peerage and Pedigree, I, 165. 
 
 ^ The ' Proclamation, ' now issued, contains the words " And we do 
 further by this Our Royal Proclamation... dispense, upon the occasion 
 of this Our Coronation, with the services and attendance of all persons 
 who do claim and are bound to do and perform any services which, 
 according to ancient custom or usage, are to be performed in West- 
 minster Hall or in the Procession. " 
 
 ' See the section on " The Canopy bearers " in this work. 
 
 ' See WoUaston's Court of Claims, pp. 39-46. 
 
so SOME FEATURES 
 
 have a canopy ; do you say your right goes to the extent 
 that he must have a canopy in order that you may perform 
 your duty ? 
 
 their Counsel replied that " if it is not His Majesty's 
 pleasure to have a canopy, we do not desire to press 
 that part of our claim, though we say that it is part 
 of our right that a canopy should be provided. " 
 The Court gave judgement " that if it is His 
 Majesty's pleasure to have a canopy, then the 
 Barons of the Cinque Ports are entitled to bear it." 
 Legally the point involved is whether a claimant 
 has " a right as against the King." ^ It is clearly 
 the correct view that such right is " subject to His 
 Majesty's pleasure.^ This point will arise again 
 when I come to deal with " The Glove and sceptre 
 serjeanty, " and suggest that the Sovereign, in the 
 hour of his crowning, is not bound to accept 
 " support " fron^ any mortal man. 
 
 Lastly, there is a small point arising from the 
 fact that great lords, such as the Counts of Boulogne 
 and of Eu, could and did create serjeanties on the 
 lands of their English fiefs.' The services from 
 these lands would be rendered to themselves, but 
 when the widespread Boulogne fief escheated to the 
 Crown, and its tenant held of the King ufc/e honore^ 
 the case of these serjeanties might present some 
 difficulty. A chamberlain, for instance, of the 
 Count of Boulogne would not become a chamber- 
 
 ' Compare Ibid., p. 58. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 59. 
 
 ' Littleton asserted that " a man cannot hold by Grand Serjeantjr, 
 or by Petit Serjeanty, but of the King" {Tenures, sec. 161). This, 
 however, is wrong. " One may well hold by serjeanty of a mesne lord. 
 Bracton speaks clearly on this point " iflist. ofEng. Law, I, 265). 
 
-OF SERJEANTY 51 
 
 lain of the King. In such a case the service due 
 might be, and apparently was, changed to another. 
 The two Primates also, and even some bishops 
 and abbots, had tenants holding of them who were 
 under the obligation of rendering certain services; 
 and the former, at their enthronizations, imitated 
 to some extent coronation ceremonies. But in 
 a work devoted to the King's Serjeants, these 
 services can only be dealt with by way of illus- 
 tration. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 It is, no doubt, owing to the fact that he wrote 
 as a scholar for scholars, whether in his Constitutional 
 History or in his great Prefaces to the series of 
 Chronicles and Memorials, ^ that the true greatness 
 of Stubbs is not more widely known. It may be 
 that this is not the place for insisting on the 
 vastness of his learning, the soundness of his judg- 
 ment or the supreme merit of the work he did for 
 English history ; but those who have realised this 
 for themselves, and who have even been privileged 
 to receive instruction at his hands, cannot readily 
 forego any opportunity of expressing their sense of 
 the debt due to him and of its somewhat imperfect 
 appreciation. 
 
 There could be no better introduction to the 
 subject of this chapter than that wonderful passage 
 in which he brings before us the King's palace of 
 Westminster as the centre of the work of govern- 
 ment, as the home of that court [curia) from which 
 developed all administration, all justice, and all 
 finance. At the risk of mutilating that passage I 
 quote from it what follows : — 
 
 When the palace and the abbey had grown up together, 
 ' in the Master of the Rolls' Series. 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 53 
 
 wlieh Canute had lived in the palace and Hardicanute 
 had been buried in the abbey, and when the life and 
 death of the Confessor had invested the two with almost 
 equal sanctity, the abbey church became the scene of the 
 royal coronation, and the palace the centre of all the work 
 of government. The crown, the grave, the palace, the 
 festival, the laws of King Edward, all illustrate the perpe- 
 tuity of a national sentiment typifying the continuity of 
 the national life. There the Conqueror kept his summer 
 courts, ' and William Rufus contemplated the building 
 of a house of which the great hall which now survives 
 should be only one of the bedchambers. 
 
 After observing that the reign of Edward I 
 " saw the whole of the administrative machinery 
 of the government permanently settled in and 
 around the palace, " the historian proceeds : — 
 
 The ancient palace of Westminster must have pres- 
 ented a very apt illustration of the history of the Cons- 
 titution which had grown up from its early simplicity to 
 
 its full strength within those venerable walls As the 
 
 administrative system of the country had been developed 
 largely from the household economy of the King, the 
 national palace had for its kernel the King's court, hall, 
 
 chapel, and chamber : the chamber became a council 
 
 room, the banquet hall a court of justice, the chapel a 
 hall of deliberation ; but the continuity of the historical 
 building was complete, the changes were but signs of 
 
 growth and of the strength that could outlive change 
 
 It was a curious coincidence certainly that the destruction 
 of the ancient fabric should follow so immediately upon 
 the great constitutional change wrought by the reform 
 act, and scarcely less curious that the fire should have 
 originated in the burning of the ancient exchequer tallies, 
 one of the most permanent relics of the primitive simpli- 
 city of administration. ^ 
 
 ' i.e. the Whitsuntide crown-wearings (see below). 
 
 * Consiit. Hist. (1878), III, 382-5. A foot-note points out that " the 
 tallies had been in use until 1826. " 
 
54 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 It is, precisely, " the primitive simplicity of 
 administration " under the Norman Kings that will 
 most impress the reader. In the document to 
 which we are now coming, " The establishment 
 of the King's Household, " we are struck at the 
 very outset by the fact that the first officer named, 
 the (Lord) Chancellor, who receives the then large 
 salary of five shillings a day, is entitled to a fixed 
 daily allowance of candle-ends, as are the lesser 
 officers of the Household, This ' Establishment, ' 
 indeed, is of so early a date that it practically 
 stands alone. It is partly in consequence of this 
 that it presents some difficulties ; for we do not 
 possess contemporary records to assist us in its 
 elucidation. Except for the Pipe Roll of 1 1 30, 
 which affiards little help, we are virtually dependent 
 on such assistance as later evidence affords. It is 
 to this document, however, that we must look for 
 the origin of the great offices of state, and for the 
 illustration of those services which were rendered 
 in the King's household or in connection with his 
 sport by those who held of him " by serjeanty." 
 
 What then is this document, and where is it 
 printed ? It was printed by that industrious anti- 
 quary, Hearne, in his Liber Niger Scaccarii (1774), 
 from the text in the Little Black Book of the 
 Exchequer, and again in the official edition of the 
 Ked Book of the 'Exchequer (1896), from the text in 
 that volume. Stubbs, somewhat strangely perhaps, 
 deals with it only in a footnote, as giving " the 
 daily allowances of the several inmates of the 
 palace ; " but in more recent years it has been 
 critically discussed, with a knowledge of both texts. 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 55 
 
 by an officer of the Public Record Office, Mr, 
 Hubert Hall, firstly in his Court Life under the 
 P lantagenets (1890), pp. 242-9, and then in his 
 official edition of The Red Book of the Exchequer, 
 pp. cclxxxviii-ccci, 807-813. As his text and 
 observations are the source of information to which 
 the student would naturally turn, it will be necessary 
 to say something of them, the more so because he 
 has described Hearne's notes as " clumsy and far- 
 fetched " and brought against him the charge that 
 he " did not always treat his MSB. texts with 
 proper respect." ^ " It is," he added, "both strange 
 that historians should have been so long content 
 with the printed version of Hearne, and most 
 desirable that a perfect text should be provided at 
 the first opportunity." ^ A few years later his own 
 was published. 
 
 Now a very good test of Mr. Hall's critical 
 judgment, and indeed of his ability even to read 
 the MS. before him, is afforded by his lengthy 
 observations on its word sal'. 
 
 It will be only necessary to place side by side his 
 assertions in 1890 and in 1896. 
 
 1890 1896 
 
 The greatest stumbling- In the Constitutio itself 
 
 blockexperienced by Hearne much difficulty has been 
 
 in his annotation of the Black experienced in the rendering 
 
 Book MSS...... was in respect of certain archaic terms and 
 
 of the word " Sal., " as it formulae. A very good ins- 
 appears in this abbreviated tance will be found in the 
 form. Hearne, who did not case of the abbreviation 5<?/', 
 always treat his IMSS. texts which appears in connection 
 
 ' Court Life, p. 242. 
 " Ibid., p. 244. 
 
56 
 
 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 in 
 
 with proper reSpect, seems 
 to have jumped at once to 
 the conclusion that by this 
 abbreviation, which appears 
 in almost every entry in 
 connection with an inferior 
 sort of simnel, a salted loaf 
 was implied, i.e. "simenellus 
 salus " or " salinus. " Un- 
 fortunately, however, the 
 occasional extensions of 
 "sal." in the two Exchequer 
 MSS. scarcely warrant this 
 conjecture, in spite of the 
 immense amount of learn- 
 ing which has been expended 
 thereon. In the Black Book 
 the word is twice extended, 
 once as "salu." and again as 
 
 " salci. " 
 
 The Red Book also gives 
 two extensions, both as " sal- 
 ac. " It has seemed to me, 
 therefore, perfectly simple 
 and probable to understand 
 the word " salacii, " dripp- 
 ing, or animal grease of 
 some kind, in contrast to 
 the more costly royal simnel, 
 which may have been com- 
 pounded with oil or butter. 
 In fact, a simnel of this kind 
 was probably very like a 
 modern tea-cake, and 1 
 would even venture to sug- 
 gest that the familiar " Sally 
 Lunn " etc. etc. (pp. 242-3). 
 
 The plain facts, it will be seen, are, when 
 
 with a certain kind of sim 
 
 nel The simnel 
 
 question was probably the 
 -pain de sel or panis de sala 
 supplied to the Hall, or 
 Household, as contrasted 
 with the Payn demayn or 
 Panis dominicus reserved for 
 
 the high table but there 
 
 can be little doubt that, 
 rightly or wrongly, the 
 scribes of both Exchequer 
 MSS. read the word as 
 " salted, " since in the Black 
 Book it is twice extended as 
 salum^ and in the Red Book 
 twice also as Salatum. At 
 the same time it by no means 
 follows that this is the cor- 
 rect form, for the MSS. have 
 been transcribed with very 
 scant intelligence. A " salt- 
 ed " or "seasoned" simnel, 
 or possibly a cake com- 
 pounded of salt dripping 
 instead of oil, may have 
 been served out as the ac- 
 companiment of a rather 
 liberal allowance of wine, 
 but the pain de sel is a more 
 reasonable alternative. 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD ^j 
 
 stripped of verbiage, that Hearne read his MS. as 
 meaning a " salted " simnel ; that for this he was 
 charged by Mr. Hall with not treating his MS. 
 "with proper respect " and with having "jumped 
 at once to the conclusion " that " a salted \o^i was 
 implied, " thus completely ignoring " a repeated 
 reading ; " and that this charge rests solely on the 
 misreading of the MSS. by Mr. Hall himself in 
 three out of four cases ! 
 
 This is not my own assertion ; it rests on Mr. 
 Hall's own words, as given side by side above, and 
 on his admission that " the scribes of both Exche- 
 quer MSS. read the word as ' salted '." But as he 
 is there discreetly silent as to his previous statements, 
 it is only when I print them side by side that their 
 contradiction is revealed. 
 
 Mr. Hall, has, somewhat impertinently, spoken 
 of my "hasty charge" against Swereford, ^ of which 
 he claims to have cleared him " on the clearest 
 possible evidence, " but which, was made with 
 full consideration and which as the point is histor- 
 ically important, I subsequently proved up to the 
 hilt. ^ What shall we say of his own charge against 
 the unfortunate Hearne ? 
 
 A further collation of Mr. Hall's statements 
 illustrates the value of his critical judgment where 
 texts are concerned. 
 
 1890 1896 
 
 The Black Book text is The text of the Black 
 considerably inferior to that of Book, which is otherwise 
 
 ' Preface to Red book of the Exchequer, p. clxxxiv. 
 * See my Studies on the Red Book of the Exchequer (Printed for private 
 circulation). 
 
58 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the Red Book of the Exche- the more correct, is defaced 
 quer, which contains another by some gross blunders in 
 and a much more careful the rubrication of the initial 
 transcript, and this text has letters, (p. ccxcviii). ^ 
 been chiefly followed in the 
 translation appended here... 
 (p. 242). 1 
 
 The quotation on the right proceeds thus : — 
 
 Both MSS. are utterly at fault with ' Oinus Polcheard, ' 
 for which the readings ' Dominus ' or ' Omnis ' have 
 hitherto been suggested. This officer can, however, be 
 easily identified with * Oinus Polcehart ' or ' Oinus ser- 
 viens ' of the Pipe Roll of 1 130, his office being doubtless 
 that of the Poultry (Puletarius). Cf. the local names of 
 the Polecat. 
 
 Now, in the first place, the Black Book, so far 
 from being " utterly at fault, " reads the name, 
 according to Mr. Hall himself, "Oinus Polechart" 
 (p. 810), which, we learn, is right. And why, in 
 the second, was his office " doubtless that of the 
 Poultry (Puletarius) " ? The record places him at 
 the head of the officers of the Great Kitchen, but 
 Mr. Hall transfers him to another department and 
 makes him " Serjeant of the Poultry " (p. ccxci) . 
 Why ? Can it be possible that, because his name 
 began with 'Pol', Mr. Hall has "jumped at the 
 conclusion" that he was "the King's Poulterer"?^ 
 It would seem, indeed, inconceivable were it not 
 that he actually renders his record's " Bernarius " 
 as "bear-ward" (p. ccxciii), ' apparently because it 
 
 ' The italics are mine. . 
 
 ' Court Life, p. 246. 
 
 ' And Court Life, p. 249. 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 59 
 
 begins with ' Ber-' ' One can hardly imagine that 
 there is any other scholar, in or out of the Record 
 Office, ignorant of the fact that a bernarius was a 
 hunt-servant in charge of hounds. ^ Mr. Hall is 
 evidently unaware that there was a man named 
 ' Polcehard ' who held a hide in Berks at the time 
 of the Domesday Survey. As the Pipe Roll of 
 1 1 30 proves that Oin ' Polcehart ' held a hide in 
 that county (p. 126), we have here clearly the 
 origin of his possibly unique surname. ' 
 
 I must point out that these criticisms are not 
 on the work of an amateur, or even of an ordinary 
 scholar. Mr. Hall has put himself forward, from 
 among his fellow-officers, to teach others how 
 MSS. should be edited and how records should be 
 read. On these subjects he has lectured and he 
 has written, and always, to quote the phrase he 
 himself applies to Madox, with a " great show of 
 learning. " He has thereby challenged public 
 criticism and investigation of his claims to instruct 
 others. The Red Book of the Exchequer is no mere 
 private enterprise ; it is the official edition of a 
 famous public record, and the authority, for scholars, 
 of that edition is matter of public interest. 
 
 I am compelled to deal critically with Mr. Hall's 
 treatment of this document of" inestimable value,"^ 
 because it affi^cts directly a work on " the King's 
 Serjeants. " I have, for instance, devoted sections 
 
 ' The word for * bear-ward ' was ursarius (see Pipe Rolls, 2-4 Hen. II 
 [1844], pp. 136, 149). 
 
 * See the chapter below on ' the King's sport. ' 
 
 ' Mr. Hall makes the wild suggestion that " this Owen was possibly 
 a Welshman. " 
 
 * Court Life, p. 244. 
 
6o 
 
 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 to " the King's tailor " and " the serjeanty of the 
 Hose, " and, as the rendering " tailor " is opposed 
 to Mr. Hall's conclusion in The Red Book of the 
 "Exchequer, I am relieved to find that his Court Life, 
 on the contrary, supports it. 
 
 1890 
 I have also ventured to 
 suggest " tailor " as a better 
 reading than " counter, " 
 who would have appeared 
 as ' calculator, ' if any such 
 oifice existed apart from the 
 exchequer. It will be seen 
 that " hosiers " are mention- 
 ed in another place (p. 244). 
 
 1896 
 Difficulties have also been 
 experienced in connection 
 with the offices of the Hosa- 
 rii and of the Tallator of the 
 Household, though such 
 
 difficulties must have been 
 of the commentators' own 
 making. Probably, how- 
 ever, the confusion between 
 the offices of hosiers of the 
 Wardrobe and Buttery res- 
 pectively is of old standing, 
 but Cissar would certainly 
 have been the title applied 
 to the King's Tailor, and 
 the official here referred to 
 was doubtless the Tally- 
 cutter in the suite of the 
 Treasurer and Chamberlains 
 (p. ccxcix). 
 
 So v^^e first learn that the word Tallator must 
 mean ' tailor, ' because, if it meant ' counter, ' 
 calculator would be used, and then, on the contrary, 
 that it meant ' Tally-cutter ' (/. e. reckoner) , because, 
 if it meant ' tailor,' cissor would be used ! And, 
 while in 1890 the 'hosiers ' are connected, we see, 
 with the 'tailor,' in 1896, on the contrary, they 
 are placed in the butler's department (p. ccxci). 
 
 Before we leave what I may term the ' Sally 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 6i 
 
 Lunn ' school of criticism, it may be well to note its 
 verdict on the date of these " famous regulations. " ^ 
 In 1890 they could " be distinctly referred to the 
 reign of Henry II ; " in 1896 we read that the 
 Establishment " has been commonly assigned to 
 the time of Henry II, although it is actually dated 
 in the reign of Henry I by the scribe who copied 
 it into the Red Book of the Exchequer, " and that 
 " Mr, Stapleton clearly proved long since that this 
 Establishment refers to the reign of Henry I. " ^ 
 
 The exceptionally early date of this ' Establish- 
 ment of the Household ' {Constitutio domus regis) is 
 seen, on careful study, in the names of some of the 
 officers and in their classification. The Escantiones, 
 for instance, were of sufficient importance to form 
 a class by themselves, but their subsequent disap- 
 pearance makes their functions doubtful, though 
 they significantly appear on the similarly early 
 Pipe Roll of 1 1 30. ' They appear to have been 
 cupbearers. In France the Grand Echanson existed 
 independently of the Chief Butler. The Hosarii, 
 also, of our document have completely baffled 
 enquirers, * though these also are named on the 
 Pipe Roll of 1 1 30. Another mark of antiquity is 
 the prominence of the ' Dispensers '. There was 
 a ' Master Dispenser ' of the bread, with others 
 under him, a ' Master Dispenser ' of the Larder, 
 with other Dispensers of the Larder, who served 
 in turn, and ' Master Dispensers ' of the Butlery. 
 
 ' Court Life, p. 242. 
 ' Red Book, p. cclxxxyiii. 
 
 ' "Osmundus Escanceon" (Berks) ; "Turstinus Escanceon" (Middle- 
 sex). 
 
 * See the section below on ' The serjeanty of the Hose. " 
 
62 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 The function of these officers has proved so obscure 
 that they have sometimes been confused with 
 stewards, * whose office was quite distinct. 
 
 Even the ' Master ' Dispensers only received 
 about half the pay of the stewards and other officers 
 of the first rank. As a lengthy section of this 
 work is devoted to a family of "King's Dispensers," 
 one may explain that theirs was virtually the issue 
 department of the Household ; they " dispensed " 
 the rations of bread and of wine with which the 
 Constitutio is so largely concerned. The expensa of 
 the record became, no doubt, on English lips, the 
 ' spence ', and its officer the ' spencer ', and these 
 renderings are now adopted in Record Office 
 publications. But as a "• spencer ' would convey to 
 a modern Englishman no meaning except, perhaps, 
 that of an overcoat, I prefer the form ' dispenser ', 
 which does at least convey a very similar meaning 
 in connection with the verb 'dispense'. In French, 
 the word depense retained its meaning as buttery, 
 larder, etc., as did the word depensier^ which long 
 denoted also a ship's purser. 
 
 On the great officers of state the evidence of this 
 record is, in my opinion, of high importance. The 
 test of their position is their pay. The chancellor, 
 who comes first as a cleric, receives five shillings 
 a day, and the stewards, ^ who receive the same, 
 become the units of wage for the other great 
 officers. ' This raises the question of the Marshal's 
 
 ' e.g. in Hall's Court Life, pp. 245-7. 
 
 * The mention of " Dapiferi " is important as implying that there 
 were then more Stewards than one (see the section on the Steward 
 below). 
 
 ' "Dapiferi sicut Cancellarius Magister Pincerna sicut Dapifer 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 63 
 
 position at the time. The marshals follow immed- 
 iately on the constables, and the sectional heading 
 in the Red Book may be disregarded : ^ the text, 
 therefore, runs : — " Rogerus de Oyli similiter. 
 Magister Marscallus similiter, scilicet Johannes. " 
 Now Roger, we find, only received two shillings 
 a day, as against the five shillings of the Dapifer. 
 It is true that the marshal seems to have had fees 
 in addition {preter hoc), but the impression, certain- 
 ly, is conveyed that he was then inferior to the 
 constables. There is some reason to believe that 
 this was the case abroad. ^ 
 
 We are dealing, in these officers of state, with 
 an institution of high antiquity : their offices, it is 
 well recognised, can be traced back to the Empire, 
 long before the Normans set foot in England. 
 The Capttula Remedii, Stubbs notes, " mention the 
 camerarius, buticularius, senescalcus, judex publicus 
 and conestabulus : the Alemannic law enumerates 
 ' seniscalcus, mariscalcus, cocus, and pistor '. " * 
 "The Karolingian Court," he adds, " had a slightly 
 different rule : the four chief officers are the mar- 
 shal, the steward, the butler, and the chamberlain." 
 From the Empire this system passed into France, 
 and thence into Normandy, and, in my opinion, it 
 
 Magister Camerarius par est Dapifero in liberatione. Thesaurarius, ut 
 
 Magister Camerarius Constabularii liberationes habent sicut Dapi- 
 
 feri et eodem modo. " 
 
 ' It is not found in the Black Book text. 
 
 ' I do not know that anyone but Stubbs has touched upon this point. 
 He pointed out in a foot-note that in (the Kingdom of) Naples the 
 marshals were subordinate to the constable, but that " in England the 
 marshal was not subordinate to the constable " {Const. Hist. [1874], I, 
 
 3 54)- 
 
 ' Const. Hist., I, 343. 
 
64 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 was Edward the Confessor who introduced it, with 
 other Norman innovations, into England. ^ 
 
 Under our Norman Kings we become able to 
 distinguish the Steward, Constable, Marshal, Cham- 
 berlain, and Butler. There is, however, extreme 
 difficulty in determining the holders of these offices 
 for a century after the Conquest. That admirable 
 antiquary Madox, while careful to avoid error, was 
 unable in the absence of records, on which alone 
 he wisely relied, to satisfy himself on the subject. ^ 
 Dr. Stubbs wrote as follows : — 
 
 The exact dates for the foundation of these offices 
 cannot be given, nor even a satisfactory list of their early 
 
 holders It is, however, to be noticed that each of 
 
 these names appears to have been given to several persons 
 at once ; there were certainly several dapiferi and pincerrne 
 at the same time. These were honorary distinctions 
 probably, although they may in some instances have been 
 grand serjeanties. The dignity that emerges ultimately 
 may be the chief of each order ; the high steward, the 
 great butler, the lord high chamberlain. ^ 
 
 The offices, I think, of chamberlain and of butler 
 are the first to emerge singly ; the chief marshalship 
 had been determined before the year 1130; but 
 the claims to the high stewardship and the con- 
 stableship of England were still, apparently, con- 
 flicting at the date of the Constitutio, and, indeed, 
 for many years afterwards. 
 
 ' See my paper on " the officers of Edward the Confessor " in Eng. 
 Eist.Rev.,\o\. XXI. I do not think the earlier officers named by Stubbs 
 as occasionally occurring in England belong to this definite system. 
 
 ^ See the chapter on " The officers of state " in his History of the 
 Exchequer. 
 
 ' Const. Hist., \, 344-5. 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 65 
 
 We are again reminded that all administration 
 developed out of the King's household when we 
 find Stubbs writing, as before: — ^ 
 
 The great officers of the household form the first circle 
 round the throne, and furnish the King with the first 
 elements of a ministry of state. There is from the very 
 first some difficulty in drawing the line that separates 
 their duties as servants of the court from their functions 
 as administrators. ^ 
 
 England is, perhaps, the one country in which 
 the outward forms of government have been jeal- 
 ously and obstinately retained, however wide their 
 separation from the facts of national life. It is 
 still in the old Norman-French that the royal assent 
 is given and would, in theory, be refused to the 
 bills passed by Parliament. The King " who reigns, 
 but does not govern, " must still, at every coronation, 
 " solemnly promise and swear to govern the people 
 of this " kingdom. Parliament, it may be, now 
 governs, or, it may be, the Ministry that Parliament 
 has placed in power ; but in the great act of the 
 King's crowning Parliament has no part; Parliament 
 and Ministry are still ignored, as they were ignored 
 of old. On that day the King's Ministers are the 
 ministers of his Norman ancestors ; about him in 
 the Abbey are the Steward and the Chamberlain, 
 the Constable and the Marshal of England, ' though 
 the Steward and the Constable are now revived 
 for the day only to complete the picture of a dead 
 past. 
 
 ' p. 53 above. 
 ^ Const. Hist., I, 343. 
 
 ' The Chief Butler, as such, has ceased to figure at Coronations since 
 the banquet was abandoned by William IV. 
 
66 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 In the Holy Roman Empire — where the coron- 
 ations of the Emperors presented striking analogies 
 to those of our own Kings — the distribution of the 
 great offices, in the words of Stubbs, " was per- 
 manent, and was observed, with some modifica^tions, 
 down to the latest days of the Empire, in the elec- 
 toral body, where the Count Palatine was high 
 steward, the Duke of Saxony marshal, the King of 
 Bohemia cup-bearer, ^ and the Margrave of Bran- 
 denburg'' chamberlain,"* In France, also, at the 
 crowning of its " most Christian King, " there 
 were found two at least of the great officers of 
 state, the Constable and the Great Chamberlain, 
 though the Steward had disappeared at an early 
 date. ^ But with the Empire and the Kingdom 
 their officers have passed away : in England only 
 are they still found by the throne of the new-crown- 
 ed King. , 
 
 Before leaving the subject of the King's house- 
 hold, one may note the primitive aspect of its 
 division into two great departments, the hall {aula) 
 and the chamber [camera). Perhaps it would be 
 more correct to say that the house, rather than the 
 household, was so divided. But to understand the 
 
 ' Otherwise " Arch-Butler. " 
 
 * Ancestor of the Kings of Prussia (now German Emperors.) 
 
 ' Cmit. Hist., I, 344. See also Taylor's Gkry of Regality pp. 10 1-3, 
 and Bryce's Holy Roman Empire (1871), pp. zjo-i, where he aptly 
 quotes the lines from the De Imperio Romano of Marsilius of Padua : 
 " Est Palatinus Dapifer, Dux portitor ensis, 
 Marchio prsepositus cameras, pincerna Bohemus, 
 Hi statuunt dominum cunctis per saecula summum. " 
 
 * Philip, Count of Flanders officiated at the coronation of Philip 
 Augustus, and " the seneschal of France, as a coronation official, survived 
 the accession of Louis the Ninth. Ultimately the constable of France 
 took his place. " (Harcourt's His Grace the Steward, p. 55). 
 
THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 67 
 
 household arrangements, this division must be kept 
 in view. There w^ere also, of course, on the one 
 hand, the chapel and chancery, with the Chancellor 
 at their head, and, on the other, the kitchen, larder, 
 butler's department and so forth ; but the ' hall ' 
 and the ' chamber ' were the kernel, as it seems to 
 me, of the palace. We shall find, perhaps, the 
 nearest equivalents in the ' state apartments ' and 
 ' private apartments ' of a modern palace, while the 
 phrase ' groom of the privy chamber ' seems to 
 preserve the meaning of the medieva;l camera. In 
 any case it was from the ' chamber ' that the cham- 
 berlain derived his name, and with it that his 
 functions were connected. It was in the hall, on 
 the other hand, that the marshal preserved order 
 and that the steward, as dapifer {discthegn), set the 
 dish upon the table. 
 
 The hall {aula) still denoted, in Norman as in 
 classical times, ^ the palace as a whole. ^ But we 
 are still reminded by Westminster ' Hall ' of the 
 word's true meaning. It is, still, in theory, from 
 his ' chamber ' that the King goes forth to be 
 crowned, ^ and in the ' hall ' of his palace, West- 
 minster Hall, that the coronation banquet is held, 
 although it is now dispensed with. And I think 
 that from the present we can feel our way to an 
 even more remote past. For if we study the 
 
 ' Cf. auRci (courtiers). 
 
 ' See, for instance, the Conqueror's charter making a grant to the 
 New Minster, Winchester, in return for the land he had taken from its 
 cemetery for making his palace (" ad aulam meam faciendam ") in 'New 
 Minster and Hyde Abbey (Hants. Rec. Soc), p. 1 1 1. 
 
 ' It was from " a certain chamber " in the " Old Palace of West- 
 minster " that George II, " being clothed in his royal robes " proceeded 
 to his Coronation, as did George IV after him. 
 
68 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 historic fees claimed by the Great Chamberlain, 
 and those also of the Queen's Chamberlain, we find 
 them practically representing the contents of the 
 bedchamber alone/ The original camera, therefore, 
 may have been the actual thalamus, in days when 
 even a king required little more than a ' chamber ' 
 in which to sleep at night and a ' hall ' in which 
 he spent the day. 
 
 THE STEWARD 
 
 " The Steward of England still is, and, according 
 to popular tradition, always has been the first officer 
 of state in the kingdom. " Such are the opening 
 words of the Preface to His Grace the Steward 
 (1907), that notable work by the late Mr. L. W. 
 Vernon Harcourt, which has made obsolete all that 
 had previously been written on the history and 
 functions of the office in this country. There are 
 those, doubtless, who, in the usual fashion, would 
 condemn the author's outspoken criticism of the 
 errors and the fables which older antiquaries had 
 been indolently content to repeat. For those of 
 whom I speak never ask themselves whether such 
 criticism is just, but only whether it is severe. 
 Mr. Vernon Harcourt was entitled to claim, as he 
 did claim on his title page, that his work was " a 
 
 novel inquiry founded entirely upon original 
 
 sources of information and extensively upon hitherto 
 unprinted materials. " A scholar who had under- 
 taken the labour required for such a work was 
 entitled to speak with some scorn of the book- 
 
 ' The velvet for robes was another matter altogether. 
 
THE STEWARD 69 
 
 making writers who had followed one another in 
 the repetition of error. 
 
 It has already been explained that ' the Lord 
 Steward, ' as ' Steward of the Household,' is distinct 
 from ' the Lord High Steward. ' But originally 
 this was not so. For although Mr. Vernon Har- 
 court did not make the matter clear, he cited the 
 document of 1 221, in which the chief stewardship 
 is styled " senescalcia hospicii nostri " (p. Jj)' 
 The Montforts magnified this office into the Stew- 
 ardship " of England " about the middle of the 
 I 3 th Century, and a steward " of the household " 
 {hospitii domini regis) appears subsequently as a dist- 
 inct officer and develops into the Lord Steward. 
 
 One of the difficulties presented by this office is 
 indicated by its double Latinisation as dapifer and 
 as senescallus. A dapifer, as his name indicates, 
 had for his duty to serve the king by placing the 
 dishes on his table. He was, as Stubbs pointed 
 out, the discthegn of days before the Conquest, the 
 inferior of the Salian law. In this capacity he was 
 represented in later days, among ourselves, by the 
 " sewer, " who, in the days of Edward IV, " rece- 
 veth the metes by (as)sayes and saufly so convey eth 
 
 it to the King's bourde and all that cometh to 
 
 that bourde he setteth and dyrecteth. " ^ By 
 this time he had been, sharply enough, differentiated 
 from the Lord Steward (" Stywardof Houshold"), 
 who, under the king, had the governance of the 
 Household. * Yet, as is cautiously observed by the 
 judicious Madox, " whether there was anciently a 
 
 ' Household Ordinances. 
 ' Ibid. 
 
JO THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 notable difference, or any, between the Senescallus 
 and the Dapifer in England, let others judge. " ' 
 
 Mr. Vernon Harcourt, while admitting that the 
 steward " is and was, " in England, " first officer of 
 state, " contends that this position was an unautho- 
 rised development, and that his earlier position was 
 comparatively humble. "The original sewer, or 
 dapifer, " he writes " was, of course, the subsequent 
 lord high steward" (p. i8o). Under the Con- 
 queror, the dapifer, he holds, was but " the dish- 
 thane and caterer " (p. 21) ; under John he had 
 still no higher privilege than that " of serving at 
 the royal table on special occasions, with perhaps 
 the additional right of carrying a sword at corona- 
 tions " (p. 76) ; even under Henry IH, he dismisses 
 the belief of Simon de Montfort that his office of 
 Steward entitled him to most important functions 
 as a delusion. 
 
 Henry may have found it difficult to convince him that 
 the sole duty properly belonging to Simon de Montfort 
 as hereditary steward was the business of chief sewer at 
 particular state banquets. Nevertheless such was the 
 case, and moreover there was nothing intrinsically strange 
 in the matter. The strangeness lay rather in the circum- 
 stance that the French and other dapifers had soared to 
 precedence over all other functionaries, than in the fact 
 that the English dish-thegn was a dish-thegn still (p. 84). 
 
 For it is the essence of the writer's theory that 
 the development of the dapifer and his functions 
 began in France towards the close of the eleventh 
 century and gave rise to the erroneous belief that 
 he ought to possess similar powers and similar 
 
 ' History of the Exchequer (1711), p. 33. 
 
THE STEWARD 71 
 
 precedence in England. In the closing year of the 
 eleventh century the French dapifer rose, we learn, 
 
 to be " the first great officer of state " " his 
 
 preeminence appears fully established " (pp. i, 22). 
 The force of continental example was increased 
 under the Angevin kings by the facts that the 
 dapifer happened to be the chief officer of Anjou 
 (p. 35), and that Henry II's eldest son acted as 
 dapifer to the French king, in 11 69, as Count of 
 Anjou. Thus it was that, from about the middle 
 of the twelfth century, this office became, he holds, 
 an object of ambition with great nobles in England. 
 But, even if we admit the justice of his main 
 contention, especially his rejection of the view that 
 the steward was originally justiciar, the writer was 
 perhaps too eager to depreciate the steward's pos- 
 ition. He may not, at first, have enjoyed prece- 
 dence, but he was always one of the great officers. 
 It is very doubtful, however, if it was one of his 
 functions to bear the royal sword before the king 
 at coronations, though it was so borne at the 
 coronation of Philip Augustus; for, as we saw above, 
 the phrase ' portitor ensis ' denoted, in the Empire, 
 the marshal. The only case in which this privilege 
 seems to have been exercised in England was at the 
 coronation of Richard I, when the Earl of Leicester 
 bore one of the swords. The other privilege, which 
 was exercised by the steward as dapfer, was that 
 of setting the first dish on the table at the coronation 
 banquet and on similar great occasions. Henry, 
 heir-apparent of England, so served the French 
 King in Paris (i 169),^ and the Count of Flanders 
 
 ' " servivit regi Francise ad mensam ut senescallus Francise. " 
 
72 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 at the coronation of Philip Augustus. ^ Of the 
 great officers of the Empire, the Count Palatine, 
 as dapifer, carried " four dishes of meat " at the 
 coronation, and though we do not seem to have 
 direct evidence ^ of this function in England, there 
 can be little doubt that it was duly performed at 
 coronation banquets. 
 
 The point requires to be insisted on because, in 
 his Glory of Regality, Taylor, describing the Coron- 
 ation Banquet, asserts that the bringing on of the 
 first course, which is preceded by the " sewers, " 
 " was anciently superintended by the dapifer or 
 grand sewer" (p. 220), whose office he treats as 
 wholly unconnected with that of the Steward 
 (pp. 124-5). ^^' ^^ " sewers " were themselves 
 preceded by three officers of state " mounted on 
 goodly horses, " viz. the Steward, with the Con- 
 
 ' " in reglis dapibus apponendis. " 
 
 ' We have such indirect evidence as the service of the earls of Devon, 
 as stewards, at the enthronization of the bishop of Exeter, when it was 
 part of their duties to place, personally, the first course (totum primum 
 fenulum) before the bishop at the banquet, receiving as fee four silver 
 dishes (quatuor discos argenteos) out of those used for the purpose. The 
 earls of * Clare ' similarly received, as high stewards, at the enthronization 
 of archbishops of Canterbury, the dishes set before them at the first 
 course. I would also invite attention to the services of the Lords Wil- 
 loughby d'Eresby as stewards to the bishops of Durham, for their palat- 
 inate made them almost petty sovereigns. In 13 17 Robert, Lord 
 Willoughby, was found to have held Eresby by service (inter alia) of 
 " being steward to attend upon the bishops ' dishes (fercula) on the days 
 of their consecration, and on Christmas Day and Whitsunday yearly. " 
 {fial. of Inq. VI, p. 48). A similar return was made on the death of 
 his grandson in 1372, the service being then defined as " to carry the 
 messes of meat to the table upon the day of their consecration, as also at 
 Christmas and Whitsuntide " (Dugdale, Baronage, II, 84.). This service 
 is not mentioned by Mr. Lapsley in his valuable monograph on The 
 County Palatine (Harvard Historical Studies, 1900) though he deals fully 
 with the steward under " officers of state " (pp. 76-80). 
 
THE STEWARD 73 
 
 stable on his right and the Marshal on his left 
 (p. 219). At the coronation of George III, a 
 private letter states, the " table was served Mrith 
 three courses, at the first of which Earl Talbot, as 
 Steward of his Majesty's Household, ^ rode up from 
 the hall gate to the steps leading to where their 
 Majesties sate. " This, doubtless, was a survival of 
 the original, but forgotten service, and it brings 
 the High Stewardship into line with the office of 
 dapifer as exercised,, we have seen, in early days and 
 in other realms and places. 
 
 Indeed, it seems a natural inference that the 
 dapifer set the meat before the king as the ' butler ' 
 set the drink. If so, the two offices would be 
 much on the same level. ^ 
 
 But on no account must the steward's functions 
 be confused with those of the chamberlain. In 
 dealing with the "famous" (p. 191) record of 
 Queen Eleanor's coronation (1236) Mr. Vernon 
 Harcourt wrote 
 
 Simon de Montfort served that day as steward without 
 let or hindrance, As soon as Henry had seated him- 
 self at the banqueting table, Simon, arrayed in robe of 
 office, gave him water in a basin to wash his hands. * 
 
 The error is quite inexplicable, for this was the 
 chamberlain's function, and, indeed, the record 
 expressly states that the chamberlain performed the 
 service. * 
 
 ' Rather in his capacity as Lord High Steward for the day. 
 
 - There are indications (see, for instance, p. 23 above), that the 
 steward controlled the kitchen as the butler did the butlery. 
 
 ' Hh Grace the Steward, p. 83. 
 
 * " Servivit autem ea die de Aqua tarn ante prandium quam post, 
 major Camerarius, videlicet Hugo de Ver " {Lib. Rub. p. 759). By 
 
74 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 We are not here concerned with the Steward's 
 later duty of presiding over the trial of peers, with 
 which Mr. Vernon Harcourt has dealt so fully, but 
 on two other later developments something must 
 be said. It was still alleged in the latest edition of 
 Elount's Tenures ^ that, under a special commission, 
 " he holds his court (of claims) some convenient 
 time before the coronation. " But his presidency 
 of that court, which appears to have begun in 1 377, 
 certainly came to an end before the reign of 
 Hienry VIII. ^ The other of these functions is 
 that of carrying St. Edward's Crown immediately 
 before the Sovereign in the Coronation procession. 
 This function is still discharged by the noble who 
 is appointed ' Lord High Steward ' for the pur- 
 pose. 
 
 How the office became hereditary and descended 
 with the earldom of Leicester has been very fully 
 explained by Mr. Vernon Harcourt. After Simon 
 de Montfort's fall, it was held by the earls and 
 dukes of Lancaster till it merged in the Crown. 
 The question here is, as was observed above, * 
 whether the office was ever held by serjeanty, that 
 is, in virtue of the tenure of certain lands. There 
 were, as Mr. Vernon Harcourt has shown, four 
 distinct grants of it in less than twenty years (1141- 
 1 1 55), namely those to the Earl of Essex, to Hum- 
 frey de Bohun, to the Earl of Leicester, and to the 
 
 another error the writer alleged that the Consiitutio assigned the same pay 
 to the Dispensers as to the dapifert (p. 24), which, we have seen, was not 
 the case (see p. 62 above). 
 
 ' Ed. Hazlitt (1874), p. 296. 
 
 ' His Grace the Steward, p. 191; WoUaston, Court of Claims, pp. 1 1 -j[ 2 . 
 
 ' See p. 45. 
 
THE STEWARD ys 
 
 Earl of Norfolk. The terms of these grants are 
 known, and, as I read them, they are all grants of 
 an office in gross. It is true that Mr. Vernon 
 Harcourt definitely claimed that 
 
 Humphrey de Bohun was granted his dapifership 
 
 to hold to himself and his heirs as a serjeanty appertain- 
 ing to certain lands there seems not the smallest reason 
 
 to doubt that the intention was to exact the active duties 
 attaching to the post of dapifer from Humphrey de 
 Bohun and his heirs, as the service to be rendered for the 
 possession of particular properties (p. 34). 
 
 But I do not hesitate to say that the charter, 
 which he printed in full, ^ contains nothing of the 
 kind. 
 
 In 1232 Amauri de Montfort made over his 
 rights in the lands and the Stewardship to his 
 younger brother Simon, ^ but not as a serjeanty. 
 In 1239, however, he made a fresh grant of them, 
 in which he definitely named the Stewardship as 
 part of the service due from the Montfort share of 
 the Honour of Leicester. ^ But the royal charter 
 confirming that grant does not mention the Stew- 
 ardship, and, in any case, Amauri's statement could 
 not alter the fact that the Stewardship had not, 
 originally, been connected with these lands. As 
 to the later story that the Stewardship was appur- 
 tenant, " not to the earldom of Leicester, but to 
 the honour of Hinckley, " it was shewn by Mr. 
 
 ' It was printed by me from the original in Ancient Charters (Pipe 
 Roll Society, 1888), pp. 4.5-6. 
 
 * His Grace the Steward, pp. 81, i iz. 
 
 ' " totam partem (sic) honoris Leycestrie faciendo inde eis de- 
 
 bitum servitium ad iUam partem (sic) pertinens tarn in senescakia domini 
 Regis Henrici predicti quam in aliis servitiis " {Ibid. pp. 86, 177). 
 
76 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Vernon Harcourt that, in spite of its persistent 
 repetition, it was based on forgery alone. 
 
 THE CONSTABLE 
 
 The Constable was, throughout, essentially a 
 military officer ; he is found with the garrison in 
 the castle or with the army in the field. In the 
 constabularia of ten knights we detect the unit of 
 the feudal host, ^ which shows the close association 
 of the constable's office with war. ^ With him, in 
 his military functions, the marshal was regularly 
 connected, though whether in a diffisrent capacity 
 or as his recognised lieutenant appears to be con- 
 sidered doubtful. 
 
 The constable and the marshal, whose functions 
 
 are scarcely distinguishable from those of the constable, 
 reached at a comparatively early date the position of 
 hereditary dignities. Their military functions, however, 
 preserved them from falling into the class of mere grand 
 serjeanties, and at a later period they had very great 
 importance in the management of the army. * 
 
 One of the most familiar scenes in English 
 medieval history is that at Salisbury, in the gather- 
 ing of the barons (1297), when the constable and 
 the marshal together withstood King Edward to his 
 face. Of Bohun and Bigod, Stubbs has written, 
 " each now held with his earldom a great office of 
 
 ' See my Feudal England. 
 
 ' On the Close Roll of 4 Edward 11 (3 Sept. 1 3 10) is an imperative 
 order from the king to the earl of Hereford and Essex, as Constable of 
 England, to come to Scotland and do his service as Constable of the 
 Army (" ad faciendum ibidem servicium vestrimi de Constabular' exer- 
 citus nostri, ut tenemini sicut scitis "). 
 
 ' Stubbs, Const. Hist. (1874), I> 354- 
 
THE CONSTABLE ^j 
 
 state. " Called upon to lead the English host, 
 without the king, in Gascony, the earls refused ; 
 " as belongs to me, by hereditary right, " the mar- 
 shal proudly exclaimed, " I will go in the front of 
 the host before your face : without you. Oh King, 
 I am not bound to go, and go I will not. " " By 
 God, earl, " the king replied, " you shall either go 
 or hang. " The two earls broke away and, at the 
 head of armed horse, defied the King's commands. ^ 
 As in the army, so also in the famous ' Court of 
 Chivalry ' we find the Constable and the Marshal 
 presiding jointly ; but I would note the fact that in 
 the records relating to this court the Constable has 
 precedence. " A military court, nominally, at all 
 events, under the control of the constable and the 
 marshal of England, is in existence at least as early 
 as the reign of Edward the First. " So wrote 
 Mr. Vernon Harcourt, ^ to whose learned and most 
 valuable chapter on the early history of this court 
 I may refer the reader. Originally a court martial 
 {curia militaris), its jurisdiction developed, through 
 cases of honour and of arms — quaintly styled 
 " heroical causes " in the sixteenth century, — till 
 its encroachments had to be checked by law. ^ 
 Even when the Constable had disappeared, the court 
 lingered on as that of the Earl Marshal, the recog- 
 
 ^ Stubbs, Const. Hist. (1875), II, 132-3. 
 
 ' His Grace the Steward, p. 362. 
 
 ' According to the statute 1 3 Ric. II, cap. 2, " To the constable it 
 pertaineth to have cognisance of contracts touching deeds of arms and 
 
 war which the constables have heretofore duly and reasonably used 
 
 in their time. " Stubbs wrote, in indignant language, that an " abuse 
 which had the result of condemning its agents to perpetual infamy was 
 the extension of the jurisdiction of the High Constable of England to 
 cases of high treason. " {Const. Hist. Ill, 282). 
 
78 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 nisedyorww for questions concerning coat-armour 
 and titles of honour. ^ 
 
 It appears to me probable that the Duke of 
 Buckingham's claim, under Henry VIIl, to hold 
 this great and ancient office, not by royal appoint- 
 ment, but by grand serjeanty as of right, ^ was one 
 of the causes contributing to his fall ; for Henry 
 looked upon it as " very hault et dangerous. " ^ 
 Another was his royal descent, as heir of Thomas 
 of Woodstock, whose arms he was entitled to bear 
 "alone",* and yet another was his high position, as 
 an ancient noble, in an upstart age. For Henry, 
 like Abdul Aziz, was quick to scent conspiracy and 
 danger to his royal person. And so " the finest 
 buck in England " was pulled down by " a but- 
 cher's dog. " 
 
 ' The Lord High Constable ' is now effectually 
 tamed ; he is appointed by the Crown, and only 
 for the day of coronation, and when he has deli- 
 vered the regalia to the Lord Great Chamberlain, 
 he has only to walk in the procession on the right 
 of the sword of state. But until the Champion's 
 service was dispensed with, he rod? into the banquet 
 on the champion's right, with his ancient partner, 
 the Earl Marshal, on the Champion's left, * a sur- 
 
 ^ See ' Peerage Cases in the Court of Chivalry ' in my Peerage and 
 Pedigree. 
 
 ^ See pp. 43, 45 above. 
 
 ' Dyer's Reports, 285b. I think this must refer to the doctrine that 
 the ' hereditary ' steward, constable, and marshal, ' or tvsfo of them, ' 
 had power jointly to coerce the king (See my Commune of London, 
 pp. 317-8, and compare Ku Grace the Steward, pp. 144-152.) 
 
 * See Peerage and Pedigree, II, 358. 
 
 * The Constable, one notes, here also, occupies the place of honour, 
 as he does in the coronation procession. Cf. p. 82. 
 
THE CONSTABLE 79 
 
 vival of their old association on the field of battle. 
 We return to the origin of his office. It is 
 pleasant to be able to pay tribute to the memory 
 of that great antiquary, Madox, who, although 
 writing no less than two centuries ago, knew 
 already, virtually, all that records can tell us. ^ If 
 anything, he was too cautious in the use he made 
 of his materials. It seems to be fairly well esta- 
 blished that Walter son of Roger (de Pitres), who 
 appears in Domesday Book as a tenant-in-chief, 
 was constable (or a constable) under Henry I. ^ 
 A Llanthony writer speaks of him as " Constabu- 
 larius, princeps militiae domus regise, " and though 
 it has been suggested that he was only constable of 
 Gloucester castle, it is certain that his son and 
 successor. Miles, was an actual constable. Dugdale 
 asserts that Henry I gave him " all his father's 
 lands held in capite, with the office of Constable of 
 his Court, " and he is named as a Constable at 
 Stephen's Easter Court in 1136. ' When he 
 deserted the king in 1 139 he is styled by Gervase 
 of Canterbury "princeps militiae regis" and " sum- 
 mum regis constabularium, " but Gervase was not 
 a contemporary writer and he seems to have here 
 developed the statements of the Continuator of 
 Florence, who styles him " constabularius. " * From 
 Miles the office descended, with his earldom, 
 
 ' History of the Exchequer (171 1), pp. 28-9. 
 
 ' See the authorities cited by Dugdale {Baronage, I, 537), and Mr. 
 A. S. Ellis (Landholders of Ghticestershire, 1086) ; also Charter Roll 
 14 Edw. Ill, m. 13, No. 26, where he is styled " Walterus Constabu- 
 larius" in a charter of John (1199) to Llanthony. 
 
 ^ Geoffrey de Mandeville, pp. 262-3. 
 
 * Ibid, pp. 284-5. 
 
8o THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 through his (laughter, to the Bohuns \ of whom the 
 Duke of Buckingham was heir. 
 
 The Duke, however, claimed, we saw, not as 
 such heir in blood, but as the holder of two manors 
 out of the three alleged to be held by this service. 
 But the only one of the three which the family 
 had held as long as the office was that of Haresfield, 
 Glos., and this was held by knight-service. ^ There 
 was, however, another manor, which has been 
 similarly mentioned, namely that of Caldicot, which, 
 indeed, had been held even in 1086 by ' Durand 
 the sheriff ' \ from whom it passed to his nephew 
 Walter, father of Miles. Caldicot lay at that time 
 in the very teeth of the Welsh, an outpost of 
 Norman rule. Its castle, low on the northern 
 shore of the Severn estuary, and slightly in advance 
 of Harold's Portskewet, is of much later date, but 
 the moated mound of its present keep may well 
 have been thrown up by its first Norman lord. * 
 Owing to this advanced position, there is a lack of 
 evidence as to its early tenure, so that, perhaps, one 
 cannot actually disprove the statement that it was 
 held by serjeanty : it is alleged to have been held, 
 with Oaksey (Wilts), by the serjeanty of being 
 Constable of England in an Inq.p.m. of 3 Edw. I 
 on Humphrey (de Bohun), earl of Hereford.* 
 
 ' Doubt is thrown on this accepted view in the learned Clarendon 
 Press edition of the Diologus (1902), p. 25, but the argument there 
 from the " honor constabulariae " is wrong, for the Bohuns had nothing 
 to do with it. 
 
 ' Peerage and Pedigree, I, 155. 
 
 ' Domesday Book. 
 
 ^ See my paper on '■ The Castles of the Conquest ' in Archaeologia. 
 
 * Cal. oflnq. li. No. 131. In Hazlitt's 'Bhuni's Tenures' (p. 56) it is 
 identified as 'Caldecote, co. of Norfolk' and the date wrongly given ! 
 
THE CONSTABLE 8i 
 
 But no other evidence is vouchsafed. The alleged 
 tenure, therefore, seems to be as baseless as was 
 certainly that of the three Gloucestershire manors. 
 
 We must now turn to another constableship, 
 which has been somewhat obscured. This is that 
 which was held in succession by Robert de Ver 
 under Henry I and Stephen and by Henry de Essex 
 under Stephen and Henry H until his fall and 
 forfeiture early in the latter reign. I have else- 
 where shewn that this office was brought to Robert 
 de Ver by his wife Adeline (sister of Robert and) 
 daughter of Hugh de Montfort. ^ She brought 
 him, with the office, the great " Honour of Hage- 
 net " (i.e. Haughley, co. Suffiolk), held at the time 
 of Domesday by Hugh de Montfort, who was also 
 of note in Kent. After the forfeiture of Henry of 
 Essex, it was also known, in the hands of the 
 Crown, as " Honor Constabulariae. " * In this con- 
 nexion I have pointed out that Robert de Montfort, 
 general to William Rufus is styled " strator Nor- 
 mannici exercitus hereditario jure. " 
 
 Under Henry II we meet with yet another 
 constableship, that of the D'Oilly family, ^ of which 
 there are traces also at Stephen's accession. * 
 
 ' Geoffrey de Mandeville, pp. 148, 326-7. 
 
 ' See, for instance, the Pipe Rolls of 1 5 Henry II and I Richard I. 
 Cf. p. 80 above. 
 
 ' See Eyton's Court of Henry II and Salter's Cartulary of Eynshum 
 (Oxford Hist. Soc.) I, 75, 77, 78 ; also Charters in the British Museum, \, 
 No. 44, 
 
 * Geoffrey de Mandeville, p. 263 ; Lih. Rub., p. 812. 
 
82 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 THE MARSHAL 
 
 The present high position of this officer of state 
 is due, it appears to me, to several distinct causes. 
 Of these the first is the early disappearance, for all 
 practical purposes, of his original colleague, or, 
 rather, superior officer, ^ the constable. Another 
 is the survival, to our own times, of some of the 
 functions of his office, such as the marshalling of 
 state ceremonies and the siiperintendence of the 
 officers of arms, vi^hile the functions of his ancient 
 colleagues have become honorary or obsolete. 
 And yet another is its long association w^ith the 
 great house of How^ard, standing at the head of 
 the nobility. 
 
 Something has been said in the previous section 
 of his function, with the constable, in time of war. 
 It was, however, his special duty to keep the rolls 
 of the Marshalsea recording the performance of 
 service due with the king's host.^ Here again we 
 observe the constable's precedence : the ' Marshal's 
 Rolls ' of 5 Edw. I and 4 Edw. II name both offi- 
 cers, and the constable comes first.* 
 
 "The marshal," Stubbs wrote, "is more distinct- 
 ly an officer of the court, the constable one of the 
 castle or army." * It is with court and coronation 
 service that we are here chiefly concerned. The 
 
 ' See p. 63 above. It should have been there added that the subor- 
 dination of the marshal to the constable is asserted by the editors of the 
 Clarendon Press Diakgus de Scaccario (1902), p. 24. 
 
 ' See Mr. S. R. Bird's "The Scutage and Marshal's RoUs" in 
 Genealogist (N.S.) I, 65-76. 
 
 ^ Cf.'^.']'] above. 
 
 * Const. Hist. I, 354. 
 
THE MARSHAL 83 
 
 one great precedent for the marshal's state service 
 was the record of Queen Eleanor's coronation in 
 1236. That service is there stated to consist of (i) 
 suppressing tumult in the king's 'house'; (2) acting 
 as quarter-master or billeting officer ; (3) keeping 
 the gates of the king's hall.^ The last of these 
 functions deserves special attention, because it con- 
 nects the marshal with the ' hall ' as apart from the 
 ' chamber ' ^ and also because it distinctly constitu- 
 tes ' usher ' service. ^ It was not the marshal, but 
 the chamberlain, who kept the door of the ' cham- 
 ber, ' although there has been some confusion on 
 the point. To this day the (earl) marshal and 
 (lord great) chamberlain have their distinct pro- 
 vinces — at Westminster, for instance, the Abbey 
 and the Palace — and there was counter-claiming 
 between them at the coronation of James II. 
 
 Apart from this state service, the marshal had 
 important functions as a permanent household 
 officer. To quote from the valuable introduction 
 to the Dialogus de Scaccario : '" 
 
 The marshal has the special duty of witnessing all 
 expenditure by the king's officials, and keeps accounts by 
 means of taUies (dicas) both of payments out of the 
 Treasury and Chamber and of other expenditure. This 
 right of general supervision may be the ' Magisterium in 
 Curia Regis de Liberatione Prebende ' for which John the 
 Marshal owed forty marks of silver in 31 Henry I. 
 
 ' " cujus est officium tumultus sedare in domo Regis, liberationes 
 hospitiorum facere, hostia aulas Regis custodire " {Lib. Rub., p. 757). 
 ^ See p. 6S above. 
 
 * See the sections on " Usher of the King's Hall ' (pp. 1 08- 1 12). 
 
 * Whose service is entered in the record immediately before the 
 marshal's. See also * the Catteshill serjeanty' belovir. 
 
 ' Ed. Hughes, Crump, and Johnson (Clarendon Press, 1902), pp. 24-5. 
 
84 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 In the Exchequer the staff of this department consists 
 
 of the constable, his clerk, and the marshal The 
 
 marshal in the Exchequer has the custody of the vou- 
 chers he keeps the prison of the Exchequer, admi- 
 nisters oaths, and delivers the writs of summons to the 
 usher to be served. Originally the marshal of England 
 performed these duties in person, but afterwards they fell 
 into the hands of a clerk 
 
 The marshal had his deputies both in the Exchequer 
 and in the King's Bench ; but the marshal of the Common 
 Bench was a deputy of the Marshal of the Exchequer. ^ 
 
 I must here differ from the authors of that scho- 
 larly work, for I attach a very different and most 
 interesting meaning to the above word 'Prebende'. 
 Apart from its more usual and ecclesiastical mean- 
 ing, it denoted, in the words of Ducange, " quod 
 ad victum equo praeberi solet. " ^ Now, on the 
 Close Rolls of Edward II we find " hay, oats, and 
 litter " regularly in the charge of the clerk of the 
 marshalsea.' The great interest of the connexion I 
 suggest between the marshal and the horses' oats is 
 that, at the coronation of the Emperor, — 
 
 Before the palace gate there used to stand a heap of 
 oats to the breast of a horse ; then comes the Duke of 
 Saxony (as Arch-Marshal) mounted, having in his hand a 
 silver wand, and a silver measure stood by, which was to 
 weigh two hundred marks ; he fills the measure, sticking 
 his wand afterwards in the remainder, and so goes to 
 attend the Emperor.* 
 
 ' Judges, it will be remembered, still have marshals. 
 
 ' There are cited, as English instances, " Praebendam quotidianam ad 
 duos equos de granario nostro " and " ad praebendandos equos suos et 
 hospitum suorum. " 
 
 * e.g. order to deliver 500 quarters of oats to him (12 Nov. 1307) ; 
 £220 paid by him for hay, oats, and litter" for the maintenance of the 
 King's horses " (April 1 3 1 2). 
 
 ■* Taylor's Glory ^Regality, pp. 102-3. 
 
THE MARSHAL 85 
 
 The further back we go, the closer seems to be 
 the marshal's connexion with the horse, though it 
 came to be forgotten. I shall have occasion to 
 insist on it when dealing with ' The great spurs '. 
 
 Madox, it appears to me, was right in holding 
 that the marshal also appointed " a deputy or clerk 
 to act for him in the Court holden before the 
 
 king called Marescallus Marescalcie Curia 
 
 Regis. " ^ This deputy was the marshal " of the 
 household" (hospicii), who is named at least as 
 early as the middle of the 1 3th century. It may 
 be well to explain, as the fact seems little known, 
 that this deputy regularly sat with the steward " of 
 the household " (who was similarly the deputy of 
 the steward of England) in that household court of 
 the king which had jurisdiction over matters 
 within the ' verge ' and which became the court 
 of the Lord Steward. Its pleas were known as 
 pleas of the Hall {Aule).^ It is this deputy who 
 appears to have been known eventually as the 
 ' knight marshal '. In the king's ' ordinances ' of 
 31 Hen. VIII (1539-1540) we read "that the 
 Knight Marshall, or his sufficient Deputie, shall 
 give continuall attendance upon the Court, as well 
 to expell all Boyes, Vagabonds, and Rascalls, being 
 
 ' Exchequer (171 1), P- 33- This would be a parallel development 
 to that by which the jurisdiction at Court of the (lord high) steward 
 devolved on his deputy, the ' lord steward. ' 
 
 ' See, for instance, the " letters close " " to the steward and marshal 
 of the king's household " in 1318 and their joint mention in 1322 
 {Cal. of Close Rolls, 1318-1323, pp. 16, 471, 590 ; also City of London 
 Letter Books, E. pp. 206-7, for " Pleas of the Hall " held at the Tower, 
 20 July 1325, andHw Grace the Steward, p. 424. note, for " Placita Aule 
 Hospicii Domini Regis... coram seneschallo et marescallo hospicii sui " 
 in Oxford castle early in 1400). 
 
86 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 expulsed out of the Court-gates, as all others resort- 
 ing thither from time to time as occasion shall 
 require."^ Here we have the marshal's police 
 functions, described in 1236 as " sedare tumultus." ^ 
 The earlier ' ordinance ' of 17 Hen. VIII (1525- 
 1526) ^ expressly assigns to " the Knight Marshall 
 
 and his officers and deputyes execution of all 
 
 such things as shall concerne the ofBce of the 
 marshalshy within the precinct of the verge." 
 
 And among others, the same knight marshall shall 
 have speciall respect to the exclusion of boyes and vile 
 persons, and punishment of vagabonds and mighty beg- 
 gars, and semblably he shall take good regard that 
 
 all such unthrifty and common women as follow the 
 court * may be likewise, from time to time, openly punish- 
 ed, banished and excluded, and none of them to be 
 suffered neere thereunto.^ 
 
 The same ' ordinances ' provide, under " mar- 
 shalls and ushers of the hall," that " the marshalls 
 of the hall shall give their dayly attendance,^' * and 
 in ' Queen Elizabeth's household book ' (43 Eliz.) 
 we find, among the " officers of the hall, four 
 marshalls, " with the old-world wage of j^i. 
 a day. 
 
 Their place is, under the white staves, to marshall the 
 hall, when her Majestie shall come thither, or when any 
 
 embassador their place in ancient time was, when the 
 
 hall was kept, to see the Lord Steward, the Treasurer, 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries), p. 240. 
 ^ See p. 83 above. 
 ' Ibid., p. 150. 
 
 * See the next section. 
 
 ' Household Ordinances, ^. 150. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 143. 
 
THE MARSHAL 87 
 
 etc rightly placed in their degrees, and to see good 
 
 order kept in the hall. ' 
 
 These must be the ' marshal (s) men ' who still,, 
 of course, remain. In 1689 the 'knight marshall,' 
 Sir Edward Villiers, had ^26 a year, and the five 
 " Marshallsmen " ^loo a year between them,^ and 
 he was directed to " suffer no masterless men, or 
 vagrants, or persons that have ho dependence upon 
 us or Our familv, to shelter themselves in or about 
 Our house. "^ At the coronation of James II it was 
 the Knight Marshall who " proclaimed the Cham- 
 pion's challenge " in Westminster Hall ; at that of 
 George III he cleared the way for the champion ; 
 and at that of Queen Victoria he rode at the head 
 of the Marshalmen in the procession to the Abbey.* 
 
 It is evident that the ' harbingers ' also had 
 developed out of the marshal's department. Going 
 back to the Constitution * we read 
 
 Quatuor Marscalli qui serviunt familiae Regis, tarn 
 clericis quam militibus, quam (etiam) ministris, die qua 
 faciunt herbergeriam^ vel extra Curiam morantur, etc. etc. ® 
 
 A century later this function was " liberationes 
 hospitiorum facere, " '' but in 1377 this is rendered 
 " faire liveree des herbergages " in the ' marshal ' 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 293. The knight marshal was then receiving £66. 13.4.(1. 
 a year {J.btd. p. 250). 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Soc. of Ant.), p. 401. 
 ' Ibid., p. 420. 
 
 * He was Sir C. Montolieu Lamb, Bart. (d. 1 860), whose father Sir 
 J. Bland Burgess had been granted the office for life with reversion to 
 his son in 1795. 
 
 * See p. 54 above. 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 8 1 2. 
 ' See p. 8 3 above. 
 
88 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 petition to the Court of Claims. ^ As an excellent 
 illustration of this function, we read that Henry III, 
 in 1251, " sent forward his marshals to York 
 to deliver divers inns to divers magnates against 
 the solemnization of Christmas,"^ The privilege 
 of exemption from this billeting was eagerly 
 sought, and in 1325, when the " serjeant-herber- 
 geour of the king's household " billeted the King's 
 secretary on the house of a sheriff of London, 
 the sheriff removed the chalk mark, and the 
 City authorities made good their claim that by 
 charter of Henry III (1268) no one was to take a 
 hostel within the City "by delivery of the Marshal."* 
 Under Henry VIII this duty was discharged by 
 the ' Knight Herbinger ' with his staff of " gentle- 
 men ' and ' yeomen, ' who had always to be " ready 
 to make lodging and herbigage " by billeting those 
 entitled to " Lodging " on private houses. * Under 
 Queen Elizabeth the ' gentleman herbinger ' had 
 an extra daily allowance, exactly as under Henry I, 
 " while he is making herbigage, " and finding for 
 " lordes, ladyes, and chiefe officers, needful men, 
 necessary lodgeing. * " Finally, under William and 
 Mary the two " gentlemen harbingers " were still 
 paid the ancient wage of y^^d. a day. ^ 
 
 From the marshal's functions we pass to the 
 origin and descent of his office. Into this I have 
 
 ' See my Commune of London, p. 303. 
 
 ^ Cat. of Pat. Rolls, 1247-125 8, p. 124. Cf. pp. 181, 476, 482. 
 
 ' Letter Book E, pp. 206-7. The original charter is preserved at the 
 Guildhall, and the text is printed in Liber Custumarum, I. 259-260 : — 
 " Nemo capiat hospitium per vim vel per liberationem Marescalli. " 
 
 ■* Household Ordinances. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 293. 
 
 ^ Ibid., p. 400. 
 
THE MARSHAL 89 
 
 gone so fully in my paper on ' The marshalship of 
 England' ^ that I need not here repeat what I have 
 there written. The main point to be kept in 
 mind is that I have traced to its source, in the 
 ' marshal ' petition to the Court of Claims in 1 377, 
 the persistent error that Gilbert ' Mareschall ', Earl 
 of ' Strogoil ' (/. e. Pembroke) officiated at the 
 coronation of Henry II (11 54), This led to the 
 mistaken view that the marshalship ' of England ' 
 was derived from one source, and the marshalship 
 ' of the household ' from another. I have shown 
 that by substituting the coronation of Queen Elea- 
 nor in 1236 for that of Henry II (1154) all 
 this error disappears and everything falls into place. 
 
 The really governing record is John's charter 
 (27 April 1200) which proves that a certain Gil- 
 bert and John his son made good their claim, in 
 the court of Henry I, to the chief marshalship 
 (" magistratum maresc' curie nostre")^ as against 
 Robert de Venoiz and William de Hastings who 
 claimed the same office [ipsum magistratum) . John 
 had succeeded his father l3y 1 1 30' and duly appears, 
 as holding the office, in the Constitution From his 
 elder son William (Marshal) descended the marshals 
 of England, and from a younger son the marshals 
 of Ireland. 
 
 Robert de ' Venoiz ', though his claim failed, 
 held a true ' marshal ' serjeanty. The family took 
 its name from Venoix, just to the south-west of 
 
 ' In The Commune of England and other studies (1899), pp. 302-318. 
 
 ^ Ibid., p. 306. 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 3 1 Hen. I. 
 
 ' See p. 6 1 above for this document. 
 
90 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Caen, and was founded in England by Geoffrey 
 ' Marescal ', who is found in Domesday holding at 
 East Worldham, Hants, and who, as ' Geoffrey ', 
 also held at Draycot, Wilts. The above Robert is 
 duly entered on the Pipe Roll of 1 130; and a later 
 Robert is found holding part of East Worldham 
 (' Verildham ') "by service in the king's household 
 {hospicio), that is, by marshalsey [per mariscaciani)" 
 the record adding that " King William gave it to 
 Geoffrey Marshal {Mariscallo)." ^ It is interesting 
 to note that a Caen charter of Henry II (1156- 
 1 1 57) mentions " the marshal of Venoix," as if he 
 held an office over there/ 
 
 That the c/^z>/ marshalship was held by serjeanty, 
 in connexion with Hampstead Marshal, I do not 
 believe. Mr. Vernon Hartourt has cited evidence 
 that it was, ' and there is earlier evidence to the 
 same effect.* Indeed, the entry in the Testa itself 
 (i 241-1245) is quite compatible with serjeanty.^ 
 On the other hand, the manor is not found among 
 the recognised Berkshire serjeanties; * there is no 
 proof that the marshals held it so early as the days 
 
 * Testa, p. 235. There are several variants of the service, e.g. " per 
 serjant' quod antecessores sui fuerunt marescalli de hospicio domini 
 Regis " (p. 233), " pro qua debuit portare unam virgam marescalcie per 
 totum annum in hospicio domini Regis" (p. 239). 
 
 * See my Cal. of Documents, France, p. 157. 
 
 ' " Rogerus Bygot comes Norfolk et marescallus Anglie tenet xx 
 libratas terre per serjanciam mareschallie in Hamstede " (Assize Rolls, 
 Berks, 12 Edvifard I, No. 48). 
 
 * Inq. p. m. on Roger Bigod, earl of Norfolk in 1270 (54 Hen. Ill) : 
 
 " Hamstede held of the king in chief by service of the marshal's 
 
 wand " {Cal. of Inq. I, No. 744). 
 
 ' " Walterus Mar' com. Pembr[oc] manerium de Hamsted ' in domi- 
 nico suo de marescaugia, et non facit scutagium " (p. 125). 
 
 * Lib. Rub., p. 45 1 and Testa passim. 
 
THE MARSHAL 91 
 
 of Henry I ; and, finally, the Inq. p. m. on the last 
 of the Bigod earls (21 December 1306) expressly 
 states that the manor was held by knight service.^ 
 It was by this earl's surrender that the office, at his 
 death, came to the Crown. 
 
 Mr. Legg, in 'English Coronation 'Records, seems 
 to be much at sea on the descent of the Marshal's 
 office. We find him writing : — 
 
 In 1385 Thomas Mowbray, Earl of Nottingham, was 
 made Marshal of England, with the right to call himself 
 Earl Marshal, which led to his descendant claiming the 
 Earl Marshalship at Henry Vs coronation. But since 
 then the claim of the Mowbrays has not met with much 
 approval, and in the Forma et modus the Earl of Norfolk 
 is certainly said to be Earl Marshal (p. Ixx). 
 
 And on p. 172 we read, of the Forma et modus, 
 that " the marshalship, however, has already passed 
 into the family of the earls of Norfolk ". It was, 
 on the contrary, solely due to the claim of their 
 Mowbray ancestors that the office of earl marshal 
 was obtained by the Howards (1483 and 15 10) 
 and Berkeleys (i486), their co-heirs ; nor could it 
 pass " into the family of the earls of Norfolk, " for 
 the excellent reason that there were no such earls 
 when the Forma et modus was composed * and that 
 there were not any, afterwards, till 1644 ! 
 
 Although the marshalship was first associated at 
 so early a date with the family of Howard, the 
 existing Earl Marshalship held by the Dukes of 
 Norfolk is no older than 1672. The important 
 
 ' " tenuit manerium de Hampstede Maresciial per servicium 
 
 feodi unius militis" (35 Edw. I, No. 46 a). 
 ' According to Mr. Legg's date. 
 
92 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 functions of the Earl Marshal, especially in con- 
 nexion with a coronation, are matters of common 
 knowledge. 
 
 A MARSHALSHIP AT COURT 
 
 Between the King's marshals it is not easy to 
 distinguish. Even in the days of the Constitutio 
 the marshal's department [Mareschaucia) ^ had four 
 marshals as well as the master marshal ; but as the 
 latter only is mentioned by name ^ we do not know 
 if these included the office dealt with in this 
 section. It obviously falls, however, within the 
 marshal's province. ' 
 
 About the middle of the 12 th century, if not 
 indeed rather earlier, Robert Doisnel was holding 
 at least five manors by the service of performing 
 its duties. Later evidence enables us to make this 
 statement. His daughter Juliane, inheriting his 
 office and his land, was given in marriage by 
 Henry II to one of his trusted stewards {dapiferi), 
 WilUam Fitz Audelin. This we learn from Wil- 
 liam's Carta in 1 166. * Styling himself the King's 
 Marshal * {Marescallus), he claimed that he held all 
 the land of Robert Doisnel which had not been 
 subinfeudated " per servitium suum sine aliquo * 
 servitio nominate^ sicut Marscaucia^ Regis." His 
 
 ' The word still exists, as Marichaussie, in French. 
 
 * Liber Rubeus, p. 812 and p. 89 above. 
 ' See p. 86 above. 
 
 * Lib. Rub., p. 209. 
 
 ' This must have been in right of his wife. 
 ^ ' alio ' in Black Book. 
 
 ' This I take to mean that no part of it was charged with a quota of 
 service. 
 
 ' " de Marescalcia " in Black Book. 
 
A COURT MARSH ALSHIP 93 
 
 wife, having no children by him, gave her estate 
 at Little Maplestead ^ to the Hospitallers by a 
 charter addressed " omnibus hominibus et amicis 
 suis Francis et Anglis. " ^ Of her gift there is still 
 a tangible memorial in the round church erected 
 at Little Maplestead by the brethren. 
 
 By her death the succession opened to her col- 
 lateral heirs, William de Warberton {i.e. Warbling- 
 ton) and Enguerrand de Munceaus [i.e. Monceaux) . 
 In 1 199 they undertake to give the king no less 
 than 500 marcs for the heirship. ^ By a fresh 
 arrangement in 1 204 William pays for obtaining 
 possession of his land of " Shirefield, Cumpton, 
 Tieuresham, and Angr'. "* But in 1205 there is 
 an important payment of 100 marcs by Waleram 
 " de Munceaus " for his reasonable share of the 
 inheritance of Juliane as against William de War- 
 berton, saving to the said William his rights as the 
 elder coheir. " And the sheriffis thereupon directed 
 to apportion the inheritance accordingly. * 
 
 These details may appear wearisome, but they 
 bear on a point of some importance. " It would 
 seem from the case before us that there was a third 
 alternative to partition and impartibility. * "A 
 tenement held by serjeanty " has been insufficiently 
 
 ' " totam villain meam de Mapletrestede. " 
 
 * The text is printed in a note to Morant's History of Essex. 
 
 * Rot. de 6bl. et Fin., p. 19. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 217. 
 
 ' " quod una medietas illius hereditatis remanet predicto Willelmo 
 cum esnetia." (Ibid., p. 310.) For 'esnetia' see p. 38. 
 
 ' " Faciat partitionem de terra que fuit ipsius Juliane in Sirefeld' et in 
 Ciuntone secundum formam prescriptam" (Ibid.). 
 
 ' See p. 38 above. 
 
 ' See p. 42. 
 
94 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 distinguished from the actual performance of the 
 office by which the land was held. For the land 
 itself, as in this case, might be, and was, partitioned, 
 although the esnetia was retained by the elder co- 
 heir^ and might possibly carry with it the actual 
 performance of the office. 
 
 The cliie to the identity of the lands belonging 
 to this serjeanty is afforded by William's payment 
 in 1204.* The four manors there named are 
 Sherfield upon Loddon and Compton in King's 
 Somborne, Hants, Teversham, Cambs., and Little 
 (or High) Ongar, Essex. All these can be duly 
 connected with the marshal's service by records. 
 In the Red Book (p. 460) the serjeanty appears as if 
 divided : — 
 
 Willelmus de Warblintone per marescauciam in domb 
 regis. Waleram de Muncellis tenet per idem servitium. 
 
 In the Testa we have fuller information. On 
 p. 232 the serjeanty is said to be " of the old feoff- 
 ment, " * that is, created previous to the death of 
 Henry I. Similar to the Red Book entries are those 
 on p. 235 : — 
 
 Willelmus de Warblinton tenet Scirefeld per serjant' 
 marescalcie in domo Regis. 
 
 Waler[am] de Munceus tenet cum (sic) Cumpton per 
 serjant' Marescaucie. 
 
 ' " Willelmo plenam saisinam habere faciat (vicecomes) de medietate 
 predictarum terrarum cum esnetia, et de alia medietate predict© Wale- 
 ram', et qualiter illam particionem fecerit, et quis eorum quam porcio- 
 nem habuerit domino Regi scire faciat per litteras suas. " {Rot. de Obi., 
 P- 310.) 
 
 * See above. 
 
 ' " Thomas de Warblington tenet Syrfeld per serjant' marescall' de 
 domino R. de veteri feofiamento, sed nescitur per quem." 
 
A COURT MARSHALSHIP 95 
 
 Here we see the result of the partition. Again 
 we have another version on p. 237 : — 
 
 Willemus de Warbelington tenet Silefeld (sic) de 
 domino R. per serjant' marescaucie domini R. et valet 
 X li., et ipse earn tenet hereditaria. 
 
 Terra Willelmi de Montellis (sic) in villa de Cumpton 
 pertinet ad marescauciam domini Regis et respondet 
 Willelmo de Warblinton de x libris. 
 
 Finally, the In^. p.m. on William de Monceaux 
 (Muncellis), in 27 Henry III, states that — 
 
 Compton Manor was held by the said William of 
 Thomas de Warblington by service of J knight's fee ; the 
 manor pertains to Sirefeld manor, which the said Thomas 
 holds of the king in chief by serjeanty. ^ 
 
 Here we have the senior co-heir holding of the 
 king by serjeanty, and the junior alleged to hold of 
 him by knight-service. 
 
 So far we have been dealing with the two 
 Hampshire manors, but there were others, we have 
 seen, in another part of England. The Teversham 
 rnanor is found among the Cambridgeshire ser- 
 jeanties in the Testa (p. 358) : — 
 
 XX libratse terre quas Willelmus filius Adelin tenuit in 
 villa de Tevresham per serjant' marescalcie sunt escaete 
 domini R. in custodia S[tephani] de Turnham. 
 
 But the Red Book entry takes us further : — 
 
 Willelmus de Warbintone x libratas in Teveresham, 
 quae fuit Willelmi filii Audelini, per serjanteriam (p. 530). 
 
 So also, the Testa enters the Essex manor : — 
 
 Willelmus de Munceus tenet Parvam Ang' de domino 
 R. de Mareschaucie, que fuit de baronia Gilberti de Tani 
 (p. 269). 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq.. Hen. Ill, No. 12. 
 
96 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Here again we have the manors, though alleged 
 to belong to the serjeanty, divided between the co- 
 heirs. To these manors must be added, as part of 
 Juliane's inheritance, that of Little Maplestead. ^ 
 It is a notable fact that all three were held by John 
 son of Waleram in 1086, ^ for there are indications 
 that Juliane may have been among his represen- 
 tatives. ' 
 
 In that case there has been confusion of these 
 manors in the east of England with those in Hamp- 
 shire, which had not been John's, and which had 
 probably been given to be held by this serjeanty. 
 
 It is only from later evidence that we learn 
 the actual nature of that marshalship in the King's 
 household which constituted this serjeanty. As an 
 illustration of court life and of those police functions 
 which were part of a marshal's duty, * it is too 
 curious to be omitted. Madox, who placed it at 
 the head of his " Grand Serjeanties in capite, " 
 showed, by the record he ' cited, that the details 
 must have been given when the serjeanty was arr- 
 ented in 1250^ although we do not find it among 
 
 ' See p. 93 above. 
 
 ' There is reason to believe that the knight's fee " in Essex " which 
 was held of William Fitz Audelin (jure uxoris) in ii 66 by Baldwin 
 Wiscard (Lib. Rub., p. 209) was yet another, viz. Old Saling, which 
 was held of John Fitz Waleram by Turstin (Wiscard), his tenant at 
 Greenstead by Colchester, in 1086. 
 
 ' She may have inherited her name from that " Juliana uxor Willelmi 
 de Hastings " who appears under Essex on the Pipe Roll of 1130 as 
 owing £7 "de veteri auxilio militum Waler[anni] avisui" (p. 58). 
 
 * " Cujus est officium tumultus sedare in domo Regis hostia aula 
 
 Regis custodire." A.D. 1236 (Lib. Rub., p. 759). 
 
 ' Baronia Anglica, p. 242. 
 
 ° " Sicut continetur inter serjantias arrentatas per Robertum fasselewe 
 anno xxxiiii Regis H." 
 
A COURT MARSHALSHIP 97 
 
 the Hampshire arrentations in the Testa. But the 
 earliest published record is that of Blount from a 
 plea of 8 Edw. I (i 279-1 280) : — 
 
 Johannes de Windreshull tenet manerium de Shyre- 
 
 feud per serjantiam inveniendi unum serjantum ad 
 
 custodiendum meretrices in exercitu domini Regis. ^ 
 
 Madox, who did not mince matters, cited in full 
 the record from the Fine Roll for Easter i Edw. Ill, 
 from which Blount had made an extract. From 
 this it appears that John de Warblinton, who then 
 made a fine of ten marcs for his relief, had suc- 
 ceeded in 10 Edw. II (1316-7) his father Thomas,* 
 who held 
 
 per serjantiam essendi marescallus de meretricibus in 
 hospitio Regis, et dismembrare (sic) malefactores adjudi- 
 cates, et mensurare {sic) galones et bussellos in hospitio 
 Regis. 
 
 It has indeed been contended by Blount and 
 others after him that meretricum here merely meant 
 laundresses {lotricurri) . The two terms, however, 
 would not be mutually exclusive, * and when one 
 finds, in the case of the companion serjeanty, that 
 Catteshill was alleged to be held " per serjantiam 
 marescalli duodecim puellarum quze sequuntur 
 curiam domini Regis, " all doubt is removed on 
 
 ' He was in charge of the manor at this date, but handed it over to 
 Thomas de Warblington in 1 28 1. 
 
 ' See also Cal. of Inq., VI, No. 42, where John acknowledges 
 14 March, 10 Edw. II, that he holds "by serjeanty of Marshalcy, 
 carrying a wand in the King's guesthouse {hosficio) when required. " 
 The rendering " guesthouse " is wrong. 
 
 ' If one may venture tp quote Goldsmith, — 
 
 " The chest contrived a double debt to pay, 
 A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day." 
 
 7 
 
98 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 comparing this entry with the very curious record 
 cited by Ducange : — 
 
 Et si soloit estre que le Marescal devoit avoir douze 
 damoisellez a la Court le Roy, que devoient faire seire- 
 ment k son Bacheler que elles ne sauveroient aultres 
 putains a la court qu' elles mesmes ne ribaudes sans 
 avowerie de altre ; ne laron ne mesel, qu'elles ne les 
 monstreront au Marescal. 
 
 It was a strange result of the serjeanty system 
 that Juliana must have held, as lady of the manor, 
 this office in her own right, and that Edeline de 
 Broc must have similarly held that which was 
 associated with Guildford. ^ The Sherfield service 
 is duly found in Inquisitions on the death of suc- 
 cessive holders, actually appearing for the last time 
 as late as the days of James I (1603-4). Unlike, 
 however, the marshalship of the hawks, this service 
 does not appear to have ever formed the subject of 
 a coronation claim. 
 
 THE CATTESHILL SERJEANTY 
 
 This Serjeanty is at once notorious because of 
 the service occasionally attributed to its tenure and 
 of some importance as forming the subject of a 
 coronation claim. Catteshill adjoins Godalming 
 in Surrey and the story told by the jurors of 
 Godalming Hundred in 121 2 is this : — 
 
 Henricus Rex senior dedit Cateshull Dyvo Porcell 
 patri Radulfi (sic) de Broc et Henricus Rex (II) pater 
 domini Regis fecit cartam suam Radulfo de Broc tenere 
 
 ' See the section on " The Catteshill Serjeanty." 
 
THE CATTESHILL SERJEANTY 99 
 
 de eo per serjanciam hostiarutn de camera domini Regis ut de 
 R[ege ?] et post mortem ejusdem Randulfi Stephanus de 
 Turneham habuit predictam villam cum filia ipsius Ran- 
 dulfi per predictum servicium (Tesia, p. 225). 
 
 It is in the first place difficult to imagine what 
 name is represented by " Dyvo, " and, in the second, 
 difficult to believe that this Porcell was father of 
 Ralf {sic) de Broc. An entry however, on the 
 Pipe Roll of 1 1 30 gives us a sure starting-point. 
 On p. 50 we read : — 
 
 Gaufridus porcell(us) redd. comp. de xx marc. arg. pro 
 terra patris sui de Gateshela. 
 
 Clearly then, in 11 30, Geoffirey Porcel had 
 succeeded his father in possession of Catteshill, 
 which, therefore, had been severed from the royal 
 manor of Godalming. This Geoffirey appears to 
 have given a hide of land at Windsor to Reading 
 Abbey, the great foundation of Henry I, and to 
 have there taken the cowl. His gift was confirmed 
 by the Empress and then by Henry II. ^ 
 
 I suspect that, in the Testa entry above, we should 
 read, " patri Radulfi Parcel, " for in a Charter 
 assigned by Eyton to 1155, Henry II granted to 
 Ralf Purcel, his usher, the office of Robert Burnel, 
 his uncle. * A Ralf Purcel had remission of Dane- 
 
 • Testa, p. 128. 
 
 ' Cart. Ant., F. 19. Robert Burnel duly appears on the Pipe Roll of 
 1130 as excused payment of his Danegeld under Oxfordshire, StaiFord- 
 hire, Northants, and Bucks, which accords with his being the holder of 
 some oifice or serjeanty. It should be added that in 12 10 Ralf Purcel 
 is entered, under Buckinghamshire, as giving the King jfio "pro 
 habendo officio suo in hospicio domino Regis secundum cartam Henrici 
 Regis et confirmacionem domini Regis super hoc" {Rot. de Obi., p. 83). 
 
loo THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 geld on five hides in Surrey in 1156.^ It seems 
 to have been another Ralf Purcel who had such 
 remission on five hides in Staffs,* and who was 
 holding two thirds of a fee of Robert de Stafford 
 in 1 166/ for this holding was in ShareshuU and is 
 found in the hands of the Porcels, his heirs. 
 
 Very possibly Randulf de Broc, who was in 
 favour with Henry II, * secured Catteshill, as he 
 did other lands in the neighbourhood, by grant of 
 Henry II and not by inheritance. He left four 
 or five daughters, of whom Edelina, the eldest * was 
 married to Stephen de Turnham, a Kentish land- 
 owner. * In 1 206 this Stephen bought from the 
 King (i) his confirmation of ^^15 of rent in 
 " Ertendune " with the Hundred etc., which Henry 
 II had given him to hold in fee farm at jTi 5 a year, 
 a tenure which Richard I had changed to half a 
 knight's fee, and (2) his confirmation for himself 
 and his wife Edeline, daughter of Randulf de Broc, 
 of the grant and confirmation by Henry II to the 
 said Randulf his usher and marshal (" hostiario et 
 marescallo suo ") '' of the whole land and office of 
 his (Randulf 's) father of whomsoever held and of 
 all the land held in Guildford which belonged to 
 
 * Pipe Roll, 2 Hen. II, p. iz. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 29. 
 
 ' Liber Rubeus, p. 267. 
 
 ' He came into prominence ini the Becket quarrel by being put in 
 charge of the possessions of the See of Canterbury. 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq. Henry III, Nos. 317, 365. 
 
 ' Son of the founder of Combwell Abbey. Dugdale {Baronage, I, 663) 
 confused him with Stephen " de Turonis, " which misled Foss {Judges, 
 
 II, 1 20) and Stubbs. A valuable note on Stephen de Marpai (Taro- 
 nensis or de Turmibus) will be found in Meyer, Guillaume k Marechal, 
 
 III, 9S- 
 
 ' This double office will be dealt with below. 
 
THE CATTESHILL SERJEANTY loi 
 
 Reginald de Resting', his kinsman, ' etc. This 
 important record helps us to clear up much confusi- 
 on between the Catteshill serjeanty, which was 
 that (we shall find) of usher/ and the Guildford 
 serjeanty, which was that of marshal. The Cattes- 
 hill serjeanty had, we find, an important outlying 
 portion at (New) Windsor itself. In 1212 its 
 constable made return that : — 
 
 Stephanus de Turnham tenet Walenton scilicet duas 
 partes unius carucate terre et xxvij solid' terre de redditu 
 assise, per uxorem suam filiam Randulfi de Broc, per 
 serjantiam custodiendi ostium camere. ^ 
 
 A later entry shows us Adam de Stawell holding 
 one hide in "Waleton* per serjant' custodiendi 
 hostium domini Regis. " ' 
 
 Early in the reign of Henry III Edelina "del 
 Brok, " duly appears as holding Cateshill by the 
 serjeanty "servandi hostium camer' domini Regis. "* 
 She was then a widow, Stephen having died about 
 the end of John's reign. ^ She left by Stephen five 
 daughters and co-heirs, * but the Cateshill serjeanty 
 again passed to the eldest of these, Mabel, who 
 raarried first, Robert de Gatton, and then Thomas 
 
 ^ Roi. de Obi. et Fin., p. 193. 
 
 ' i. e. of the ' chamber ', not of the ' hall '. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 1 29, 
 
 * A marginal note adds " in villa de Wyndelsor. " 
 
 ' Ibid. p. io8, Cf. p. 124, where it appears as " in Nova Wyndeles... 
 unam hidam per serjant' de baronia Randulfi de Broc. " The index, 
 as so often, is here sadly deficient. 
 
 ^ Testa, p. 227. 
 
 ' Rot. Pip., 16 John. 
 
 * Dugdale, Baronage, I, 663. 
 
I02 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 de Bavelingham. ^ By Robert she had a son and 
 heir, Hamo de Gatton. * 
 
 Meanwhile the tenure had been complicated by- 
 accretion of inheritance. In the winter of 1170- 
 1171, Master David of London was despatched to 
 Rome, on the Becket business, as an envoy of the 
 King and the Bishop of London. He was rewarded 
 by a grant of land in Artington in the royal manor 
 of Godalming, with ^15 a year. ' This land was 
 secured from him by Randulf de Broc in fee-farm 
 for that sum* and thenceforth descended with 
 Catteshill. 
 
 Randulf also secured from Henry II the wardship 
 of Roger Testard's heir, who held some land in 
 Guildford, and afterwards obtained the land, which 
 descended with his eldest daughter to Stephen de 
 Turnham, held " per servicium marescauciae. " * 
 This holding was quite correctly entered, in her 
 widowhood, as held by her separately " per maris- 
 callem in curia domini regis. " For Catteshill she 
 owed service as usher ; for her Guildford lands 
 service as " marshal. " This is further proved by 
 the arrentation in 1250 of "Richard Testard's 
 Serjeanty in Guildford" as it is expressly termed. * 
 It is very important to observe that the duties of 
 
 ' See Bractot^s Note Book, Cases 1 171, 1410, 1765. 
 
 * Ibid., Case 1 171. 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 17 Henry II, and Te%ta, p. 225. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 225. 
 
 ' Ibid. She was impleaded for this land by William Testard in 1 2 1 7 
 {Bractm^s Note Book, Case 1 347). 
 
 ° " Seijantia Ricardi Testard in Geldeford pro qua debuit esse mares- 
 call' in hospicio domini Regis, et dismembrare malefactores in hospicio 
 domini Regis adjudicatos, et mensurare gallones et bussellos in hospicio 
 domini Regis" {Testa, p. 228). 
 
THE CATTESHILL SERJEANTY 103 
 
 this office, as there recorded, are precisely similar to 
 those of the marshalship connected with Sherfield 
 upon Loddon, as we have seen in the section 
 " A Marshalship at Court. " As for this Guildford 
 Serjeanty, the result of its arrentation was that the 
 service was changed to that of a knight's fee. ^ 
 
 Here I break off for a moment to glance at yet 
 another holding, which had come in through 
 Randulf's wife Damietta in 1204-5.* This was 
 •• FroUebury ' in Hampshire. We find Stephen de 
 Turnham entered as holding it in right of his wife 
 (Edelina) " per serjantiam custodiendi hostium 
 domini Regis, " ' and she herself subsequently held 
 it as " Edelina de Frolebir'," by a service recorded 
 in the same words. * As this land came to her 
 from her mother, and not from her father, who 
 held Catteshill by that service, one is tempted to 
 suggest that these entries were due to a very 
 possible confusion with her Catteshill serjeanty. 
 
 To such confusion, clearly, is due the substitution 
 of the " marshal " service, due for the Guildford 
 holding, for the " usher " service due for Catteshill, 
 the former being further defined in terms which 
 made it notorious. ^ There would seem to have 
 
 * Et dictus Ricardus faciat servicium feodi unius militis pro parte sua 
 quam tenet. " Cf. pp. 17, 28 above. 
 
 'Close Roll, 6 John. 
 ' Testa, p. 235. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 236. 
 
 ' Blount cited entries from Plea Rolls that Robert de Gatton held 
 Catteshill "per serjantiam Marescalli duodecim puellarum quae sequuntur 
 curiam domini Regis, " and that Hamo de Gatton held it " per serjan- 
 tiam ut erit Marescallus meretricum cum dominus Rex venerit in 
 partibus illus. " Hamo is also said to be described as " mareschallus de 
 communibus foeminibus, sequentibus hospitium domini Regis. " (' Esch. 
 
I04 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 been similar confusion in the case of another usher 
 serjeanty, that of the Delameres, for Henry de la 
 Mara (or " de Mara ") is returned as holding iii 
 Oxfordshire " eodem mode (/. e. " ut sit hostiarius 
 Regis ") et quod servet meretrices " {Lib. Rub., 
 p. 456), or simply "per sergentiam custodiendi 
 itieretrices sequentes curiam Domini Regis " ' 
 {Testa, p. 107). Another ^nd a curious instance 
 of confusion is found in the Re^^ Book version of 
 the 1212 returns, where we read, under Surrey 
 serjeanties, of Edelina's husband : — 
 
 Stephanus de Turneham tenet in CateshuU per servi- 
 tium mapparioe (sic) et iiij libratas in Gudeford per servi- 
 tium mareskalsiae. ^ 
 
 How Catteshill came to be returned as held by 
 napery service it is impossible to say. 
 
 The Catteshill serjeanty figured in a claim to 
 prerogative wardship by the Crown* of which there 
 is a record in the Reii Book, the editor dating it 
 for reasons only known to himself ^Circ. 1275.'* 
 Earl Gilbert (de Clare) claimed the wardship of the 
 heirs of Geoffrey de Lucy " recently deceased, " 
 then in the King's hands, on the ground that 
 Geoffrey had held of him by knight-service ^ and 
 
 29 Edw. n. 58') See, for further discussion of the point, Blount's Tenures, 
 Ed. 1815, p. 210-214 > Ed. 1874, PP- 126-8. 
 
 ' This will be dealt with in the section on " The usher of the King's 
 Hall "(p. no). 
 
 ' Liber Rubeus, p. 561. 
 
 " See p. 3 5 above. 
 
 * It is obviously subsequent to the death of Geofiirey de Lucy in 1 284. 
 
 ' Richard de Lucy had held one knight's fee of the Honour of Clare 
 in 1 1 66 (Lib. Rub., p. 403), but the holding by a former Geoffrey of 
 four knight's fees, in Bucks, of the Honour of Gloucester (Jb. p. 536), 
 more probably accounts for the claim. 
 
THE CATTESHILL SERJEANTY 105 
 
 held nothing in capite of the Crown. Thereupon 
 the Treasurer and Barons of the Exchequer were 
 ordered to examine its rolls and see if and what 
 Geoffrey or his predecessors had held in chief. 
 They made the extraordinary report that, according 
 to the rolls, Ranulf de " Broke " had held the 
 Catteshill serjeanty and had left two daughters and 
 co-heirs, Edeliva {sic) and Juliana, who succeeded 
 on his death to all his possessions, and did homage 
 for them to the Crown. They added that on the 
 (Pipe) Roll of 9 John (1207) they found Geoffrey 
 de Lucy, grandfather of the late Geoffrey, paying 
 3000 marcs (^2000) for marrying Juliana de 
 " Broke, " then the childless widow of Peter de 
 Stoke, with all her inheritance. ^ 
 
 The whole of this alleged connexion with the 
 Catteshill serjeanty, on which was based the claim 
 to prerogative wardship, was sheer fiction. Edelina 
 had no younger sister named Juliana, but she had 
 several younger sisters whom this report ignores. * 
 
 The Pipe Roll of 9 John and the Fine Roll of 
 that year do prove the payment of ^Taooo by 
 Geoffrey for Juliana, widow of Peter de Stokes, 
 and a suit of 1 2 1 7 shows Geoffrey and his wife 
 Juliana bringing an action for the advowson of 
 Wigginton (Herts) as her right. ' She claimed as, 
 maternally, granddaughter and heir of Eva " del 
 
 ' " Ranulphus de Broke tenuit de rege in capite manerium de Cattes- 
 hulle in com. Surr. per serjantiam custodiendi hostium Camerae Re^s : 
 qui quidem Ranulphus habuit duas filias, Edelivam scilicet et Jolianam, 
 quae, mortuo eodem Ranulpho, successerunt eidem tanquam filise et 
 hseredes," etc. etc. 
 
 ' See the Inq. p.m.on her sister Sibyl, in 1254 and 1 256 cited above. 
 
 ' Bracton's Note Book, Case 1336. 
 
io6 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Broc " by her husband Walter " de Chesneto. " 
 This was clearly that Walter ' de Caisneio, ' who 
 was holding five fees of the Earl of Gloucester in 
 1 1 66, ^ and who married Eva, daughter of Eustace 
 "del Broc."' 
 
 The earl, however, did not challenge this un- 
 founded statement. He contented himself with 
 stating that the late Geoffrey de Lucy had held 
 none of the lands which Juliana had held in capite, 
 either at Catteshill or anywhere else. And he 
 added the strange assertion that Robert de Vere, 
 earl of Oxford, was " in seisin of doing the service 
 of the aforesaid serjeanty and had been seised thereof 
 at the King's coronation, ' where he, and not 
 Geoffrey, performed the said service. " After a 
 full hearing it was decided that, as Geoffrey himself 
 had been in the King's wardship, by virtue of the 
 homage done to Henry III by his father, and had 
 died a homager of the King, the wardship belonged 
 to the King, by reason of the said homage, " even 
 though Geoffrey held nothing of the aforesaid 
 serjeanty or of the other holdings which his grand- 
 mother {avid) Juliana or his other predecessors had 
 held of the King in capite. " * 
 
 One fact at least here emerges definitely. We 
 are dealing with three Geoffreys in succession, not, 
 as was assumed by Dugdale (followed by Blaaw * 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 289. 
 
 ' Eynsham Cartulary (Oxford Hist. Soc.) I, 79, 80. 
 
 ^ i.e. in 1274. This is a noteworthy assertion in view of the fact 
 that we know so little of that coronation, and that the earl who made it 
 would have been present. But the earl of Oxford did not hold Cattes- 
 hill and cannot have claimed this serjeanty. 
 
 * Lib. Rub., p. 1014. 
 
 ' Barons' War (1871), p. 112. 
 
THE CATTESHILL SERJEANTY 107 
 
 and others), with two only. ^ The Geoffrey de 
 Lucy who supported John in the great struggle 
 for the Charter, was the grandfather, not the father 
 of the Geoffrey who joined the barons' party against 
 Henry III and whom Simon de Montfort included 
 among those whom he could safely summon to 
 Parliament in 1264. As these Lucys were import- 
 ant people, with lands in eight counties, and played, 
 we have seen, a part in history, the correction is 
 worth making. 
 
 It was the coronation of Richard II, for which 
 we have our first great record of a court of claims, 
 which raised the question whether the " usher " 
 service due from the Catteshill serjeanty concerned 
 a coronation. Nicholas Hering, steward of the 
 King's lands in Kent and holder of Catteshill in 
 right of his wife, a descendant of the Gattons, 
 claimed to act as usher of the King's Chamber. 
 His claim was unsuccessful, and rightly so, no 
 doubt, on the ground that this ushership was not 
 a coronation service. ^ As a matter of fact, at the 
 Queen's Coronation in 1236 which formed the great 
 precedent, the ushership of the King's Hall appears 
 as the Marshal's,' and that of the King's Chamber 
 as the Chamberlain's. * It was this office which 
 must have been discharged by the earl of Oxford, 
 as Great Chamberlain, at the Coronation of Edward 
 I, when the Earl of Gloucester had supposed him 
 
 ' Baronage, I, 566-7. 
 
 * In the Const, dom. Reg. there is an usher of the Chamber {hostiarius 
 camera) who received fourpence a day " ad lectum regis " when the 
 King was travelling {Lib. Rub., 813). 
 
 ' "hostia aulae regis custodire" {Lib. Rub., p. 759). 
 
 * " custodia camera: et hostii " (Ibid.). 
 
io8 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 to be acting as holder of the Catteshill serjeanty. 
 This, therefore, is a good example of an office 
 which was discharged on ordinary occasions by a 
 mere tenant in serjeanty, but which, on Coronation 
 day, fell to an officer of State. In spite, however, 
 of the failure of the claim, it was revived by Sir 
 George Moore, as owner of Catteshill manor, 
 more than two centuries later, at the coronation of 
 James I. No decision was then given. 
 
 THE USHER OF THE KING'S HALL (i) ^ 
 
 This was a fairly important serjeanty, for its 
 lands lay in three counties. Its holders were a 
 family of De la Mere (or De La Mare), a name 
 which was not rare and which does not imply the 
 common origin of all those who bore it. In addi- 
 tion, for instance, to this family, which held by 
 serjeanty its lands in Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire 
 and Wiltshire, there was another family of the 
 same name, lords of Fisherton Delamere, which 
 held lands by knight-service in the same three 
 counties. 
 
 The former's lands were at Alvescote and Middle 
 Aston, Oxon, Winterbourne Gunnor and Laver- 
 stoke, Wilts, and Windrush, Glos. The last of 
 these was held in Domesday by an English thegn, 
 Chetel ; the rest by another English thegn, 
 " Saricus. " The service jdue is variously stated, 
 but " the serjeanty of being usher (or chief usher) 
 of the door of the king's hall " appears to have 
 
 ' See p. 83 above. 
 
USHER OF THE HALL 109 
 
 formed its main feature. ^ The same version is 
 given in the record of " arrentation " under Wind- 
 rush/ and under Alvescote. ' Gunnor, however, is 
 said, in a return for Bampton Hundred, to hold 
 Alvescote by the service of keeping (by deputy) 
 the door of the king's bedchamber.* Nevertheless 
 Henry de la Mare holds at Alvescote as usher of 
 the hall* and, in another place, as usher simply.* 
 The word " usher " has changed its meaning and 
 we no longer associate it with the keeper of the 
 dooT {/ims-/imsskr). The Scottish "door-ward,"^ 
 being formed from the English, not the French, is 
 more explicit. 
 
 The arrentation, however, of Winterbourne re- 
 cords Gunnor's service as that of keeping the 
 King's brushwood ahd litter ^ and changes it to that 
 of half a knight's fee for the lands in the three 
 counties which had' not been alienated.® Henry de 
 
 ' See the Inquisitions on Gunnor de la Mare — the lady from whom 
 Winterbourne Gunnor derives its name — in 1249 and 1250 (Cal. of 
 Inq., vol. i). 
 
 * " Debuit esse hostiar[ius] de aula domini Regis " (Testa, p. 78). 
 
 " " Debuit esse hostiaria (sic) in aula (or de aula) domini Regis. " 
 (Ihld., pp. 114 IS 115). 
 
 * " Per seijentiam inveniendi unum militem ad custod' hostium 
 thalami Regis." (Jbid., p. 108) or " hostiarium ad hostium thalami, " 
 etc. (Ibid.). 
 
 * " Per serjentiam custodiendi ostium aule domini Regis. " {Ibid., 
 p. 106). 
 
 ' He is entered as holding Alvescote and Middle Aston " per seijant' 
 de esse hostiar' domini Regis "... "per servicium custodiendi hostium 
 domini Regis. " (Ibid., p. 1 1 8). 
 
 ' More familiar in the surname " Durward. " 
 
 ' " pro qua debuit custodire buscam et literam domini Regis" {Testa, 
 pp. 146,147). 
 
 ' " Et ipsa Gunnora faciat servicium dimidii feodi unius -militis pro 
 parte sua quam tenet, tam in com. Oxon' et Glouc' quam in com' pre- 
 dicto, que non est alienata. " Cf. p. 28 above. 
 
no THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 la Mare also is in one place entered as holding Win- 
 terboume by the service of being " marshal of the 
 litter " * although in another the record makes him 
 hold " ut sit hostiarius Regis. " ^ Under Oxford- 
 shire, again, in one entry he is shown as holding at 
 (Middle) Aston " per sergentiam custodiendi mere- 
 trices sequentes curiam domini Regis," ' although in 
 another he holds there by usher service/ All this 
 is a further warning of the caution needed in 
 accepting such statements as these. 
 
 THE USHER OF THE KING'S HALL (2) 
 
 The special feature of this serjeanty is that we 
 can trace it clearly back to Domesday Book itself 
 (1086). Among the King's Serjeants {servientes 
 regis) of Somerset entered in that record, we find 
 John the Usher {hostiarius) holding "Pegens, " 
 " Peri, " " Wincheberie, " and " Hustille, " while 
 *' Newetune " and " Candetone " are held of him 
 by under-tenants. * Four out of these six places 
 we recognise arnong the lands named as held by 
 his representative, Richard of Wigborough, in 
 1250, by usher service. 
 
 When the great inquest into tenures was made 
 in 12 12, this serjeanty was held by a lady, Ellen 
 the (female) usher Qiostiaria). She was returned 
 as holding Wigborough * and her other lands in 
 
 ^ " Marescallus domini Regis de litera " (p. 143). 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 143. 
 
 ' Testa, -p. 107. Cf. p. 104 above. 
 
 * Ibid., -p. 118. 
 ' D. B., I. 98b. 
 
 * In South Petherton. 
 
USHER OF THE HALL m 
 
 Somerset by usher service. ^ A few years earlier 
 she had, as Helen " Hostiaria " daughter of William 
 the usher {Hostiarius) , made an agreement with the 
 prior of Bruton concerning the oratory at Wigbor- 
 ough. * Her father, whose name is thus given us, 
 appears as a benefactor of Montacute Priory in a 
 charter of John as Count of Mortain (i 189-1 199), 
 which records his gift, as William " Hostiarius, " of 
 messuages in Hunstile (in Goathurst),^ one of John 
 the usher's Domesday holdings. This is entered in 
 the Testa (p. 172) as an alienation from the serjeanty. 
 Early in the reign of Henry III, William's 
 daughter is entered as Ellen " de Wikeberg, " who 
 is married to Eustace de Doveliz and holds her 
 lands at Wigborough and " Peggenesse " * by ser- 
 jeanty of being usher of the King's door. * A plea 
 roll of 1243 records Eustace as holding in both 
 places y«r^ uxoris by serjeanty that he should be 
 usher in the hall of our lord the king. * The son 
 and heir of Ellen was Richard the usher (' Arussir') ,^ 
 otherwise Richard de Wigborough, in whose time 
 the serjeanty was " arrented, " being then (1250) 
 described as that of " usher of the great hall. " * 
 Only the alienations were " arrented ; " the service 
 remained. * Richard died in 1 270, holding " by 
 
 ' " Per hostiaritatem " {Testa,^. 162). 
 ' Bruton Cartulary (Som. Rec. Soc), No. 165. 
 ' Montacute Cartulary (Som. Rec. Soc), No. 13. 
 * Horsey Pignes in Bridgwater. 
 
 ° " Per serjantlam ussar' ostii domini Regis " (Ibid., p. 167). 
 ° Somerset Pleas (Som. Rec. Soc), Nos. 11 27, 1128. 
 ' Cal. oflnq., I, No. 885. 
 
 ' " pro qua debuit esse hostiar' domini Regis de Magna Aula per 
 totum annum" (TVjto, pp. 171, 173). 
 
 ' " Et faciei servicium consuetum predictum " {Jbid., p. 171). 
 
112 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 service of being usher of the king's hall, " ^ and was 
 succeeded by his son William. In 1 284-5 William 
 is recorded as holding Wigborough by serjeanty of 
 being usher in the king's hall and " Pegenesse " 
 by an arrented payment of 40J. " 
 
 In 1324 a William de Wigborough died and 
 was found to have held the same lands by the same 
 service. He was succeeded by his brother Richard.' 
 
 THE CHAMBERLAIN 
 
 It would have excited considerable surprise, had 
 it been generally known that in 1 90 1 the late Lord 
 Ancaster formally petitioned the Court of Claims 
 that, as Lord Great Chamberlain, he might 
 
 have livery and lodging in the King's court at all times, 
 and bring to His Majesty on the day of His Majesty's 
 Royal Coronation His Majesty's shirt,* stockings, and 
 drawers : that your Petitioner, together with the Lord 
 Chamberlain of the Household ® for the time being may 
 dress His Majesty in all his apparel on that day : and 
 that your Petitioner may have all profits and fees there- 
 unto belonging, viz. forty yards of crimson velvet for 
 his robes against the day of His Majesty's Coronation, 
 together with the bed wherein the King lays (sic) the 
 night previous to the Coronation, with dl the. vallances 
 and curtains thereof,* and all the cushions and clothes 
 within the chamber, together with the furniture of the 
 same, and also the night robe of the King wherein his 
 
 ' Cal oflnq.. Hen. Ill, No. 754. 
 ^ Feudal Aids., IV, 277. 
 ' Cd. oflnq., VI, No. 596. 
 
 * It was similarly the privilege of the Grand Chamhellan, in France, 
 to bring the King his shirt at his Levee. 
 
 ' i.e. his permanent deputy at court (see pp. 7, 85 above). 
 
 * A ' four-poster ' is here assumed. 
 
THE CHAMBERLAIN 113 
 
 Majesty rested the night previous to the Coronation, and 
 likewise to serve His Majesty with water on the said day 
 of His Royal Coronation and to have the basins and 
 towels and the cup of assay for his fee. 
 
 And yet the form of this petition was in strict 
 accordance with precedent and with the almost 
 Chinese conservatism which regulates these matters. 
 Had not the Earl of Lindsey, Lord Ancaster's 
 predecessor, solemnly petitioned the Court of Claims, 
 two centuries before, that he might enter the cham- 
 ber of his " Tresredoubte seigneuresse " Queen 
 Anne, before she rose, on coronation day, and bring 
 her " sa chemise et ses base et privie draps " and 
 dress her, and receive all the fees, including " le 
 nuite Robe de la Reyne " ? ^ But, grotesque as these 
 survivals may, at first sight, appear, it is one of the 
 objects of this work to explain the light they throw 
 on the ways of a remote past. It has been suggest- 
 ed above ^ that the king's ' chamber ' may have 
 been at first his bedchamber, and that the fees of 
 the ' chamberlain ' preserve the memory of the 
 fact. To make their meaning clear, we must 
 glance at other chamberlains and at the fees which 
 they received. The queen consort's chamberlain, 
 we shall find, received her bed and basins " and the 
 other things that belong to the chamberlain ; " and 
 the archbishop of Canterbury's chamberlain recei- 
 ved, at his enthronization, the bed, the ewer and 
 the basin.' 
 
 ' His father had acutely claimed " les nuyte Robes le Roy et la 
 Reigne " at the previous coronation, William and Mary being joint 
 sovereigns. 
 
 ' See pp. 67-8. 
 
 ' Bartholomew de Badlesmere, a local baron, held Hothfield of him 
 
 8 
 
114 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 The point that I wish to press is that the cham- 
 berlain's fees, although evidently representing the 
 whole contents of the bedchamber, came to be 
 divided into two portions, received in respect of 
 distinct services. Of these, one was the ewer and 
 basins, with the towels, for " serving the King 
 with water"; the other was the bed and nightshirt, 
 with all the furniture of the bedchamber. The 
 first mention, in England, of these fees is at the 
 coronation of Queen Eleanor in 1236, when the 
 Great Chamberlain received the basins and towels 
 as his fee, for the former service : ^ the ewer is not 
 mentioned. Thenceforward, we shall find, this 
 service, with its fees, was claimed as a separate 
 " office," and even as an office distinct from that 
 of Great Chamberlain. The hereditary Great 
 Chamberlains made it the subject of separate peti- 
 tions at each coronation, to the Court of Claims, 
 and did not even claim it as Great Chamberlains. 
 
 I desire, therefore, to show why it came to be 
 distinguished from that office of chamberlain to 
 which it essentially belonged. I say " essentially," 
 because, we shall see, it was performed, in this 
 country, by the Deputy Chamberlain, the Queen's 
 Chamberlain, and the Archbishop of Canterbury's 
 
 " by serjeanty, viz : — by service of attending upon him with water to 
 ■wash his hands on the day of his enthronement at Canterbury ; and he 
 shall have the ewer and basin, and shall also be the chamberlain of the 
 aforesaid Archbishop for the night, and shall have the Archbishop's couch 
 for his fee" {Cal. oflnq. VII, No. 104, p. 91). The date is 1328. 
 Ten years later, his son Giles was found to have held Hothfield by the 
 same service {Cal. of Close Rolls, 1337-9, p. 55S)- 
 
 ' " Servivit autem ea die de Aqua, tam ante prandium quam post, 
 major camerarius... Recepit etiam, tanquam jus suum, bascinos et manu- 
 tergia unde servivit. " {Lib. Rub., p. 759.) 
 
THE CHAMBERLAIN 115 
 
 chamberlain, while, abroad, it was similarly per- 
 formed by the hereditary chamberlains in Nor- 
 mandy. So essential a feature, indeed, was it of 
 the office that, at the coronation of the Emperor, 
 the Margrave of Brandenburg, as Arch-Chamber- 
 lain, came " on horseback with a sylver basin of 
 water of the value of twelve marks, and a clean 
 towell, which being alighted, he holds to the 
 Emperour." ^ 
 
 It is necessary to prove my statement as to the 
 chamberlains of Normandy, who were known, from 
 their lordship, as the chamberlains of Tancarville.* 
 In 1 1 82 William de Tancarville was, in Normandy, 
 chief chamberlain in fee.' King Henry was keep- 
 ing his Christmas court at Caen, with his sons 
 and his son-in-law. Water was brought to him, to 
 wash his hands, on the great day of the feast, by 
 his acting chamberlain {cubicularius)^ when Wil- 
 liam, bursting through the throng, with a great 
 following of his knights, flung aside his mantle, as 
 was the way with ' ministers '," snatched the silver 
 basins and roughly took possession.* The other 
 officer resisted, but the king ordered him to let 
 them be, and WilUam, after " giving water " to the 
 
 ' Taylor's Glory of Regality, p. 103. 
 
 ' The ruins of their casde are still visible on a diff above the mouth 
 of the Seine. 
 
 ' " summus ex feudo regis camerarius, vir nobilis genere " (Walter Map). 
 
 * This virord directly connects the chamberlain wfith the bedchamber. 
 So does Jordan Fantosme's story of" li chamberlens " in the bedchamber, 
 where the weary King was being lulled to sleep by the massaging of his 
 feet, parleying with the impatient messenger who brought the great 
 news from the North on that summer's night in 1 1 74. 
 
 ' " sicut mos est ministrorum " (Jbid). 
 
 * " arripuit traxitque fortiter ad se " {Jbid). 
 
ii6 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 king and the princes, handed the basins to a fol- 
 lower of his own. The other officer asked in vain 
 for their return, the king refusing to interfere. 
 
 Charged on the morrow, in public audience, by 
 the steward of Normandy, with appropriating the 
 basins, William retorted that they were his due, of 
 which his underling had wrongfully endeavoured 
 to deprive him.^ It is the proof of his right that 
 he offered which is here so important. His father, 
 he said, when he founded the abbey of St. George 
 at Tancarville, placed therein the basins which he 
 had duly received, without question, from the hands 
 of King Henry the First, and which were there, as 
 witnesses, to that day. Witnesses also were those 
 in the Priory of Ste Barbe.^ If this testimony was 
 not sufficient, he was ready to assert his right in 
 his own person in whatever way the court desired.' 
 We have here a definite statement that the chief 
 chamberlain of Normandy was receiving the basins 
 in right of his office at least Tas early as the days of 
 Henry I. 
 
 If, then, the " giving of water " to the sover- 
 
 * " justa vi jureque traxi pelves, suminus domini regis camerarius, 
 quas ille subditus meus extorquere conatus est injusta violentia " {Ibid.). 
 
 ' " Pater meus, cum abbatiam fecisset in Tankervilla beato Georgio, 
 posuit in ea pelves quas a manibus regis Henrici primi jure suo sine lite 
 tulerat, quod adhuc ibi testaritur, similiter et idem aliae testificant in 
 monasterio beatae Barbaras. " The latter was the Priory of Ste. Barbe- 
 en-Auge in Ecajeid-sur-Dives, of which these chamberlains were patrons. 
 The former seems to be an error for the abbey of St. Georges de 
 Boscherville much higher up the Seine and founded by the family a 
 good deal earlier (See my Cal. of Docs., France). 
 
 ' " si vero tantis non adhibetur fides instrumentis, si quis se juri meo 
 praesumpserit adversarium opponere, praesto sum illud asserere quacunque 
 vi vel virtute sanxerit haec curia, nemine pro me nominate, sed in 
 persona propria" (See, for all this, Map, De Nugis [Camden Soc] 
 pp. 232-4). 
 
THE CHAMBERLAIN iiy 
 
 eign and the right to receive the basins as fee were 
 the chamberlain's recognised due, how was it that 
 in England it was treated as a separate office ? The 
 answer I suggest is that, though the basins were 
 part of the furniture of the bedchamber, yet the 
 actual service, being performed, not in the ' cham- 
 ber ', but in the ' hall V was treated as outside the 
 chamberlain's special province. It is the only ser- 
 vice which is named as performed by the chamber- 
 lain at Queen Eleanor's coronation (1236), though 
 it is explained by the record that he had to act, 
 further, as chamberlain when the King was crown- 
 ed.^ As the record restricts the duties of the 
 Queen's chamberlain to her own quarters, ' I infer 
 that the basins included in his fee were those 
 in her " chamber," while those received by the 
 great chamberlain ("major camerarius ") were, as 
 stated, in respect of his service at the banquet in 
 the hall. 
 
 Ten years ago, the point was of some impor- 
 tance, and I drew up a special memorandum on 
 the subject for the use of the Crown. Its object 
 was to rebut the allegation in Lord Ancaster's 
 Printed ' Case ' that " At the coronation of King 
 Edward (VI) the claim of the Earl of Oxford (to 
 the office of Great Chamberlain) was admitted." 
 If this statement had been correct, it would have 
 seriously affected the case for the Crown. But I 
 was able to show that, on the contrary, the office 
 
 ' See pp. 66-^ above. 
 
 ' " Ad quern spectat Cameraria in Re^ coronatione et custodia 
 camerae et hostii. " {Lib. Rub., p. 759). 
 
 ' " sibi jus vendicavit in domo Reginse" {Ibid.). 
 
ii8 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 of Great Chamberlain was exercised, on that occa- 
 sion, by the Crown nominee ; that it was not even 
 claimed by the earl of Oxford ; and that what he 
 did claim was only " to serve the King the day of 
 his Coronation of water, as well before dynner as 
 after," and to have " the basons and towells " for 
 his fee. Of the office of Great Chamberlain he 
 made no mention. And he appealed to the record 
 of the Court of Claims in 1 377 when the earl of 
 Oxford had successfully claimed, by a separate 
 petition,^ in similar terms, to perform this service.* 
 His claim was allowed " forasmuch noe other man 
 claymeth the said office, " and the fact that it was 
 not claimed by the Crown's nominee, the Great 
 Chamberlain in possession, proves that the original 
 connexion between the two ' offices ' had then long 
 been forgotten. 
 
 The other portion of the chamberlain's fees, 
 namely the bed and furniture of the bedchamber, 
 raises no question. As an illustration of his claim 
 to the bed occurring similarly abroad we may take 
 that of the Vicomte d'Aunay, as Chamberlain of 
 Poitou, in 14 10. 
 
 Quand mondit seigneur viendra premierement a Poi- 
 tiers que je dois de men droit avoir son lit garni de tous 
 les paremens qui seront, esquels il couchera la premiere 
 nuit. ' 
 
 That the Great Chamberlain claimed the whole 
 contents of the bedchamber is clear from the record 
 
 ' " quandam aliam petitionem. " 
 
 ' to serve " de eaue si bien devant maingier comme apres le jour de 
 leur coronement. " 
 
 ' See Ducange's Ghssarium. 
 
THE CHAMBERLAIN 119 
 
 of the Court of Claims for James I's coronation, 
 when " the costly chairs, seats, cushions, hangings 
 and other ornaments " were included, the whole 
 contents being compounded for at jC^oo. This 
 redemption for cash became the recognised practice, 
 even as the King to this day redeems, at his coron- 
 ation, for a hundred shillings the sword he offers in 
 the Abbey. At Anne's coronation the Great 
 Chamberlain received £2^° " ^^ ^ Composition 
 for y* furniture of her Maties Bedchamber and for 
 2 pieces of Arras hangings of the story of Caesar and 
 Pompey, and the Green Velvet embroidered state 
 set up in Westminster Hall." At that of George I 
 he obtained £25°> *^^ perquisites to which he was 
 entitled including " two rich pieces of Arras hang- 
 ings of a Sett called Tobias " and " one piece of 
 Tapestry hangings of a suit called the Seasons." 
 
 The fee. However, for the other service, namely 
 the ewer and basins — a ' cup of assay ' in addition 
 was regularly claimed and refused — was always 
 received in kind, and it is significant that the earl 
 of Oxford leaves by will to his son Robert in 1371 
 two silver basins.^ At the coronation of James I, 
 when, as at the present time, the banquet was 
 dispensed with, this service was not performed, and 
 the fee for it was withheld. 
 
 Apart from the forty yards of crimson velvet, 
 which were always petitioned for and received, the 
 Great Chamberlain was entitled by custom, in 
 addition to his fee, to be assigned a ' box ' in the 
 Abbey as if in return for his services at the actual 
 coronation. This, which was a very valuable per- 
 
 ' Dugdale's Baronage, I, 193. 
 
I20 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 quisite, was petitioned for in 1901, but "disal- 
 lowed," as not " provided of right." ^ The services 
 in the Abbey were not claimed in the normal peti- 
 tions/ but at the Restoration the earl of Oxford 
 (an unsuccessful claimant) named them thus : — 
 
 que le dit Comte d' Oxford, come cheife et principall 
 Chamberlan d'Angleterre puit, le jour de Coronacion du 
 nostre Seigneur le Roy, attender le Roy et porter avec lui 
 al dit Coronacion le CoefFe et Gaunts et draps de lynnen 
 de user a I'unction du Roy, cy pour ses mains come pour 
 son teste, et aussi porter I'Espee du Roy avec le scabare 
 que sont destre ofFrees et aussi les autres OiFerings et 
 Oblations du dit Roy, cest a dire dix livres sterling d'or 
 et un marque d'or, et apporter avec lui une Robe Royall 
 avec une Couronne pour le Roy apres service divine avec 
 autre Royall array et vestuments pour le Roy, aussi qu'il 
 puit a le Coronacion du Roy devestir et disrober le Roy 
 jusques a son cotte et sa chemise quand le Roy sera vestu 
 et Appareille avec sa regalite, et puis estre proche al Roy 
 jusques a ceo que le dite Coronacion sera pleinemente 
 finiee et accomplis, et apres le Coronacion finiee desvestir 
 les Regalities du Roy. 
 
 This recital is of interest for comparison with 
 present usage. 
 
 In England the association of the Chamberlain 
 with the King's treasure is lost sight of so early 
 that it is practically non-existent, unless indeed it 
 lingers, as seems to me possible, in his charge, as 
 described in the above recital, of the king's " Offer- 
 ings et Oblations." On the Continent, however, 
 it was well established ^, and in English municipal 
 
 ' Wollaston's Caar/ 2^ C/«'»M, pp. 1 3 1-3. The claim to the velvet 
 also was disallowed, somewhat strangely {Ibid., pp. 23-4). 
 ' Possibly because they carried no specified fee. 
 * i.e. at medieval courts. 
 
THE CHAMBERLAIN 121 
 
 life, of course, the chamberlain was often a finan- 
 cial officer: ^ to this, doubtless, refers the key, the 
 chamberlain's badge of office. Edward the Con- 
 fessor, as the story goes, kept his silver in his 
 bedchamber itself. 
 
 Now arrived Hugelin 
 
 The chamberlain, who takes some money, 
 
 Carries off as much as he wished 
 
 To pay to his seneschals. 
 
 To his caterers and marshals, 
 
 But in his haste he forgets 
 
 That he shuts not the chest.^ 
 
 Hugh the Chamberlain was a real man, and so was 
 Herbert who, in the next reign, is styled in the 
 Abingdon History (II, 43) "regis cubicularius et 
 thesaurarius, " a style which again connects the 
 king's treasure with his bedchamber. Of Herbert 
 the Chamberlain and the camera curie (roughly 
 equivalent to the Privy Purse) we shall hear again 
 below.* 
 
 With his usual sound judgment, Madox, in his 
 Baronia Anglica (p. 158), selected the Great Cham- 
 berlainship as an instance of ' Offices in heritage. ' * 
 For we have the actual text of Henry I's charter 
 bestowing that office — which had been held by 
 Robert Malet, a great man in Domesday — on 
 
 ' e.g. in the City of London. The same practice is found in Germany. 
 
 * Luard's Lives of Edward the Confessor (Rolls Series), p. 207. The 
 word for ' caterers ' is ' achaturs ' (fif. ' The King's larderer ' below). 
 
 ' The chamberlains of the Exchequer were, of course, distinct from 
 the Great Chamberlain, as was the Exchequer itself from the camera. 
 They both appear to have held by serjeanty. See, for Mauduit, my 
 paper on "Mauduit of Hartley Mauduit" {jncestor, V, 207), and, for 
 Fitz Gerold, Testa, p. 153, and Red Book, p. 486. 
 
 * See also his Exchequer (171 1), p. 40. 
 
122 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Aubrey de Vere and his heirs. In this case, there- 
 fore, at least, there is no question of serjeanty. No 
 land whatever was held in connexion with the office. 
 
 I need not labour anew the troublous problem 
 of its descent. It had always been a puzzle to 
 antiquaries why this office in fee should have first 
 passed to an heir-male to the exclusion of heirs- 
 general, and then, on the contrary, to an heir-gene- 
 ral (of the whole blood), to the exclusion of the 
 heir-male. In 190 1-2 we cleared it up at last. 
 The one point to bear in mind is that, as I then 
 proved, the Earl of Oxford who had held the office 
 from 1526 to 1540 had done so, not by hereditary 
 right, but under a grant from the Crown for his 
 life. Consequently, his son's allegation, made to 
 the Court of Claims for Queen Elizabeth's corona- 
 tion, that his father was seised of the office " as of 
 fee " was directly contrary to fact. ^ 
 
 Owing to the absence of a counterclaim, the 
 falsehood was not exposed, ^ and the allowance of 
 his claim, in error, has been the root of title of 
 every Great Chamberlain from that day to this. 
 In spite, however, of this exposure, the House of 
 Lords decided not to re-open the question. For 
 " Nullum tempus occurit regi " we must now sub- 
 stitute the principle '' Quieta non movere. " 
 
 By the " Act for placing the Lords" (31 Hen. 
 VIII c. I o) the great officers are ranked thus : — 
 "the Great Chamberlain first, the Constable next,the 
 
 ' See my papers, " The Great Chamberlain " in MmMy Review 
 (June, 1902, pp. 54-5), and "Notes on the Great Chamberlainship 
 Case " in Ancestor (IV, 19). 
 
 ' See, the section on ' the Queen's Chamberlain ' for other false 
 allegations by the earls. 
 
THE DEPUTY CHAMBERLAIN 123 
 
 Marshal third, the Lord Admiral the fourth, the 
 Grand Master or Lord Steward the fifth, and the 
 king's Chamberlain the sixth. " This, however, 
 is obviously a merely arbitrary arrangement, which 
 is based on no historical principle, which confuses 
 the great officers and their deputies, and which 
 interpolates the Admiral in their midst. 
 
 THE DEPUTY CHAMBERLAIN 
 
 Winfrith-Newburgh, in the county of Dorset, 
 derived its name from a family of Newburgh (/. e. 
 Neuf bourg) which held it from the days of Henry I 
 by 'chamberlain' service. The 12 12 return states 
 that Robert ' de Novo Burgo ' then held it with 
 (the lordship of) the Hundred of Winfrith and 
 part of that of Hasler, together with lands in 
 Lulworth (to the south) and Burton (to the north) 
 by 'chamberlain' service,^ and that his ancestors had 
 done so since the days of Henry I, who must have 
 carved out this holding from the Winfrith group 
 of Royal demesne. Hard by were Ower Moigne 
 with its ' larderer ' serjeanty and Wool with its 
 ' baker ' serjeanty. A few years later the service is 
 defined ; Robert holds Winfrith " by the service of 
 giving water to our lord the King at Christmas, 
 Easter, and Whitsuntide." * Here again we find 
 the chamberlain connected with the basin, and we 
 have also a welcome reference to the three great 
 Crown-wearing days of the Norman kings. 
 
 In 1250 this serjeanty was " arrented; " its alien- 
 
 ' " per servicium camerarii" {Testa, p. 164). 
 ' Testa, p. 166. 
 
124 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ations were compounded for. On this occasion 
 the service was recorded in the same terms, with 
 the addition that the basins and towels were to be 
 received as fee, unless the earl of Oxford should be 
 present.^ As the earl of Oxford was Great Cham- 
 berlain, I term this serjeanty that of the ' Deputy ' 
 Chamberlain, although it was, clearly, restricted to 
 " basin and towel " service, and did not extend to 
 the "chamber." In 1285 John ' de Novo Burgo' 
 was returned as holding Winfrith by performing 
 this service at Christmas, for which he received 
 the silver basins/ Two generations later, Robert 
 de Newburgh was found, at his death, to have 
 held the manor by the service of giving the King 
 water on his Coronation day, receiving the basin 
 and ewer as his fee/ So late, even, as the year 
 i486 a Newburgh was still holding Winfrith- 
 
 Newburgh " with the Hundred by service of 
 
 giving water for the King's hands on Christmas 
 day, and he shall have the silver basins from which 
 he gave the water."* 
 
 That a serjeanty of such ancient date, with its 
 service so well defined, a serjeanty, moreover, of 
 such long continuance in the family of its first 
 holder, should have failed to obtain recognition 
 would seem most unlikely. But when the lord of 
 the manor claimed, as against the lord of the ntianor 
 
 ' " debuit dare aquam ad manus domini Regis die natalis, die pasch' 
 et pent', et habere pelves et manutergia nisi comes Oxon' presens esset " 
 (r«/3, pp. 171, 174). 
 
 ' " habebit bacinos argenteos de quibus dederit aquam " {Feudal Aids, 
 II, 9). 
 
 ' " habebit pelvem cmn lavatorio pro servitio predicto. " (/»f . p. m. 
 12 Edw. III). 
 
 * Cal. oflnq., Henry FII, I, p. 18. 
 
BASIN AND TOWEL 125 
 
 of Heydon, ^ to perform the old service at the 
 coronation of James II, and again at that of 
 George IV, his claim was unsuccessful. For the 
 Court of Claims is the slave of precedent ; it has 
 always enquired if a service has been ' allowed ' by 
 the Court before : the historical right to perform 
 it goes for nothing in its sight. Beati possidentes ! 
 
 BASIN AND TOWEL SERJEANTIES 
 
 The privilege of holding the basin and towel, 
 when the King washed his hands on coronation 
 day, appears to have been highly valued. In 
 addition to the claims of the Great Chamberlain 
 and the Deputy Chamberlain, there were various 
 minor claims, of which the Heydon serjeanty is the 
 most notable, as having formed the subject of suc- 
 cessful claims from the coronation of Richard II to 
 that of George IV. 
 
 Heydon, which was formerly in Essex, in the 
 North- Western corner of the county, was trans- 
 ferred to Cambridgeshire by Act of Parliament in 
 1895. It formed in Domesday (1086) the solitary 
 holding of Robert son of Roscelin in that county, 
 and though the Domesday arrangement for Essex 
 does not enable us to distinguish the manors held 
 by serjeanty, its position in the survey is such that 
 it may have been so held. 
 
 The other Domesday holding in capite of Robert 
 Fitz Roscelin was in Stepney. This is, perhaps, 
 worth noting, for, if the Domesday " Stepney " 
 
 ' See ' Basin and towel serjeanties. ' 
 
126 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 included Bromley (which is not named in the 
 survey), it would have included the land which Ida 
 Triket subsequently held by the service of holding 
 a towel for the King's hands on his coronation 
 day. ^ The record proceeds to say that it had been 
 divided by her heirs between the (Benedictine) 
 nuns of Stratford (at Bow) and the canons of Holy 
 Trinity (Priory). * The tenure of these two houses 
 is mentioned in another entry ^ and it explains the 
 statement cited by Blount from a plea-roll of 
 22 Edward I (1293-4) that the Prioress of St. 
 Leonard's of Stratford held fifty acres in Bromley 
 " per servicium inveniendi domino Regi unum ho- 
 minem ad tenendum manutergium ipsius Regis in 
 coronatione sua. " If the above conjecture, which 
 is nothing more, should be correct, it would carry 
 back the serjeanty to the days when Robert's 
 Domesday holdings were still one. 
 
 I think it probable that in this serjeanty we 
 have the explanation of a plea advanced by Ida 
 Triket in 7 John (1205-6) relating to Sharn- 
 brook, Beds. * The Trikets had inherited the 
 two hides which Robert Fitz Roscelin had there 
 held as an under-tenant of Count Eustace (of 
 Boulogne). * Ida pleaded that her husband Roger 
 had alienated this land to Ailward the Chamberlain 
 {temp. Hen. II.), who gave it to Newnham Priory, 
 
 ' " Ida Triket tenuit quandam terrain in Brembeleg' per serjant* 
 tenendi unum manutergium ad manus domini Regis ad coronacionem 
 suam." Testa, p. 360. 
 
 » lUd. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 362. For Ida Triket's relations with these two houses, and 
 for Bromley, see Ancient Deeds, A. 182 7- 1835. 
 
 ' See Phc. Abbrev., p. 48. Cf. Hist. ofEng. Law, I, 270. 
 
 ' Domesday, I, 211. 
 
BASIN AND TOWEL 127 
 
 " et dicit quod de sergantia Domini Regis est terra 
 ilia, et non potuit nee debuit aliquis sergantiam 
 dilacere nee aliquo modo alienare. " She must 
 have claimed that it formed part of the lands held 
 by the towel serjeanty, though it was really held 
 by knight-service of the Honour of Boulogne. It 
 was afterwards agreed " quod terra ilia non est de 
 sergantia Regis, " but her plea shows that the ser- 
 jeanty was already of such old standing that its true 
 origin was uncertain. 
 
 When we first meet with mention of this ser- 
 jeanty, it is curiously involved with another. For 
 in the early days of Henry III we read, under 
 Essex, that Thomas Pikot ' of Radeclive ' holds the 
 moiety of Heydon by the serjeanty of holding the 
 basin at the Ring's Coronation. ^ It is added that 
 Thomas Pikot holds the other moiety "per serjan- 
 tiam tenendi manutergium ad coronacionem domini 
 Regis, " while, under Nottinghamshire, we read 
 that Thomas of " Hedon " holds " Radeclive " by 
 goshawk service. ^ Another Essex entry ' tells us 
 that Thomas ' de Hey den ' held one moiety of 
 Heyden by towel service * and Peter son of Robert 
 Picot the other moiety by basin service, both 
 at the King's coronation. There is, therefore, 
 abundant evidence that the Picots who held the 
 goshawk serjeanty at RatclifFe-on-Soar were the 
 same family as those who held this serjeanty at 
 Heydon. 
 
 * Testa, p. 266. 
 
 * " Villa de Radeclive est serjantia domini Regis de ostricer[ia]. 
 Thomas de Hedon tenet per dominum Regem. " Testa, p. 19. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 276 ; Lib. Rub., p. 457. 
 
 * " Serjanteriam tualliae." 
 
128 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Thomas " de Heyden," however, was a person 
 apart. I find him acting as vice-chancellor to 
 Richard I in Normandy in 1198.^ In 1203, as a 
 clerk {clericus noster) of John, he was holding lands, 
 with a female ward (Constance dau. of Robert 
 Furree), in Heydon,^ and in 9 Henry III (1224-5) 
 he paid 50 marcs for the custody of the heir and 
 land of Peter Picot his brother-in-law. In 1 1 
 Henry III a plea roll cited by Morant shows him 
 as holding the wardship of Thomas son of Peter 
 Picot. Finally in 1235 his nephew Thomas Picot 
 gave a palfrey for confirmation of all his lands in 
 Heydon.^ 
 
 The upshot was that the manor descended in 
 two moieties in the Picot family, the one moiety 
 held by basin, the other by towel service. This 
 certainly indicates the division of an original basin 
 and towel serjeanty. In 1286 Peter Picot, at his 
 death, held " by service of holding a basin before 
 the King at his coronation."* In 1324 Nicholas 
 de Segrave was found to hold Heydon by the double 
 service, viz : " by the serjeanty of holding a basin 
 and towel in the king's hall on the day of the king's 
 coronation." * There continued to be much con- 
 fusion as to the apportionment of the service : 
 under Edward III, Richard de Kelsall was found 
 at his death to have held by towel service {tenendi 
 
 ' See my Calendar of docs. France, pp.91, 384, and Cal. of Charter 
 Rolls, II, 306. 
 
 ' Rot. Lift. Pat., I, 27b. 
 
 ' Excerft e Rot. Tin., I, 124, 276 : — " tota terre que pert'pred. T. de 
 Heydon in Heydon quam idem T. de Heydon dedit predicto T. Picot." 
 
 * Cal. oflnq., II, No. 602. 
 
 'Hid., VI, p. 187. 
 
BASIN AND TOWEL 129 
 
 unum manutergium) , but his son, in 1367, by basin 
 and ewer service. ^ 
 
 Yet, only ten years later, John Wiltshire, citizen 
 of London, who had acquired Kelsall's moiety, 
 petitioned the Court of Claims, successfully, for the 
 towel service. 
 
 Come le dit Johan tient certains tenements en Heyden 
 queles fount le moytee del Manoir de Heyden de nostre 
 sieur le Roy par sergeantie, cestassavoir de tenir un 
 towaile quaunt nostre dit sieur le Roy lavera ses mains 
 
 devant manger le jour de son coronement qil puisse 
 
 estre accepte le dit office de sergeantie faire en la forme 
 susdicte. 
 
 The petitioner made the usual appeal to " le 
 record de leschequer, " as proving that John, son of 
 John Picot had held by this service, and on this 
 ground his claim was granted. But as the service 
 was performed by a deputy, — the king's uncle, the 
 Earl of Cambridge, — and as no fee was claimed, 
 one does not see that John gained much. 
 
 From the Wiltshires the manor of * Heydon- 
 bury ' ^ passed to the Asplands, and finally, shortly 
 before the death of Queen Elizabeth, it was acquir- 
 ed by the typical London citizen who is met with 
 so often as the founder of an Essex family. Grocer 
 and Alderman, Sheriff and Lord Mayor, Sir Stephen 
 Soame hastened to signalise his new position by 
 claiming the service at the coronation of James L 
 The claim was allowed to his descendants at and 
 from the coronation of Charles II, but when Sir 
 
 ' " Per serjantiam tenendi j pelvem et lautarium ad coronacionem 
 dominl Regis." 
 
 ' The termination 'bury' is found on the Hertfordshire side of Essex. 
 
I30 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Peter Soame petitioned, for the coronation of 
 James II, to hold the basin and ewer for one moiety 
 of the manor, as well as the towel for the other, this 
 further claim was rejected, nor was he even allowed 
 to hold the towel, save by deputy (the Earl of Kent). 
 
 It is, however, noteworthy that, at the last 
 coronation banquet, that of George IV, the Lord 
 of the Manor of Heydon, though only an esquire, 
 was (according to Sir George Nayler's report) 
 allowed to act as towel-horse (" holding the towel ") 
 in his own person. Mr. Legg, taking his name 
 from that report, speaks of him as " Peter Soame 
 John Everard Buckworth Heme Soame Esq., in 
 whose family the manor had been at least since 
 1685" (p. Ixxix). It had only, however, been 
 devised to them by Sir Peter Soame, a stranger in 
 blood, in 1798. As to the above amazing name — 
 which reminds one of the line in Rejected addresses, 
 *' Long may Long Tilney Wellesley Long Pole 
 live " — the works of reference on the baronetage 
 describe this gentleman as Peter, son and heir 
 of Buckworth Buckworth-Herne, who added 
 *' Soame " to Buckworth-Herne in 1806, making 
 it a triple surname. His three intervening Christian 
 names remain unaccounted for. 
 
 This serjeanty well illustrates the stereotyped 
 character of decisions by the Court of Claims. 
 When the towel service, in respect of a moiety of 
 the manor, had been successfully claimed under 
 Richard II, this formed the standing precedent, 
 and it is even probable that the long insistence on 
 a deputy was due to the fact that the claimant in 
 1377 was a mere London citizen. 
 
BASIN AND TOWEL 131 
 
 It is an illustration of the honour of " basin and, 
 towel" service that, under Edward IV, it was the 
 business of the King's Chamberlain to assign 
 " knyghts or other worshypful astate for the 
 towell and for the basyn, " and that " to serve the 
 King of his bason " was part of the regular duty 
 of the " knyghts of (the) household. " ^ 
 
 There was also a " towel " serjeanty connected 
 with Steepleton, Dorset. In 1212 Geoffrey de 
 St. Clair was returned as holding " Stapelton " by 
 serjeanty, namely by bearing a towel before the 
 Queen at Easter, Whitsuntide, and Christmas and 
 the King's coronation. ^ This entry is of double 
 interest as a very early reference to a coronation 
 service, and as containing also a distinct allusion to 
 the three crown-wearing days of the Norman 
 kings. An entry of a few years later records this 
 towel service. ' 
 
 It is a mere guess, and perhaps not a likely one, 
 that this " towel " developed into the " cloth of 
 pleasaunce " held before the Queen.* At the coron- 
 ation banquet of Richard III, the Queen sat at 
 table, and " on every side of her stoode a countesse 
 holding a cloth of pleasance when she listed for to 
 drinke. " This is clearly the " fine cloth before 
 the Queen's face whenever she listed to spit or do 
 otherwise at her pleasure," which was held at Anne 
 
 ^ Household Ordinances (1790), pp. 32, 33. 
 
 ' " per serjantiam, scilicet per unam tualliam ferendam coram domina 
 Regina ad festum pasch' et pentecost' et ad nativitatem domini, et ad 
 domini Regis coronacionem " (Testa, p. 162). 
 
 ' per serjantiam manutergii." Ibid., p. 167. 
 
 * In the Red Book (p. 547), the service is given as " debet tenere die 
 Paschae coram domina Regina unum manutergium." 
 
132 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Boleyn's coronation by the countess of Oxford, 
 standing on her right, and the countess of Wor- 
 cester, standing on her left. The mention of count- 
 esses on both occasions, as discharging this office, 
 is decisive on the point. 
 
 Lastly, we have the evidence — probably worth- 
 less — of the " Inquest after death " on Margery 
 " de Ripariis," Countess of the Isle (of Wight), 
 that is, of Devon, in 1292, that she held Nuneham 
 Courtney ("Newnham"), Oxon, by service of 
 giving the King water to wash his hands on Christ^ 
 mas Day and carrying off the basins and towel (as 
 fee) . ^ The Testa, however, enters the manor as 
 held, in her own right, by a previous Countess 
 Margaret as one knight's fee (p. 100). I have 
 shown in another place ^ how it descended to her 
 from the Courcys, who had held it from the Con- 
 quest. 
 
 THE QUEEN'S CHAMBERLAIN 
 
 This serjeanty is of special interest because the 
 coronation service rendered in respect of it is duly 
 recorded in that precious account of Queen Eleanor's 
 Coronation (1236) which was the great precedent 
 in these matters. We there read that no one 
 claimed any right in the Queen's house save 
 
 ' " Ita quod ipse qui tenet manerium dabit domino Regi aquam ad 
 lavandas manus suas die Natalis Domini, et asportabit et habebit pelves 
 et manutergium " (See Hutchins' Dorset, I, 436). Can this strange 
 allegation have originated in her ^Wiltshire) serjeanty of " Chamberlain 
 of the Exchequer," on the supposition that every "Chamberlain" 
 owed the king ' basin and towel ' service ? 
 
 * Ancestor, No. i, pp. 244-245. 
 
THE QUEEN'S CHAMBERLAIN 133 
 
 G(ilbert) de Sanford, who said that, of ancient 
 right from his predecessors, he ought to be the 
 Queen's Chamberlain and to have the custody that 
 day of her chamber and her door, which right he 
 obtained. And (it is important to be observed) 
 he received, as his right, the whole of the Queen's 
 bed and the basins and the other things which 
 belong to the Chamberlain. ^ This fee exactly 
 corresponds with that of the King's Chamberlain,^ 
 who similarly claimed (and claims) the basins and 
 the bed. 
 
 The lands held by this service were the two 
 Hertfordshire manors of Great Hormead and Nut- 
 hampstead (in Barkway) and the three Essex ones 
 of Fingrith (in Blackmore), Margaretting ('Ginge') 
 and Woolverston (in Chigwell) . * The Hertford- 
 shire estate enjoyed the distinction of appearing in 
 Domesday as the holding of Edgar .iEtheling him- 
 self, the only holding left to him. The three 
 Essex manors appear together in a group among 
 the King's lands.* An important entry in the 
 Testa (p. 270) shows us the Hertfordshire manors 
 held " de veteri feofFamento, " which carries back 
 the serjeanty to the days of Henry I. 
 
 One seeks, therefore, to trace it on the roll of 
 1 1 30. In that record we have mention pf an 
 
 * " De praedictis autem officiis nullus sibi jus vendicavit in domo 
 Reginae, except© G[ileberto] de Sanford, qui a veteri jure praedecessorum 
 suorum dixit se debere esse camerarius Reginae, cameram et hostium ea 
 die custodire, quod ibidem obtinuit. Habuit autem tanquam jus suum 
 totum lectum Reginae et bascinos et alia qu£ spectant ad camerarium 
 (sic J. " Liber Rubem, p. 759. 
 
 ' And with that of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Chamberlain. 
 ' Liber Rubens, p. 507 ; Testa, p. 266. 
 
 • D. B., II, 5. 
 
134 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Adam " camerarius, " to whom is remitted for 
 Danegeld sixteen shillings under Hertfordshire and 
 twenty four under Essex. This would represent a 
 holding of eight hides in the former county and 
 twelve in the latter. The Domesday assessment 
 for the former is SJ hides, which is probably near 
 enough, but that of Fingrith, unfortunately, is 
 wanting for the Essex portion, so that one cannot 
 speak positively. Moreover, Adam " camerarius " 
 is also excused twenty shillings Danegeld under 
 Hampshire, and no Hampshire land belonged to 
 this serjeanty. ^ 
 
 In the 1 2 1 2 returns for the Essex lands of the 
 serjeanty, they are entered as held by John de 
 Sanford " per serjant' camer' domine Regine..,. 
 per serjant' t(h)alam' Regine," and the Hertford- 
 shire tenure is " per serjant' Regine. " * At an 
 early date the separate existence of this serjeanty 
 was lost through the marriage of its heiress, Alice 
 de Sanford to Robert (de Vere), Earl of Oxford 
 (1263-1296). She died in 5 Edward II (1311- 
 13 12), seised of this serjeanty, which was thence- 
 forth, by a singular coincidence, combined with the 
 office of Great Chamberlain, which was held by 
 the De Veres with similar duties to the King. 
 
 But now comes the difficulty. The lands of 
 her inheritance were divided between her sons and 
 
 ' There is, further, an entry on the roll (p. 150), under Middlesex, 
 thit " Adam et Samson filii Aldwini Camerarii redd. comp. de xxviii 
 S. pro terra patris eorpm. " We cannot trace them under Middlesex, 
 but eighteen years later in the second Winchester survey {Liber Wintm, 
 p. 545) we find the land " que fuit Alwini camerarii " held by a man 
 who is paying the large rent of ^^2.9.4 to Samson (Sansoni), evidently 
 Aldwin's son. 
 
 * Testa, pp. 269-270. 
 
THE QUEEN'S CHAMBERLAIN 135 
 
 her daughter, and the serjeanty thus dismembered. 
 Two of the estates, Fingrith in Essex and Great 
 Hormead in Hertfordshire, passed to her sons, the 
 Earl of Oxford and his younger brother, Alphonso, 
 respectively ; three of them, Woolverston, Margar- 
 etting, and Nuthampstead, formed part of the 
 marriage portion which her daughter Joan brought 
 to her husband, Earl Warrenne. ^ There arises 
 here an important question as to the law of ser- 
 jeanty. When the lands had been dismembered, 
 who was entitled to perform the service ? ^ It seems 
 clear that in such cases the right remained appur- 
 tenant to all the manors, and further, though the 
 two manors retained had passed, in this case, to 
 two brothers, each of them, we shall find, was 
 returned as entitled to the office in respect of his 
 manor. It seems, therefore, perfectly clear that 
 the earls could not claim exclusive right to the 
 office when they only held two of the manors.' 
 Nevertheless, they seem to have considered that 
 the right was theirs alone, and indeed they went 
 further ; they spoke of their Sandford lands as part 
 of the ' barony ' of Sandford, although they were 
 held by serjeanty, and they even assumed the title 
 of Baron Sandford, and to such good purpose that, 
 under Charles I, the judges held that the barony of 
 Sandford was among those which had been held by 
 the earl of Oxford temp. Henry VIII, and which 
 
 ' Dugdale's Baronage, I, 80, 192 (the names are there unrecogni- 
 sable). 
 
 ' See p. 43 above for this point. 
 
 ' Fingrith and Hormead were re-united on the death of Earl Robert 
 in 1 33 1, when he was succeeded by Alphonso's son, John. 
 
136 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 had descended to his heirs general. ^ The later 
 earls, however, continued to assume it as theirs, 
 and the last earl of all hoped, to my own know- 
 ledge, that it might descend to his heirs. 
 
 Their claim appears in the Inquisitions taken after 
 their deaths. On the death of Alphonso de Vere, 
 he was returned (1328) as holding Great Hormead 
 " by service of guarding the Queen's Chamber on 
 the . night following the day of her coronation. ^ 
 His elder brother Robert, Earl of Oxford, died 
 shortly after him, and was returned, in 1 3 3 1 , as 
 having held Fingrith "in chief by serjeanty, viz : — 
 serving in the Queen's Chamber, as chamberlain, 
 on the day of her Coronation, receiving for his fee 
 as is fitting (profeodo suo percipiendo sicut decetj. " ' 
 
 The escheator was ordered, 1 7 May 1 3 3 1 , * to 
 give seisin to John de Vere, the earl's nephew and 
 heir, and Fingrith is again named among the lands 
 as held by this serjeanty. * A year before the 
 earl's death a most important writ was issued for 
 the earl, which proves that he actually received 
 his fees for officiating at the coronation of Queen 
 Philippa. The King informs his officers of the 
 Exchequer, 2 April 1330, that the Earl had 
 petitioned, — as he and his ancestors, the Earls of 
 Oxford, had been, by hereditary right, cham- 
 
 ' Collins' Precedents, p. 175. 
 
 ' Cfl/. «/■/«?., VII, No. 116. 
 
 ' IbU., No. 379. 
 
 ' This document was printed among the ' proofs ' in the Great 
 Chamberlain Case (and wrongly dated ' 1332 '). It was evidently sup- 
 posed to relate to the Great Chamberlainship, which is not even ment- 
 ioned in it. 
 
 ' " per serjanciam, videlicet, serviendi in camera Regine loco came- 
 rarii die coronacionis sue " (Originalia Roll, 5 Edward III). 
 
THE QUEEN'S CHAMBERLAIN 137 
 
 berlains to the queens of England at their coron- 
 ations, time out of mind, and had received certain 
 fees — that he might receive them, as having 
 officiated ; and he adds that, of the fees claimed, 
 he has given the earl the queen's shoes [calcia- 
 mentd) ' and three silver basins, from one of which 
 the queen w^asbed her head {^pro locione capitis sui) 
 and from the others her hands, and has compounded 
 with him for the queen's bed at a hundred marcs 
 (^^66.13,4), which they are to pay him/ 
 
 Although the record states that the earl had 
 produced proofs to the king, ' his allegations were 
 impudent. He must have known perfectly well 
 that the office had not been exercised by his ances- 
 tors, the earls of Oxford, * but had come into his 
 family through his niother, and that it was noi held 
 " by hereditary right ", but in virtue of the tenure 
 of certain manors, of which only one was in his 
 hands. This is one of the three statements made 
 by the earls of Oxford with regard to their ' cham- 
 berlain ' offices which I denounce as fraudulent. 
 
 For some reason or other we seem to have no 
 record of early petitions by the Earls to the Courts 
 of Claims for this office. At the coronations of 
 Richard II and of Henry IV, with which begin the 
 records of Courts of Claims, there was no Queen 
 
 ' This is the word used for the King's coronation * buskins. ' 
 
 ' Liberate Roll, 4 Edward III, m. 7. Cf. -p. 119 above. 
 
 ' " per diversas evidencias nobis per prefatum comitem exhibitas 
 plenius apparebat quod idem comes et antecessores sui officium illud 
 diebus coronacionum reginarum predictarum habere et hujusmodi feodum 
 percipere consueverunt. " 
 
 * " et ipse et antecessores sui comites Oxon' officium camerarie diebus 
 
 coronacionum reginarum Anglie a tempore cujus contrarii memoria 
 
 non existit facere et exercere consueverunt. " 
 
138 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Consort, so that there was no office for which to 
 petition. For the coronation however of Elizabeth, 
 consort of Henry VII (Nov. 1487), a court of 
 claims was appointed, — 
 
 That all maner of men, what(ever) Estate or degree 
 they were of, that held any lands by service Royall, that 
 is to say to doe any service at the Coronation of the 
 Queene shold come in and shew theyr clayme, etc. 
 
 Thereupon the Earl of Oxford put in his claim 
 " to be chamberleyn " 
 
 in regard that he holds the manors of Fringrith in the 
 County of Essex and Hormede in the County of Hertford 
 for the service of Chamberlein of England. ^ 
 
 He therefore claimed " to perform the said his 
 service " at the Queen's coronation. This claim, 
 of course, was entirely erroneous in form ; for the 
 office of Queen's Chamberlain was wholly distinct 
 from that of " Chamberlain of England, " though 
 he happened to hold them both. It ought to be 
 observed that the claim is made in respect of the 
 two manors which, we have seen, had descended 
 to the earls, ^ 
 
 Before the Court of Claims which sat (July 1603) 
 for the coronation of James I, Edward, Earl of 
 Oxford, the spendthrift earl, who dissipated the 
 great estates of his house and who " was the first 
 that brought perfumed gloves and such fineries out 
 of Italy into this kingdom, " claimed not only the 
 great Chamberlainship (" grand Chamberlaine 
 
 ' This document is taken from the State Papers (Domestic). 
 ' See p. 1 3 5 above. 
 
THE QUEEN'S CHAMBERLAIN 139 
 
 d'Angleterre "), but also, by a separate petition, 
 " to be Chamberlain of the Queen, the King's 
 wife. " In its curious " Norman " French, his 
 claim ran thus : — 
 
 que come il tient sicome ses auncestors ont tenuz le 
 manner de Fingry ovesque les manners de Hormeade, 
 Ginges, et part del Ulsamston in lez counties de Essex 
 et Hertford per serjantie, cestascavoir per le service destre 
 chamberlaine de Roignee feme le Roy et de guarder 
 chamber le Roigne et le huis de ceo al jour de coronement 
 le Roigne et daver tout le lite del dit Roignee et les 
 bassines et les auters choses quex apperteigne a le cham- 
 berlaine, etc. 
 
 This claim, purporting to be made in respect of 
 four out of the five manors which originally formed 
 the serjeanty, was a most impudent proceeding. 
 Two out of these four manors had never even 
 descended to the earls ; Fingrith he had himself 
 parted with many years before, and Hormead was 
 the subject of a counter-petition on behalf of its 
 real owner, Daniel Cage, gentleman ! ^ The latter 
 claimed the office as being " seised in his demesne 
 as of fee" of that manor. Both claimants further 
 petitioned to have a clerk in the Exchequer to 
 receive the Queen's gold and take from it sixpence 
 a day for its receipt. This was the further claim 
 which was made by Gilbert de Sandford at Queen 
 Eleanor's coronation {1236), the consideration of 
 which was deferred.'' It is clear from the silence 
 of the record that neither claim was successful. 
 
 ' The Earl had licence to alienate the manor of Great Hormead to 
 Anthony Cage so far back as i May 1579 (ex inform. General Editor, 
 Victoria County History). 
 
 ' " Vendicavit etiam se debere habere clericum in scaccario ad exigen- 
 
140 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 It is not, therefore, surprising that, when again 
 advanced, it was again unsuccessful, especially as it 
 was made in respect of the naanor of Fingrith alone. 
 Such claim was made by the Cory family for the 
 coronations of James II, William and Mary, and 
 Anne ; by Mr. William Fytche for that of 
 George II and his Queen (1727), and finally in 
 1911, by Mr. Adolphus G. Maskell, for the coron- 
 ation of George V- 
 
 THE CHIEF BUTLER 
 
 The holder of this office was, by general admis- 
 sion, one of the great officers of state in this country 
 and abroad.^ Even before the Conquest a Waltham 
 Abbey charter is witnessed by Wigod " regis pin- 
 cerna, " as if to remind us that Edward was 
 adopting continental fashions in the names of his 
 court officers. * 
 
 In Normandy Duke William had, on the eve 
 of the Conquest, a butler, Hugh ' Pincerna ' (or 
 ' Buticularius '), whom one charter enables us to 
 identify as Hugh d'lvry. ' After the conquest he 
 
 dum aurum Regine qui percipiet, ut dicit, de praedicto auro qualibet die 
 sex denarios pro liberatione ; sed fuit dilatum usque ad praedictum ter- 
 minum. " (Lii. Rub., p. 760). This is followed by a statement that the 
 rightful amount of the Queen's gold was ten per cent on the amount of 
 all fines. Compare Diahgus de scaccario (1902), p. 157: " adest clericus 
 regine ad haec constitutus," etc. 
 
 ' In the Empire the Arch-Butler carried, as his symbol of office, the 
 covered cup that figures on some Butler coats of arms. 
 
 ' See my paper on the officers of Edward the Confessor in Eng. Hist. 
 Rev., XIX, 91. 
 
 ' See my Calendar of documents preserved in France, Nos. 73, 81, 1167. 
 Roger d'lvry also (his contemporary ,and probably his brother) is found 
 attesting as ' Pincerna. ' 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 141 
 
 is found again attesting as Hugh ' Pincerna, ' and 
 he was certainly the Hugh d'lvry who held Am- 
 brosden (Oxon) in 1086, and probably the Hugh 
 ' Pincerna ' who then held some lands in Beds. ^ 
 
 By about the middle of the reign of Henry I 
 the butlership is found held by another family. 
 High in his favour were two brothers, William and 
 ' Nigel ' * d'Aubigny {de Albini), who took their 
 names from Aubigny in that Norman province of 
 the Cotentin which had been, in earlier days, his 
 portion. On William he bestowed the office of 
 chief butler (of England), an appointment to which 
 all claimants have traced, ever since, their root of 
 title. In order to distinguish him from his name- 
 sake, William ' de Albini ' of Bel voir — who was 
 known as William ' de Albini ' the Breton {Brito) 
 — he was regularly styled William ' de Albini 
 Pincerna. ' To provide him with a territorial 
 endowment, Henry constructed for him a sub- 
 stantial fief in Norfolk, ' where he established at 
 Buckenham his castle, and founded at Wymondham 
 an abbey. The whole controversy as to the right 
 to this great and ancient office turns upon his 
 tenure of these lands. Did he hold his office in 
 virtue of his tenure of this fief or of some portion 
 thereof ? Or was it held in gross ? And, if the 
 latter, ought it to descend to his heirs in blood, or 
 to those who held that earldom of Arundel which 
 his son subsequently obtained ? 
 
 ' Domesday, I, zi6. He is mentioned as " pincerna regis. " 
 * Not to be confused with the Domesday lord of Cainhoe, Beds. 
 ' See Lib. Rub., p. 397 : " Hoc est tenementum Willelmi Pincerna 
 Domini Regis, de dono Regis Henrici. " 
 
142 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 But we must not anticipate the history. William 
 d'Aubigny (or his son and heir of the same name) 
 was doubtless the " Magister Pincerna " of the 
 Constitutio Domus Regis,^ and in 1136 he attended 
 Stephen's Easter Court as Butler [Pincerna) with 
 the other officers of state. ^ In 1 1 37 he crossed 
 with Stephen from Portsmouth and was with him 
 at Rouen, again as ' Pincerna. ' ' 
 
 The younger WiUiam, as is well known, married 
 about this time the relict of Henry I, Queen 
 Adeliza, obtaining with her the splendid dower of 
 the castle and ' honour ' of Arundel, and Waltham 
 in Essex also. That he did not become thereby 
 earl of Arundel I was able, for the first time, to 
 prove. * The chronicle of Waltham Holy Cross, 
 explaining in a notable passage that his marriage had 
 turned his head, ^ pointedly speaks of " Willelmus 
 ille, pincerna, nondum comes, " * thus proving that, 
 although not yet an earl, he had succeeded to his 
 father's office of butler. 
 
 We now pass to a strange incident, which I am 
 disposed to place some twenty years later, and which 
 illumines for a moment the office of chief butler. 
 The story is told us by no other than King Henry 
 the Second, through the mouth of Walter Map. ^ 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 811. 
 
 ' See my Geoffrey de MandeviUe, pp. 262-3. 
 
 ' Cal. of Charter Rolls, III, pp. 338, 375. 
 
 * Geoffrey de Mandeville, pp. 322-4. 
 
 ' " Quern post discessum Regis Henrici conjugio Reginae Adelidis 
 contigit honorari, unde et superbire et supra se extolli ccepit ultra modum 
 ut (non) possit sibi pati parem, et vilesceret in oculis suis quicquid pr»- 
 cipuum praeter regem in se habebat noster mundus " (Ibid.). 
 
 « Ibid. 
 
 ' De Nugis curialium (Ed. Camden Soc), pp. 234-5. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 143 
 
 The place was Paris, and the year, I make it, 1 1 58. * 
 The Kings of England and of France were seated 
 at meat together, when there suddenly burst upon 
 them, fresh from pilgrimage to the east, the haughty 
 Earl of Arundel, on whom no one had set eyes for 
 the space of three years. Flinging off his rough 
 cloak, the great, strong noble caught sight of the 
 vessels of wine, and, on the officiating butler refus- 
 ing to give them up, hurled him to the ground. 
 Then, falling on his knees before the King of the 
 French, he explained that he was by hereditary 
 right, as his own king knew, chief {princeps et pri- 
 mus) of the butlers, and that the man he had over- 
 thrown had insolently refused him his right. That 
 his violent action was accepted as a jest, not as an 
 insult, was a precedent Henry urged, for the similar 
 action of William de Tancarville ^ being pardoned. * 
 
 ' This was the only year in which Henry, as King, can have been 
 in Paris with Louis. And the Earl is here made to speak of him as 
 King. Otherwise one would guess that he had joined the second 
 crusade (1147) and returned after three years, to find Henry, as Duke, 
 in Paris. 
 
 * See the section on the Great Chamberlain. 
 
 ' Rex autem ait: " Memores auterii in hoc casu vos oro fieri 
 
 quod cum Parisius in hospitio meo dominus meus Ludovicus rex et ego 
 consedissemus, astante nobis pincerna meo, subito domum ingressus 
 Willielmus comes Hyrundella, recens a reditu Jerusalem, quem nemo 
 nostrum videret triennio preterito, nobis breviter salutatis, pallam villo- 
 sam quam sclavinam nominant velox abjecit et vasa vini rapidus inhoe- 
 sit, pincemamque renitentem, ut erat magnus et fortis, impulsu dejecit, 
 flectensque genua coram domino rege Francorum subintulit : 'Domine mi 
 rex, quod hie agitur non est excessus aut reverentiae vestrae contemptus ; 
 scit dominus meus rex quod de jure decessorum meorum pincemarum 
 princeps sum et primus ; hie autem quem dejeci prsesumpsit arroganter 
 sibi jus meum cum detinuit quod obtulisse debuerat non petenti. ' Sic 
 et hasc ille Willielmus et a tanta curia nomen facetiae retulit, non arro- 
 gantias. Vobis autem hoc ideo recordor, et ex aliis actis instruamini, ne 
 cujusquam amore sit huic Willielmo censura nostra curiae remissior, vel 
 
144 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Next in order of date is a notable passage in the 
 chronicle of ' Benedictus Abbas ' describing the 
 King's Christmas feast, in 1186, at Guildford.^ 
 On that occasion the Earl of ' Arundel ' * performed, 
 we read, the service due from him at the corona- 
 tions and solemn feasts of the Kings of England. ' 
 That is to say, he was chief butler. We must now 
 skip a longer space, namely half a century. 
 
 The great precedent for the services due on 
 coronation days was the record of those rendered 
 at Queen Eleanor's crowning in 1236 ; and on the 
 butler's office its details are exceptionally full. * 
 We first read that, on this occasion. Earl Warenne 
 served in the place of Hugh 4'Aubigny, Earl of 
 Arundel, to whom the office of butler belongs, 
 becaxise he was under excommunication. * We 
 then learn that, under him and by his side, there 
 
 odio alicujus dlstrictior; sequa lance libretur quod audistis, quatinus licet 
 haec ilia curia videatur interior, non judicetur interior (sic)." Quoniam 
 igitur nemo jnri sue est factus obviam ("sicj omnium judicio Williel- 
 mus obtinuit. 
 
 ' Eyton, p. 275. 
 
 ' This earl was normally styled Earl of Sussex. 
 
 ' " In illo vero festo predicti comites de Leicestria et de Harnndel et 
 Rogerus Bigot servierunt ad mensam Regis de servitio quod ad illos 
 pertinebat in coropationibus et solemnibus festis regum Angliae" 
 (Vol. II., p. 3). 
 
 * "De officio Pinqernarie" ("LiB. Rub., pp. 758-759). 
 
 * " Servivit ea die comes Warennae vice Hugonis de Albiniaco, Comitis 
 de Arundel, ad quem tunc (sic) illud officium spectat. Fuit autem 
 [eodemj tempore [idem] sententia excommunicationis [innodatus] a 
 Cantuariensi [Archiepiscopo] eo quod cum fugare fecisset Archiepiscopus 
 in foresta dicti Hugonis in Suthsexaj idem Hugo canes suos cepit." 
 Mathew Paris, however, gives as the reason Earl Hugh's youth : — "loco 
 Comitis ArundelisE ; eo quod adolescens erat idem comes Arundelise, nee 
 adhuc gladio cinctus militari." He was still a minor 28 June 1234, 
 but was of age, 10 May 1235, when — though only as Hugh ' de Albi- 
 niaco ' — he was given possession of all his castles by the Crovra. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 145 
 
 served Master Michael Belet, who had a secondary 
 right to the office, in virtue of which he held the 
 cup filled with wine, ready to be handed, when the 
 King required it, to the Earl of Arundel, that the 
 Earl might hand it to the King. For he held, 
 it is added, butler's office {pincernariam) in the 
 King's household of ancient right. ^ Master Mi- 
 chael's right to " stand before the King " was 
 challenged, it appears, for himself by the Mayor of 
 London, but he was told by the King that no one 
 but Master Michael ought to serve there. ^ 
 
 After the banquet the Earl Butler {comes Pincer- 
 ndf received the King's cup, with which he had 
 served him, as his right,and Master Michael receiv- 
 ed that earl's robe as his right. His own robe he 
 gave to Henry 'de Capella', his kinsman, who was 
 wont to serve the King with his cup on the other 
 days of the year. But this was a voluntary gift.* 
 
 We may recognise in this formal ceremonial 
 three grades of office, the butler, assistant butler, 
 and deputy assistant butler. This phraseology I 
 borrow from the cumbrous, but familiar form 
 
 ' " Servivit autem sub eodem in latere suo Magister Michael Belet, 
 cujus est illud officium seciindario, ut teneat cuppam porrigendam Comiti 
 Arundelliae vino refectam cum Rex exegerit, ut comes eandem Regi 
 porrigat. Habet etiam Magister Michael Pincernariam in domo Regis, 
 sub Cpmite, de jure veteri." See the section below on 'The assistant 
 butler.' 
 
 * " Major civitatis Londonis vendicavit locum Magistri Michae- 
 
 lis astandi coram Rege ; sed repulsus fuit praecepto Regis, dicentis quod 
 nullus de jure ibi deberet servire nisi Magister Michael." The Mayor's 
 coronation service will be dealt with separately under * The assistant 
 butler.' 
 
 ' Compare the expression ' Earl Marshal ' for one who was both Earl 
 and Marshal. 
 
 *• " Non tamen tenebatur dare nisi vellet." 
 
 10 
 
146 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 "Deputy Assistant Quartermaster General," preserv- 
 ed, characteristically enough, by the British War 
 Office. As for Michael Belet, he held an ancient 
 serjeanty with which we shall deal below. His 
 kinsman was no tenant by serjeanty, but can be 
 identified as holding in fee-farm of the abbot of 
 Westminster at Denham, Bucks.' 
 
 The male line of the earls of Arundel, whose 
 right was thus unquestioned, came to an end within 
 a few years of the coronation of Queen Eleanor, 
 namely in 1243. What became, in these circum- 
 stances, of the ofiice of chief butler ? The question 
 turned, as in other cases, on the right by which the 
 office was held. Did the last earl hold as heir in 
 blood to William d'Aubigny, butler to Henry I, or 
 as tenant in chief of certain lands, or as earl of 
 Arundel ? To those who have followed its early 
 history, the last alternative must seem a very strange 
 suggestion. As a matter of fact, however, the 
 second and third hypotheses were those respectively 
 adopted by the subsequent claimants of the office ; 
 and it is specially to be noted that no appeal is 
 found to asnecia — the position of the eldest daughter 
 — as conferring a right to the office.^ 
 
 No fewer than fifty pages of Mr. WoUaston's 
 Court of Claims are required for the petitions and 
 counter-petitions of those who in 1901 claimed to 
 be recognised as chief butler at the coronation of 
 King Edward VII. " It is unfortunate, " he 
 observes, " that the Court held itself bound by the 
 terms of the Proclamation to exclude those petit- 
 
 ' Testa, p. 246. 
 ' See p. 38. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 147 
 
 ions from its notice, as referring to the banquet, 
 thereby postponing the settlement of a very inter- 
 esting question. " (p. 16). As the question is thus 
 left open, one may venture to offer some attempt 
 to state the facts. 
 
 The three claimants were : — 
 
 (i) the Duke of Norfolk, the right of whose 
 predecessors, as earls of Arundel, had been 
 repeatedly allowed, 
 
 (2) Mr, F. O. Taylor, as lord of the Norfolk 
 manor of Kenninghall. 
 
 (3) Lord Mowbray, Segrave and Stourton,.as 
 senior representative of the second sister of 
 Hugh, earl of Arundel (d. 1243), through 
 the Howards, his claim being that the 
 office was hereditary in the blood. This 
 was practically the first occasion on which 
 that claim was advanced. 
 
 The several petitions are strange examples of 
 what lawyers can make of history when they take 
 it in hand. In that, for instance, of the Duke of 
 Norfolk it was formally alleged " that at the Cor- 
 onation of Edward III, the said Edmund, earl of 
 Arundel served the said office, " ^ though " the said 
 Edmund " had been actually beheaded under 
 Edward II, while the family had lost the earldom, 
 castle, and honour of Arundel, when Edward III 
 was crowned. On the other hand the two remain- 
 ing claimants, in their eagerness to expose the weak 
 point in the claim of the earls of Arundel, — namely 
 that the D'Aubignys had held the office before 
 
 ' Court of Claim, p. 229. 
 
148 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 they were earls of Arundel, — were both committed 
 to the statement that William d'Aubigny ' Pin- 
 cerna ' had received his oiEce and his lands from the 
 Conqueror himself, a statement which, we have 
 seen, is wholly opposed to fact. 
 
 Lord Mowbray alleged " that the office of Butler 
 was, under the Conqueror, held by William de 
 Albini, Pincerna, " and that " the office of Butler 
 to the King of England was throughout this 
 period" [i.e. down to 1102) "held by the De 
 Albini family " and urged 
 
 that the Castle and Manor of Bokenham, or Buckenham, 
 in Norfolk were found by an Inquisition taken in the 
 third year of the reign of Edward I to have been granted 
 by King William the Bastard to William the Butler, who 
 was William de Albini. ■* 
 
 As this evidence is at once disposed of by the 
 contemporary evidence of Domesday, one does not 
 see why " an Inquisition " of some two centuries 
 later should be here invoked. It is the more strange 
 as on, the next page good use has been, evidently, 
 made of my own Geoffrey de Mandeville ^ including 
 its citation from the Chronicle of the Holy Gross — 
 or as Lord Mowbray is made to term it, " the 
 Holy Ghost "—ofWaltham. ' 
 
 Mr. Taylor, we read, similarly alleged that 
 
 the Manor of Kenninghall and the lordships or Manors 
 of Bokenham (otherwise Buckenham) and Wymondham, 
 aU in the County of Norfolk, together also with the 
 Manors of Rising and Snettisham in the same county, 
 
 ' IMti., p. 252. See below for this Inquisition. 
 ' See p. 142 above. 
 ' IBid.,Tp. 253. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 149 
 
 were granted in the time of William the Conqueror by 
 the Crown to William d'Albini, to be held in grand 
 serjeanty by the service of being chief Butler to the Kings 
 of England on the day of their Coronation, upon which 
 account he was called Pincema Regis. ^ 
 
 This curious petition further states that the 
 second William was created earl "in or about the 
 year 1 1 5 1 (but \sic\ prior to which year, he is 
 described as Pincema Regis), " although, as I have 
 shewn, he was created earl not later than 1141." 
 Neither petitioner appears to have seen anything 
 incongruous in making this first earl, who died in 
 1 1 76, the son of a man who received his fief in the 
 days of William the Conqueror. 
 
 This would seem to be the best place at which to 
 introduce the inquisition which appears to be re- 
 ferred to more or less inaccurately in the petitions 
 of lord Mowbray and of Mr. Taylor. It is on the 
 Hundred Rolls (1274-5) *^^^ ^^ ^'^'^ ^^' 
 
 dominus Robertus de Tateshale tenet manerium de 
 Bickenham {sic) in hundredo de Shropham, et dominus 
 Rex Willelmus Bastard dedit illud cum Kenynghal et 
 Wymondham Hug[oni\ Butelar[io], et te[netu]r per ser- 
 vicium quod ille qui tenet dictum manerium {sic) debet 
 esse botel[arius] domini Regis. ' 
 
 Here is the very information we want, but di- 
 vorced, by the lapse of two centuries, from what 
 we have seen to be the facts. It is, however, 
 excellent evidence for the belief then prevailing, 
 especially as the return to the Inq. p. m. on Robert's 
 
 * Ibid., p. 267. 
 
 ' Geoffrey de MandeviUe, p. 322. 
 
 ' Rot. Htmd., I. 467 b. The italics are mine. 
 
I50 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 father, shortly before (1273), states that he held 
 Buckenham by butler service.^ For the return of 
 1274-5 undoubtedly implies the belief that the 
 holder of Buckenham was the King's butler. 
 
 That return is thus referred to in the allegations 
 made in Lord Mowbray's petition : — 
 
 That the castle and manor of Bokenham, or Buckenham, 
 in Norfolk were found by an Inquisition taken in the 
 third year of the reign of Edward I to have been granted 
 by King William the Bastard to William the butler who 
 was William de Alhini. 
 
 That the Castle and Manor of Bokenham included 
 also the Manors or reputed Manors and lands of Kyning- 
 hall, Wymondham, Castle Rising, and Snettisham, and 
 possibly other lands, the whole being known as the 'Butelarid' 
 held of the King in chief by the service of Butler to the 
 Kings of England. ^ 
 
 One would really like to know who the expert 
 was to whom we owe this paraphrase. 
 Mr. Taylor's petition retorts thus : — 
 
 The Manor of Kenninghall and the Lordships or 
 Manors of Bokenham (otherwise Buckenham) and Wy- 
 mondham... together also with the Manors of Rising and 
 
 Snettisham were granted in the time of William the 
 
 Conqueror to William d'Albini, to be held in grand 
 serjeanty by the service of being Chief Butler to the 
 
 Kings of England on the day of their coronation The 
 
 Manor of Kenninghall was not included in the Manor of 
 Bokenham as alleged by Lord Mowbray's petition, but 
 was an independent Manor. On the division of the 
 D'Albini estates, the Manor of Kenninghall became the 
 caput serjeantia, etc. ' 
 
 ' See below. 
 
 * Court of Claims, p. 252. The italics are mine. 
 ' Ibid., p. 266. The italics (in English words) are mine. It will 
 be seen that the original grantee, who is given simply as Hugh on the 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 151 
 
 But in this triangular duel, this great Battle of 
 the Butlers, Mr. Taylor had himself to submit to 
 being told, in the Duke of Norfolk's petition, of 
 an " alleged decision " on which he relied, that 
 there does not "exist any such decision " and 
 that Blomefield's statement about it "is wholly 
 untrue ".' Mr. Taylor countered with an effective 
 record, but his argument that Blomefield " was the 
 rector of Fersfield, the adjoining parish to Kenn- 
 inghall," and must therefore have known the facts 
 about the coronation of Edward III, ^ will hardly 
 convince historians of to-day. 
 
 Leaving for the present these petitions, let us see 
 if the known facts, from an historical standpoint, 
 enable us to decide the question. 
 
 We must first set aside the claim of the earls of 
 Arundel, of which, for an historian at least, they 
 effectually dispose. Legally — so far as the matter 
 can be said to be one of law — their claim could 
 hardly be disputed. For at every coronation of 
 which the facts are known it has been allowed if 
 made, with the sole exception of that of Edward III, 
 when the family was, for the time, disinherited. 
 Historically it ' has not a leg to stand on, ' for the 
 fact that the d'Aubignys held the office before they 
 acquired the earldom is, as the opposing claimants 
 urged in 1901, absolutely decisive against the claim 
 that it was held in right of the earldom. Nor was 
 any attempt made in the Duke's petition to reply 
 
 Hundred Rolls, is transformed in these petitions into " William 
 d'Albini. " One wonders whether " Hugh " was derived from the 
 " Hugo Pincerna " of Domesday, (see p. 141 above). 
 
 ' Court of Claims, p. 237. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 269. 
 
152 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 to this argument. Even so late, indeed, as 1 168, 
 the office was still distinguished so carefully from the 
 earldom that, a separate return having been made 
 for the Norfolk fief of the earl as of " William 
 d'Aubigny the butler " (1166), he was similarly 
 charged for the aid due from it, not as earl of 
 Arundel, but as " Willelmus de Albeneio Pincerna."^ 
 
 If one is asked to account for the origin of the 
 erroneous belief that the earldom carried the office, 
 the answer is simple. Courts of claims have always 
 adopted a rule of thumb method ; they looked only 
 at precedents and did not go behind them. A 
 Fitzalan earl of Arundel would claim, in the usual 
 form, to serve the office of butler as it was served 
 by his predecessor Hugh, earl of Arundel, in 1236. 
 The fact of such service could not be disputed, and 
 it was not in accordance with the practice of the 
 court to investigate the title of earl Hugh. That 
 the office was held in right of the earldom was a 
 view which would naturally follow. Of such 
 confusion other cases will be found in this volume. 
 
 We have now disposed of the accepted view, 
 but there still remain two others. That the office, 
 as was contended in Lord Mowbray's petition, was 
 unconnected with land and was vested in William 
 d'Aubigny and his heirs in blood is the view that 
 I should prefer to take, on the ground that this 
 was certainly the case with the office of Great 
 Chamberlain and was so also, probably, with the 
 other offices of state. The Butlership of Ireland 
 also appears to have been unconnected with land. 
 And this view is further confirmed, at first sight, 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 14 Hen. II, p. 21. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 153 
 
 by the fact that the Norfolk fief was undoubtedly 
 admitted, in r 166-8, to be held by knight-service. 
 
 On the other hand, it is but fair to say that, 
 looking at the question independently and not 
 frona the standpoint of counsel urging the claim of 
 his client, one can find, at least, certain evidence 
 that the manors in respect of v^rhich the butlership 
 v^as alleged to be held were distinct from that 
 portion of the fief which was held by knight- 
 service. This is, I think, a new view and it 
 requires explanation. The carta of n 66 ^ enum- 
 erates seventy-seven knight's fees as held by 
 William d'Aubigny ' pincerna, ' but the great 
 demesne manors of Buckenham, Kenninghall, etc., 
 which ' the butler ' retained in his own demesne, 
 are found in 1086 in the hands of the King him- 
 self. ^ They were riot part of the fiefs named as 
 given him by Henry I. Moreover the great 
 Norfolk inquest of 12 12 returns the earl of Arundel 
 as holding Buckenham, Kenninghall, Wymondham, 
 Rising and Snettisham, and adds in each case that 
 " by what service is unknown. " ' 
 
 There is here, certainly, no mention of tenure 
 in serjeanty by butler-service, but there is, at least, 
 no statement of tenure by knight-service. * 
 
 It rtiust always be remembered that, unfortunate- 
 ly, the findings of juries in ' inquests after death ' 
 cannot be accepted as proof ; but the great test of 
 tenure remains in liability to scutage. And we 
 
 ■ Lib. Rub., pp. 397-9. 
 ' Domesday II, 126 b., 127. 
 
 ' " Nescitur per quod servitium " {Testa, pp. 293-5). 
 * Perhaps, however, it might be argued that the jurors meant that 
 they could not apportion on each manor its quota of knight-service. 
 
154 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 cannot find that Buckenham or Kenninghall — the 
 two manors in respect of which claims have been 
 made to the office — were ever liable to scutage. ^ 
 We have, moreover, for what it is worth, the find- 
 ing of the jurors in 1273 that Robert de Tateshale 
 (senior co-heir of the D'Aubignys) held Buckenham 
 with the Hundred of Shropham, and the Hundred 
 of Freebridge also, " by serjeanty of butlery, " ^ and 
 further a finding in 1335 that Joan de Tateshale 
 
 had held in Buckenham "a moiety of the manor 
 
 held in dower of the King in chief, by service of 
 being the King's butler. " * The office was claimed 
 in virtue of the lordship of this manor at the 
 coronation of Charles II and at that of George IV. 
 Kenninghall, the other manor in respect of which 
 it has been claimed, fell to a junior co-heir of the 
 D'Aubigny earls. The evidence as to the manors 
 which passed to this co-heir is confused and con- 
 tradictory. On the death of Isabel, widow of the 
 last D'Aubigny earl, she was found (Aug. 1283) ^^ 
 have held (as dower) Snettisham and the Hundred 
 of Smithdon " by service of butlery " and Kenning- 
 hall " by 3J. £fd. blanch farm. " * The manors 
 then passed to Mohaut, a junior co-heir, who 
 already held Castle Rising (as his capital messuage 
 of the D'Aubigny inheritance), by knight-service, 
 as it was alleged. * 
 
 ' This, however, is not conclusive, for the records of 1 166-8 appear 
 to showr that the whole liability of the Norfolk fief was more than 
 covered by the portions of it which had been enfeoifed. 
 
 ' Cal. of Inq., II, No. 4. Compare the return in the Hundred Rolls, 
 two or three years later, given above. 
 
 ' IbU., VII, 684. Cf. No. S90. 
 
 • Cal. of Ing., II. No. 540. 
 
 ' Uid., No. 128. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 155 
 
 Nevertheless, on the death of Roger de Mohaut, 
 it was found (1296) that he had held all three 
 manors " per servitium pincerne. " ^ 
 
 From the whole tangle of evidence there emerges 
 the general idea that Buckenham and Wymondham, 
 Kenninghall, Rising, and Snettisham were all held 
 by the D'Aubignys as the King's butlers ; and as 
 the two first passed to the Tateshales and the three 
 last to the Mohauts, there was naturally much 
 question as to who was entitled to the office, if, as 
 was alleged, it was held by serjeanty. 
 
 Unluckily, there was no claim in 1901 either 
 as heir of Tateshale or as lord of Buckenham, so 
 that there was no one to uphold the rights of 
 either. Lord Mowbray could only claim as " one 
 of the heirs of William de Albini, Pincerna. " * 
 Mr. Taylor claimed that " on the division of the 
 D' Albini estates, the Manor of Kenninghall became 
 the caput serjeantia" ' although, if any manor could 
 claim this distinction, it would, we shall see, be 
 Buckenham, and, even of the above portion of the 
 nianors. Castle Rising, not Kenninghall, was ex- 
 pressly assigned as the caput " on the division of 
 the estates. " " 
 
 This division is of some interest to students of 
 the feudal system, as illustrating a principle of 
 descent prevailing under the Normans. Its most 
 notable example is in the case of the Conqueror 
 himself, who bequeathed to his eldest son his 
 
 ' Court of Claims, p. 255. 
 ' Ibid., p. 262. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 266. 
 
 * Col. of Pat. Rolls, 1232-47, p. 408. Compare p. 154 above. 
 
156 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ancestral duchy of Normandy, while leaving his 
 ' conquest, ' the English throne, to his second son 
 William. So also, the greatest of his followers, 
 Roger de Montgomery, "literally the foremost 
 among the conquerors of England," ^ was succeed- 
 ed in his English ' conquest, ' the ' earldoms ' of 
 Arundel and of Shrewsbury, not by his eldest, but 
 by his second son. There are other instances in 
 point. * 
 
 It appears to me that this principle, if broadly 
 applied, would explain the assignment, on the death 
 of Hugh, Earl of Arundel (1243), to Fitz-Alan, the 
 heir of his second ^htcv, of the castle and " honour " 
 of Arundel with the " honour" of Petworth, ' that 
 great domain which the first Earl had added to 
 his own inheritance. In any case the eldest co-heir 
 (as he is expressly styled), Robert de Tateshale, 
 was assigned the caput o£ the old inheritance, 
 as Buckenham must have been, tbgether with 
 Wymondham, * where the D'Aubigny earls lay 
 
 ' Freeman's Norman Conquest. 
 
 " Touching upon this early principle, the authors of the History of 
 English Law (1895) speak of Glanvill's distinction between hereditas and 
 qtuestus and of his view that a man's " power over his conquest is greater 
 than his power over his heritage, " so far as alienation from his son and 
 heir is concerned (11, 306). They add that " in borrowing from beyond 
 the Tweed the words heritage and conquest we show that in England the 
 distinction soon became unimportant. " The principle, however, of. 
 which I am speaking has to be carefully distinguished from the Scottish 
 " Law of Conquest, " by which on' the contrary " Landis Conquest " 
 would descend to the heir of the acquirer's elder brother, though Ms 
 " heritage " would pass to the heir of his next younger brother. See 
 Riddell {Peerage and Consistorial Law, II, 838-840), though he does, no 
 doubt, speak of " the law of conquest " as " familiar to the feudal law 
 and Normandy. " 
 
 ' See his Inq.p. m. in 1272 (fial. oflnq., 11, No. 812). 
 
 * Some miles north of Buckenham. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 157 
 
 buried in the abbey of their own foundation. But 
 as the Norfolk fief was divided between him and 
 the youngest co-heir, they can, neither of them, 
 have had so rich a share as Fitz-Alan. 
 
 It was urged on behalf of the Duke of Norfolk, 
 in 1901, that — 
 
 In 30 Edward I, A.D. 1302, Robert de Tateshale 
 petitioned the King and claimed to have the service, 
 alleging that his grandfather, Robert de Tateshale, was 
 received three times in the reign of King Henry III to 
 do the ofBce, and did it. Whereas (sic) it appears by the 
 Reii Book of the Exchequer that the Earl of Arundel and 
 not Robert de Tateshale, served the office by his deputy,^ 
 
 But between these statements there is no contra- 
 diction. No one could have claimed to serve the 
 office before the earl's death (1243). ^^^ there 
 remained a space of some 30 years (i 243-1 272) 
 within which Robert's grandfather, then senior 
 co-heir of the earls, may well have been ' received ' 
 as alleged. It was further urged for the Duke that 
 Robert's claim was " not successful, for at the 
 coronation of King Edward the Second the earl of 
 Arundel served the office. " ^ But this omits the 
 important fact that Robert died the year after 
 making the above claim (31 Edward I), leaving a 
 son who died a minor, the last of his line, * before 
 
 ' Court of Claims, p. 235. 
 
 ' Ibid., -p. 236. 
 
 ' His inheritance was split up between three co-heirs, the eldest, 
 Thomas de Cailly, obtaining the castle of Buckenham and one fourth 
 of the manor. On the death of this Thomas, some ten years later 
 (10 Edward 11), the jurors found that half the manor of Buckenham 
 was held by his predecessor's widow, the rest being apparently divided 
 between the three co-parceners, and that the " manor is held of the 
 King by service of being the King's butler. " {Cat. oflnq., VI, No. 48). 
 This subdivision must have greatly weakened the daim. 
 
158 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the accession of Edward II. At the coronation of 
 Edward I (August 1274) some one must have 
 officiated, for it was solemnised with due splendour. 
 But unfortunately we do not know who it was. It 
 cannot have been John FitzAlan, then lord of 
 Arundel,^ for he was only 7^ years old at the 
 time. 
 
 We read, indeed, in the latest product of histor- 
 ical scholarship on the subject that — 
 
 At the coronation of Edward I, in 1276 (sic), it was 
 found that the chief butlership was held by the tenure of 
 the manors of Kenninghall, Buckenham and Wymondham.* 
 
 But, as the coronation of Edward I was in 1 274, 
 there is evidently something wrong, and one can 
 only surmise that the author was thinking of the 
 Hundred Rolls return to that effect, or of some 
 other Inquisition. To continue the above quota- 
 tion : — 
 
 In 1327 the earl of Arundel claimed the office.,... The 
 Montealt family is now merged in that of the Duke of 
 Norfolk, who is therefore (jic) chief butler as well as 
 Earl Marshal. ' 
 
 As in 13 27 there was no earl of Arundel, the 
 office could not well be claimed by him. And the 
 ' Montealt ' family is not " merged in that of the 
 Duke, " who does not even hold their manor of 
 Kenninghall, in right of which they claimed. In- 
 deed, the Duke's petition presented in the same year 
 (1901), argued vigorously against the claim of the 
 
 * The earldom of Arundel was not revived till later. 
 ' English Coronation Records (1901), p. Ixxii. 
 ' Ibid. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 159 
 
 Montealt family and in favour of his Grace's own 
 claim, not by descent from them, but as Earl of 
 Arundel ! There would seem, therefore, to be still 
 room for such an attempt as I am making to state 
 the facts of the case. 
 
 At the coronation of Edward II (i 308), Edmund 
 (Fitz Alan) earl of Arundel undoubtedly served, 
 though Mohaut, youngest of the co-heirs, had 
 claimed the office, a claim which he made success- 
 fully at the next coronation (1327), as was shown 
 by Mr. Taylor in 1901.^ But this, as I observed 
 above, was doubtless owing to the disinherison, at 
 the time, of the earls of Arundel. The next cor- 
 onation (1377) is the first for which we possess the 
 record of a court of claims, from which we learn 
 that the earl of Arundel, claiming in right of his 
 earldom, was unsuccessfully opposed by the lord of 
 the manor of (Nether) Bilsington in Kent. The 
 Bilsington serjeanty, the claim of which to serve at 
 the coronation banquet was eventually recognised 
 in another form, is dealt with elsewhere in these 
 pages. In 1 377 the above claim was rejected on 
 the ground that, after parting with the manor, the 
 earls of Arundel had continued to serve as chief 
 butlers, and that the lord of Bilsington could show 
 no precedent for the exercise of the office by his 
 predecessors. 
 
 The earls, however, were not allowed to retain 
 the coveted honour without challenge. Only a 
 few years later (1381) the lord of Buckenham and 
 Wymondham claimed restitution of the office, a 
 claim which was revived in fresh circumstances for 
 
 ' Court of Claims, p. 269. 
 
i6o THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the coronation feast of Queen Katherine (1420/2 1). 
 The claims made upon that occasion have not 
 received, I think, sufficient attention. That of the 
 earls of Arundel was rent, as it were, in twain; for 
 on the death of Earl Thomas in 141 5, his heirship 
 in blood had passed to his three sisters, but the 
 castle and honour of Arundel passed to his heir 
 male under a family entail. Both parties claimed 
 the office in 1420/21, the three sisters as represent- 
 ing the earls of Arundel in whom it had been 
 vested, ^ and the heir male, John Fitz Alan, not as 
 earl of Arundel (for his right to the earldom was 
 in dispute) , but as seised of the castle and honour of 
 Arundel. * 
 
 This claim is most important, for it diffisrs wholly 
 from that of his predecessors and his successors, 
 namely that they were entitled as earls of Arundel. 
 Probably the Court of claims, groping as usual for 
 precedent, thought that John FitzAlan had at 
 least one point in common with his predecessors, 
 namely his tenure of Arundel, while the three 
 
 ' Their petition is epitomised in the Duke of Norfolk's petition of 
 1901 {Court of Claims, pp. 240-241). They claimed that their ancestors 
 
 had been seised "in right of the earldom of Arundel and they 
 
 prayed to be received at the Coronation of Queen Katherine by Richard 
 (sic) Lenthall their deputy. " The youngest sister had married Sir 
 Rowland "L^-axha^, wrongly given as "Robert Lenthall" (p. 240). Their 
 position should be compared with that of the three sisters apd co-heirs 
 of the Earl of Oxford in 1526. 
 
 ' " Setting out his title to the Castle and honour of Arundel, and 
 claiming that those who were seized of the said Castle and honour from 
 the time whereof memorj' is not, had served the office of Chief Butler 
 at the Coronations of the Kings and Queens of England " {Ibid., p. 241). 
 The falsity of this claim is obvious from the fact that at the Coronation 
 of Edward III, less than a century before, the earl of Kent (the King's 
 uncle), though seised of the castle and honour, had neither claimed nor 
 sorved the office. 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER i6i 
 
 co-heirs had neither the earldom' nor the tenure. 
 After this the earls of Arundel continued to be 
 allowed the office, except that there seems to be no 
 evidence as to the coronation of Edward IV. It 
 may be pointed out, however, that just before it, 
 Sir John (afterwards Lord) Wenlock, a great sup- 
 porter of the King, was granted, " with the advice 
 
 of the council the office of chief butler of 
 
 England " for life, " in the same manner as Ralph 
 Boteler, knight, lord of Sudeley, held it. " ^ In 
 spite, however, of the identity of style, it is possible 
 that the honorary office remained with the earls of 
 Arundel, while that in which Wenlock succeeded 
 Lord Sudeley was the actual headship of the butler's 
 department, of which we read in the Liber Niger 
 of King Edward's household : — 
 
 Office of Butler of England capital, unto whome the 
 Styward and Thesaurer of Household make yerely war- 
 
 raunt this sergeaunt capitall Buttler taketh wages 
 
 of houshold vij ^.ob. ' and clothing xlvj s. viij d. with 
 
 the serjeauntes It hath lyked the Kinge now, ^ by the 
 
 avyse of his full sadde and noble counsayle, to discharge 
 this greate Butler of all the pourveyances of wynes for 
 the King and his houshold, and to exempte him from 
 this courte, lyke as is nowe the office of Privey Scale, the 
 office of Marschalsey... Taylour, armourer, pavyllioner, 
 
 and other moe that sumetyme were here incorporate 
 
 which littelyth this courte to no small blemysshe, but 
 to greete profit shall prove and worship for the Kinge. ^ 
 
 ' It was claimed by the (Mowbray) Duke of Norfolk, representing the 
 eldest. 
 
 » Cd. of Pat. Rolls, 146 1-7, p. 8. 
 
 ' 7i </. a day was the wage of several household officers (see pp. 86, 88). 
 
 * /. e. Temp. Edward IV. 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries), pp. 73-4. 
 
 II 
 
1 62 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 This duplication of the office of Chief Butler 
 would roughly resemble the existence to-day of a 
 Great Chamberlain and a Lord Chamberlain ; but 
 a period in which the office of Privy Seal was 
 spoken of with those of tailor and armourer was 
 obviously far removed from our own. 
 
 The earls of Arundel appear to have duly exer- 
 cised the office from the coronation of Richard III 
 till that of Edward VI, when it was again unsuc- 
 cessfully claimed by the Lord of Buckenham. 
 Once more — at the coronation of Charles II (i 66i) 
 — was their claim unsuccessfully opposed from the 
 same quarter. But the singular thing is that on 
 this occasion the earl (or rather his trustees for 
 him), while, as usual, claiming " that the said office 
 is appendant to his county or earldom of Arundel," 
 added to it the further and clearly contradictory 
 claim ^ that he held the manor of Kenninghall, 
 " which is and anciently of long time heretofore 
 was held in grand serjeanty, that is to say, to be 
 the principal and Chief Butler of England on the 
 days of the Coronations of the Kings of England."^ 
 This was a tactical blunder as amazing as it was 
 wanton, for the whole question was at once re- 
 
 * The Duke of Norfolk's petition in 1 901, after speaking rightly of 
 *' the trustees of Thomas (sic) Duke of Norfolk, Earl of Arundel, who 
 claimed the office, " proceeds, if correctly copied, to quote the further 
 claim as that " of the said Henry ( !) Earl of Arundel " {Court of Claims, 
 p. 244). Either this is a mere blunder or it is taken from the petition 
 of his nephew Duke Henry, at the coronation of James II. 
 
 * " Plutot que mesme le Due tienne en son droit et en son demesne le 
 mannor de Kenninghall ove les appurtenances en le county de Norfolke 
 qui et auncientment et de long temps par devant fuit tenus en grand 
 serjeantie c'est ascavoir destre le principal et chief hotelier d'Angleterre. " 
 Compare the Earl of Arundel's phrase in 1 158, " pincernarum princeps 
 sum et primus " (p. 153 ). 
 
THE CHIEF BUTLER 163 
 
 opened by this fatal admission. If Kenninghall 
 was held in serjeanty by the service of acting as 
 chief butler, it is obvious that the oiEce was not 
 held in right of the earldom of Arundel. ^ The 
 two claims are contradictory. 
 
 Moreover if the serjeanty be thus admitted, it 
 is not the manor of Kenninghall alone that is 
 concerned. Buckenham has at least as good a 
 claim, and in my opinion, a better ; for it 
 clearly formed the caput of the alleged butelaria. 
 Nevertheless the Dukes (as Earls) thenceforth 
 regularly continued to add at coronations this 
 second claim " up to and inclusive of that of 
 George IV, " ^ the last occasion on which a chief 
 butler was required. It was, therefore, natural 
 enough that when they claimed anew in 1901, 
 after parting with the manor, their claim was 
 opposed by Mr. Taylor, whose father had bought it 
 from them. ' As there is no longer a coronation 
 banquet, the claims could not be decided. 
 
 I have endeavoured to state, without partiality, 
 the evidence bearing on the origin of this most 
 
 ' Kenninghall had been acquired hj the family long after they had 
 made their claim as earls. It is obviously to Kenninghall that the 
 " Lords' Committee on the Dignity of a Peer " refer in their third 
 Report (1822) where they observe that "at this day the Duke of 
 Norfolk, as inheriting the property of the Arundel family (sic), enjoys 
 part of the ancient Barony of Albini in Norfolk, and has been allowed 
 to perform the Service of Butler as incident to the tenure of that 
 property" (p. 82). Apart &om the interest of the latter part of this 
 statement as evidence of the authors' belief, its earlier portion is 
 erroneous, for Kenninghall did not come to the Dukes of Norfolk by 
 inheritance from the D'Aubignys. 
 
 * Court of Claims, p. 274. 
 
 ' Ihid., p. 275. 
 
1 64 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ancient office. To sum up, we have seen, at least, 
 that it cannot have been originally held in right of 
 the earldom of Arundel, and that it must have 
 been granted either as a territorial serjeanty or as 
 an office in gross. For both views there is some- 
 thing to be said. The presumption affiarded by 
 the other great offices of state is in favour of the 
 latter view. Especially is this the case with the 
 office of Great Chamberlain, which had its root of 
 title in the same reign. On the other hand, so 
 far as we know, there has never been a grant of 
 the Chief Butlership by charter. If the whole of 
 the Norfolk fief was held by knight-service, there 
 is no room for serjeanty. If, however, three or 
 more of its great demesne manors were held by a 
 separate tenure, that tenure may, as alleged, have 
 been butler-service. But it is, at least, highly 
 significant that in no official list of Norfolk ser- 
 jeanties is this service found. And this is further 
 emphasised by the fact that the Kentish manor of 
 Bilsington does appear as a serjeanty and was 
 arrented as such.^ It was, indeed, on this fact that 
 its holder wisely rested his case when he claimed 
 the butler's office in 1 377. 
 
 There is, as we have seen, abundant proof that 
 Norfolk jurors returned certain Norfolk manors, of 
 which Buckenham was clearly the head, as held by 
 the service of acting as chief butler. But the 
 evidence in the case of the Great Chamberlain 
 demonstrates the utter worthlessness of such returns. 
 The decisive test of scutage cannot, in their case, 
 be applied, and as I said, it is not possible to prove 
 
 ' Testa, (See below). 
 
THE ASSISTANT BUTLER 165 
 
 definitely whether they were held, as was the rest 
 of the fief, by knight-service or not. '■ That they 
 were held by serjeanty I hold " not proven. " But, 
 whatever view historians may take of the origin of 
 this office, one can hardly doubt that a Court of 
 Claims would award it to the earls of Arundel with 
 its right, at the banquet of the crowned King, to 
 a golden cup and cover and its disputable claim to 
 such further perquisites as the wine that was left 
 over from the feast and " the vessels that lay under 
 the bar. " 
 
 THE ASSISTANT BUTLER 
 
 At the coronation of Queen Eleanor in 1236 
 there was a dispute as to this office between the 
 Mayor of London and " Master " Michael Belet. 
 Mr. Wickham Legg writes, in the " Introduction " 
 to his book : — 
 
 In 1236 the manor of Sheen was held by Michael Belet 
 as King's butler ; and he had to find two white cups for 
 the king. The office that MichaeF Belet held on that 
 occasion appears to have been due to a gross piece of 
 favouritism on the part of Henry III. * 
 
 With this view I cannot agree. What the record 
 states is this : — 
 
 servivit autem sub eodem [comite] in latere suo Magister 
 
 Michael Belet, cujus est iUud officium secundario 
 
 Habet etiam Magister Michael pincernariam in domo 
 regis sub comite dejure veteri (p. 60). ' 
 
 ' Because there seems to have been no part of the total quota due that 
 remained chargeable on the " demesne. " 
 ' English Coronation Records, (p. kxix). 
 » See Lib. Rub., p. 758. 
 
1 66 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 The allegation of " ancient right " is entirely con- 
 firmed by the Pipe Roll of 1 130 (31 Hen. I), in 
 which we read, under Surrey, that John Belet 
 accounts for jC^7- J- 3- " P^° rehabenda terra sua de 
 Sceanes " (p. 49). Sheen, now Richmond, was 
 the manor held by this service, as we learn from 
 the Testa. Its abstract of the 1 2 12 Inquest (p. 226) 
 states that Sheen, which had been in the King's 
 demesne, had been given by Henry I to the prede- 
 cessors of Michael Belet, then in possession, (to 
 hold) by butler service. ^ Six years earlier (1206) 
 this Michael had given ^100 for his succession to 
 the butlership. ^ 
 
 The pedigree becomes difficult to follow owing 
 to collateral successions, but we know that in 
 1218-1219 Wimund de Raleigh gave a hundred 
 marcs for the wardship of Michael Belet's daughter 
 and heir,' and that, very shortly afterwards, he was 
 holding the Sheen serjeanty as her guardian.* The 
 industry of Blount has preserved an entry on a 
 Surrey plea roll which he dates 1 9 Henry III, — 
 but which must be later,* for it refers to the arren- 
 tation, — giving a different version of the service, 
 namely the presentation of cups at the Coronation 
 
 ' " Syenes, quod fuit dominicum domini Regis H. vet' dedit mane- 
 rium de Syenes antecessoribus Mich[aelis] Belet qui nunc tenet, per ser- 
 jantiam pinceme " (The text is corrupt). 
 
 ' Magister Michael Belet dat centum libras pro habenda pincernaria 
 domini Regis sicut jus suum " {Rot de obi. etfin. [6 Joktt\,p. 358). 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 3 Hen. III. 
 
 * " Wimundus de Raleg habet custodiam filie et heredis Nichis («V) 
 Belet cum hereditate sua in Senes ; et debet esse in custodia domini 
 Regis ; et valet per annum x li. praeter duas dotes ; et idem Wimundus 
 habet custodiam predictam per Willelmum Briwere ; et (est) serjantia 
 domini Regis de buteleria sua" {TestOf p. 227). 
 
 ' See Testa, p. 228. 
 
THE ASSISTANT BUTLER 167 
 
 banquet. ^ When the serjeanty was " arrented " 
 (in 1250) it was in the hands of Emma Oliver and 
 Alice de Valletort, the daughters and co-heirs of 
 John Belet/ and it seems to have been a clear case 
 of a serjeanty being held jointly, and not being 
 deemed " impartible. " Apart from the fines 
 imposed for alienation, the two sisters arranged 
 that each of them should hold as half a knight's 
 fee that portion of her property which she had not 
 alienated.' 
 
 At about the same time, Emma ' Belet ' (who 
 was apparently a widow) sued John de Valletort and 
 Alice his wife for land in West Sheen. The plea 
 contains much information on the pedigree.* Sheen 
 was thenceforth held by knight-service: the butler- 
 service was at an end. 
 
 We now return to the allegation that Michael 
 Belet was allowed to usurp the place of the Mayor 
 of London at Queen Eleanor's Coronation (1236). 
 His office, we have seen, was no new one, and, as 
 I read the records, the Mayor's claim to take his 
 place in 1236 was rightly rejected by the King. 
 Mr. Legg asserts that '* the City of London, which 
 
 ' " Othonns (sic) de Grandison et Johannnes de Valletorta et Alicia 
 uxor ejus tenent villain de Chenes (sic) de serjantia inveniendi, die 
 Coronationis Regis, duos albos ciphos ad prandium ; et modo arrentata 
 est. " The form " Chenes " disguises the identity of the place. 
 
 ' " Serjantia Emme Oliver et Alicie sororis ejus in Schenes, que fuit 
 Johannis Belet patris earum, pro qua debuit esse pincerna domini Regis " 
 (Testa, p. 228). 
 
 ' " Johannes de Valletorta, qui duxit in uxorem Aliciam predictam, 
 
 alteram heredem dicte serjantie, faciat servicium dimidii feodi 
 
 unius militis de parte sua quam tenet que non est alienata Et 
 
 predicta Emma faciat servicium dimidii feodi unlus militis de parte sua 
 quam tenet que non est alienata" (Testa, p. 229). Cf. pp. 28-9 above. 
 
 * Wrottesley's Pedigrees from the Pka Rolls, p. 495. 
 
1 68 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 had served in butlery at the Coronation of Richard I, 
 is set aside in favour of Master Michael Belet '' 
 (p. 57). But what we read of the former occasion 
 is : " Gives vero Lundonie servierunt de pincerna- 
 ria, et cives Wintonie de coquina" (p. 50). There 
 is no mention here of the Mayor, nor, indeed was 
 there a Mayor at the time.^ In 1236 a novel 
 claim was advanced by the Mayor, namely to take 
 Michael's place at the King's table.* I do not 
 gather that the right of the citizens to serve in the 
 butlery was denied, and indeed the record admits 
 that the City is bound to render that service. The 
 personal claim of the Mayor was compromised by 
 his serving the two bishops on the King's right.' 
 When we come to the Court of Claims for the 
 Coronation of Richard II, we find the Mayor and 
 citizens claiming (through the Recorder): (i) that 
 the Mayor in virtue of his Mayoralty should person- 
 ally serve the King, both in hall at dinner and in 
 his chamber afterwards, with the King's gold cup, 
 and should receive the gold cup and ewer as his 
 fee ; (2) that " the other citizens," chosen by the 
 City for the purpose, should serve in the butler's 
 office as assistants to the chief butler, both in hall 
 and in the great chamber. It entirely confirms my 
 own view that, while no objection was raised to 
 the citizens' claim, the Court reported to the King 
 
 ' See rsxy researches on the subject. 
 
 ' " Andreas autem. Major civitatis Lundonix qui ibidem venerat ad 
 serviendum de pincernaria cum ccc et Ix cupis, eo quod civitas Lundonie 
 servire tenetur in auxilium majoris pincernae, sicuti et civitas Wintonie 
 de coquina in auxilium senescalli, vendicavit locum magistri Michaelis 
 astandi coram Rege, sed repulsus fuit precepto Regis dicentis quod 
 nullus de jure ibi deberet servire nisi magister Michael. " 
 
 ' " et ita concessit Major et servivit duobus episcopis a dextris Regis. " 
 
THE ASSISTANT BUTLER 169 
 
 that the Exchequer records proved the service now 
 claimed for the Mayor to have been formerly dis- 
 charged by the chief butler and the fee received 
 by him. ^ The King, thereupon, to gratify the 
 Londoners and encourage them to loyal devotion, 
 compromised the matter by allowing the Mayor to 
 serve him in his chamber, ^ receiving the golden 
 cup and ewer as his fee. The chief butler — on 
 this occasion the Earl of Arundel — ^would serve 
 him, however, in hall, at the coronation banquet, 
 and would receive the gold cup there used as his 
 fee.* The Crown, therefore, had to find two gold 
 cups, one for the chief butler and one for the 
 Mayor as his assistant.* 
 
 The Mayor's fee, however, must have been of 
 older date, for a notable petition on the Rolls of 
 Parliament from Richard Bettoyne of London 
 states that he, being Mayor, had discharged the 
 office of butler at the Coronation of Edward III,* 
 
 * " pro eo quod per recorda et evidencias in scaccario Regis tesidencia 
 est compertum quod capitalis Pincerna domini Regis pro tempore 
 
 existens dictum servicium quod pro predicto Majore est vendicatum 
 
 facere et hujusmodi feodum optinere solebat temporibus retroactis " 
 etc., etc. 
 
 ' " cum idem dominus noster Rex, post prandium, cameram suam 
 ingressus vinum pecierit {sic), dictus Major predicto Regi de cipho aureo 
 serviret. *' 
 
 ' The partial success, on this occasion, of the Mayor of London was 
 perhaps due to the fact that the butler serjeanty of the Belets had long 
 come to an end. 
 
 * We read accordingly, of the coronation of Edward VI, that eighty 
 ounces of " liemi souveraine gold " were "employed upon making of three 
 cnppes of gold gevin the day of the Coronacion to therle of Arundel, 
 Sir Edward Dymmocke and the Mayour of London for their claymes. " 
 {Jets of the Privy Council, 1547, p. 65.) After the banquet the Mayor of 
 London, " bearyng his cuppe in his hande, with his brethren went 
 through the hal to their barge. " 
 
 ' We know hardly anything of this Coronation. 
 
170 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 with 360 'valets,' all in one livery, each of them 
 carrying a silver cup, as at the previous corona- 
 tions,^ and had received the accustomed fee, namely 
 a gold cup and cover, M^ith an enamelled gold 
 ewer, ^ but that the Exchequer had ordered the 
 Sheriffs to distrain upon his property to the 
 amount of ^89. 1 2. 6. in payment for his fee ! He 
 said they would gladly pay the fee if they were 
 discharged from the service.' 
 
 Eventually the Mayor's persistence was rewarded 
 to some extent, for he was allowed to perform his 
 service at the banquet itself when James II was 
 crowned. 
 
 The Lord Mayor of London, attended by twelve prin- 
 cipal citizens, came from the cupboard and presented on 
 his knee a bowl of wine to the King in a gold cup which 
 he received as his fee ; * and with his attendants repaired 
 to dinner at the lower end of the hall. 
 
 But indeed, two centuries earlier, at the corona- 
 tion of Richard III, this was already the practice. 
 
 At the end of dinner the Mayor of London served the 
 King and Queene with Sweete wine and had of ech of 
 them a cup of gold and a ewer of gold. * 
 
 This was before " the King returned to his 
 chamber." Mr. Legg observes that : — 
 
 ' This is extremely important as confirming the almost incredible 
 statement that a previous mayor had so served, with 360 ' cups, ' at the 
 coronation of Queen Eleanor in 1236 (see p. 168 above).' 
 
 ' " le fee q'appendoit a eel jorne, c'est assavoir un coupe d'or ove la 
 covercle et un ewer d'or enamaille. " 
 
 * Rot. Pari., II, 96 (quoted in His Grace the Steward, p. 183). 
 
 * " one Cup of Gold for the Lord Mayor of London " is named, in the 
 Lord Chamberlain's Records, vol. 429, fo. 9, as provided. 
 
 ' Legg, op. cit. p. 197. 
 
THE ASSISTANT BUTLER 171 
 
 While the King and Queen are eating the wafers, ^ the 
 Lord Mayor of London who assists the Chief Buder in 
 " botelry," brings a bowl of wine in a golden cup, which 
 
 he retains as his fee (p. Ixvi) The Lord Mayor of 
 
 London claims to serve in botelry and to assist the Chief 
 Butler in his duties. The citizens of Winchester also 
 claimed this service ; but after 1236, when they were put 
 aside by Henry III [see below Doc. VIII p. 60], they do 
 not appear to have attempted a claim again (p. Ixxx). 
 
 This is one of the strangest errors in Mr. Legg's 
 ' introduction,' for, pn referring to the passage he 
 cites from his own pages, we find that the citizens 
 of Winchester did not claim to serve in the botelry, 
 but in the kitchen, and were not " put aside " by 
 the King. 
 
 Moreover, his own statement on p. f^j (see 
 above) is that it was " the City of London " which 
 was " set aside " by the King in 1236. It was, as 
 a matter of fact, at the re-coronation of Richard in 
 1 194, which he has so strangely overlooked, that 
 " the citizens of Winchester also claimed this ser- 
 vice," * and were " put aside " by the venal King 
 (for 200 marcs!) and relegated, as before, to the 
 kitchen.^ Held in the monks' refectory, it was a 
 glorious banquet {epulabantur splendide). 
 
 Lastly, the Mayor and citizens of Oxford claim- 
 ed to serve in the butlery with the citizens of 
 London. Mr. WoUaston's book is only concerned 
 with actual Courts of Claims, so that his first men- 
 tion of this service is at the coronation of Charles 11. 
 
 * See the section on " the waferer serjeanty. " 
 
 * Possibly because this ceremony took place at Winchester. 
 
 ' " Gives autem Lundoniarium, data regi mercede ducentarum mar- 
 carum, servierunt de pincernaria contra calumniam civium Wintonie. 
 Gives veto Wintonie servierunt de coquina " (floveden. III, 247). 
 
172 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 But we get a glimpse of it much earlier, for at the 
 coronation of Anne Boleyn, where twelve citizens 
 of London assisted the chief butler by waiting on 
 him "at the cupboard," the Mayor of Oxford 
 kept the buttery bar. At the coronation of 
 Edward VI he again made good his right " to ayde 
 the chief butler in his service of ale at the barr." ^ 
 As a matter of fact the Oxford privilege appears 
 to be the oldest of all so far as records are concern- 
 ed. Although known to us only by a late inspex- 
 imus, there is a charter of Henry II granting to 
 the citizens of Oxford as an additional privilege, 
 " et quod ad festum {sic) meum ^ mihi serviant 
 cum illis de Butteillaria mea." * This charter was not 
 known to Eyton, but it seems to belong to the 
 opening day of 1 156, when the King was on his 
 way to Dover. * The importance of this date is 
 that the words " cum illis " carry back the service 
 of the citizens of London even further. 
 
 THE BILSINGTON SERJEANTY 
 
 This is a most difficult serjeanty to deal with. 
 Bilsington was a manor in Kent, which was alleged 
 
 ' Taylor's Glory of Regality, p. 141. 
 
 ' This is a somewhat ambiguous phrase. It does not specify the 
 coronation and yet, being in the singular, it cannot cover the crown- 
 wearing days. Possibly the inspeximus text is corrupt. 
 
 ' Ogle's Royal letters to Oxford, p. 4. " Illi " are the citizens of 
 London. 
 
 * Ey ton's Court and Itinerary, p. 15. Its witnesses are Thomas the 
 Chancellor, Reginald, Earl of Cornwall, Hugh (wrongly given as Henry) 
 Earl of Norfolk, Richard de Humez the Constable (of Normandy), 
 Warln Fitz Gerold the chamberlain, Manasser Biset the Steward 
 (dapifero) and Jocelin de Balliol. 
 
THE BILSINGTON SERJEANTY 173 
 
 to have been held by the earls of Arundel by the 
 service of being king's butler.^ The question that 
 was raised, and that had to be solved, was the 
 nature of the service due from the manor after it 
 had passed out of their hands. 
 
 One cannot here trace the whole history of the 
 manor, but it is important to correct Mr. Legg's 
 erroneous statement that " it was originally in the 
 possession of the Albini family. Earls of Arundel, 
 but was alienated in the time of Edward III ^ " (sic). 
 It was alienated, on the contrary, in the time of 
 Henry III, when the male line of the " Albini " 
 family came to an end. The statements in the 
 Testa (which are confined to the " arrentation " of 
 the serjeanty in 1250) are fully confirmed by the 
 charter rolls and patent rolls. 
 
 The manor had undoubtedly been held by Hugh 
 earl of Arundel (who died in 1243), and the Testa 
 states that John Maunsel held, of the gift of his 
 heirs, a moiety " of the said serjeanty by sufficient 
 confirmation of the King specifying the said ser- 
 jeanty " ' (p. 216). Now the patent rolls shew that 
 as early as July 15th, 1243, John Maunsel had a 
 grant, during pleasure, of the manor, which the 
 King had impounded as " land of the Normans, " 
 and that he had licence, 28th May, 1 244, to receive 
 the earl's lands there from his heirs. Two years 
 later (22 April 1246) the king confirmed to him 
 all the earl's inheritance in Bilsington, which the 
 
 ' "pro qua debuit esse pincema domini regis" {Testa, p. 216 its). 
 
 ' English Coronation Records, p. Ixxyiii. 
 
 * Hasted holds that there were two manors, of which Nether Bilsing- 
 ton was the chief, and that only one of them was alienated to Maunsel ; 
 but the records, we shall see, speak of his obtaining all the earl's lands there. 
 
174 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 earl's heirs had given him, as it was found to be 
 not " land of the Normans," and on Oct. 7, 1 248 
 the king granted him " all fines for alienations of 
 lands pertaining to the serjeanty of Bilsington, 
 which the said John has of the gift of the heirs of 
 Hugh, sometime earl of Arundel, and which the 
 king has confirmed to him by charter. " ^ This 
 brings us to the " arrentation," when the "butler" 
 service was recognised. 
 
 Was it wrongly recognised ? Stapleton asserts 
 that the earls of Arundel had no connexion with 
 Bilsington till it was granted, as escheat of the 
 Normans, to William, earl of Arundel, during 
 pleasure, in 1 207, ^ and complains that Hasted 
 falsely ascribes its acquisition to William de Albini 
 in the reign of Henry I. * Stapleton's authority is 
 very great, but Hasted seems to be right. For the 
 tithes of Bilsington were given to Rochester by 
 William " de Albengneyo " * (/. e. the original 
 " Butler "), whose daughter seems to have brought 
 Bilsington to her husband.® This, however, does 
 not prove that he was butler in right of Bilsington ; 
 the alleged tenure may have had its rise, on the 
 contrary, in his office.® 
 
 ' Cat. of Charter Rolls, I, 292, 338. John then founded Bilsington 
 Priory, endowing it with part of his lands there. He was, of course, 
 the famous royal chaplain and official of Henry III, who became so weal- 
 thy a pluralist. 
 
 ' Stapleton^s point that it had previously been held by Robert de 
 Courcy is confirmed by the Testa (p. 2 1 6), where we have to recognise 
 Bilsington under the disguise of " Kulsintone, " which had escheated to 
 the King. 
 
 ' Liber de Antiquis Le^bus, p. xl. (note). 
 
 * Lib. Rub., p. 751. 
 
 ' Dugdale's Baronage, I, 118. 
 
 ^ See the section on " The chief butler. " 
 
THE BILSINGTON SERJEANTY 175 
 
 The very slight evidence in the Testa is supple- 
 mented by two records which were noted for us by 
 Blount. The first is an entry on the Hundred 
 Rolls (1275) that the Prior of Bilsington holds 
 part of the serjeanty there by the tenure of serving 
 the King with his cup on Whitsunday. ^ The 
 other is a Kent plea roll of 21 Edw. I (1292-3), 
 on which we read that the earl of Arundel's 
 " ancestors " used to hold Bilsington by the ser- 
 jeanty of being king's butler on Whitsunday. ^ The 
 concurrence of these two documents as to a " Whit- 
 sunday " service is very curious ; one can only 
 suggest that it refers to the annual court at West- 
 minster, the nearest of the three to Kent, being 
 held at Whitsuntide. 
 
 At the first and famous Court of Claims, in 
 1 377, the earl of Arundel's claim to serve as chief 
 butler was opposed by Edmund Staplegate, who 
 claimed that, as he held the manor of Bilsington 
 
 par les services destre Botiller de nostre sieur le Roi a sa 
 coronement, come pleinement appiert en le livre des fees 
 
 de serjanties en exchequer nostre sieur le Roi profre 
 
 de faiire le dit office de Botiller et prie quLI a ce soit receu. 
 
 He added the very interesting fact that his ward- 
 ship and marriage had been given to Geoffrey 
 Chaucer (' Chausyer '), from whom he had pur- 
 chased them. Edmund was well advised in appeal- 
 ing to the Exchequer record, as all claimants 
 endeavoured to do, for the Testa^ as we have seen, 
 did recognise the service, though it did not, as he 
 alleged, refer to the coronation. 
 
 • " ad serviendum dominum Regem, die Pentecostes, de coupa sua. " 
 ' " ^er serjantiam essendi pincerna domini Regis in die Pentecostes. " 
 
176 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 The earl had tersely claimed the office, without 
 vouching any record, for in his case there was 
 nothing in the Testa to which he could appeal. 
 But Edmund Staplegate was a small man, and the 
 earl a very great one, nor could the former cite an 
 actual precedent, which is what the Court has 
 always required. ^ So, after long discussion and 
 hearing of evidence, * it was decided that there was 
 not then time to settle the matter finally, and that, 
 as the earls could show ' possession of the office, 
 after their alienation of the manor, the earl should 
 serve at that coronation, with 2isahojure to Edmund. 
 
 At a very much later time, the coronation of 
 Charles II, Edmund's claim was revived. The 
 lord of the manor of (Nether) Bilsington was 
 allowed, as his service, to present three maple cups 
 (which he did by deputy), and this strange substi- 
 tute for the original claim was thenceforth regu- 
 larly allowed down to the last banquet, that of 
 George IV, when a deputy presented the cups. 
 By a curious — and economical — custom the King 
 presented to the Mayor of Oxford, as his fee for 
 helping at the banquet, the three cups he had just 
 received from the lord of the manor of Bilsington. * 
 I can, however, prove that he was less shabbily 
 treated in the 17th century. For the coronation of 
 James II, as for that of Charles II, there was 
 
 ' See p. 152 above. 
 
 ' " auditis quampluribus recprdis, racionibus, at evidenciis... curie 
 monstratis. " 
 
 ' " per recordum de scaccario est compertum. " It is not easy to say 
 what this " recordum " can have been. 
 
 * Taylor's Glory of Regality,^. 225 ; Legg's EngVish Coronation Records, 
 pp. Ixvi, Ixxx. 
 
THE ' HOSE ' SERJEANTY 177 
 
 provided " One guilt Bowie for the Mayor of 
 Oxford, " as for the King's Champion. ^ 
 
 SERJEANTY OF " THE HOSE " 
 
 Nothing, perhaps, in this work has caused me 
 greater difficulty than the meaning of that " hose " 
 or " huse " which we find associated with wine. 
 In the Constitutio domus regis we meet, not, indeed, 
 with hosa, but with hosarii as on the staiF of the 
 butler's department, * and Robert " Hosarius" occurs 
 as a considerable holder of land on the Pipe Roll 
 of 1 130 (p. 72) under Sussex. But so completely 
 did the term baffle the ^ed Book editor that he had 
 to leave Hosarii untranslated. ' He does, indeed, 
 observe that " Probably the confusion between the 
 offices of hosiers of the Wardrobe and Buttery res- 
 pectively is of old standing " *, but neither in old 
 English nor in old French can we find " Hosier " 
 used for a buttery officer. Ducange, we find, takes 
 (under Osd) these Hosarii to be wardrobe officers 
 in charge of the King's hose. 
 
 When we turn to serjeanties, we find, under 
 Berkshire, in the Red Book (p. 451), Roger de 
 St. Philibert holding land " per serjanteriam ser- 
 viendi in Husa. " In the Testa we read, further, 
 that Hugh de St. Philibert held the land " in Bray 
 per serjantiam serviendi de Husa" (p. 128), and 
 
 ' Lord Chamberlain's Records, Vol. 429, fo. 9. 
 ' " Hosarii in domo commedent ; et hominibus suis unicuique iij 
 den." (Red Book, p. 810). 
 ' p. ccxci. Cf. p. 60 above. 
 * p. ccxcix. 
 
 12 
 
178 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 finally that he held " in dominico suo Treswell 
 (sic) infra limites manerii de Bray de domino rege 
 in capite per serjantiatn de la Hurse " {sic). ^ This 
 would not tell us much if it were not for a welcome 
 entry for which we arc indebted to Blount : — 
 
 " Hugo de Sancto Philiberto tenet manerium de Cres- 
 well, in com. Berks., per serjantiam ducendi butellos (sicj 
 vini ad jentaculum Domini Regis — et vocatur ilia Ser- 
 jantia de la Huse^ — ^per regnum Angliae. " * 
 
 We thus know that the estate was the manor of 
 Cresswell in Bray, on the Thames, the manor 
 house of which (associated with traditions of Nell 
 Gwyn) is known from its early possessors as Phil- 
 berts (or Filberts), and that the serjeanty was alleged 
 to be connected with the carriage of wine. The 
 Inq, p. m. on the elder Hugh records him as hold- 
 ing Creswell, " whence his ancestors sometime 
 served de la Huse. " ' The Record office editors 
 were evidently baffled by the phrase " de la Huse " 
 arid even seem to have strangely imagined that the 
 service was done to a " family of de la Huse " 
 (p. 368). 
 
 We turn in vain to Ducange for light on " Huse " 
 as a term connected with wine, but under " Hosa " 
 we have one entry which is of great importance, 
 though he seems to have deemed it suspect as a 
 
 ' Testa, p. 124. 
 
 ' From " Plac. Coron. apud Windesore, 1 2 Edw. I, Rot. 40 in dors." 
 Blount's later editors give separately, under Bray, the ocrece entry men- 
 tioned below, from the Testa, and render it — " The Serjeanty of serving 
 our lord the King vyith his boots " ! 
 
 * Inq. p. m. of 1249 in Calendar of Inq. (1904), I, No. 137. *Cres- 
 welle ' is there identified as Carswell, I do not know why. 
 
THE ' HOSE ' SERJEANTY 179 
 
 mere emendation. ^ This quotation, from a Char- 
 ter of 1034, speaks " Ricardi de Lillabona qui 
 kosam vini Coraitis ferebat. " By itself it might 
 be suspect, but the Pipe Rolls of Henry II's reign 
 afford decisive evidence that there is no mistake. 
 In that of the 4th year (11 58) we have a charge 
 " pro barilz ferratis et non ferratis et buttis et 
 bucellis et summis et sumariis et hosts magnis et 
 parvis. " In that of the 6th year (1160) we have 
 a charge (among things for carrying wine) of 
 " ij liosis ad vinum ad opus Reginae " (p. 13), and 
 in that of the iithyear (1165) a charge ofj^g 
 " pro hosis ad vinum et pro Buttis Bucellis et 
 Barhuz et quatuor carrettis " (p, 31). Again in 
 the 17th year (117 1) we have 32 sh. charged " pro 
 Buscellis et y^ojw " (p. 147)^ 
 
 We are still, however, in the dark as to what 
 the hosa was. There is mention on the rolls of 
 tuns and butts, of hooped casks, and barrels and 
 wineskins* {utribus), but the hosa baffles us. My 
 own impression is that, in the first place, the term 
 became obsolete early, and that, in the second, the 
 vessel must in some way have suggested a boot. 
 As to obsolescence, the gloss in the entry cited by 
 Blount and the mention of the service as a former 
 one, support my view, as does the fact that the 
 term occurs so rarely and only in early days, and 
 disappears from the Royal Household. As to the 
 latter, the phrase "hosis a^'u/waw" suggests that there 
 
 ' " Mendum esse suspicor." 
 
 * Pipe Roll, 16 Henry II, p. 15. Mr. Freeman speaks of" Waggons 
 loaded... with casks of wine " as shown on the Bayeux Tapestry, but it 
 also shows wineskins among the things brought over by William at the 
 Conquest. 
 
i8o THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 were other " hosag " from which these had to be 
 distinguished. And this, we know, was the case, 
 for the old French housse and medieval hosa meant 
 a boot, or rather covering for the lower leg which 
 might also cover the foot. It might thus mean 
 leggings or greaves, but also a complete covering 
 which included the foot, thus giving us our word 
 ' hose. ' Strictly speaking, greaves were " Caligas 
 ferreae " ^ or " ocrece, " ^ and is is significant that the 
 hosa of Ducange's entry is equated in another ver- 
 sion of the text by " ocrea', " ^ while the Cresswell 
 serjeanty is in one place entered as serving " de 
 ocreis domini Regis. " * This looks to me like an 
 entry by some scribe who did not understand what 
 hosa meant. 
 
 We have, however, yet another gloss upon this 
 word ' hose, ' which enables us to check Blount's 
 reading. On the Hundred Rolls there is an entry 
 of about the same date which runs thus : — 
 
 Hugo de Sancto Philiberto tenet duas hidas terrae in 
 predicto manerio per serjantiam ad portandum cum domino 
 rege unum Buscellum (sic) vini. * 
 
 The meaning of " buscellum " is known : it is 
 the old French boucel, defined as a " petit tonneau " 
 (little barrel). It would seem probable that 
 Blount's ' butellos ' is but one of his misreadings, 
 though the " buscellis " of the early Pipe Rolls are, 
 we have seen, entered as distinct from the " hosis. " 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 17 Hen. II, p. 147. 
 
 """Caligis et ocreis" (lb. 16 Hen. II, p. 15); "pro ocreis Regis, 
 xlsol.'Y/^. 5 Hen. II, p. 3). 
 " See above. 
 
 * Testa de Nevill, p. 108. G^ p. 178 above. 
 ^ Rot. Hund., I, 12. 
 
THE ' HOSE ' SERJEANTY i8i 
 
 There remains the interesting question whether the 
 office of this serjeant can be traced in the house- 
 hold of later times. We find that in Queen Eliza- 
 beth's reign there was in the Department of the 
 Cellar (' Sellar ') a " Yeoman of the Bottles, " 
 whose function it was " to carry wine and drinke 
 for the King, when his Majestie rideth abroade, " 
 and that in 1 6 1 o Prince Henry had " a Groome 
 of the bottles for the field, " and that a " bottle 
 groome " was included in the households of Char- 
 les II and of William III, ^ His office must appar- 
 ently have resembled that assigned to Richard de 
 Lillebone in 1034. ^ 
 
 It would seem to be at least likely that the sur- 
 name " de la Hose " (or " Huse ") was derived from 
 service " de la Huse. " Bartholomew de la Hose 
 held a fee of Adam de Port in ir66, ' and was 
 clearly therefore, the successor of that Geoffrey 
 " de Hosa " who is entered under Berkshire on the 
 Pipe Roll of 1 1 30 (p. 123) as paying " ut resaisatur 
 de terra sua quam tenet de Adam de Port. " 
 Indeed, under John, this fee is entered as held " de 
 honore de Kyntone. " * Finally, this fee is iden- 
 tified, under Henry III, as held by Bartholomew 
 " de la Huse " in Denford of the Honour of 
 " Kynton. " ' 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries). 
 
 ' See p. 1 79 above. 
 
 ' Red Book, p. 279. 
 
 * Red Book, p. 143. See Geneahgtst (N.S.) XVI, 6-13, wiere I have 
 shown who Adam de Port really was, and have identified ' Kyntone ' as 
 Kington, Heref., Mr. HaU the editor of the Red Book having made it a 
 " Kington, CO. Dorset " in one place and an unknown Wiltshire manor 
 in another ! 
 
 ' Testa, p. 109. 
 
1 82 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 A further entry shows us this Bartholomew " de 
 la Huse " holding two hides in Great Farringdon 
 of the King " per serjeantiam ostur', " ^ and a suit 
 of 1 23 1 proves that this land was in " Inglesham" 
 and that Bartholomew was charged with witholding 
 suit for it at the Abbot of Beaulieu's court at 
 Farringdon. ^ He pleaded that he held his land of 
 the king " per unum austurcum custodiendum. " 
 Inglesham lay on the border of Berks and Wilts 
 and we find an entry under Wilts that Bartholomew 
 " de Husa " held it in chief of the king " per 
 servicium mutandi quoddam ostorium de veteri 
 feofamento, '"a statement which carries back the 
 serjeanty to the days of Henry I. This enables us 
 to identify the holding with that which Geoffrey 
 de la Huse held in 12 12. * 
 
 Although the family has been here dealt with 
 for the interest of its name * and for the early date 
 to which that name can be traced, one may note 
 that it affords an excellent instance of a family 
 holding by knight^service as under-tenants* and 
 also by serjeanty as tenants in chief. Their position 
 
 ' Ibid., p. iz6. 
 
 ' Bractar^s Note Book, Case 655. He is there Bartholomew " de la 
 Hose." 
 
 ' Testa, p. 1 54. See the section on " Goshawk seijeanties " for an 
 explanation of this service. 
 
 * " Galfridus de la Huse tenet in F[er]enden et Inglesham L solidatas 
 terra per seijantiam custodiendi unum accipitrem " (Testa, p. 128 ; Cf. 
 Red Book, p. ^S6). 
 
 ■'We have also on the Pipe Roll of 11 30 a William "de Hosa" 
 under Berkshire, and men of the name under Middlesex and Cornwall. 
 
 * A Geof&ey " Hosatus" returned his holding (under Wilts) in 1 166 
 as one fee held in chief, but although the editor of the Red Book has 
 combined the families, we have seen that the representative of ours in 
 1 1 66 was Bartholomew " de la Hose. " 
 
A BUTLERY SERJEANTY 183 
 
 is well illustrated by an entry on the Pipe Roll of 
 3 John (1201) which Madox cites thus : — 
 
 De finibus militum et scutagiis. Idem Vicecomes redd, 
 comp. de iij marcis de Galfrido de la Hose, ne transfretet 
 et (sic) pro feodoj militis de honore de Kinton ; et de 
 dimidia marca de Simone Puncard qui tenet per serjant- 
 eriam. 
 
 The true meaning of this entry is that Geoffrey 
 " fined " for his serjeanty and paid two marcs 
 (scutage) for his knight's fee held of the honour of 
 Kington. The two holdings were in the same 
 hands, but the tenures were kept distinct. ^ 
 
 A BUTLERY SERJEANTY 
 
 An obscure little serjeanty in the Butler's depart- 
 ment is that of the Kivilly family, which must 
 have taken its name from Quevilly near Rouen. 
 We read on the Pipe Roll of 1 1 30, under Essex, — 
 
 Rbbertus filius Siwardi r.c. de xv marc, argenti pro 
 ministerio et uxore Hugonis Chivilli (p. ^^. 
 
 To this Robert a large sum is remitted for Dane- 
 geld, but evidently not in respect of ' Chivilli ' 
 lands. For the Testa records, under Essex, the 
 verdict of the Writtle jurors in 1212 that 
 
 Quedam terra in Borham quam Wlllelmus de Kiveli 
 tenuit, — et dimisit illam episcopo Lend' Willelmo de 
 
 ' See p. 27 for Madox' misunderstanding of these lists. 
 
1 84 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Sancte Marie ecclesia ; ^ et predictus episcopus dimisit earn 
 Rogero filio Alani, — pertinet ad manerium de Writel', et? 
 quod solet reddere per annum ad curiam de Writel xx s, 
 (p. 270). 
 
 They further alleged that Godebold of Writtl<2, 
 having been captured by the notorious Geoffrey de 
 Mandeville under Stephen, mortgaged the land, 
 for his ' redemption, ' to William's predecessors. 
 But on p. 269 we read that 
 
 Willelmus de Kiveli tenuit in Borham dim' car' terrae 
 quam rex H. dedit Hugoni de Kiveli, sed nescitur per 
 quod servicium etc. 
 
 Although we cannot definitely connect the land 
 with the ofEce, it is clear that this William, and 
 Hugh before him, held office under the Butler, for 
 the Pipe Roll of 1 1 99 records that — 
 
 Willelmus de Chevill' redd. comp. de xl marcis pro 
 habendo officio suo in Domo Regis quod pater suus 
 habuit, scilicet ostium Pincernae, et servire in Domo ut 
 pincerna, et wardam, jus (sic J quadrigae portantis utensilia 
 Pincernae, et prisas vini cum pertinentibus ad officium 
 iUud. ^ 
 
 This record is curiously illustrated by two entries 
 on the rolls of Henry II. On that of 1179 we 
 read 
 
 Et in custamento ducendi vina per domos Regis per 
 
 ' 1198-1224. 
 
 ' Rot. I John (Essex) as cited by Madox (Exchequer). The Oblate 
 Roll of I John (1199) also records, under Essex, this payment by 
 William de ChiveK for his office in the butlery " sicut antecessores sui " 
 (P- 17)- 
 
THE BEER-BUYER'S SERJEANTY 185 
 
 Angliam ;^ 18. 16. 11, per breve Regis et per visum 
 Hugonis de Kivilli et Robert! fratris sui (p. 108) 
 
 while on that of 1 1 77 the brother only is mention- 
 ed : — 
 
 Et pro vino ad opus regis ;^ 14.3.4 per breve Regis per 
 Robertum de Kivilli (p. 166). 
 
 The office of the Kivillis w^as that of usher of the 
 Butlery — which is mentioned in the Constitutio ' — 
 but, it must be repeated, there is no actual proof 
 that it was connected with land and was, as such, a 
 serjeanty. 
 
 THE BEER-BUYER'S SERJEANTY 
 
 At West Hendred, Berks, was a small serjeanty 
 belonging to the Butler's department. On the 
 Oblate Roll of 3 John (1201) we read, under 
 
 Berkshire, " Willelmus de Henrede tenet per 
 
 sergent' pinc[ern']." In the Red Book (p. 451) 
 Richard de Henrede holds " per serjanteriam custo- 
 diendi cervisiam, " an entry which expands in the 
 Testa into 
 
 Ricardus de Hanred tenet de domino Rege in villa de 
 Westhanred c solidatas terre per servicium serviendi de 
 cervis ' in Butellaria domini Regis (p. 108). 
 
 In the 1 212 survey, however, the Testa (p. 128) 
 
 ' " Hostiarius Butellariae consuetudinarium cibum, et iij ob. homini 
 %Vio" (Lib. Rub., ip.%10). 
 
1 86 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 makes the service that of keeping (custodiendi) the 
 beer, as in the Red Book. 
 
 In the Hundred Rolls William de Spersholt is 
 given as holding one third of West Hendred of the 
 king by the service " quod debet emere cervis ' in 
 hospicio domini Regis. " And this version of the 
 service is found also in a plea of 12 Edward I 
 (1283-4) cited by Blount, where William ' de 
 Insula ' is given as holding a carucate there " per 
 serjantiam emendi cervisiam ad opus domini 
 Regis." 
 
 THE KING'S DISPENSERS 
 
 The history of this race of ' Dispensers ' will be 
 dealt with here somewhat fully, because, in spite 
 of their tenure of this court office for some two 
 centuries, they seem to have been somewhat over- 
 looked. Their history, so far as I know, has never 
 been worked out, and their pedigree, remarkable for 
 its antiquity, has served merely as a quarry for the 
 pedigree-mongers who constructed for the noble 
 house of Spencer a descent that carried back their 
 line to medieval times. Deserving as it does a 
 better fate, I have here rescued it from oblivion 
 and set it forth, I believe, for the first time. 
 
 The real clue to the history of these hereditary 
 Dispensers is found in their tenure by serjeanty of 
 Great RoUright, Oxon. And the source on which 
 we are dependent for tracing the pedigree of the 
 family is the cartulary of Abingdon Abbey. 
 
THE KING'S DISPENSERS 187 
 
 This is a serjeanty that, without question, can be 
 carried back to Domesday. In that record (io6b) 
 
 we read under " Terra ministrorum regis " — 
 
 the right heading for Serjeants — that Robert the son 
 
 Thurstan 
 
 I 
 Robert ' filius 
 Turstini ' of Great 
 Rollright, 1086. 
 
 Thurstan (of Great 
 Rollright),"Dispenser 
 to William I II. 
 
 Helewise (? sister^Hugh, ' filius Turstini ' Anskil tenant 
 
 Dispenser to Henry I of Sparsholt 
 
 in 1 105, 1 1 19. in 1086. 
 
 of Rainald, Abbot 
 of Abingdon). 
 
 .1 ' . > 
 
 $imon, Dispenser to Henry I a daughter== William 
 
 in 1 1 20 and 1 1 30 and to 
 Stephen; nephew to Rainald 
 Abbot of Abingdon. 
 
 , ! 
 
 Thurstan' filius Simonis' a dau.^ Walter * filius 
 
 Dispenser to Henry II. Hingani. 
 
 Living 1 153, 1 177. 
 
 I I I 
 
 Amauri, Dispenser to Thurstan Walter, Usher 
 Richard I & John. Mar. 1 1 80. to Henry II. 
 
 I 
 
 Thurstan, Dispenser 
 to Henry III. 
 
 I 
 
 Adam * Lib. Rub., p., 285. 
 
1 88 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 of Thurstan ^ holds 5 J hides in ' Rolendri ' and 
 that Osmund holds of him two hides in ' Lude- 
 welle. ' In the Testa we have these relative 
 entries : — 
 
 Thurstanus Dispensator tenet in Magna Rolendr' v 
 hidas terre per serjantiam de disp6nsator' Regis (p. 108). 
 Galfridus duas hidas terre in Ludewell' per serjantiam ad 
 serviend' in dispens' R[egis] sub Galfrido* (sic) Dispens- 
 atore (p. 108). Turstanus Dispens[ator] tenet in Rolin- 
 drich V hid' terre per serjantiam, videlicet quod Dispensar' 
 debet esse domini (p, 118). 
 
 This Thurstan, we shall find, was that " Tur- 
 stanus Dispensarius " who contested, at Queen 
 Eleanor's coronation in 1236, the right of Henry 
 de Hastings to the tablecloths. ' 
 
 After Domesday our earliest information is the 
 statement in the Abingdon Cartulary as to William 
 Rufus that 
 
 Mox villam quae Speresholt dicitur rex manu immittens 
 suo dispensatori Turstino ipsam donavit, quam et ille, 
 quamdiu vixit, et deinde filius ejus Hugo, ad regimen 
 usque abbatis Faricii, tenuere.* 
 
 The name of' Thurstan, which in this family 
 recurs persistently, strongly favours the view that 
 he was a son of the above ' Robert the son of 
 Thurstan.' ^ His son, Hugh, is named in a Charter 
 of Henry I, granted at Romsey in 1 105, as " Hugo 
 filius Turstini, curije meas dispensator " and as the 
 
 ' " Robertus filius Turstini." 
 
 ' This appears to be an error. 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 757. 
 
 * Jb. Cart., II, 37. 
 
 ' But he may have been brother or nephew. 
 
THE KING'S DISPENSERS 189 
 
 holder of ten hides at Sparsholt, for which he is 
 directed to do homage to the Abbot. ^ There is 
 also a writ of Henry I, addressed " Hugoni filio 
 Turstini" ^ relating to that friction with the Abbey 
 to which we owe our knowledge of the pedigree, 
 and, two years after the death of Abbot Faricius, 
 — that is, in or about in 9 — we have him, as 
 ' Hugo dispensator, ' giving the tithes of Spars- 
 holt and naming Helewis his wife. * 
 
 That Hugh was followed immediately by Simon 
 in the possession of this land and office is clear. 
 But whether Simon was his son or his brother is 
 not at present certain. We read of this Simon 
 that, being with the King in Normandy, * during 
 the four years interregnum at the Abbey ( 1 1 1 7- 
 1121), after the death of Abbot Faricius, he got 
 possession, through him, of Markham church, the 
 more easily because, as nephew to Abbot Rainald, " 
 he was heir to William, Rainald's son. * He 
 occurs, as ' Symon Dispensator, ' on the Pipe Roll 
 of 1 1 30 (31 Hen. I ), which shows him as excused, 
 under Oxfordshire, 30 sh. for Danegeld, while it 
 also records, under Gloucestershire, a payment for 
 the pleas of his sister's son, Odard of Carlisle. ' 
 
 "• Ibid., II, 126. 
 ' Ibid., II, 91. 
 ^ Ibid., II, 159. 
 
 * From which Henry returned in 1120. 
 
 ' This proves that Simon's mother was a sister of that Abbot. 
 
 ' Ibid., II, 66. 
 
 ' " Sjrmon dispensator debet xl m. argenti pro placitis quod rex habe- 
 bat versus Odardum de Chaerleolio sororium suum" (p. 79). See, for 
 Odard, my paper on "Odard of Carlisle" {GeneaL, [N.S.] VIII, 
 200-204), where it is shown that he and Hildred " of Carlisle, " his 
 father, were both living in 1 1 30, and my earlier paper on " Odard the 
 sheriff" (Jbid., V, 25-8) where I have proved that he was quite distinct 
 
I90 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Another of his sisters is proved by the Abingdon 
 cartulary to have married the dispossessed William 
 son of Anskill of Sparsholt, a marriage through 
 which some of the lands were regained by him. 
 Finally, he is mentioned under Stephen as giving 
 Tadmarton with his daughter to Walter " filius 
 Hingani, " ^ who was living in 1 166. ^ 
 
 With Thurstan, Simon's son and successor, we 
 emerge into the light of day. He had already 
 succeeded his father in n 5 3 ' and in the early days 
 of Henry II's reign the King caused the usual 
 dispute between him and Abingdon Abbey to be 
 heard at Woodstock before himself and three of 
 his justices, Gregory of London, William Fitz 
 John, and Nigel de Broc. * In 1 1 58 Thurstan was 
 excused from certain payments due from his lands 
 in Oxfordshire and elsewhere * and in 1 159, under 
 Yorkshire, from his quota to the donum of the 
 Archbishop of York. * How he came to appear 
 
 from Odard " of Carlisle " with whom Mr. Hodgson Hinde identified 
 him. See also Canon Prescott's learned notes in Register of Wetherhal 
 (pp. 143-147)- 
 
 ^ Ah. Cari.,n, 183. 
 
 ' LiL Rub., p. 285. 
 
 ^ Jb. Cart., II, 184. 
 
 * Ibid., II, 186. The mention of Gregory is of interest because he 
 figures, also as Gregory of London, in another Woodstock document 
 (see my Calendar of docs. France, p. 533) and is clearly identical with 
 that " Gregory " whom the lost Pipe Roll of 1 1 5 5 shows us as sheriff 
 of London in the early days of Henry II, i. e. till Michaelmas of that 
 year {f,ib. Rub., p. 658). This is a notable instance of the practice (which 
 I have elsewhere explained) of sherifis (and their families) assuming a 
 surname from the county town of which they were sherifis. "Gregory" 
 also appears on the Roll of the next year (11 56) as a justice in Bucks 
 and Surrey, and accounts, as "Gregory," on that of 11 59 (p. 3) " de 
 placitis de tempore suo." 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 4 Hen. Il, pp. 144, 150. 
 
 = Ibid., 5 Hen. II, p. 31. (y Lib. Rub., p. 697 (1162). 
 
THE KING'S DISPENSERS 191 
 
 under Yorkshire will be explained below. He was 
 similarly exempted from his quota to that of the 
 abbot of Abingdon. ^ 
 
 In these entries Thurstan is styled merely " filius 
 Simonis ; " but in 1165 we have him, under 
 Gloucestershire, entered further as Dispenser. * 
 The entries concerning him in the returns of 1 166 
 are of special interest for his name being therein 
 entered under three different forms. As Thurstan 
 " filius Simonis " he held half a fee of Abingdon 
 Abbey and half a fee of Walter de Bolebec ; * as 
 Thurstan " Dispensator " he held a fee of Robert 
 " de Scrupa ; " * and under the unique and un- 
 expected form of Thurstan " de Lechantone " he 
 held half a fee of the Archbishop of York. * 
 This, though entered under Yorkshire, was at 
 Compton Abdale in Gloucestershire, where his heir 
 Adam le Despenser held of the Archbishop in 
 1284-5. * And, as for his style ' de Lechantone, ' 
 it is derived from Leckhampton in the same county, 
 which was alleged to form part of his serjeanty. ^ 
 It is of interest to note that the half fee held of 
 Walter de Bolebec was an Ewelme (Oxon) ; for it 
 was held there by the later Thurstan of the Countess 
 of Oxford {nee de Bolebec) who held of the earl 
 marshal, * as her ancestor Hugh (de Bolebec) had 
 
 ' lUd., p. 37. 
 
 ' "Et pro 849 summis frumenti ;^35. 7. 6 liberal' Turst' fil' Sim' 
 dispens' " (Pipe Roll, 1 1 Hen. II, p. 1 2). 
 ^Lib. Rui.,pp. 306, 317. 
 ' Hill., p. 295. 
 ' IMd., p. 415. 
 ^ FeudalJiJs, II, z^B. 
 ' Testa de Nevill, p. 81. 
 * Tei/a, pp. 100, 106. 
 
192 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 held of his predecessor, Walter GifFard, in Domes- 
 day. 
 
 It was some time before 1 1 66 that he is found, 
 as Thurstan " filius Simonis " at Rhuddlan among 
 the witnesses to a charter of Henry de Oilli, the 
 King's constable, to which are also witnesses Man- 
 asser Biset, the King's steward {dapifer), Michael 
 Belet, and some administrative officers. ^ 
 
 We may now approach the quaint anecdote told 
 by Walter Map, in which Thurstan figures as the 
 King's dispenser {dispensator regis) and as discharg- 
 ing his office at court. The object of the story is 
 to illustrate the courtesy enjoined by Henry II. 
 Adam ' a Gernemeu, ' whose office it was to seal 
 the writs at court, declined to seal an official 
 document for Thurstan, free of charge, as he should 
 have done, and, when accused of this by Thurstan, 
 retorted that the latter had declined his request to 
 send him two of the King's cakes, when he was 
 entertaining friends. The King decreed that 
 Thurstan — the words "abjecto pallio genibusflexis" 
 should be noted ^ — must present the two cakes 
 {gastella), decently enveloped in a white napkin, to 
 Adam, who would then seal and hand him the 
 writ as required. The story is worth quoting in 
 the original Latin : I have supplied the word 
 " Simonis, " which has, clearly, been omitted. ' 
 
 * Charters in the Brit. Mus., I, No. 44. 
 " C/; pp. 115, 143 above. 
 
 * " Mos curiae nostrse fuit ut gratis fierent et redderentur brevia sigil- 
 lata ministris curias quae nomina sua vel negotia continerent. Detulit 
 autem dispensator regius reum sigillatorem, quod breve nomen suum et 
 negotium continens ei negasset sine pretio reddere. Turstinus filius 
 [Simonis] dispensator erat, Adam a Gernemue sigillator. Auditis igitur 
 his, haesitante curia, regem advocant ; qui cum Turstinum audivisset. 
 
THE KING'S DISPENSERS 193 
 
 Apart from the glimpse we thus obtain of the 
 King's court and its ways, it is of interest to note 
 that the two officers engaged in this squabble were 
 among those justices in eyre who played so large a 
 part in Henry's administration. Adam of Yar- 
 mouth (" a Gernemue ") so acted in 1 1 69 and 1 1 73, 
 while Thurstan, who was similarly employed in the 
 latter year, actually had for a colleague on his eyre 
 Walter Map himself ! ^ This gives life to the 
 story. Thurstan, indeed, was not only so acting 
 again in 1 176-7, but was entrusted, after Becket's 
 murder, with the administration of the revenues of 
 his see. Such was the man who had the keeping 
 of the King's cakes and was ordered to present, on 
 bended knee, two of them to his fellow " minister." 
 
 Thurstan left three sons, Amauri, who succeeded 
 him as King's dispenser, Thurstan, and Walter the 
 
 audivit Adam dicentem, ' Susceperam hospites et misi qui precaretur 
 dominum Turstinum quod mihi duo liba de vestris dominicis daret. 
 Qui respondit, " Nolo. " Cum autem postea vellet breve suum, memor 
 illius " Nolo, " similiter dixi " Nolo. " ' Rex vero condemnavit eum 
 qui dixerat primum ' Nolo. ' Sedere fecit Adam ad stannum (rectius 
 scannum) coram posito sigillo brevique Turstini ; coegit autem Tursti- 
 num, abjecto paUio genibus flexis, Adae prjesentare duo gastella regis, 
 mantili candido ^ecenter involuta, susceptoque xenio, jussit ut Adam 
 ipsi breve redderet, fecitque Concordes, et adjecit ut non tantum sibi 
 deberent invicem ministri subvenire de suo propio vel de fisco, sed etiam 
 domesticis, et quos necessitas urgeret alienis " {De nugis [Ed. Camden 
 Soc] pp. 23 1-232). The custom (mosj here alleged by Map seems to be 
 thus referred to in the ' Household Ordinances of Edw. IV' (p. 29). 
 The chancellor, we read, receives a fee of wrine that he may favour the 
 King's household and servants. " Wherefore all the lordes aforetyme 
 which have byn chauncellers allwey graunted and continued this privy- 
 lege to every estate and degree, high and lowe, of the felyship of the 
 
 King's householde to have aU suche writtes as he shall nedefully 
 
 shewe for hymself by his proper name seale free." The chancellor, 
 
 it must be remembered, was originally, a member of the Household 
 (see p. 54). 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 19 Hen. II. 
 
 13 
 
194 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 King's usher. On the Pipe Roll of i i8o there is 
 an important entry, which proves not only that 
 Amauri had succeeded his father as Dispenser, ^ 
 but that he had a younger brother, Thurstan, a fact 
 which was not known. To this Thurstan was 
 given as wife the daughter of Richard Butler of 
 Cropwell Butler, Notts. ^ 
 
 In January 1 1 84/5 two of them jointly attested^, 
 as Amauri the Dispenser and Walter son of 
 Thurstan Fitz Simon, * a Royal charter, and on 
 July 1 5th, 1 1 86, a fine was levied before the King, 
 at Feckenham, between the Prior of Dunstable and 
 Amauri, King's Dispenser and Amabel his wife. * 
 This Amabel was the daughter of Walter de 
 Chesnei (by Eva de Broc) , * and she clearly brought 
 to her husband the five knight's fees which her 
 father had held of the earl of Gloucester in 1 1 66,^ 
 for Amauri " Dispensator " was holding them in 
 1187.^ 
 
 ' Foss and Eyton made the father live to a later date, but another 
 Thurstan Fitz Simon must have been here confused with him. 
 
 ' " Et in terris datis Turstino fratri Amaurici dispensatoris cum filia 
 
 Ricardi Pinc[eme] de Crophulla" CRot. Pij>. 26 Hen, II, p. 137). 
 
 This was the Richard who acquired the important Warrington fief by 
 marriage with Beatrice dau. and heir of Mathew de Vilers. I suspect, 
 therefore, that this marriage, previously unknown, identifies for us " a 
 certain youth " who is thus referred to in the 1 2 1 2 survey of Lanca- 
 shire : — " Et dum WiUelmus [Pincerna] erat in custodia Radnlfi filii 
 
 Bemardi idem Radulfus dedit villam de Croppil cum pert' cuidam 
 
 Juveni cum sorore ejusdem Willelmi " (Testa, p. 4.02a). 
 
 ' Eyton, Henry II, 'p. 261. 
 
 'Harl. MS. 1885, fo. 22. 
 
 ' See, for the charters proving this, the Eynsham Cartulary, in its 
 valuable and scholarly edition by Mr. Salter (Oxford Hist. Soc.) Vol. I, 
 p. 80, where Amauri (Almaricus) styles himself " Dispensator domini 
 regis. " 
 
 * Lib. Rub., p. 289. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 67. 
 
THE KING'S DISPENSERS 195 
 
 Amauri is -duly found holding the lands of his 
 ancestors in the Testa (p. 1 1 9) : — 
 
 Almaricus Dispensator ij car' in dominico, et in vill' 
 ij caruc' in Ewelm', et valent c sol. 
 
 Idem in dominico ij car', et in vill' ij car' in Magna 
 RoUend', et valent per annum ciiij sol., per servicium 
 Dispensar', et dicit quod fecit servicium illud, et modo 
 facit pro eo gener suus, et oiFert iij marcas. 
 
 He was also sheriff of Rutland at the accession 
 of Richard I, and from that King he obtained the 
 lands at (Kings) Worthy, co. Hants and Stanley 
 (Regis), CO. Glouc, which had been granted to his 
 brother Walter, the usher, by Henry II, he 
 being then Walter's heir. ^ These lands were again 
 confirmed to him by King John. ^ 
 
 Amauri's widow, whose name was Ada, was 
 living in the early days of Henry III. ' His own 
 name has had a curious fate, for, owing to his 
 incorporation by heralds into the fabulous pedigree 
 constructed for the modern Spencers, it was reviv- 
 ed, in the senseless form " Almeric, " for the first 
 of the Spencers, Lords Churchill,* and has been 
 given to several of his descendants. 
 
 ■ Cart. Ant., DD. 8, n. 
 
 ' Rot. Cart. 5 John. In this document his brother is styled Walter 
 Despencer, from the family office. It has been assumed that Amauri 
 was younger brother to Walter, but it is clear that he succeeded his father 
 Thurstan as Dispenser. The grant of the Worthy lands to Walter " the 
 usher " is assigned by Mr. Eyton to 1 1 8 1 . They had formerly been 
 held by Hugh Tirel, who, according to the Pipe Rolls, had lost them 
 some fifteen years before. One of the later entries in the Liber Rubeus 
 (p. 210) is concerned with these two estates, but the editor identified 
 " Wordi " as " Worthy " merely, and leaves " Stanle " unidentified as 
 in " CO. Hants " ! 
 
 ' Testa, p. 107. 
 
 * This was in 1 779, early in the tide of these revivals. The French 
 
196 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Amauri's son and successor, Thurstan, is he who 
 figures in the Testa ^ and of whom we read that, at 
 the Queen's coronation in 1236, he unsuccessfully- 
 claimed against Henry de Hastings to serve " de 
 naperia. " ^ He died in 1 249, holding lands in 
 five counties, and left a widow, Lucy. 
 
 He was succeeded by Adam le Despenser, who is 
 found holding the ancestral lands in the returns of 
 1284-5^ ^^^ who died in 1295, leaving a widow 
 Joan and a son and successor, Amauri, who is 
 similarly entered as holding them in those of 1 303.* 
 But the family, as entries on the rolls prove, were 
 now alienating these lands, ^ and Great RoUright 
 itself, the caput of their serjeanty, was acquired by 
 Robert Burnell, Bishop of Bath and Wells (d. 1292), 
 whose ambition to found a family led him, as is 
 well known, to purchase estates on a vast scale, as 
 well as to have a pedigree from the Conquest 
 invented for him by the monks of Buildwas. ® An 
 interesting record of May 28, 1 3 17, informs us that 
 the King had enquired into the descent of the 
 manor, and that the rolls of the Exchequer proved 
 that 
 
 Thvirstan le Despencer held loosh. of land in Great 
 
 name Amanri — ^whence our surname Amory — ^was Latinised hy scribes 
 as Amalricus or Almariciu. " Almeric " is neither Latin, French, nor 
 English. 
 
 ' See p. 188 above. 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 757. See the section on ' Napery Service. ' 
 
 ^FeudalJids. 
 
 * Ibid. 
 
 * It is, perhaps, significant that, in 1276, Adam Dispenser owed £25 
 to a London tailor (Close Rolls). 
 
 ' Dictionary of National Biography, where it is observed that " on his 
 death he was in possession of estates in nineteen counties. " 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 197 
 
 Rolandrith yearly of the late King by the serjeanty of 
 
 being his despencer and as it appears by the inquisitions 
 
 concerning the late bishop's lands returned into the late 
 King's chancery that the bishop was seised of the manor 
 at his death in his demesne as of fee, and that he held it 
 of the late king by the serjeanty of serving him in his 
 spence (dispensa)^ ^ etc. etc. 
 
 In the following century we are surprised to 
 find the collectors of the aid pur Jille marier in 
 1 40 1 -2 ignoring all that had passed since the days 
 of Henry III. They record the payment thus : — 
 
 Et de -vs. receptis de herede Turstini le Despensare, 
 pro centum solidatis terre in Bovdondrych Magna tentis de 
 domino rege sine medio per parvam serjantiam. * 
 
 Even a century later still the ancient tenure was 
 in force. For in 17 Hen. VII (1501-2) Sir John 
 Hungerford admitted that he held — as his father, 
 Sir Thomas, had held before him^ — the manor of 
 (Great) RoUright by grand serjeanty, namely that 
 of serving the King in his " dispensary " (or 
 " spence "), when directed to do so. ' 
 
 THE KING'S PANTLER * 
 
 " He was a fellow of some birth ; his father had 
 been king's pantler. " So writes Robert Louis 
 
 * Cal. of Close Rolls, 1313-1318, p. 411. 
 
 ' Feudal ji ids, IV, 172. The collectors were only to collect from (i) 
 knights' fees, (z) socage tenures in capite. This was a serjeanty tenure, 
 not socage. But the facts illustrate the lapse of petty seijeanty into 
 socage, though it is not easy to understand how the King's dispensership 
 could be deemed /?/fy serjeanty. 
 
 * " per magnam (sic) seijantiam ; viz, serviendi domino Regi in 
 dispens' sua quando precipiatur" (record cited by Blount's editors). 
 
 * Re-printed, with alterations and additions from The Archeeological 
 Journal, Vol. Ix. 
 
198 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Stevenson in his Frangois Villon. To the modern 
 reader the phrase could hardly convey a meaning ; 
 and yet it is one that is singularly rich, not merely 
 in etymological, but in antiquarian interest. Du- 
 cange, indeed, in his learned disquisition, refers to 
 Pharaoh's chief baker ; but, without taking the 
 king's pantler so far back as this, we may claim him 
 as the holder of a feudal office, the officer of the 
 bread. We may take as parallel two officers and 
 their offices, in order that these may illustrate one 
 another by the changes of name and meaning. 
 The " butler " derived his name from the bottle, 
 the " panneter " from the bread [pain). The office 
 of the butler was the " butlery, " now corrupted to 
 " buttery ; " the office of the " panneter " was the 
 " pannetry, " now corrupted to " pantry. " Here 
 I use the word " office " in the double sense it still 
 retains, namely, the function discharged by the 
 officer and the place in which he discharged it. 
 
 It is possible to trace and account for the corrup- 
 tion and changes of meaning which these words 
 have undergone. In the Babees Book, as in feudal 
 records, the " 1 " of " pantler " is still absent ; " if 
 thou be admitted, " we there read, " in any office, 
 as butler or panter. " But a false analogy, it is 
 thought, with " butler " produced the corruption 
 " pantler. " The fate of the words has been widely 
 different ; for while " butler " survives in daily life, 
 unchanged and familiar, " pantler " has long been 
 obsolete. With their offices, however, it is just 
 the contrary ; for while the " butlery " lingers 
 only in the " buttery hatch " of our college days, 
 the " pantry " is a term of daily use ; it denotes. 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 199 
 
 however, to modern ears the one place where, cer- 
 tainly, we should not find the bread, but where, most 
 paradoxically, we should probably find the butler. 
 And now we will return to early days when the 
 Norman dukes possessed their pannetier in imitation 
 of their suzerain lords, whose officer of that name 
 was destined to become the " grand pannetier de 
 de France. " * The evidence for the existence of 
 the Norman pannetrie will be found in my " Calen- 
 dar of documents preserved in France, " where is 
 printed the abstract of a royal charter to Odoin 
 ' de Mala Palude. ' The date of this charter is of 
 very great importance, but is a question of extreme 
 difficulty. I have discussed it at some length in a 
 paper on 'The chronology of Henry IPs charters. '^ 
 Here one can only say, briefly, that the text is late 
 and corrupt, and that, although the king's style is 
 that of Henry II, the witnesses' names distinctly 
 point to the closing years of Henry I's reign. 
 Explaining this difficulty in the above work, I gave 
 the tentative date 1 156-7, but have now decided, 
 as stated in that paper, to reject the style and assign 
 the charter to the days of Henry I, The late 
 M.Leopold Delisle, greatest of Norman antiquaries, 
 originally assigned the charter to " vers 1 1 70, " 
 but, applying his supposed discovery on the char- 
 ters of Henry II to this one, placed it, a few years 
 ago, "after 1173 " and even much nearer to the 
 end [1189] than the beginning [1154] of the 
 reign. ' But although he arrived at this conclusion 
 
 ' This officer is dealt with at the end of this section. 
 ' In J rchaokgical Journal, LXIV (1907), pp. 63-79. 
 ' " la date est beaucoup plus voisine de la fin que du commencement 
 du r^gne. " 
 
200 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 on what had been his special subject, I hold him 
 to be wholly wrong. If I am right, and the 
 charter belongs to the time of the ' Constitutio', it 
 becomes of great interest in connexion with that 
 document. 
 
 Addressed to the Archbishop of Rouen and 
 granted at Montfort, this charter confirms to 
 Odoin 
 
 the whole ministry of his Panetaria, with livery in his 
 court, every day that he is at Rouen, namely four penny- 
 worth of bread from the depensa, ^ and one sextaria of 
 knight's wine from the cellar, and four portions from the 
 kitchen, one of them a large one, two of the size for 
 knights, and one dispensabile. And Odoin is to find the 
 king bread in his court, and to reckon by tallies with hi^ 
 dispensers (dispensariis) and with all his bakers, and he 
 shall receive the money and give quittances to the bakers. 
 And when he sends to Rouen for bread, Odoin is to 
 bring it at the king's cost, and every pack horse shall have 
 twelve pence, and every pannier-bearing one six pence, 
 and every basket carrier a pennyworth of bread ; if the 
 bread is brought by water, the boatman shall have six- 
 pence a journey ; and Odoin is to have all that is left of 
 the bread of the panetaria, when the king makes a journey, 
 and to have the charge of, and jurisdiction over, the king's 
 bakers at Rouen and within the purlieus of Rouen, and 
 all their forfeitures, and the weighing of bread, and all 
 fines and forfeited bread, etc. . . . nor is anyone 
 but Odo and his heirs to execute the jurisdiction of the 
 panetaria or over the king's bakers, under penalty of ten 
 pounds (p. 465). 
 
 ^ill have quoted at this length from the charter in 
 order to show that the panetaria at this early 
 
 ' This word is still preserved in some French institutions as dipense. 
 See p. 62 above. 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 201 
 
 period was concerned, indeed exclusively concern- 
 ed, with that bread from the name of which the 
 word itself was formed. When we turn to the 
 document known as the Constitutio domus regis, or 
 organisation of our royal household, ^ we cannot, I 
 think, identify ^ panetarius therein, but we do find 
 an accountant of the bread, a computator panis, who 
 must have reckoned by tallies with the bakers, as 
 Odoin was appointed to do in the above charter, 
 and as pantlers always did in later days. And his 
 mention is immediately followed by that of the 
 " four bakers, " two of whom are allowed forty 
 pence for purchasing a Rouen bushel {rnodium Rot- 
 homagenseni) from which they have to turn out a 
 certain number of loaves, according to the kind. 
 Apart from the accountant and the bakers, a master 
 dispenser of the bread {dispemator pants) is ment- 
 ioned ; but I can find no mention of an actual 
 " panneter " or " pantler. " 
 
 For what may be termed the ' master ' pantler 
 we must turn to the coronation rolls of later days ; 
 but before we do this, it may be well to mention a 
 fact hitherto, perhaps, unknown. An inquisition 
 after the death of William Mauduit, Earl of War- 
 wick, taken in 1268, shows us Richard 'de Bosco' 
 holding in Chedworth, Gloucestershire, "by ser- 
 jeanty of being the king's pantler for three feasts 
 yearly. " I cannot find this serjeanty mentioned 
 in the Liber Rubeus or the Testa de Nevill, and my 
 reason for attaching importance to it is that the 
 " three feasts " are clearly the great annual courts 
 at which the Norman Kings wore their crowns. 
 
 ' See p. 54 above. 
 
202 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 On these solemn feastdays the services of a " pann- 
 eter " or " pantler " would, we shall find, be 
 required,and I lay stress on this serjeanty's association 
 with the " three feasts, " because it is thereby 
 taken back to very early days. Henry the Second, 
 it is true, revived in his first three years the holding 
 of these solemn feasts ; but " after 1 158, " in Dr. 
 Stubbs' words, " he gave up the custom alto- 
 gether. " ' 
 
 The early existence of this serjeanty seems, there- 
 fore, clearly proved. 
 
 It is, as I have said, to coronation records that 
 we have to turn for the office of the great 
 " panneter " or " pantler, " of which the first 
 mention is more than thirty years earlier than that 
 of 'the above inquisition. At the coronation of 
 Queen Eleanor, in 1236, the first great precedent 
 for the coronation services, we read that Walter de 
 Beauchamp, of " Haumlega, " who holds from of 
 old the office of panetry [panetaria), brought on 
 the salt-cellar and knives, and did the pantry 
 service that dav, and after dinner received the 
 knives and salt-cellar as his fee.^ We observe that, 
 though panetaria is the word used for the office 
 here as in the charter of Henry I., there is nothing 
 here about bread, with which that charter was 
 exclusively concerned. Indeed, Mr. Wickham 
 Legg writes " that the office of the Panneter was 
 to carry the salt-cellar and carving knives to the 
 
 ' Constitutional History, I, 562. 
 
 ' " Salarium (sic) et cultellos apposuit Walterus de Bello Campo de 
 Haumlega cujus ofBcium a veteri panetaria. Servivit autem eodem die de 
 panetaria et sui sub se prandioque peracto cultellos et salsarium tanquam 
 de jure suo sibi competencia recepit" (Red Book of the Exchequer). 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 203 
 
 king's table ; these, with the spoons, he receives as 
 his fee. " ^ Of the bread Mr. Legg says nothing, 
 doubtless because our coronation records make no 
 mention of it in connexion with the panneter's 
 office. But this I shall discuss below. 
 
 Meanwhile I may note that Mr. Legg tells us 
 " that the office is filled by the Lord of the Manor 
 of Kibworth-Beauchamp ; this manor was held by 
 the Beauchamps of Dumleye, and later by the 
 Earls of Warwick. " ^ The corrupt and unmeaning 
 name of " Dumleye " seems to come from the 
 Liiber Regalis, where it appears as " Dumelye, " * 
 while in the Forma et Modus it degenerates into 
 " Duneleus. " * But in the original record, we 
 have seen, it is " Haumlega, " which represents 
 Elmley Castle, the hereditary seat of that house of 
 Beauchamp which inherited the Earldom of War- 
 wick in 1268, on the death of William Mauduit.® 
 Elmley, as I have elsewhere shown, ® had descended 
 to them, like Kibworth, from the Domesday holder, 
 Robert Despenser. 
 
 Robert's name suggests an interesting speculation. 
 At the coronation of Richard II Thomas Beau- 
 champ, Earl of Warwick claimed the office suc- 
 cessfully, in right of Kibworth-Beauchamp, ^ but 
 
 ' English Goronation Records, p. Ixxvi. 
 
 " Ibid. 
 
 ' Ibid. p. 108. 
 
 * Ibid. p. 181. 
 
 ' See p. 201 above. In another part of the Red Book (p. 567) 
 " Aumlega, " Worcestershire, is named ; this was Elmley Lovett. The 
 official editor, Mr. Hubert Hall, identifies it as Ombersley. 
 
 * Feudal England, 176. 
 
 ' " ratione manerii de Kibworth, com. Leicestr " (Taylor's Gkry of 
 Regality) 
 
204 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the Harcourts had held the manor by knight-serviee 
 of the earls, ^ and there is no trace of its having 
 been previously held by serjeanty. Is it possible 
 that the pantlership held by the Beauchamps of 
 Elmley in 1236 was originally the dispensership of 
 the bread ? We have seen that, in the case of the 
 Hastings family, the two offices were strangely 
 confused, and there certainly was a dispensership 
 in the Beauchamp family. For the Empress Maud 
 had " given and restored " to William de Beau- 
 champ the dispensership which his father Walter 
 had held under Henry I, ^ and which was doubt- 
 less inherited from Robert ' Dispensator. ' On this 
 hypothesis the office was held, by inheritance, in 
 gross, and its holder's tenant at Kibworth-Beau- 
 champ may have merely acted as his deputy when 
 he was not himself present. But, in any case, it is 
 always well to remember that any assertions of a 
 connection between the right to a given office and 
 the tenure of a certain manor require to be received 
 with great caution. 
 
 Full information on the subject is found in 
 Nichols's great work on Leicestershire, under Kib- 
 worth-Beauchamp. ' 
 
 At the coronation of George 11. the then holder 
 of the manor. Sir William Halford, petitioned the 
 Court of Claims (1727) * " to be admitted to per- 
 
 ^ Testa, p. 92. 
 
 ^ " dedi ei et reddidi dispensam ita hereditarie sicut Walterus 
 
 pater ejus earn de patre meo H. rege tenuit {Geoffrey de Mandevilk, p. 
 314). We have seen above (p. 200) that the Norman 'depensa' was 
 that of the bread alone. 
 
 ' Vol. II. part 2 (Gartree Hundred), 635, 636, 645-647. 
 
 * A previous unsuccessful claim seems to have been made at the 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 205 
 
 form the office of great panneter on the day of the 
 coronation of the king and queen, as being seised 
 in fee of the manor of Kibworth-Beau champ, in 
 the county of Leicester ; and to have allowance of 
 the salt-cellars, knives, spoons, clothes and cover- 
 pane, together with the other fees and accustomed 
 perquisites of that office. " Nichols prints his 
 counsel's arguments, and tells us that the Commis- 
 sioners " disallowed the claim upon a presumption 
 that if it had been just it would not have been so 
 long continued, " which last word is clearly an 
 error for " discontinued. " But he points out that 
 the claimant suppressed, as being fatal to his claim, 
 the grant of the manor by Queen Elizabeth in 
 1559, to Ambrose Dudley, to be held by the 
 service of being pantler [panetarius) after the coron- 
 ations of kings and queens. ^ For the manor, which 
 had previously lapsed to the Crown by the attainder 
 of John Duke of Northumberland, was now granted 
 with a special limitation in tail male, and on the 
 extinction of male issue " it reverted to the 
 Crown . . . and consequently the service of 
 pannetry was thereby extinct. " 
 
 The claimant's main object was to prove that 
 the ownership of the manor carried the service ; 
 but his evidence for this was weak. It appears to 
 me to have consisted, virtually, of findings in 
 inquests after death, which, as I had occasion to 
 note in the Lord Great Chamberlain case, were not 
 unfrequently erroneous. Thus, in 1341, Thomas 
 
 coronation of William and Mary (1689) by the then holder of the 
 manor, William Boveridge. 
 
 ' This grant is printed in full by Nichols. 
 
2o6 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, is recorded as 
 holding the manor " by the service of being the 
 King's panetarius on his coronation day. " ^ In 
 1304 Philippa, wife of Guy de Beauchamp, is 
 returned to have died seised of the manor held of 
 the king in capite, by the service of laying the king's 
 cloth {ponendi unam mappam super mensam) on 
 Christmas Day. * This is a notable variant of the 
 service, and the mention of laying the cloth is, we 
 shall find, important. In 1400 Thomas de Beau- 
 champ dies seised of the manor " by grand serjeanty, 
 namely, by the service of being the chief panteler 
 on the day of his coronation,"' and in 1406 his 
 widow, Margaret, is returned at her death as hold- 
 ing the manor by the same service. * There is not 
 in this, I think, any absolute proof that the pant- 
 lership was held in the right of the manor till 
 Queen Elizabeth joined the two, artificially, by hef 
 grant to Ambrose Dudley. 
 
 We may now return to the records of the Cor- 
 onation service. The two great mediaeval prece- 
 dents were the coronations of Queen Eleanor in 
 1236 and of Richard II. in 1377, and the records 
 of both, which are well known, will be found in 
 Mr. Wickham Legg's English Coronation Records. 
 From it (p. 135) I take the actual petition of 
 Thomas Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, in 1 377. 
 After claiming the privilege of carrying the third 
 sword, the earl continues : 
 
 ' Nichols cites '• Fines in Scaccario, Mich., 1 7 Edw. III. 
 ' Nichols cites " Esch. 43 Edw. III. pars, i, No. 20. 
 ' Nichols cites " Esch. 2 Hen. IV. No. 58, Leic. " 
 * Nichols cites " Esch. 8 Hen. IV. No. 68, Leic. " 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 207 
 
 Et ensement ses ditz Auncestres ont ewes I'office de 
 Panetrie et mesmes I'office serviz par eux et lour deputes 
 et Ministres enlours propres persones des salers coteaux 
 et coillers et mesmes les salers coteaux et coillers ont ewes 
 et reicus pour leur feodz ensi come ses ditz Auncestres 
 ont faitz et auant ces heures. 
 
 On this claim the Court gravely decided that 
 the earl had made out his right to the office, and 
 to the salt-cellar and knives as his fee, ' but that as 
 there was no evidence of his right to make off with 
 the spoons {cocliaria), that point must be referred 
 to the king. And the king, we read, Subsequently 
 decided, on the ground of certain evidence [pretextu 
 quarundam evidenciarum) , that the earl should have 
 the spoons. But, for us, this is the earliest evidence 
 of a claim to the spoons being recognised. 
 
 At the coronation of Henry IV (1399), accord- 
 ing to Sir William Halford's counsel, the same 
 Earl Thomas petitioned to serve the office with 
 " saliers, cotels, et coters, " and had his claim 
 allowed. Here one may add the interesting fact 
 that the earl, by his will in the following year, 
 1st April, 1400, bequeathed as heirlooms his cup 
 of the swan and the knives and salt-cellars for the 
 coronation of a king. ^ Accordingly we read, in an 
 MS. account of the coronation of Henry V., that 
 
 ' Baker renders this decision as " to bear the third sword before the 
 king and also to exercise the office of Pantler " {Chronicles.) 
 
 ' Nicolas's Testamenta Vetusta. The great prize, probably, was the 
 " salte, " such, for instance, as that which Henry the Seventh acknow- 
 ledged receiving, I Nov. 1485, from Richard Gardiner, merchant of 
 London : " a salte of golde with a cover stondyng upon a moren' gar- 
 nyshed with perles and precious stones, the which salte was sumtyme 
 belonging to Richard late in dede and not in right Kyng of England, 
 and delyvered to the said Richard Gardyner by one William Dabeney, 
 late Gierke of the Jewells of the said late pretended kyng. " (Report on 
 
2o8 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the then Earl of Warwick had " les drapes, les 
 selers, les coders, que furent mult riche, et tout les 
 autres fees de I'office. " Here, we note, the cloths 
 {drapes) appear among the fees for the first time. 
 According to another Cottonian MS., at the coron- 
 ation of Henry VII. 's queen, in the third year of 
 his reign, " the office of the pannetry, " with its 
 fees, viz. " coteux tranchanz et la sala et le cover- 
 payne, " were petitioned for by three persons in 
 right of the earldom of Warwick, as guardians, 
 Nichols suggests, of the infant earl. It is doubtful, 
 however, who was then the actual holder of the earl- 
 dom. Lastly, at Edward VI. 's coronation, John Vis- 
 count Lisle claimed " to be panterer the day of the 
 king's coronation and the queen's ; and to bear the 
 salt and the carving-knives from the pantry to the 
 king's table ; and to serve by himself, his ministers 
 and deputies, to the office of pantry during dinner- 
 time, and he claimeth to have thereby the same 
 salt and knives, and also the spoons, served to the 
 king's table that day. " He claimed that his step- 
 father. Viscount Lisle had executed the office at 
 Queen Anne Boleyn's coronation in right of his 
 wife, through whom he himself was " right heir 
 from Richard, Earl of Warwick ; " and his claim 
 was allowed. ^ No evidence was produced as to 
 
 Historical Manuscripts in various collections, II. 296.) 
 
 At the actual date referred to in the text (1400) we read of six white 
 silver salt-cellars, gilt on the " swages, " without covers, weighing 8 
 pound I Jj., four others, and a cover of a silver-gilt and polished salt- 
 cellar, all late the property of Richard II., and then in the custody of 
 Richard de la Panetrie {sic"). — Calendar of Patent Roll, p.293. 
 
 ' See, for all this, Nichols, ut supra, p. difi ; and compare for Lord Lisle's 
 heirship of the eldest daughter of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, 
 my article on " The Great Chamberlain Case " in The Ancestor, IV. 11. 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 209 
 
 Anne Boleyn's coronation beyond the allegation in 
 Lord Lisle's claim ; but in an account of that cor- 
 onation I find the entry, which refers to his step- 
 father, " Lord Lisle, panter. " ' An interesting 
 description of Anne's coronation tells us that 
 " around her was an enclosure into which none but 
 those appointed to serve, who were the greatest 
 personnages of the realm, and chiefly those who 
 served ' de sommeliers d'eschan9onnerie et de pane- 
 trie, ' " * were admitted. 
 
 It was confessed by Sir William Halford's counsel 
 that after, at any rate, Elizabeth's reign, there was 
 no trace of the office being exercised or even 
 claimed at coronations ; although, as we have just 
 seen, " it was classed with no less a dignity than 
 the butlership {eschangonnerie) .^ And, as I observed 
 abovei this was the actual ground on which the 
 claim was rejected. But he also failed to adduce 
 proof that the office had ever been claimed in right 
 of the tenure of Kibworth-Beauchamp. Indeed, 
 his own evidence showed that at Edward VI. 's 
 coronation John Dudley, Viscount Lisle, had claim- 
 ed the office as " right heir from Richard, Earl of 
 Warwick. " And here it is not irrelevant to 
 observe that he was heir only of the eldest of the 
 earl's three daughters, and that if the nature and 
 admission of his claim had been known to Lord 
 Ancaster's counsel, in the Great Chamberlain case, 
 they would possibly have made a strong point of 
 
 ' Letters and Papers, Henry VIII. 1533, p. 278. A contemporary 
 account published in Tudor Tracts (Archibald Constable & Co.) names 
 him as " panterer. " 
 
 -' Ibid. 265. 
 
 ^ Unless this word here denotes cupbearers. 
 
 14 
 
2IO THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 it, as the claim of Lord Ancaster rested, mainly on 
 the ground that such offices as these should descend 
 entire to the heir of the eldest daughter ; but the 
 instances adduced in proof were all of remote date. 
 
 As yet we have found nothing in the coronation 
 records to connect the office of the pantler (or the 
 " panneter ") with bread. Sir WilHam Halford's 
 counsel, it is true, stated that " his chief business, 
 if one may guess from the name of his office, was 
 to provide bread ; and upon that account, I presume, 
 the coverpane has been always allowed at former 
 coronations to those who have executed this office."^ 
 But this is a false etymology, though a not unna- 
 tural guess, if we may trust the New English Dici- 
 tonary, which states that, as with the " counterpane," 
 the " pane " represents not bread, but cloth. There 
 seems, however, to be reason for doubting this 
 derivation. 
 
 The absence of any mention of the bread itself 
 is obviously due to the fact thgt it was not among 
 the fees claimed for discharge of the office. But 
 there is evidence from other sources which directly 
 connects the bread with the knives and the great 
 salt as belonging to the pantler's office. If we go 
 back, so far as France is concerned, to the close of 
 the thirteenth century, we find a bishop of Angers 
 writing as follows : — " When we were seated there 
 came a noble, Sir Guy de Camilliaco, in a tunic, 
 bearing a cloth {mappani) upon his shoulder, which 
 he set on the table before us, his officers assisting 
 him ; and when this was done, he set two rolls 
 {^panes') before us with his own hands, and other 
 
 ' Nichols, ut snpra. 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 211 
 
 rolls on the said table at which we were sitting, 
 which office was incumbent on him by reason of 
 the fief of Camilliaciim which he holds of us. 
 Wherefore he was bound to undertake the office of 
 Panistarius that day .... After dinner he 
 had all the cloths {mappas) of the said places, 
 because it was his right. " ' Here we see the 
 panistarius placing the lord's bread on the table, 
 and also laying the cloth {mappa). This laying of 
 the mappa we have already heard of as the tenure 
 by which a Countess of Warwick held Kibworth, 
 and we also found an Earl of Warwick alleged to 
 have received, as panetarius, the drapes at Henry V.'s 
 coronation. But so far as actual claims are con- 
 cerned " le coverpayne " alone appears. Moreover, 
 there was, from the earlist times, another and 
 recognised claimant to the table-cloths, the mappas : 
 this was the napier, the ofiEcer of the napery. ^ It 
 is clear then that, in this country, the pantler had 
 no claim to the table-cloth, and this is further 
 confirmed by the fact, to which we shall come, that 
 the table-cloths, in household economy, were not 
 in the pantler's department. 
 
 From this it follows that the " coverpane," which 
 was what the pantler claimed, was, as I have already 
 said, something distinct from the table-cloth [mappa). 
 
 For the details of the pantler's function at the 
 coronation feast we must turn to the instructive 
 directions for another, but a strictly parallel solem- 
 nity, viz. the enthronization banquet of the Arch- 
 bishop of York in 1465. At this great feudal 
 
 * See, for the Latin text, Ducange (1886), VI, 128. 
 ' See the section on ' Napery service. ' 
 
212 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ceremony, when George Nevill sat in state. Sir 
 John " Malyvery " (Mauleverer) officiated as 
 " Panter, " a fact sufficient to demonstrate that the 
 post was, as at coronations, honorary. I only 
 regret that the narrative, which I found with some 
 difficulty,^ is too lengthy for quotation at such length 
 as it deserves. 
 
 Hereafter followeth the service to the Baron-bishop 
 within the close of Yorke : — 
 
 Item, the Yeoman of the Ewrie must cover the hygh 
 Table, with all other Boordes and Cubbordes. * . . . 
 
 Then the Panter must bring foorth Salt, Bread and 
 Trenchers, with one brode and one narrow knyfe, and 
 one spoone, and set the salt right under the middest of 
 the cloth of estate, the Trenchers before the Salt, and the 
 bread before the Trenchers towardes the Reward, properly 
 wrapped in a Napkyn, * the brode knyfe poynt under the 
 Bread, and the backe towardes the Salt, and the lesse 
 knyfe beneath it towardes the rewarde, and the Spoone 
 beneath that towards the rewarde, and all to be covered 
 with a Coverpane of Diaper of fyne Sylke. The surnappe 
 must be properly layde towardes the salt endlong the 
 brode edge, by the handes of the forenamed Yeoman of 
 the Ewrie ; and all other Boordes and Cubberdes must be 
 made redy by the Yeoman of the Pantry with Salt, Tren- 
 chers, and Bread. 
 
 Also at the Cubborde in lyke manner must the Panter 
 make redy with Salt, Bread, Trenchers, Napkyns, and 
 Spoones, with one brode knyfe for the rewarde . . 
 and the Carver must go to the table, and there kneele on 
 his knee, and then aryse with a good countenance, and 
 properly take off the coverpane of the Salt, and geve it to 
 
 the Panter, which must stand still 
 
 [Dinner being over] Then the Panter must make his 
 obeysaunce before the Table, kneeling upon his knee 
 
 ' In Leland's Collectanea, VII. 7, et sej. 
 ^ Q/; p. 192 above. 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 213 
 
 with a Towell about his neck, the one ende in his ryght 
 hande, the other in his left hande, and with his left hande 
 to take up the spoones and knyves properlye, and with 
 his ryght hande to take up the Salt bowyng his knockels 
 neare together, with his obeysaunce, and so return to the 
 Pantry. 
 
 The order that the Panter must " make his 
 obeysaunce before the Table kneeling upon his 
 knee " should be compared with Lord Montagu's 
 order, in Elizabeth's days, that his pantlcr should 
 make " two curteseyes " even to his empty dining 
 table and " a small obeysance " when placing the 
 bread, etc. thereon ; ^ for it illustrates the Laudian 
 canon of 1 640, advocating " reverence and obey- 
 sance " on entering church and chapel, " not with 
 any intention to exhibit religious worship to the 
 Communion Table, the east, or church, " etc. It 
 also helps to illustrate " the Black Rubric, " 
 
 I now pass to a document of the period, the Liber 
 Niger of the King's House temp. Edward IV . Here 
 we read that 
 
 the office of Panetry hath a sergeaunt, which is called 
 chief Pantrer of the King's mouth and mastyr of this 
 
 office he receivythe the brede of the serjeaunt 
 
 of the bake-house by entayle ^ other 3 yoman 
 
 in this office panters these yomen by assent 
 
 sette the saltes in the halle and take them 
 
 up lastJ 
 
 We also read of the " clippinges " of bread which 
 are afterwards found as the recognised fees of 
 pantry servants, and that the countroUers " oftyn- 
 tymes see that they be not pared too nigh the 
 
 * See p. 218, below. 
 ' i.e. by tally. 
 
214 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 crumbe. " ^ Among the multitude of other de- 
 partments we may note " the office of Ewary and 
 Napery. " ^ 
 
 In the ordinances of King Henry VII. we read 
 that " the karver must see the paintre {sic) take 
 assay of the bread, salt, and trenchers. " ' 
 
 Those of King Henry VIII., in his seventeenth 
 year, speak of such servants as " buttler, pantler 
 and ewer " being present at the king's dinner ;* and 
 in later ordinances of the same king we read of 
 " the Sergeant of the pantry .... dayly 
 tallying with the sergeant of the bakehouse the 
 number of bread that he doth receive of him. " * 
 Under Queen Elizabeth, in 1602, we find "the 
 Pantrey " entered, as usual, immediately after " the 
 bakehouse, " while " the Seller, " " the Buttery, " 
 and " the Ewery " appear as other departments. * 
 And we read of its fees : " The sergeant hath for 
 his fee all the coverpannes, drinking towells, and 
 other linen clothe of the king's side that are darn- 
 ed " {sic) ; while " the gentlemen have the like fee 
 of the queene's side, " and the yeomen " all the 
 chippings of breade spent within the said office, 
 for the which they find chipping knives, " '' Here 
 we are at once reminded of Shakespeare's contem- 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries [1790]), 70 and 71. 
 
 » Ibid. 83. 
 
 ' Ibid. 118. 
 
 * Household Ordinances, 153. 
 
 ' Ibid. 232. 
 
 « Ibid. 283. 
 
 ' Ibid. 294. For the Ewry {Aquar') the fees consisted of the " diaper " 
 and " plaine clothes " that were " dampned " (p. 296), and this last 
 word is used in other departments, which throws grave doubt on the 
 " darned " of the Pantry. 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 215 
 
 porary phrase : — " A good shallow young fellow ; 
 a' would have made a good pantler, a' would ha' 
 chipped bread well."^ As we might expect from 
 the conservatism that distinguished the royal house- 
 hold, the connexion of the pantry with the bake- 
 house and the bread continued close throughout ; 
 when the Gentleman Usher under Charles II. went, 
 as the phrase ran, " for to fetch AU-Night for the 
 king, " he made his way first " to the pantry, there 
 to receive the king's bread, and well and truly to 
 give the officer of the mouth the saie thereof ; " 
 next to the buttery and the pitcherhouse, and then 
 to the ewry, " there to receive the king's towell, 
 bason, and water. " " And even under William 
 and Mary, when the Court was on its " removes," 
 the bakehouse and pantry occupied jointly one of 
 the train of vehicles in the lumbering caravan. ' 
 Moreover, the " gentleman and yeoman " who was 
 at the head of the pantry was still receiving wages, 
 I have reckoned, at the rate oi j \ d. a day, the 
 same rate, apparently, as under our Norman kings. * 
 We must turn, however, from the royal house- 
 hold to those of the great nobles if we would obtain 
 
 ' 2 Henry IV. II, sc. 4, 1. 258. 
 
 ^ Household Ordinances, 374. 
 
 ' Ibid. 414. 
 
 * Ibtd. 395. The heads of the Buttery, Chaundry, Accatry, Queen's 
 Privy Kitchen, etc., the Gentlemen Harbingers and the two heads of 
 the cellar, were all similarly receiving, in 1689, £li 8/. \\d. as yearly 
 wages, which odd sum works out at ']\d. a day. Payment of wages at 
 the rate of so many pence (or halfpence) a day was the rule in Norman 
 times. In the Constitutio Domus Regis the Harbingers and the chamber- 
 lain of the chaundry are found receiving %d. a. day under Henry I. 
 The sum of "/^d. is a quarter of the dispenser's pay under Henry I., and 
 an eighth of that of the Chancellor and Dap/eri, which seems to have 
 been the unit. (See also pp. 83, 86). 
 
21 6 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 full details of the pantler's office and functions. 
 The closing years of the sixteenth and the early 
 ones of the seventeenth century are rich in rules 
 and ordinances for the great households of the 
 time. We will take first the pattern orders sug- 
 gested for the household of an earl, with its " seller, 
 buttry, pantry, and ewry, " the four departments 
 which are regularly found in these elaborate house- 
 holds. ' 
 
 Herein we read of the " yeoman and groome of 
 the pantry " : 
 
 The Yeoman should be a man of seemely stature, 
 ■wearing his apparell clenly and handsome, in regard he 
 commeth dayly to the Earles table. He is to receive the 
 manchet, cheate, and sippet breade, from the bakers by 
 
 tale ; He and the groome are to keepe the saltes, 
 
 spoones and knives very faire and cleane He is every 
 
 night to accompt to the clarke of the kitchin what breade 
 of all sortes is received, how much spent, and what 
 
 remaineth He and the groome are to chipp the 
 
 breade, but they are not to chopp of(f) great peeces of 
 the bottomes of the loaves to make the chippings the 
 better, which are their fees ; but to this the cheefe officers 
 and clarke of the kitchin are often to look (p. 29).* 
 
 Of the Yeoman of the Ewry, who here again 
 receives the cloths and napkins from the keeper of 
 the Napery, we read that " albeit he be not so 
 personable a man as the Pantler, yet should goe 
 neate and handsome in his apparell " (p. 30) . 
 
 ' In the 'Northumherland Household Book, for instance, we have the 
 " yoman of the Sellar, " " yoman o' th' Pantry," " yoman of the Buttry" 
 " yoman o' th' Ewry " (p. 41), the second being also styled the " pantler " 
 (p. 88) or "pauntler" (p. 305). 
 
 ' R. Brathwait's Some Rules and Orders for the Government of the House 
 of an Earl {lizi). 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 217 
 
 Our next authority is " A breviate touching the 
 Order and Government of a Nobleman's house, " 
 in which we read (1605) of " The yeoman of the 
 Pantrie " that 
 
 Hee is to receave all breade from the baker, and to 
 tallie with him for the same, and to enter the dailie 
 
 chardge what is spennte and to carrie the salte with 
 
 the carvinge knife, clensing knife, and forke, and them 
 to place upon the table in dewe order, with the breade 
 at the salte, and then to cover the breade, with a fynne 
 square clouth of cambrick called a coverpaine (which is 
 to bee taken of, the meate being placede on the table and 
 the lorde sett) by the carver and delivered to the pantler.^ 
 
 This is the passage on which I rely for the 
 meaning of the word " couvrepain." The removal, 
 we see, here takes place precisely as at George 
 Nevill's enthronization feast. 
 
 The last of my three selected documents is the 
 most important of all, the finest thing I know on 
 the English ritual of the table. It is buried away 
 in the seventh volume of Sussex Archaeological 
 Collections (pp. 174-212), and is styled the "Booke 
 of orders and rules ^of Anthony Viscount Montague 
 in 1595." In it the noble author writes as follows 
 on the pantler : 
 
 The Yeoman of my Pantrye and his Office. 
 
 I will that the Yeoman of my Pantrye doe receave of 
 the Yeoman of my Seller by Inventorye or biUes indented 
 interchangeably betweene them all such plate as shall 
 apperteyne to his office, viz., saltes, plate, trenchers, 
 spoones, and knives hefted with silver, and be answerable 
 
 ' Jrchaeologia, XIII. 333-4. 
 
21 8 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 to him for the same. I will that he receave the breade 
 of the Baker, by tale, and keepe a true reckonninge of 
 the receipts of the same and doe weekely make accompte 
 
 thereof to the Clarke of my Kitchen ; I will that 
 
 being warned by the Yeoman Usher to prepare for my 
 dyett, he doe arme himselfe, and have all thinges in a 
 redynes for my service, and beinge come for by him shall 
 foUowe him through the Hall to my dyninge chamber 
 dore, and from thence go even with him on his right 
 hande unto my table makeinge eche of them two curte- 
 seyes thereto, the one about the middest of the chamber, 
 the other at the boorde ; which done, he shall place the 
 sake, and laye downe the knyves, and then lay myne own 
 trencher with a manchet thereon, and a knife and spoone 
 on either side ; and my wife's in like manner ; at every 
 which service ended, he shall make a small obeysance : 
 and having fully done, and together with the Yeoman 
 Usher made a solempne courtesye, he shall departe so 
 conducted oute, as he came in. 
 
 I will that everye meale, after the first course, he 
 foUowe my service uppe havinge a purpyn ^ with breade 
 on his arme and a case of knyves in his hande, to supplye 
 their wantes that shall neede : and after that I am sett 
 that he come upp some tymes to see that there be noe 
 wante of breade or any other thinge that belongeth to his 
 office ; and after everye meale ended and the voyder 
 taken awaye, that he come and orderly take off the sake 
 and knyves, and with due reverence return, soe bearinge 
 them downe as he brought them uppe (p. 204). 
 
 In this invaluable description we see the " salte " 
 and knives ceremoniously brought to the table and 
 removed therefrom by the pantler precisely as they 
 had been by the Great Pantler at the coronation 
 feast, and as they had been at the York feast a 
 hundred and thirty years before. The spoons are 
 
 * A bread basket {^pour pain). 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 219 
 
 added, as they had been since Richard II. 's corona- 
 tion, while the placing of the manchet and service 
 with the " purpyn " directly connect the pantler 
 with the bread from which his name was derived. 
 Moreover, in another part of this document we 
 read of the " Baker and his office ": 
 
 I will that my Baker receave all his wheate of my 
 Granator by talle, and deliver his breade by the like talle 
 to my pantrye, and that att everye mohethes ende he doe 
 make accompte to the Clarke of my Kitchin of all the 
 wheate that moneth by him receaved, and howe many 
 cake of breade he hath delivered the same moneth to my 
 Pantler (p. 209). 
 
 It will be remembered that the pantler's duty 
 of accounting by tally with the baker, which 
 occurs in all these documents, was expressly named 
 in Henry I.'s grant of his panetaria, in which 
 Odoin is charged to keep account by tally with the 
 king's bakers ; also that the computator panis is 
 named in the Constitutio domus regis. From this 
 we may, I think, infer that, under Henry I, the 
 bread, when baked, was delivered by tally to the 
 pantler {computator panis), who, in turn, delivered 
 it by tally to the spence, whence it was "dispensed" 
 to the household by the " Dispensator panis." ^ 
 
 It is clear, however, that the laying of the cloth, 
 
 ' It may be interesting to note that in that early document he is 
 immediately followed by the bakers, who had, like Lord Montague's 
 baker, to produce so many loaves from each hushel of wheat, 
 "medium Rothomagensem, " the rate that is appoynted him to make of 
 de quo debent reddere xl every hushelle (viz), of full and plumme wheat, 
 siminellos dominicos, et cl every loafe to weighe sixteene ownces from the 
 sal', et cclx panes de pis- oven, and of barren and hungrye wheate fifteen 
 trino." hiber Niger and ounces and an halfe or thereabouts, and that 
 Liber Rubeus. there be made of that size, thirtye caste of bread 
 
 of everye bushell " (p. 209). 
 
220 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 as apart from the placing of the " salt," etc. was in 
 England the function of the yeoman of the Ewry/ 
 and that the Great Pantler, therefore, at the coro- 
 nation feast cannot have been entitled to the cloth 
 {mappa) as his fee. But of far greater importance, 
 as distinguishing the ^ng)i%\\ panetaria, is the fact 
 that, in England, the king's pantler never enjoyed, 
 so far as we can find, that jurisdiction over all 
 bakers which was vested in the grand panetier de 
 France, and which, as we have seen, was expressly 
 conferred in the grant by Henry I. of the Nor- 
 man panetaria. 
 
 Of the grand panetier we read : 
 
 On d^signait autrefois en France sous le nom de grand 
 panetier un grand officier de la couronne, charge de servir 
 le roi a table, concurrement avec le grand ^chanson ", dans 
 les jours de ceremonie, et sous I'autorit^ duquel se trou- 
 vaient tous les boulangers demeurant a Paris et hors des 
 portes 
 
 L'office de grand panetier 6tait toujours poss6de par un 
 homme de la plus haute noblesse. En 1332 Bouchard 
 
 ' Even in the Royal Household the Ewry included the Napery, but 
 in the coronation services the two were differentiated and the offices of 
 Napier and of Ewer were vested in different persons. But at the enthro- 
 nization feast of the archbishop of York, the cloth (" surnappe "), we 
 have seen, was laid by the Serjeant of the Ewry, and this was also tbe 
 procedure in Lord Montague's household. His Lordship's directions 
 were that the yeoman of his Ewry should " laye the table cloth fayre 
 uppon both his armes, and goe together with the Yeoman Usher writh 
 due reverence to the table of my dyett, makeinge two curtesys thereto, 
 the one about the middest of the chamber, the other when he cometh 
 to ytt, and there, kissinge ytt, shall laye ytt on the same place where the 
 sayd Yeoman Usher with his hande appoynteth casteinge the one ende 
 the one waye, the other ende the other waye ; the sayd Usher helpeinge 
 him to spreade ytt, which beinge spredde and reverence done, " the 
 yeoman of the Pantry is to place the " sake, " etc. The whole cere- 
 monial deserves to be compared with that of the York feast in 1465. 
 
 ' (y pp. 61, 209 above. 
 
THE KING'S PANTLER 221 
 
 de Montmorency dtait Panetarius Franfice^ et en cette 
 quality il eut un procfes avec le pr6v6t des marchands et 
 des dchevins de la ville qui, soutenant les int^r^ts des 
 boulangers, I'entravaient dans I'ex^rcise de sa jurisdiction 
 
 Louis XIV., par un 6dit du mois d'aoAt 17 11, 
 
 supprima la jurisdiction de ce grand officier, qui pla9ait 
 au bas de I'^cu de ses armes la nef d'or et le cadenas 
 qu'on paralt autrefois a c6t6 du couvert du roi. ^ 
 
 In the eighth volume of his Histoire genealogique 
 de la maison de France^ 17335 Pere Anselme devotes 
 eighty pages to his history of the " Grands panne- 
 tiers de France" (pp. 603-682), at the head of 
 which the cadenas and the nefzvc rudely shown in 
 woodcuts. But a better description shows us the 
 richly wrought nef, which was replaced in the 
 sixteenth century by the cadenas, a square plate 
 two inches high, with a cover, which held the 
 knife, fork, and spoon, salt, pepper and sugar. A 
 still more close connection with the mediaeval 
 custom is seen in Montaigne's account of the cade- 
 nas used by the Cardinal de Sens even in Italy: 
 
 " devant ceux a qui on veut faire un honneur particu- 
 lier ... on sert de grands quarres d'argent qui por- 
 tent leur saliere, de mdme fafon que ceux qu'on sert en 
 France aux grands. Aux dessus de cela, il y a une ser- 
 viette pli6e en quartre ; sur cette serviette le pain, le cou- 
 teau, la fourchette, et le culler" ^ 
 
 Here we have the salt, the bread, the knife and 
 the spoon, which formed, as we have seen, the 
 pantler's province, with the addition of the fork 
 that marked an advance in civilisation. 
 
 ' Grand DicAonnaire Universe!, XII. 113. 
 * Ibid. III. 43. The italics are mine. 
 
222 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 NAPERY SERVICE 
 
 The officer who had charge of the royal table- 
 linen is named ' Maparius ' or ' Napparius * in the 
 Constitutio domus regis. '^ The. equivalent of this 
 term in coronation documents is " the naperer, " 
 but the true English form appears to be Napper, 
 or Napier, both of which have become surnames. 
 I have avoided the difficulty by speaking of " napery 
 service. " 
 
 There appears to have been always some confus- 
 ion between the position of this officer and that of 
 the pantler, or even the dispenser, on the one hand, 
 and the Serjeant of the ewry on the other. ^ In the 
 Liber Niger domus of Edward IV " the office of 
 Ewary and Napery *' was served by a Serjeant " in 
 covering of the bourde with wholesome, cleane, 
 and untouched clothes of straungers." ' He received 
 " the charge of alle napery by measure, for the 
 Kinge and his chambre and halle." * He was en- 
 titled to " one sompter-man and horse for the 
 Kinge's stuffe, founden by the Thesaurer his charge 
 of housholde. " * 
 
 For his fee he had the " perused clothes, so that 
 with honestye they will noe longer serve, 
 
 ' Lib. Rub. p. 808, see p. 54 above. The survey of Winchester, 
 temf. Henry I, shows " Audoenus napparius " holding a good house 
 (p. 531), and his widovir (" uxor Oini naparii ") is named on the Pipe 
 Roll of 1 1 30 (p. 143). 
 
 ' See pp. 211, 220 above and pp. 223-4 below. 
 
 ' i.e. cloths untouched by strangers. 
 
 * See p. 66 above. 
 
 ^ Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries), p. 83. Under Henry 
 I this officer had, similarly, "Homini suo iij ob. in die ; et j </ ad sum- 
 marium " {Lib. Rub. p. 808). 
 
N APERY SERVICE 223 
 
 clothes surnape, footeclothe, and such others 
 
 to be fee to the serjeaunt, except at any coronation. " 
 The right to the napery used at the coronation ban- 
 quet was a contested matter. 
 
 From an early date we detect the existence 
 of an honorary napery service. At the head of his 
 pedigree of Hastings Dugdale places " William de 
 Hastings, Steward to King Henry the First, which 
 office he held by serjeantie, in respect of his tenure 
 of the mannor of Ashele in com. Norf, vzz. by the 
 service of taking charge of the Naperie (id est, the 
 table-clothes and linen) at the solemn coronations 
 of the Kings of this Realm. " ^ This statement is 
 badly confused. The office of the Hastings family 
 was not that of ' steward, ' and the tenure of the 
 manor is not recorded till a good deal later. " It is 
 the manor of Ashill, Norfolk, though identified as 
 " Ashley " in HazHtt's edition of Blount's Tenures^ 
 and, worse still, as " Ashley in Essex " in Legg's 
 English Coronation Records (p. Ixxv). 
 
 Blount has noted for us evidence of its ' pantler ' 
 tenure so early as 1204-5.' In the Testa it is 
 variously entered, the tenure being given as ' dis- 
 penser ' service in 1 2 1 2 * and again in two later 
 entries, ' though two other entries record it as 
 
 ^ Baronetage, I, 574. 
 
 ' Dugdale vouched the Testa de Net/ill, which relates, of course to a 
 later date. 
 
 ' " Johannes de Hastings tenet manerium quod vocatur le Uppe 
 Hall in Ashele, in capite de domino Rage, per serjantiam essendi pane- 
 tarius domini Regis. " Rot. Fin. 6 John, m. 28 dors. 
 
 * " Willelmus de Hasting' tenet x libratas terre in Asle per seijantiam 
 scilicet existendi despensarius in Despensa Domini Regis" (p. 294). 
 
 * " De serjant' dicunt quod Henricus de Hasting tenet c solidatas 
 terre in vill' de Aselelegh per serjant' dispense " (p. 299) ; " Henricus 
 
224 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ' pantler ' service. ^ It will be observed that in 
 none of these entries is the tenure given as napery 
 service, and yet in the very period covered by these 
 returns, viz. in 1236, Henry de Hastings claimed 
 successfully, as against Thurstan the Dispenser, ^ 
 the right to render Napery service at the coronation 
 of Queen Eleanor, and to receive the table-cloths, 
 when removed, as his fee. ' It is difficult to see 
 what right a 'dispenser' could allege to the office, 
 though a ' pantler, ' possibly, had some. 
 
 The right, however, had now been established, 
 and at the coronation of Richard II, * Ashill, then 
 still in the hands of the Hastings family, was again 
 allowed to confer the right to this service, as it also 
 was at that of Henry IV, when Lord Grey de Ruthyn, 
 who had then inherited the manor, claimed it as 
 against John de Drayton. In the interval between 
 1236 and these later dates, John de Hastings had 
 been returned in 1325 as holding, at his death, this 
 manor " by serjeanty of napery. " ^ When, how- 
 ever, the old service was claimed in right of 
 
 de Hasting tenet quandam terram . in villa de Asseles per servicium 
 dispensar' " (p. 283). This latter entry is of 1236 (see p. 30 above). 
 
 ^ " Henricus de Hastinges tenet Aschele de domino Rege per serjan- 
 tiam Panetrie" (p. 290) ; " Henricus de Hastinges tenet quandam 
 serjantiam de Panetr' domini R. in Essele, et valet per annum c solidos " 
 (p. 296). 
 
 ^ See p. 196 above. 
 
 ' " De Naperia — servivit ea die Henricus de Hastinges, cujus est 
 officium serviendi de nappis a veteri. Vendicavit tamen illud officium 
 Turstanus Dispensarius ea die, asserens suum esse debere a veteri. Sed 
 Rex repulit eum et admisit Henricum ea die assignans eisdem diem de 
 
 contentione Extractas vero post prandium nappas, tanquam suas et ad 
 
 officium suum spectantes, recepit " {Lib. Rub. p. 757). 
 
 * The fee, on this occasion was " les napes quand ils soient suistretz. " 
 
 = Cal. oflnq.Yl, p. 386. 
 
NAPERY SERVICE 225 
 
 Ashill ^ at the coronations of James II, George II, 
 and George IV, the claim was not allowed. 
 
 Apart from this manor of Ashill, there were at 
 least two other estates which were held by napery 
 service. One of these was at Little Missenden, 
 Bucks, ^ and the other in Chadwell and West 
 Thurrock, in the southernmost part of Essex. ' It 
 is possible to carry back both these services a good 
 deal further than has hitherto been known, namely 
 to the reign of Henry I. For on the Pipe Roll of 
 1 1 30 we find Danegeld, under Bucks, remitted to 
 Michael " Naparius " * (p. 102), while under 
 Essex we find a remission of a " iriurdrum " pay- 
 ment to " Torellus Naparius " (p. 56) and also the 
 entry of a considerable sum tendered by " Torellus 
 iSTaparius " that he may hold in peace his land of 
 
 ' The manor had been alienated by Richard (Grey), earl of Kent, in 
 1 5 12, and the tenure was subseijuently changed to Knight-service 
 (Taylor's Glory ofRegalUy, p. 132). 
 
 ' " Serjantia Walteri Mauntel in Parva Messenden, pro qua debuit 
 esse Naparius domini Regis" (Testa, pp. 256-257). See also Cal. of 
 In J. Hen. Ill, No. 162. 
 
 This serjeanty reappears as at Chesham (adjacent to Little Missenden) 
 in Michaelmas Term, 1 3 Edward III, when Richard de Wedon gave 
 1 2sh. 6d. for his relief on two messuages etc. in Chesham held " de 
 Rege per seijantiam essendi naparius Domini Regis." 
 
 ' « Will' iilius Will'i Tarel (sic) tenet in Parva Turrak et in Chaun- 
 dewell per serjant' essendi custus (sic) napar' domini Regis " (Testa, 
 p. 266). " Will's Thorel tenet' in Chaldewell per serjant' Naper' " 
 (lb., p. 267). " Serjantia Will'i Torel' in Chaudewell' et in Thorrok 
 pro qua debuit custodire nappas in hospicio Regis (lb., p. 268). 
 
 The Pipe Roll of 1 207 records 40 marcs as due from William Torel 
 "pro habendo officio Naperiae Regis," and the Fine Roll of 1 207-1 208 
 (9 John) records him as giving the king 60 marcs and a palfrey " pro 
 habendo officio naperie domini Regis." The/«f./. m. on John Thorel 
 in 1282 duly records this tenure by serjeanty. 
 
 * He has a similar remission on p. 86, which suggests to me that he 
 was then holding at Hartwell, Northants. 
 
 15 
 
226 THE KING'S HOUSEIHOLD 
 
 the earl's fee in Thurrock. " ^ Clearly " the earl '-' 
 was the Count of Eu, and the place, therefore, 
 West Thurrock. ^ We thus obtain the origin of 
 that manor in West Thurrock which appears later, 
 for several generations in the hands of the Torel 
 family. ' 
 
 It should be observed that in the cases of both 
 these serjeanties their holders were then known by 
 the name of their office (" Naparius ") . We shall 
 meet with further instances of this practice below. 
 
 Originally seated at Torell's Hall in Little 
 Thurrock, * the holders of this serjeanty subse- 
 quently acquired extensive estates in Essex, but 
 their line ended in an heiress under Henry VIII 
 (1544). The tenure was returned in several In- 
 quisitions as that of serjeanty, grand serjeanty, or 
 petty serjeanty as King's Napperer in his household, 
 or on his coronation day, plus an annual payment 
 of ten shillings in the Exchequer.* It is, however, 
 doubtful if these returns were right, for, when the 
 serjeanty was ' arrented 'under Henry III, William 
 Torel exchanged its service for that of the sixth of 
 a knight plus ten shillings a year. ^ In spite of 
 this, Sir John Leveson, who had purchased Torrell's 
 Hall a few years before, claimed and was allowed 
 to act as ' naperer ' at , the coronation of James I 
 
 ' " terrain suam de feodo Comitis de Turroc" (p. 59). 
 
 ' Not Greys Thurrock, which Morant (erroneously) made to be the 
 Count's holding. 
 
 ' Morant's M.ssex, I, 92. 
 
 * For a suit of 1219 in which they were concerned see Bracton's Note 
 Book, Plea 47. ' Loures, ' the place to which it relates, was really 
 Bowers Gifford. 
 
 ' Morant's Essex, I. 227, 
 
 ' Testa, p. 268. 
 
THE WAFERER SERJEANTY 227 
 
 (1603), and the same claim was made, though not 
 allowed, at that of George IV. ^ 
 
 Another Essex instance of napery service affords 
 a very early example of pecuniary commutation. 
 In tjhe Writtle inquest of 12 12 we read that 
 Menigar ' le Napier ' alleges that Henry I enfeoffed 
 his predecessors by napery service, but that when 
 the earl of Arundel married Queen Adeliza, in the 
 following reign, he changed this service into an 
 annual payment of twenty shillings.'' This Menigar 
 had been preceded by a Ralf ' Naper ' or ' le Napier ', 
 who appears as a leading inhabitant of Waltham 
 (Holy Cross) in 1168.' Conversely, King John 
 changed the service of one knight due from Pishill, 
 Oxon., into serjeanty, the service being the annual 
 render of a tablecloth {nappani) worth three shil- 
 lings. * 
 
 THE WAFERER SERJEANTY 
 
 This is a particularly good example of a recog- 
 nised office in the King's Household being dischar- 
 
 ' Wollaston, Court tf Claims, p. 308. 
 
 * " Menigarus le Napier dicit quod Rex Henricus avus {sic) domini 
 Regis feodavit antecessores suos per serjantiam de Naperie et dicit quod 
 quando comes de Arundel duxit Reginam Aliciam in uxorem removit 
 illud servicium et fecit inde reddere xx sol. per annum, et predictus 
 Menigarus tenet iUud feodum de abbate de Waltham per idem servicium 
 de XX sol. " Writtle Inquest in Testa, p. 270. 
 
 ' Tipe Roll, 14 Henry II, pp. 40, 49. 
 
 * " Robertus Napparius habet feodum unius militis de hereditate 
 uxoris sue in Pushull, et dominus Rex perdonavit predicto Roberto et 
 hered' ejus per cartam suam predictum servicium militare per unam 
 nappam de precio iij sol. vel per tres solidos reddendos pro precio illius 
 
 nappe ad scaccarium ad compotum constabuli. " Inquest of 1212 in 
 
 Testa, p. 1 15 ; (/; p. 107 : " Robertus le Nap' tenet per sergentiam 
 
 inveniendi.... " and p. 1 18 ; also Red Book of the Exchequer, p. 145. 
 
228 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ged, on the occasion of his cordnation,by the tenant 
 in serjeanty of certain lands. 
 
 The " Office of Waferes " is fully described in 
 the Black Book of Edward IV's Household. ' It 
 hathe one yeoman making wafyrs, and saufely and clenely 
 to kepe them covered and under Jock and by assay to be 
 
 delivered for the King's mouth to the sewar 
 
 He taketh for the stuiFe of this office, after the prices of 
 estates, being present in courte, first for the flower (sic) of 
 the sergeaunt of bake-house dayly or wekely as he hathe 
 nede by a tayle ^ betwext them bothe, and suger of the 
 greete spycery ; towells of raygnes, towelles of worke, and 
 of playne clothe, fyne cofiyrs, small gardevyaundes and 
 
 bakyng irons, and of the office, if it nede, egges 
 
 The statutes of noble Edward the Thirde, for certaine 
 reasons used in thoose dayes, gave this office greete 
 wages, clothing and higher lyverey than he taketh nowe 
 because his busynesse was muche more. 
 
 Under the yeoman there was a groom " that can 
 make wafyrs as be used in this courte, " and serve 
 in the yeoman's absence, and a page "■ to lerne the 
 cunnynge service and dewties of this office. " 
 
 In Elizabeth's days we read that the yeoman of 
 the Wafery and " his fellow groome make wafers 
 at festival times, as they are appointed by the clerke 
 comptroller and clerke of the spicery ". Eventu- 
 ally this ancient office seems to have been merged 
 in that of the confectionery ; but in early times it 
 was probably of more importance. The Roiu/us 
 Misa of 1 1 John (1210) records a gift by the King 
 to the Emperor Otho's Waferer {Wafrario). 
 
 The Waferer serjeanty was of ancient date and 
 of very long continuance. The Essex manor of 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries), p. 72. 
 ' i.e. tally. See p. 2 1 9 above. 
 
THE WAFERER SERJEANTY 229 
 
 Listen Overhali was already held by this tenure in 
 1 185, when Avici a de Lyston, widow of Godfrey 
 the Chamberlain, and daughter of Robert de Lyston, 
 with a son who was of age, was bound, as its holder, 
 " facere canestellas ad summonicionem ad festum 
 regis." ^ We can therefore hardly doubt that her 
 father had held it before her. In 1 2 1 2 John de 
 Liston held "per serjanteriam faciendi canestdlos ",* 
 and, early in the reign of Henry HI, his heir held by 
 the serjeanty of making " canestellos" ' or " wafres".* 
 Godfrey de Liston is found holding, in 1226, by 
 the service of making them " ad coronacionem 
 domini Regis ; " ^ but the Inq. p. m. on Godfrey de 
 Liston in 1267 returns him as holding the manor 
 " by service of making wafers {^afras) when the 
 King wears the crown, at the King's cost. " ° This 
 variation is of some importance as pointing back to 
 the three annual crown-wearings of the Norman 
 Kings. ' 
 
 The service continues to be returned in Inquisi- 
 tions after death as that of making wafers at the 
 coronation, to which is added, in 1332, that of 
 serving them to the King, they being also then 
 defined as five in number. In 1367 Joan, widow 
 of William de Liston, was similarly returned as 
 
 ' Ret. de thtninabus. 
 
 * Lib. Rub., p. 506. 
 ' Ibid., p. 4S7, 
 
 * Testa, p. 267. 
 
 ' Ibid, and plea roll of 1 1 Hen. Ill (Morant). 
 
 * Cal. of Inq. Henry III, p. 203. 
 
 ' Yet another variation is given by Morant from a Chelmsford plea 
 roll of 39 Hen. III. He is there said to hold forty shillings' worth of 
 land in Witham " by the serjeanty of carrying flour to make Wafers on 
 the King's birthday, wherever his Majesty was in the Kingdom. " 
 
230 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 having held the manor by the service of placing 
 five wafers before the JCing at his coronation, but 
 her son sold his reversion to a London wine mer- 
 chant, Richard Lyons, who succeeded at her death, 
 and made good his claim, in 1 377, to act as waferer 
 at the coronation of Richard II. ^ " He had, " 
 Morant observes, " the misfortune of being behead- 
 ed in 1 38 1 by that insolent rebel Wat Tiler, whose 
 master he had been. "^ The King then made a 
 fresh grant of the manor (12 April 1382) to be 
 held as before by Waferer service, ' but it sub- 
 sequently passed by fine to William Venour, whose 
 claim to act as Waferer was allowed at the coron- 
 ation of Henry IV. 
 
 It was apparently by trustees that, in 141 3, the 
 claim was made at the coronation of Henry V- 
 On that occasion the materials required were set 
 forth in the claim and are of interest for com- 
 parison with those employed in the " wafery " of 
 Edward IV. * 
 
 En primes un pipe de flour. Item xxx loves de sugre. 
 Item XX lb. dalmonds puriple...... Item un dimid lb. de 
 
 saffron pur bastrons Item j. dozen de towailles de 
 
 Paris. Item ij. Paris bulteres. Item xl aulnes de streig- 
 nours. Item xx aulnes de canvas pur celours, * etc. 
 
 ^ " Come il soit tenant du Manoir de Listen, par cause de quel Johan 
 de Lyston et ses Auncestres de temps dont memorie ne court ont fait les 
 Wafres dont les nobles progenitours nostre sieur le Roi quore est ont 
 estee servy le jour de lour coronement. " 
 
 ' He had also been, as Stubbs writes, Lord Latimer's " partner in 
 some gigantic financial frauds. " 
 
 ' Cal. Pat., 1 38 1-5, p. 120 : — " by the service of making wafres and 
 serving the King at his coronation. " 
 
 * See p. 228. 
 
 ' Legg's EngRsh Coronation Records, p. Ixxviii, and Taylor's Ghry e> 
 Regality, p. 146. 
 
THE WAFERER SERJEANTY 231 
 
 A certain portion of these materials, including 
 the baking irons, were retained as the fee. 
 
 The service continued to be returned in inqui- 
 sitions, and occasionally claimed at coronations, till 
 at that of Charles II it was allowed to Thomas 
 Clopton of Liston Hall. His son William claimed 
 to make and serve the wafers at the coronation of 
 James II (1685) and " to have all the instruments 
 of silver and other metal used about the same, with 
 the linen, and certain proportions of ingredients, 
 and other necessaries, and liveries for himself and 
 two men ; which claim was allowed " and the 
 perquisites compounded for at ^30. ^ The service 
 was again successfully claimed by the Clopton 
 family at the following coronations, but the manor 
 was alienated, under George II, to a brother of the 
 Duke of Argyll, whose son performed the service 
 for him at the Coronation of George III. To- 
 gether with others connected with the banquet, it 
 figured for the last time at that of George IV, 
 when Mr. John Campbell of Liston Hall perform- 
 ed it. ^ 
 
 The " wafers " linger on in France under the 
 form of ' gaufres ' (etymiologically the same) , and 
 are still, made in the ancient way, the delight of 
 Paris children. 
 
 ' Sandford's History of the Coronation of James II. 
 
 * It was petitioned for, of course unsuccessfully, at the Coronation of 
 Edward VII, by an officer who, though not himself the owner of the 
 manor, explained that he was " decorated with the Burmese medal and 
 D.S.O." (WoUaston's Court of claims, p. 283.) 
 
2 32 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 THE KING'S BAKER 
 
 In the Dorset Hundred of Winfrith, rich in 
 serjeanties, we find Robert ' de Welles ' entered in 
 1 2 1 2 as holding two hides in Wool (' Welles ') 
 and one in Galton^ ('Galdon'), which had been 
 held of the king and his ancestors, from the con- 
 quest of England, " per servicium pistoris. " ^ An- 
 other entry shows us William ' de Welles ' holding 
 forty shillings' worth of land there " by the service 
 of making the King's bread. " * On William's 
 death an inquisition records him as holding the 
 same amount of land there by the service " of 
 being the king's baker. " * Here again the inval- 
 uable Pipe Roll of 1 1 30 comes to our help and 
 shows us Hugh " filius Ber " as " pistor Regis " in 
 Winfrith Hundred (p. 15), while as "pistor " he 
 is further excused the payment of three shillings 
 Danegeld (p. r6). * This would be the payment 
 on a hide and a half, and on turning to Domesday 
 we find ' Alward, ' a king's thegn, holding a hide 
 and a half in Wool (' Welle '), which he had 
 similarly held before the Conquest. 
 
 We might, therefore, be tempted to say that as 
 early as 1130 Wool was held by the service of 
 acting as king's baker. But the other portion of 
 the serjeanty is really the older ; for Domesday 
 
 ' in Owermoigne. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 164 ; cf. Red Book, p. 547. 
 
 ' *■* per serjantiam faciendi panem domini Regis in hundredo de 
 Winfrod" {Testa, ^. 166). 
 
 * Cal. oflnq. Heitry III, No. 920. 
 
 ' The entry in both cases is " Hugo filius Ber pistor (is ?) ". 
 
THE KING'S LARDERER 233 
 
 shows us Osmund the baker {pistor) holding a hide 
 and an eighth in ' Galtone. ' 
 
 The other Domesday baker, Erchenger, appears 
 under Cambridgeshire, where he held five-sixths of 
 a hide at Comberton. This land is found held, in 
 later days, by serjeanty of the bakehouse, ^ and when 
 it was arrented in 1 250, the service due was record- 
 ed as that of bringing to the King every day a hot 
 simnel for his dinner. * The land had then passed 
 into the hands of Barnwell Priory, and the writ 
 issued in its favour on this occasion ^ is of special 
 value, because it is dated 28 April 1250 and ad- 
 dressed to Robert Passelewe and his fellows, then 
 actually engaged in arrenting the serjeanties. * The 
 Priory was to hold the land (121 acres) for a 
 payment of 6s. 8d. a year. 
 
 THE KING'S LARDERER 
 
 To the office of Larderer (or Lardener) at the 
 Coronation of the Sovereign there have, from an 
 early date, been two rival claimants. The one was 
 the lord of Sculton (now Scoulton), Norfolk, 
 known from its early holders as Sculton Burdeleys; 
 the other was the lord of the Essex Manor of 
 
 ■ " per serjant' pistrini " (Testa, p. i$i). 
 
 ' " pro qua debuit ferre domino Regi unum suninellum calidum 
 singulis diebus ad prandium suum. Et pro hoc servicio debet idem 
 Robertus habere qualibet septimana unum quarterium fromenti et totum 
 furfur de pane dominico Regis" {Ibid., p. 357). 
 
 ' It is printed both in the Testa (p. 358) and in the Barnwell Cartu- 
 lary. 
 
 * " dilecto et fideli suo Roberto Passelewe et sociis suis justic' ad, 
 fines serjant' capiend' assignatis. " (JLiber mem. Ecclesif de Bemetoelk, 
 P- 93)- 
 
234 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Great Easton and of other scattered manors, all of 
 which were originally held by the family of Moyne. 
 Sometimes one and sometimes both of these claims 
 were successful : and so persistent was their riValry 
 that one of them was represented by petition for 
 the Coronation of Queen Victoria, and the other 
 for that of Edward VII. 
 
 In the Gonstitutio Domus Regis the larder was a 
 recognised department of the household, staffed on 
 the same principle as the others, with a Chief 
 {Magister) Dispenser of the larder. Dispensers 
 under him, who served in turn, larderers, and an 
 usher. ^ How soon it came to be represented among 
 the serjeanties one cannot say precisely. If we 
 take the Great Easton serjeanty, we find, under 
 Essex, in 1 130, a remission of 10 sh. danegeld to 
 William ' Monachus, ' ^ which would represent 
 a holding of five hides. This was precisely the 
 assessment of Great Easton, as given by Domesday, 
 and it would appear that this rhanor was the chief 
 one of the Moyne serjeanty. ' 
 
 On the other hand, it is possible, I find, to iden- 
 tify the whole group of four manors, — Ower 
 Moigne, Dorset, Shipton Moyne, Glouc, Mad- 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 809. 
 
 ' Rot. Pip. 31 Hen. I, p. 59. 
 
 '' " Essex. Henricus le Moigne filius et heres Willelmi le Moigne finem 
 fecit cum Rege de xviij /. pro relevio terrae suse de Eystaii quam de Rege 
 tenet in Capite per serjahtiam Lardinerije Regis ; quam quidem terram 
 Radulfus Monachus antecessor ipsius Henrici tenuit per eandem Serjan- 
 tiam, et valet terra ilia per annum xviij /. sicut continetur in rotulo 
 Testae de Nevill sub titulo Hundredi de Dunmawe " (Pasch. Comm. 26 
 Edw. I. Rot. 80 a in bund. 25 and 26 Edw. I). — Madox' Exche- 
 quer. The reference in the record is to the Testa, p. 268, where (early 
 in the reign of Hen. Ill) Ralf ' Monachus ' is said to hold his land of 
 Eyston, wrorth ;^i8 a year, "per serjant' lardenariae." 
 
THE KING'S LARDERER 235 
 
 dington, Wilts, and (Great) Easton, Essex, — in 
 respect of which Sir John Moigne claimed to serve 
 at the coronation of Henry V, as having been 
 held in Domesday by Mathew de Mortagne ('Maci 
 de Moretania'). ^ This is an interesting, but a 
 puzzling fact ; for the same roll records, under 
 Essex, that Mathew was succeeded by his nephew, 
 Robert (not by William ' Monachus '). A further 
 complication is introduced by an entry on the Pipe 
 Roll of 5 Richard I (i 193), which shows us, indeed. 
 Great Easton as already held by larderer service at 
 that date, but which gives, apparently, a William 
 de Clinton as its holder. ^ It is true that the Dorset 
 jurors of 1 2 1 2 definitely assert that the serjeanty 
 dated from the days of Henry I, ' but assertions of 
 this kind on their part need to be received with 
 caution. 
 
 From quite another quarter we get some sug- 
 gestive hints. In 1223 Ralf ' le Moynne ' was 
 impleaded by the Abbot of Cirencester for setting 
 up a gallows and pillory in Shipton (Moyne) to the 
 injury of the Abbot's franchises and for cutting 
 off, in his court, a woman's ear for theft. Ralf 
 produced, in reply, a Charter of " King Henry, " 
 which seems to have granted Shipton with all the 
 
 ' His Wiltshire Manor is given as Winterbourne, but must be Mad- 
 dington, which is not named and which is tucked away on Salisbury 
 Plain in the folds of the Winterbourne valley. 
 
 ' " Willelmus de Clinton red- comp. de x marcis pro habenda seisina 
 de terra sua de Eston, que est serjantia Lardar' Domini Regis " (Madox' 
 Exchequer). 
 
 ' " Radulfus Monachus tenet manerium de Oweres cum pert' a domi- 
 no Rege per servitium serjantie de coquina (sic). Antecessores ejus 
 tenuerunt ista tenementa a tempore Regis H. primi per predictum ser- 
 vicium" (Testa, p. 164). 
 
236 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 liberties with which Richard " de Daunfrunt " had 
 
 held it, and asserted that his predecessor Geoffrey 
 
 had set up a gallows accordingly. ^ Now it is a 
 
 singular fact that a Charter of Henry II, in or 
 
 about II 75, is witnessed by a Robert ' Monacus, ' 
 
 son of Henry de ' Damfront. ' * Another plea takes 
 
 us further. In 1230 Ralf * le Moynge ' brought 
 
 an action for some land in Maddington (which 
 
 was appurtenant to Shipton) agaiiist Walter son of 
 
 Hugh, who pleaded that his father had been 
 
 enfeoffed, fifty years before, by Geoffrey 'le 
 
 Moynne', uncle (avuncu/i) of Ralf s Father. ' The 
 
 Geoffrey to whom we are thus referred is found, 
 
 not indeed as Larderer, but as holding ofSce in the 
 
 Exchequer in the early years of Henry II. * It 
 
 is, however, certain that he held the lands of 
 
 the serjeanty, for the Pipe Roll of 1162 records 
 
 remission to him (as an official) of his Dane geld on 
 
 Shipton Moyne (21 hides), Maddington (4 hides), 
 
 and Great Easton with Mathew de Mortagne's 
 
 other Essex manor (10 hides). The roll of 1163 
 
 proves further that he must have held Mathew's 
 
 Berkshire manor of Lambourne, for it records 
 
 remission to him of Danegeld on (its) four hides. 
 
 The same test shows him holding in 1 1 56 the two 
 
 ' Bractoi^s Note Book, Case 1651. The pillory he could only justify 
 on the ground that he had one at " his Essex manor " (Great 
 Easton) ! 
 
 ' Eyton, Antiquities of Shropshire, VIII, 154. A Henry ' de Donmo- 
 fironte ' witnesses a charter of Henry 11 at Domfront in 1 1 5 7 (see my 
 Cal. of Docs., France, p. 299). 
 
 ' Bractoifs Note Book, Case 4.02. 
 
 * He is Marshal of the Exchequer in 1 165, and acted in some finan- 
 cial capacity in the Household. 
 
THE KING'S LARDERER 237 
 
 Essex manors, -Owermoigne, Shipton Moyne, 
 and Maddington. ^ 
 
 Having thus carried back the history of these 
 lands, we are confronted with a fresh difficulty 
 when we turn to the nature of the service. Under 
 Shipton Moyne and (its appendant) Maddington, 
 the service is that of being buyer for the King's 
 Kitchen ; * under Owermoigne it is serjeanty of the 
 Kitchen or serjeanty of buying things for the 
 Kitchen ; ' in Essex it is lardener serjeanty or 
 keepership of the King's krder * or even of being 
 buyer for the King's cauldron. ^ The serjeanty, 
 evidently, was that of the ' accatry ' as well as that 
 of the larder. 
 
 But although the departments of the larder and 
 the ' accatry ' were in later days quite distinct, 
 there was, of necessity, between them a very close 
 connexion. For it was the buyer's function to 
 furnish the larder with provisions. * At the close, 
 for instance, of Elizabeth's reign we read that the 
 Serjeant of the Accatry 
 
 is to govern the office of the Accatry, and to see that there 
 be beeves and muttons in the Queene's pastures, for the 
 daily expence of her Majesties house, and that there be 
 in store ling, codde, stockfish, herrings, salmon, salte- 
 eeles, white salte and grey salte ; that with these provisions 
 
 * Rot. Pip. 2 Hen. II, (Record Commission). 
 
 ' " debuit esse emptor coquine domini Regis " (Testa, pp. 78, 147). 
 
 ' " se'rvicium serjantie de coquina serjantia emendi quas spectant 
 
 ad coquinam domini Regis" (Ibid., pp. 164, 166). 
 
 * " per serjantiam lardenamie " .... " per s* custod' lardar* Regis " 
 (Testa, pp. 268, 276). 
 
 ° " per serjantiam ut sit emptor ad cauderam domini Regis " (Ibid., 
 p. 266). 
 
 ' See p. 121 above for the King's • achaturs. ' 
 
238 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 he may furnish the Larder with such provisions as shall 
 be weekely made unto him by the officers of the boarde, 
 the clerk of the kitchen, or the serjeant of the Larder. ^ 
 
 An Essex plea-roll of 11 Henry III (1226-7), 
 cited by Blount, records the service as that of 
 accatry, * and a Hampshire one of 8 Edward I 
 (1279-1280) gives the two hides at ' LyndeshuU, ' 
 Hants, as held by the ushership of the larder ; ' but 
 simple lardener service is returned for Owermoigne 
 in 1285, * and the same return was made* at that 
 date for Shipton Moyne. * The Essex service was 
 similarly given not long afterwards as " per ser- 
 jantiam lardinerias Regis. " * 
 
 Thenceforth, the service continued to be that of 
 ' Lardener ' only, and, after the manor of Great 
 Easton had passed by marriage from the Moynes 
 to the Stourtons, John, ist Lord Stourton was 
 found, at his death (1462), to have held it by the 
 service of being the King's lardener on the day of 
 his Coronation. The Stourtons alienated the 
 manor, which, under Henry VIII, was held by Sir 
 Ralph Warren, Lord Mayor of London, who, at 
 his death (1553), was returned as having held it by 
 the serjeanty of being the King's lardener and pur- 
 veyor of his Kitchen on his Coronation day. The 
 heiress of the Warrens brought the manor to Sir 
 Henry Cromwell of Hinchinbrooke ^ but his spend- 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Soc. Ant.), p. 289. 
 ' " ut sit emptor domini Regis in coquina sua." 
 ' " per serjantiam custodiendi hostium lardarii domini Regis." 
 * " pro qua erit lardinarius domini Regis percipiendo feodum inde 
 pertinens " (Feudal Aids, II, 9. Cf. p. 16). 
 
 ' " per serjantiam essendi lardinarius regis (Ibid., p. 244). 
 
 ' See p. 234 above. 
 
 ' Grandfather of the Lord Protector. 
 
THE KING'S LARDERER 239 
 
 thrift son, Sir Oliver, sold it, in 1597, to Henry 
 Maynard, secretary to the famous Burghley, who 
 claimed within a few years its coronation service, 
 and who founded, in Little Easton adjoining, the 
 afterwards ennobled family of which Lady Warwick 
 is the heir. 
 
 We will now trace the early history of the rival 
 serjeanty of the larder. The earliest entry in the 
 Testa is that in the 1212 survey (p. 294), which 
 runs : — " Domina Laurette tenet in Sculeton ^ C 
 solidatas terre per serjant' existendi lardarius (sic) 
 in lardario domini Regis. " The lady who was 
 thus bound to service in the King's larder occurs 
 in another list of serjeanties (p. 286), which may 
 be of even earlier date, as " Laureta Picot " 
 holding lands in Sculton worth ^6 a year " per 
 servicium serviendi larder' Regis. " After this 
 the manor is returned as held by members of the 
 Burdeleys family, who owe the same lardener 
 service in general terms. ^ Hugh de Burdeleys 
 died in 1251,^ and was succeeded by his son 
 Geoffrey, who died in 1264 holding by serjeanty 
 of being larderer* and leaving a son John, who 
 died in 1283, holding " of the King in chief by 
 serjeanty of the king's larder. "* In 1329 a later 
 John, son of GeojfFrey Burdeleys, held Sculton " of 
 the king in chief by service of being the King's 
 
 ' now Scoulton. 
 
 ' Testa, pp. 283, 290, 296. They also held Burdelys manor in 
 Stagsden, Beds., and at Oakington and Maddingley in Cambridgeshire 
 by knight-service as under-tenants. 
 
 ' The Norfolk Inq.p. m. is missing. 
 
 • Cal. oflnq., I., No. 589. 
 
 » Ibid., II., No. 465. 
 
240 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 larderer [lardenartus) at his Coronation " ^ and, some 
 years subsequently, Margaret, relict of John, held 
 by service of coming to the King's Coronation 
 with a knife and axe to perform the office of 
 Larderer. " ^ 
 
 Scoulton had been entailed on this John and 
 Margaret and their heirs by John's father, Geoffrey, 
 in 14 Edward II (by licence), and they were jointly 
 seised thereof from 1322 till 30 July 1329, when 
 John died. ' Nevertheless, it was alleged before 
 Richard II's Court of claims that Geoffrey Burde- 
 leys had performed the service at the coronation of 
 Edward III * ( 1 327/8) . As we have no records for 
 that coronation, the statement cannot be tested. 
 
 John Fitzjohn, who claimed, in right of his 
 wife, " destre chief lardener al coronement nostre 
 dit sieur le Roi " (Richard II), further relied on an 
 Inquisition of 2 1 Edward III, when it was found 
 " que le dit Manoir estoit tenuz par mesme le 
 service. " This Inquisition was taken on the death 
 of the last of the Burdeleys family, John, son of the 
 John and Margaret mentioned above. His lands 
 were divided between his two sisters, of whom the 
 younger married Gilbert " att? Chamber, " and in 
 1399 Edmund "de la Chambre " claimed and was 
 
 > im., VII. No. 261. 
 ' md.. No. 589. 
 
 ' See, for all this, the entry of 24 April 1330 on the Close rolls, 
 where the raanor is expressly said to be " held of the King by the ser- 
 vice of being the King's Lardener at his Coronation.'' At that date 
 Margaret, the widow, was remarried to Nicolas de Thony and had 
 brought him the Manor. 
 
 * " le quel service monsieur Geffroy Burdeleye fist au coronement sire 
 Edward aiel a nostre dit sieur le Roi quore est pur lez services de mesme 
 le Manoir." 
 
THE KING'S LARDERER 241 
 
 allowed the service, at Henry IV's Coronation, as 
 Lord of Sculton. It Was at the next Coronation, 
 that of Henry V, that the lord of Sculton's claim 
 disappears for the time, possibly owing to a minority, 
 and is replaced by that of Sir John Moigne, as 
 Lord (as explained above) of four manors jointly. 
 At the Coronation of James I the contest settles 
 down to a conflict between the lords of Sculton and 
 of (Great) Easton, the latter manor having been 
 purchased a few years before by Sir Henry May- 
 nard. Both claims were allowed, selection being 
 left to the King, and this result was repeated at 
 the Coronations of Charles II, James II, William 
 and Mary, and Anne. At those of George I and 
 George II Lord Abergavenny alone, as lord of 
 Sculton, claimed and had his claim allowed. At 
 that of George IV, when many claims were revived, 
 the lord of Sculton had to contend against the 
 counter-claims of the lords of no fewer than three 
 Moigne Manors, Great Easton, Shipton Moyne 
 and Maddington. All four claims were allowed. 
 Lord Maynard petitioned for the office in respect 
 of the Manor of Great Easton at the Coronation 
 of Queen Victoria, ^ and Mr. G. J. T. Sotheron- 
 Estcourt at that of Edward VII in respect of the 
 manor of Shipton Moyne. ^ 
 
 It is necessary to explain that Lardener service 
 Was by no means connected only with the larder of 
 the King's Court. Venison had to play, in early 
 
 ' Mr. WoUaston found the petition in the Crown Office although it 
 does not figure on the Coronation Roll. 
 
 ' The Estcourts had been seated there from the 1 3th century, holding 
 originally under the Moignes. 
 
 16 
 
242 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 days, a large part at the King's table, arid the 
 dependence, at that time, on salted meat in winter 
 made it necessary to salt and store, in certain forests, 
 the flesh of the deer there killed. For this pur- 
 pose local larders with local larderers were estab- 
 lished. A good instance of this is afforded by a 
 serjeanty which, I propose to show, can be clearly 
 carried back to the days of Henry I. 
 
 An early charter of King Stephen, addressed to 
 the magnates of Yorkshire, runs thus: — 
 
 Sciatis me reddidisse et concessisse ' Johanni larderario 
 meo de Eboraco et David filio sue terram suam totam 
 quam tenet de me in capite cum ministerio sue de 
 larderio et liberacione sua... sicut tenuit die qua rex Hen- 
 ricus fuit vivus et mortuus. ^ 
 
 A charter of Henry II confirmed to David his 
 ' larderer of York ' his right to pasture at Cortburn 
 (in Bulmer), as held in the time of Henry I, with 
 pasture for his mares and she-goats in the Royal 
 Forest.* As " David Lardarius " (or " Lardinarius ") 
 he made in 1166 the return for Bertram de Bul- 
 mer's fief, on which, he said, he held a fifth of a 
 fee himself. * In the early days of Henry III a 
 namesake held the serjeanty: — 
 
 David Lardinarius tenet I serjantiam et est custos 
 
 gaiolae forestae et venditor averiorura pro debito Regis. * 
 
 In 1250 we find it styled " serjantia domini 
 
 ' These are the terms for a re-grant. 
 
 ' Inspeximus by Richard II in Cat. Pat. Rolls, 1385-1389, p. 19. 
 
 ' Ibid. 
 
 * Lib. Rub., pp. 428-429. This David appears on the Pipe Rolls, 
 from 1165,33 receiving, under Yorkshire, a regular allowance of five- 
 pence a day. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 467 ; Testa, pp. 365, 375, 376, 378. 
 
* MAUPYGERNOUN ' SERJEANTY 243 
 
 Regis faciendi lardarium domini Regis apud Ebo- 
 racum." ^ The Inquest after death (i 260) of David 
 " le Lardiner " is more precise in detail. His mes- 
 suage in York and land in ' Bustardthorp ' and 
 Cortburn are 
 
 all held of the King in chief for keeping the King's gaol 
 of the forest, ' making and keeping the King's larder, and 
 finding salt at his own cost ; and for this he shall have 
 " crura superiora et loynes, " and shall make sales for the 
 King's debt, ^ etc. 
 
 In letters close of Edward II the Sheriffs are 
 usually directed to provide the huntsmen M^ith salt 
 for the venison; in those of July 22nd, 13 16, a 
 "lardener " is expressly mentioned as accompanying 
 the huntsmen and hounds to the Wiltshire forests, 
 and the venison is directed to be sent up to 
 Windsor. * 
 
 THE ' MAUPYGERNOUN ' SERJEANTY 
 
 This is probably the most familiar of the ser- 
 jeanties connected with the kitchen. It is notable 
 not only as having formed the subject of a series 
 of coronation claims, but also as being, practically, 
 traceable back to Domesday Book. Among the 
 king's Serjeants {servientes regis) of Surrey in 1086 
 we find Tezelin the cook holding Addington 
 
 ' Testa, p, 377. 
 
 ' The great Yorkshire forest of Galtres, reaching to the walls of York. 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq. Hen. Ill, No. 753. He also held at Skelton of Robert 
 de Nevill (heir of the Bulmers). 
 
 * The receipt of venison in the King's larder is seen even in the Con- 
 stitutio, under 'The great kitchen' {Magna Coquina) : — " Caretarius 
 lardarii similiter. Serviens qui recipit venationem intus commedet " 
 {Lib. Rub., p. 810). 
 
244 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 (*Edintone'), a substantial manor, of the king. 
 Although his name is suggestive of foreign, rather 
 than of native origin, the group of entries in which 
 he occurs is headed ' Terras Osv^roldi et aliorum 
 tainorum, ' and the other names found in it are 
 those of English thegns, ^ with the possible excep- 
 tion of ' Teodricus aurifaber, ' who, however, is 
 expressly stated to have held the same land under 
 Edward the Confessor. It is proved by later 
 manorial history that it was the same Tezelin who 
 held of William de Warenne a manor in Perching 
 and Fulking, at the foot of the South Downs, near 
 Poynings. There also he occurs in connection 
 with English tenants, two of whom precede him. 
 He gave his son, however, the Norman name of 
 William. This we learn from one of the Lewes 
 Priory charters cited by Mr. Stapleton in his 
 learned introduction to the Liber de Antiquis Legibus.^ 
 But, in spite of his wealth of erudition and of 
 record references, he does not appear to have 
 classified or dated the returns in " that invaluable 
 record, the Testa de Nevill" (p. x). It is a task 
 of much labour, but the value of the Testa depends 
 on its accurate performance. The earliest and 
 most important entry of this serjeanty in the Testa 
 is that on p. 225, where I have identified the 
 returns as belonging to the great Inquest of 1212. 
 We there read that Bartholomew ' del Chennay ' 
 held part of Addington by kitchen serjeanty, and 
 
 ' It is in the Schedule prefixed to Surrey that this same group is 
 headed " Oswold', Teodricus, et alii sefvientes regis. " This is contrary 
 to the practice of Domesday, which normally first deals with the foreign 
 * servientes, ' and then with the English ' taini. ' 
 
 ' Camden Society, 1 846. 
 
' MAUPYGERNOUN ' SERJEANTY 245 
 
 that King Richard gave that part, with Barthol- 
 omew's daughter, to Peter, son of the Mayor of 
 London ; that King John afterwards gave it with 
 Peter's daughter to Ralf, the merchant-taylor 
 {Parmentario)^ and that at the time of the Inquest 
 {nunc) it was in the King's hand. ^ 
 
 This statement is of much interest, as confirming 
 the date of the return as given above. For the 
 evidence collected by Mr. Stapleton proves that 
 Joan, Peter's daughter, was the widow of Ralf le 
 Parmentier in 1212, and was given to William 
 Aguillun on October 5th of that year, with her land, 
 which had been in the King's hand {in manu nostra)} 
 This is why Addington was returned in June 1212 
 as " in manu domini Regis. " 
 
 Peter was the eldest son of the first Mayor of 
 London, Henry Fitz Ailwin, and appears to have 
 died in his father's lifetime, for seisin of his land 
 was given to his son-in-law Ralf le Parmentier, 
 30th October 1207.* According, however, to 
 Mr. Stapleton, he is said in another Testa entry 
 " to hold the moiety of Addington by the service 
 of the Kitchen. " * If so, that entry, we have seen, 
 must be older than 1 207. Now the Uber- Rubeus, 
 in that list of serjeanties which its editor* dates, 
 from " internal evidence, " asof 1212-1217 (p. 456), 
 
 ' " Bartholomaeus del Chenna7 tenuit quandam partem in Edintun in 
 capite de domino Rege per serjantiam coquine, et nescitur ex cujus done, 
 et Ricardus Rex dedit eandem partem Petro filio majoris Lond' cum filia 
 predicti Bartholomsei, etc et nunc est in manu domini Regis. " 
 
 ' Oj>. cit, pp. ix-x. 
 
 ' The mayor did not die till 1212 (24 July-5 Oct.). See my papers 
 on him in The Antiquary for 1887 and the Diet. Nat. Biog. 
 
 * No page is cited. 
 
 ' Mr. Hubert Hall of the Public Record Office. 
 
246 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 has the entry ; " Petrus filius Majoris Londoniae 
 medietatem de Adintone per serjanteriam coquine," 
 and yet in that other list which he dates as 1 2 1 o-i i 
 (or 1 2 1 o- 1 2 1 2) makes his son-in-law and successor ^ 
 Ralf le Parmentier the holder (p. 561) ! What is 
 the explanation ? We turn to what the Editor 
 gives, on p. 456, as the parallel returns in the 
 Testa, only to find that neither of them corresponds 
 with the list on that page. And then we discover 
 for ourselves that the really corresponding list is 
 on p. 417 of the Testa (II, 878), where the seven 
 Surrey entries are identical word for word. ^ Such 
 is the lamentable editing of the *■ Red Book of the 
 Exchequer. ' 
 
 Joan, daughter of Peter, brought to William 
 Aguillun not only the Addington serjeanty, inher- 
 ited through her mother, but the Watton-at-Stone 
 (Herts) serjeanty, derived from Peter's father, 
 Henry, Mayor of London. The Mayor was still 
 holding it in June 121 2, when it is entered as that 
 of finding a foot archer for the Welsh wars. * He 
 was dead before 5th Oct. 1212, and on the 
 17th Nov. the Sheriffs were directed to allow 
 Margaret, his relict, her reasonable dower. ^ 
 
 Early in the reign of Henry III, William Aguillun 
 (in right of his wife) was holding this land by the 
 
 ' The explanation, therefore, is that in both these lists the Addington 
 entry is cut down from the earlier return, which spoke of Peter as a 
 former holder. 
 
 ' " Henricus Major Lond' tenet Watton per serjant' inveniendi unum 
 hominem peditem ad exercitum domini Regis in Wallia cum arcu et 
 sagittis, et antecessores sui tenuerunt per idem servicium de antecessoribus 
 domini Regis" {Testa, p. 270). 
 
 ' Rot. Litt. Claus. This, again, confirms the date I assign to this 
 return. 
 
' MAUPYGERNOUN ' SERJEANTY 247 
 
 same service^ and, of course, the Addington ser- 
 jeanty, which is now entered as held 
 
 per serjantiam faciendi hastias in Coquina domini Regis die 
 coronacionis sue vel aliquis pro se debet facere ferculum 
 quoddam quod vocatur ' Giruht, ' et, si apponatur sagina, 
 tunc vocatur ' Malpigernoun. ' ^ 
 
 Here we have an early and direct reference to 
 the Coronation, and a statement, which apparently 
 is only made here, that the service included making 
 spits (hastias) in the King's kitchen.^ Thenceforth 
 the two serjeanties descended together. 
 
 In a record of 39 Hen. Ill (1254-5), cited by 
 Blount from a plea-roll, the mess {ferculum) is sim- 
 ilarly described. * The common earthenware pot 
 in which it was made is again mentioned in 1304, 
 when an Inquest was held at Addington, October 
 14th, after the death of Hugh Bardolf, to whom 
 the land had descended in right of his wife. ^ His 
 relict, Isabel, held the two serjeanties at her death 
 (1323), that of Addington "by service of making 
 a dish called ' maupigernouri ' at the King's Coron- 
 ation, " ' and was succeeded by Thomas Bardolf, 
 
 ' Testa, p. 266. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 229. Later in the reign (1234) we have the service des- 
 cribed as " inveniendi unum cocum in coronatione Regis ad faciendum 
 cibum,qualem Senescallus prasceperit, in coquina Regis" (See p. 24.). 
 
 ' The word Sagina (seym below) is said to mean fat or lard. 
 
 * " per serjantiam faciendi unum ferculum in olla lutea, in coquina 
 domini Regis, die coronationis sue, et vocatur mess de Gyron ; et si sit 
 Seym in illo ferculo, vocatur Maupigyrnun. " 
 
 * "per servlcium ad inveniendum unum cocum ad coronamentum CsieJ 
 domini Regis ad faciendum unum ferculum, quod vocatur Mees de 
 Geroun, sumptibus Domini Regis, in una olla lutea. " — Li&. de Ant. 
 Leg., p. Ixxxviii. Stapleton thought these the " fullest and most correct 
 details as to its tenure, " not knowing, apparently, Blount's record. 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq., VI, No. 454. 
 
248 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 who held Addington at his death in 1330. — 
 
 " by service of serving before the king, on the day of his 
 Coronation, three dishes of a certain food called ' Mau- 
 pygernon, ' viz. one before the King, the second to the 
 Archbishop of Canterbury and the third to whom the 
 king shall assign it. " ^ 
 
 We may now pass to the first recorded coronation 
 claim, that of William Bardolf (1377) : — 
 
 monstre William Bardolf que come il tient certeines terres 
 en la ville de Adynton come de son heritage tenuz due 
 Roi en chief per" sergeantie,cestassavoir de trover le jour 
 del Coronement nostre tresredoute sieur la Roi un homme 
 de faire une messe quest appelle dilgirunt, et si apponatur 
 sagimen, adonque il est appelle Malpigeryun, en la Cosyn * 
 del Roi etc. etc. 
 
 It seems to me that this claini gives us the 
 transition form ' from the " mess de Gyron " of 
 1254-5 t° th^ " "^^ss of Dillegrout, " which is the 
 form that Mr. Wollaston adopts, following late 
 antiquaries. According to Mr, Wickham Legg, 
 "the Lord of the Manor of Addington has to 
 bring a dish of gruel called Dillegrout or Male- 
 pigernout" {sic) ; * but I think it clear that " Dille- 
 grout " is what is termed a " ghost word. " 
 
 It has been ingeniously suggested that this mess 
 of potage (as it is subsequently described) may be 
 represented by the recipe for "Bardolf" in an 
 Arundel MS., said to be of early 1 5th cent. date. 
 It runs thus : 
 
 ' Ibid., VII, No. 243. 
 
 ' i.e. cuisine. 
 
 ' i.e. dil Girunt. 
 
 * Eng. Cor. Records, p. Ixxviii. 
 
THE KING'S SAUSER 249 
 
 Take almonde mylk, and draw hit up thik with 
 vernage, and let hit boyle, and braune of capons braied 
 and put therto ; and cast therto sugre, claves [cloves] 
 maces, pynes, and ginger, mynced ; and take chekyns 
 parboyled and chopped, and pul of the skyn, and boyle 
 al ensemble, and, in the settynge doune from the fire, put 
 thereto a lytel vynegur alaied with pouder of ginger, and 
 a lytel water of everose, and make the potage hanginge, 
 and serve hit forth. " ^ 
 
 After the Reign of Richard II this " mess " was 
 presented at coronations, from thei-eign of Charles II 
 onwards, by the Leigh family, but the " merry 
 monarch, " we are told, carefully abstained from 
 eating it. It was still presented by the lord of the 
 manor at the coronation of George III, and even 
 at the last banquet, that of George IV, the right 
 was claimed and obtained by the Archbishop of 
 Canterbury. ^ Accordingly, 
 
 the Deputy appointed by his Grace the Archbishop of 
 Canterbury, as Lord of the Manor of Bardolf, otherwise 
 Addington, presented the mess of Dillegrout, prepared 
 by the King's Master Cook. ' 
 
 This was its last appearance (July 19, 1821). 
 
 THE KING'S SAUSER 
 
 Among the Cumberland serjeanties, it was reck- 
 oned, was that of Adam " the Queen's cook," who 
 held Salkeld in John's reign by the annual render 
 of a pound of pepper. * Whether this was a true 
 serjeanty might be fairly doubted, though it seems 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries), p. 466. 
 
 ' The Archbishops held Addington from 1807 to 1897. 
 
 ° Sir George Nayler's narrative reprinted by Mr. Legg (p. 358). 
 
 * Lib. Rub., pp. 462, 494 ; Testa, pp. 380, 381. 
 
2 so THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 to be so classed ; ^ but the entry on the Oblate 
 Roll of 3 John (1201), " Tenet in sergent' " 
 (page 158) must be deemed decisive. The land, 
 it appears from the survey, had been held by 
 ' corn age, ' that is, by the payment of 27s. iid. 
 under that head, but this payment vras remitted 
 when the King granted him the land. 
 
 That it was given him by King Richard is not 
 only asserted in the survey of 12 12, but on the 
 Oblate roll of 3 John (1201), when he had to give 
 the king ^5 for regaining seisin, though he had 
 been wrongly ousted, as he proved by producing 
 the charters of King Richard and of John himself 
 (p. 119). But this was not the only land that was 
 given to this favoured cook. It is from no English 
 record that we gain our knowledge of the fact, but 
 from a charter among the archives of that famous 
 abbey of Fontevraud, where Eleanor, the old queen, 
 was then expiating the somewhat flighty youth of 
 half a century before. Queen of the English, 
 Duchess of the Normans, Duchess of Aquitaine, 
 she recites that her dearest son King Richard (there 
 interred the year before) had given her the land of 
 Upperby and Farmanby, which used to pay at the 
 exchequer forty shillings a year, and that she now 
 gives it to her faithful servant {servienti) Adam the 
 cook and Joan his wife, to be held quit of cornage 
 etc., by the payment only of a pound of cummin 
 yearly at Carlisle. ^ 
 
 Adam was thus " the queen's cook. " But both 
 
 ' Red Book, p. 494 ; Testa, p. 380. 
 
 " Original charter of A.D. i zoo, still preserved at Angers (see my 
 Calendar of documents preserved in France, p. 394). 
 
THE KING'S SAUSER 251 
 
 in the Testa and in the Red Book we find him 
 styled "cocus" and "salsarius, " while in both the 
 entries on the Oblate Roll (1201) he is "Adam 
 salsarius. " King John had his own " salsarius, " 
 to whom he made grants/ and so had Henry III. * 
 In the next reign (1278) the king's steward was 
 ordered " to deliver to Master Ralph the Sauser 
 {Salsario), the King's Serjeant, a wardship," etc' 
 Now this carries back to a very early date a curious 
 little department in the King's Household. Under 
 Henry VI, the " Saulcery, " as it was termed, was 
 of more importance than later, for it had its " ser- 
 geant, " clerk, and six other officers. By the time 
 of Henry VIII " the pastry and Salsery " (or 
 " Sawcery ") had become one department, but we 
 obtain at this date * some light on its nature. Of 
 the jCS4 allowed for it, ^^50 was for " mustard, 
 vinegar, and verjuice, " and £^ for " herbs for 
 sauces. " The supply of vinegiar was ingeniously 
 increased, it seems, by making a raid upon the 
 cellar, when there had been a bad vintage, 
 
 " It hath been oftyntymes, in yeres togydyr, that the 
 Kinge hath had the advauntage of the feeble and dulle 
 wynes, to make thereof venegere, and to delyvur it to the 
 sergeaunts of the saucerye. " * 
 
 Under Queen Elizabeth " the pastery " alone is 
 
 ^ " Gaufrido Salsario servienti nostro." {Rot. deLib., 3 John [izoij, 
 pp. 20, 49, 108). 
 
 * Grant to " Master William, the King's sauser, and Hugh de Bradele, 
 king's Serjeant" {fial. of Pat. Rolls, 1247-1258, p. 207). " Le Sauser" 
 became a surname ; it was that of one of Edward IFs huntsmen. 
 
 ' Cal. of Close Rolls, 1272-9 ; p. 441. 
 
 * Ordinances made at Eltham, 17 Henry VIII (1525-6). 
 
 ' " Office of Sellar (sic) within the King's household " in Edward IV's 
 "Liber Niger Domus" {Household Ordinances, p. 76). 
 
252 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 named, but the two departments were stiU distinct, 
 for even in the days of William and Mary (1689) 
 " the pastry and salsary " are mentioned together, 
 and the " salsary-man " was drawing ^^30 a year 
 board wages. 
 
 Returning to Adam "salsarius," one cannot but 
 feel that his holding was hardly a true serjeanty, 
 for no service was attached to it. And the render 
 of a pound of pepper or cummin was of the nature 
 of quit-rent. It shows how easily petty serjeanty 
 could pass, in such cases, into socage. 
 
 THE SCALDING SERJEANTY 
 
 A very curious serjeanty was connected with 
 the manor of Bures in South Essex, now, corruptly. 
 Bowers GifFord. Early in the reign of Henry III, 
 wc find Robert de Sutton holding there by ser- 
 jeanty, by the service of scalding the King's hogs.^ 
 
 But in one entry the service is defined as " per 
 serjant' de Cauderie. " ^ Although the meaning is 
 the same, a strange error has been caused. For 
 the word, as with so many others, was misread in 
 Blount's Tenures, and connected with the chaundry 
 or department of the wax. Even in the latest 
 edition of his work (1874) the serjeanty figures as 
 that " of the chandelry " (p. 49) . * 
 
 ' " Per seijant' escaldandi porcos Regis." Lib. Rub., pp. 457, 507; 
 Testa, p. 276. On p. 507 of the Red Book he is said to hold under 
 Roger de Leybourne. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 267. 
 
 ' Blount's actual source seems to have been a plea-roll of 1 1 Henry III, 
 where he read the word " eschanderie," and rendered it " The Chandry, 
 where the candles were kept." 
 
THE SCALDING SERJEANTY 253 
 
 One is tempted to associate this serjeanty with 
 the office of " the scalding house " in the King's 
 Household, but only geese and fowls are mentioned 
 as there dealt with, ^ while " the boiling house " 
 was only concerned with beef. An allusion to the 
 necessary scalding of the hogs is found in an old- 
 world recipe for " Pygges in sauge " : 
 
 Take pygges and scalde horn, and wash horn clene, and 
 smyte horn on gobettes, and sethe horn in water and salt, 
 and when thai arne ynough, take hem up, and let hem 
 kele, then take sauge and parsel and grinde hit, and do 
 therto brede steped in vynegur, and grynde hit smal, and 
 take the yolkes of harde egges and do therto, and grynde 
 hit al togedur and tempur it up with vynegur sum dele 
 thick ; then put thy pygges in a faire vessel, and poure 
 the sewe above, and serve hit forth colde. ^ 
 
 Although Robert de Sutton, we have seen, is 
 entered as holding the lands under Henry III, he 
 appears to have alienated them in marriage, with 
 his daughter Margery, to William Bigod, a cadet 
 of the earls of Norfolk, in the days of John, with 
 his serjeanty of the Hundred of Barstaple,' etc., the 
 gift being confirmed by John in his 1 1 th year 
 {1209-10). In 1228 Roger de Leybourne passed 
 by fine to William Bigod and Margery his wife 
 two carucates and two marshes in " Bures " with 
 the advowson of the church. * It was this William 
 Bigod who was entered in 1 2 Hen. Ill as holding 
 with his wife in Bures " by the serjeancy of the 
 
 ' Household Ordinances (Society of Antiquaries). 
 
 " Ibid., p. 432- 
 
 ' Cart. Ant., H. 2. 
 
 * Essex Fines (E.A.S), p. 83. 
 
254 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Eschauderie. " ^ From them this serjeanty appears 
 to have passed in marriage with a daughter Gun- 
 dred ^ to William GifFard from whom (or from 
 whose heirs) Bowers GifFord derives its distinctive 
 suffix. A Chelmsford plea of 1255 gives the ser- 
 vice of this William for Bures as that of making 
 the King's lard or bacon wherever he was in 
 England,^ but after this, the scalding serjeanty, 
 thus associated with the names of great baronial 
 houses, fades from view. 
 
 TURNSPIT SERJEANTIES 
 
 Of interest in more ways than one was the 
 tenure of the Ashwell (Hall) estate in Finchingfield, 
 Essex. It was a kitchen serjeanty which was held 
 in Domesday by a cook ; it hints at an honorary 
 service on the old Crown-wearing days ; it had a 
 recognised caput ; and it has led learned men into 
 the wildest blunders. 
 
 The Domesday holding of Walter the cook 
 (cocus) was half a hide in this Ashwell and half a 
 hide in Shalford adjoining. It is Ashwell that is 
 referred to when the Testa tells us that (early in 
 the reign of Henry III) Simon de ' Achwell ' 
 holds by serjeanty in Dunmow Hundred and has to 
 be the King's turnspit. * A little later, Roger de 
 ' Eswell ' holds a virgate in ' Eswell ' by serjeanty 
 of being the King's turnspit. * Roger's serjeanty 
 
 ' Morant's History of Essex. 
 
 ' Gundred was an old Bigod name. 
 
 ' Morant's History of Essex. 
 
 * " debet esse hastelarius domini Regis " (p. 268). 
 
 ' " per serjantiam quod sit hastillarius domini Regis" (Ibid., p. 266). 
 
TURNSPIT SERJEANTIES 255 
 
 was 'arrented' (in 1250), and the entry gives us a 
 fresh variant of the name : — 
 
 Serjantia Rogeri de Axswell, in Axswell, pro qua 
 debuit esse hastillarius in coquina domini Regis in princi- 
 palibus festis, alienata est in parte (Testa^ p. 268). 
 
 Here we see the honorary character of this 
 service in the King's kitchen ; it was due on the 
 principal feast-days, probably the old crown-wear- 
 ing days of the Norman kings. 
 
 The word " hastillarius " presents no difficulty. 
 In the ' Establishment of the king's Household ' ' 
 there is mention of the " hastelarius " and of the 
 " hastalaria, " and Morant, the historian of Essex, 
 defines the serjeanty as " the service of finding a 
 broche, or spit, of maple to roast the King's meat 
 on the day of his coronation ", and cites an inquest 
 after death (1361) in which the service is given as 
 that " of turning one broche, or spit, in the King's 
 kitchen on his coronation day." ^ Nevertheless, 
 'Blount's Tenures' (Ed. Hazlitt), which gives the 
 service correctly, following Morant, under ' Ash- 
 well ' and under ' Finchingfield, ' records it under 
 ' Hashwell {sic), co. of Essex,' as " the serjeanty of 
 being a spearman ' {sic) of our lord the king " and 
 repeats a solemn disquisition which informs us that 
 " the spear or lance is among the oldest weapons 
 recorded in history " ! There was one other mis- 
 take that could be made, and the Public Record 
 Office has made it. Dealing with the Inq. p. m. 
 
 ' 'Constitutio domus Regis' (Lib. Rub., p. 8io). 
 * A turnspit in the royal kitchens was termed a ' turnbroche. ' 
 ' Blount's extract, " per serjantiam esse hastilarius domini Regis " is 
 quite correct. 
 
256 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 on Roger 'de Eswell'jUnder whom the serjeanty was 
 arrented, and failing to recognise where in Essex 
 the. serjeanty was, the editor, reading "hostiler, " 
 produced the " serjeanty of being the usher of the 
 King's guesthouse, ^ " " Which serjeanty, " the 
 record proceeds, " was put into money and he paid 
 i mark yearly. " 
 
 As a matter of fact the half marc was paid in 
 respect of the alienated portions only, * and for the 
 rest Roger was charged with the twentieth part of 
 a knight's service ; ' but Morant has shown that 
 the turnspit service was returned in Inquests at 
 least as late as 1444. * 
 
 At Hungerford there was another turnspit, or 
 at least kitchen, serjeanty. In 1212 Geoffrey 
 ' Ponsard ' wa^ returned as holding there a virgate 
 " per serjantiam ad Hardland Carv'" {sic), but a 
 few years later Simon ' Punchard ' is entered as 
 holding two virgates there " per serjant' hastillar.^ " 
 
 This again is wrongly rendered in Hazlitt's 
 " Blount's tenures " as " the serjeanty of being the 
 king's spearman, " though it was clearly turnspit 
 tenure : indeed in the Red Book it is " per serjan- 
 
 teriam hastas tornands hastas tornandi" (pp.45 1, 
 
 514). There is in the Testa yet another and very 
 curious variant of this serjeanty, in which the hold- 
 er's name is mangled out of recognition. On 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq., Ij.No. 867. Cf. p. 97, note 2 above. 
 ' Cf. Testa, p. 268: — "Et dictus Rogerus fecit inde finem, vide- 
 licet per annum dim. marc." 
 ' C/: p. 28 above. 
 
 * C/: p. 18 above. 
 " Testa, p. 125. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 107. 
 
THE KING'S TAILOR 257 
 
 p. 1 27 we read that Richard ' Possat ' holds the 
 virgate in Hungerford " per serjant' faciendi Harz 
 in coquina domini Regis." Finally, in 1263, we 
 have the " Inquest after death" on Godfrey ' Pun- 
 sard' (or 'Puncard') in which the service is return- 
 ed as that " of finding withies for hanging up 
 pieces of meat in the King's kitchen {harde ad 
 laquand "pecias carnium in coquina) ". ^ It is at 
 least clear that these " harde " are the " harz " of 
 the Testa (p. 127), and I would make the bold 
 suggestion that in the phrase, " harde ad laquand^ 
 pecias carnium. " we have the clue to the meaning 
 df that weird " Hardland Catv " in the Testa's 
 nightmare text. 
 
 THE KING'S TAILOR 
 
 Among the puzzles of that puzzling record the 
 Constitutio Domus Regis is the entry " Tallator Regis 
 in Domo sua commedet ; et homini suo iij ob. " * 
 This entry occurs in the midst of the Chamber- 
 lain's department, where the chamberlains are 
 jostled by the man who carried the king's bed and 
 by the man who was responsible for the king's 
 bath. What was the King's ' Tallator ' ? Can it 
 have been his tailor ? That Henry I had a recog- 
 nised tailor is a fact brought to light by a charter 
 of Henry II (confirmed by Edward II), which 
 gives to Robert de St. Paul, his chamberlain, 
 " totam terram que fuit Eschorsan {sic) cissoris 
 Henrici regis, avi mei, cum ministerio ejus. " ' 
 
 • Cal. oflnq. I, No. 547. 
 
 ^ Lib. Rub.,^. 811. 
 
 ' Cal. of Charter Rolls, III, 417. 
 
 17 
 
258 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 The editor of the record, Mr. Hubert Hall, 
 asserts that — 
 
 Cissor would certainly have been the title applied to 
 the King's Tailor, and the oiBcial here referred to was 
 doubtless the Tally-cutter, in the suite of the Treasurer 
 and Chamberlains (Red Book, p. ccxcix). 
 
 But is this certain ? He himself, in an earlier 
 work, had contended, on the contrary, that ' tailor ' 
 must be meant, ^ and in a very early contemporary 
 mention of a king's tailor I find him styled ' Tail^ 
 ator. ' We meet with this mention in a fragment 
 of a Winchester survey, of which there is a trans- 
 cript in the Tesia (p. 236). We there read that 
 " King John has given to William his tailor a 
 certain house on his demesne called Chapmannes- 
 halle. " * This house re-appears in the survey temp. 
 Edward I as " a certain large house in which are 
 sold linen cloths in Winchester, " and which 
 " King John gave to William his tailor [cissori 
 suo) " for an annual render of a grey (fur) pelisse. ' 
 
 ' See p. 60 above. 
 
 ' " Dominus Rex Johannes dedit Willelmo Tailatori suo quendam 
 domum " etc. In John's actual charter, granting the house to William 
 " Cissori nostro," it is styled " the house which is called the linen shop" 
 (linea selda), an interesting glimpse of the trade of Winchester and its 
 ' chapmen '. 
 
 ' Archaol. Joum. VII, 375. This render is also referred to on the 
 Close Rolls. In 1276 (Oct. 22), the king having made a grant of the 
 " yearly rent of a fur-cloak (pellicio) of grey {grisd) that William le Tail- 
 leur owes to the king for a house in Winchester, and the arrears of the 
 same," he " orders the barons (of the exchequer) to cause the cloaks to 
 be appraised " etc. (Cal. of Close Rolls, 1 272-1 279, p. 313). In 1312 
 the house is " held in chief by the service of rendering a pilch (pellicium) 
 of greywork (grisonis) yearly (Ibid., 1307-1313, p. 416) and again, later 
 in the year, as "by the yearly service of rendering a pilch of greywork" 
 (Ibid., p. 472). Finally in 12 Edw. II (13 18-9) Robert de Duns- 
 taple " tenens terrarum quae fuerunt Willelmi le Taillour," duly render- 
 
THE KING'S TAILOR 259 
 
 This is decisive, but I think we may further iden- 
 tify this house as that from which WiUiam ' Le 
 Taylur ' was receiving an annual marc of rent 
 under Henry III and in which he was succeeded by 
 his son WilHam in 1250.^ It is certain that in 
 1235 ^^*^ Winchester Jews had to buy out the 
 claim of " William the King's tailor " for lands in 
 that city which had been granted to him by the 
 king after being purchased by themselves. ^ 
 
 But there is further evidence of equation. In 
 this same volume of Mr. Hall's edition (p. 1078), 
 we find ' Raynerius Taliator ' as one of the York 
 moneyers in 1243. ^^^ name, luckily, occurs 
 about this very time, in another record, as Reiner 
 " le Tayllur. " ' Again, also in the Red Book, we 
 find, among Oxfordshire serjeanties (p. 456), that 
 Emma de Hampton held one carucate by the 
 service "talliandi pannos regis." The Testa in two 
 of its entries (pp. 115,1 34) records her service in 
 the same words, which might well suggest a tal- 
 lying, or checking, of the royal wardrobe ; but in a 
 third we find the important variant :— 
 
 Emma de Hamton tenet de domino Rege in villa de 
 Niwenton xl s. terre per servicium scindendi linos (sic) 
 pannos domini Regis et Reginae (p. 107). 
 
 ed at the Exchequer " Tria pellicia de griseo, quorum quodlibet est de 
 VII fessis, pro iij annis," i. e. 8-10 Edw. II (Madox' Exchequer). 
 
 "■ Cal. oflnq. Henry III, No. 183. 
 
 ' Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1 23 2-1 247, p. 122. 
 
 ' Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1 232-1 247, p. 355. He was sent to Bordeaux by 
 the chamberlains of the Exchequer in charge of 10,000 marcs for the 
 keeper of the wardrobe. There is nothing strange in the choice of a 
 " Tayllur " as a monetarius ; for a Draper, a Dyer, and a Cook are also 
 found in the list, while a ' Taliure ' (unindexed) occurs, on the same 
 page, as a warden of the Carlisle mint. 
 
26o THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Here then we obtain scindendi as the equation of 
 talliandi, as scissor (or cissor) was that, we saw, of 
 tailator. The fact is that between the names of 
 the tailor {tailleur) who ' cut ' clothes and of the 
 talley-cutter, who ' cut ' wood, ^ there would always 
 be risk of confusion. 
 
 The right form of the surname or name of 
 occupation derived from the tally {taled) was appar- 
 ently taleator, and it is significant that we first meet 
 with it in connexion with Winchester. On the 
 Pipe Roll of 1 130 (p. 41) we find three shillings 
 of ' aid ' remitted there to Godfrey ' Taleator ' and 
 in another entry, relating to the New Forest (p. 1 7) 
 Robert ' Taleator ' is excused the payment due for 
 his woodcutter at Eling. Is it too speculative to 
 suggest that the wood was destined for tallies ? A 
 Robert ' Taleator ' and a Gilbert ' Taleator ' are also 
 entered in the second of the early Winchester 
 surveys, that of 1143. It is right, on the other 
 hand, to mention that a John ' contratalliator ' {sic) 
 — whose name must have been derived from the 
 counter-tally — is found on the Pipe Rolls of Henry 
 II in receipt of a salary of twopence a day from 
 the revenue of Southampton. What his office was 
 is proved by an entry on the Pipe Roll of 1 200 
 (2 John), in which, by the way, the form 'ta/lli- 
 ando ' is used. ^ 
 
 Before passing to the holdings by serjeanty of 
 Roger, tailor to Henry III, something may be said 
 
 ' Cf. the French name ' Taillebois ', which became a surname. 
 
 " " Ricardus de Leircestria debet x libras pro officio suo habendo in 
 villa de Suthanton quod antecessores sui habuerunt, scilicet de Tailliando 
 contra Prepositos villae de hoc quod captum fuerit ad opus Regis. Sed 
 recordatum est" etc. (Madox' Exchequer). 
 
THE KING'S TAILOR 261 
 
 of William as actual tailor to John. It is, probably, 
 little known that on the Rotulus Misae of 1212- 
 1 2 1 3 we have the detailed tailor's bills sent in by 
 him, ^ not for materials, which were charged for 
 separately, but for making the ' robes * of the king 
 and his friends. William was a ladies ' tailor as 
 well ; he made ' robes, ' on the King's account, for 
 the Queen, for the Scottish King's daughters and 
 for Suzanne " domicella, arnica domini Regis. " 
 The striking feature of these ' robes, " whether 
 made for men or women, is that each uniformly 
 consisted, like a ' suit ' of to-day, of three parts, 
 though these were very different, namely the tunic, 
 the ' over-tunic, ' and the mantle {pallium). ^ We 
 can picture to ourselves what these were by studying 
 the vestments of our early kings on the effigy, on 
 the seal, or in records. In John's case they corres- 
 ponded with the (i) tunic, (2) dalmatic, (3) mantle 
 {pallium) of his coronation vestments. In colour 
 also there is a correspondence. Robes were of 
 scarlet, green, or russet, sometimes even of black 
 burnet, but various shades of red * were those most 
 in favour, and in the four scarlet ' robes ' made for 
 the Mayor of Angouleme and his fellows (1213) 
 we have perhaps the earliest mention of these 
 municipal vestments, which, in that case, are but 
 survivals from a time when kings and nobles, 
 
 ' See Cole's Documents illustrative of EngRsh History (1844), pp. 267, 
 269. The first extends from Mid-Lent to the summerof 1213, and 
 the other from Christmas Eve 1212 to Mid-Lent 121 3. They are 
 entered on the * dorse ' of the Roll. 
 
 ' See, for allusions to this mantle, pp. 115, 143, 192 above. 
 
 ' " escarleta," " escarleta rubea," " escarleta sanguinea." There is 
 one ' robe ' of green samite. 
 
262 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 knights and mayors walked alike in scarlet. 
 William was also a military tailor and more. 
 He was paid for furbishing up {furbiandis) swords 
 and knives and quarfells ; ^ for cleaning the king's 
 swords of rust, * and, as " William our tailor," was 
 paid in 1220, for repairing the young king's 
 crown and regalia for the Whitsun coronation at 
 Westminster. * The render recorded for his Win- 
 chester house * gives a special interest to its valua- 
 tion at 1 4 sh. when received from him in 1 208 * 
 and to his purchase at Winchester of grey fur for 
 lining the king's ' over-tunic' ® It was at Win- 
 chester fair that, in 1233, the Yorkshire and 
 Lincolnshire clothiers, with those of Leicester, 
 had to deliver to " William the King's tailor, " 
 the cloth bought for the king's use, ^ but we also 
 hear of his buying oversea, for in 1233 "the king 
 has caused all the merchants of the power of 
 France (to be) arrested in England by his order on 
 account of the taking of William the king's tailor 
 beyond seas. " * The last fact I shall, record of 
 this favoured tailor is that, in 1227, he had been 
 given by the king that land at Newton Purcell, 
 Oxon., " which Emma de Norhamtona sometime 
 
 ' Cole's Documents, p. 232. 
 
 ^ "pro rubigine gladii domini Regis detergenda" .{J.Ud., p. 241). 
 
 ' Cal. rot. claus. I, 43 1. 
 
 ' See p. 258 above. 
 
 ' " pro uno pelliceo de griso ad opus nostrum liberato eidem Radulfo 
 per manum Willelmi Cissoris apud Lameheth die Sancti Vincentii 
 (22 Jan.) xiiij sol." (Letters Close, 3 Feb. 1208). 
 
 ' "pro una ferrura de grisio, ad supertunicam domini Regis ad 
 
 surgendum, emptam apud Wintoniam xxv s per manum Willelmi 
 
 Scissoris" (Cole, p. 175) 
 
 ' Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1 232-1 247, p. 23. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 96. 
 
THE KING'S TAILOR 263 
 
 held of the king,.... to hold on payment of certain 
 shears {forfices) at Christmas. " ^ This was the 
 land which Emma de ' Hamtona ' had held by the 
 serjeanty of cutting out the King's linen clothes, * 
 and which, after the above grant, was held by 
 William the tailor {Ctssor) by the service of ren- 
 dering the said shears. ^ 
 
 I pass from tenure by the tailor's shears to 
 tenure by the tailor's needle. Blount has cited 
 and Morant repeated a plea of 1284-5 (^3 Edw, I) 
 to the effect that Roger, formerly the King's tailor, 
 held a carucate of land at Hallingbury, Essex, 
 by the serjeanty of paying to the king's Exchequer 
 a silver needle every year on the morrow of 
 Michaelmas. * The land was the small manor of 
 Wallbury, and its holder was Roger de Ros, who 
 appears, subsequently to William, as tailor to 
 Henry III. * I hasten to add, lest any Taylor, 
 Taylour, Tayleur, or Tailyour should claim this 
 Roger de Ros a/ias Le Tailleur a/ias Le Taluur as 
 his ancestor, and desire to change his name to de 
 Ros, that Roger left no issue, his two sisters being 
 found to be his heirs at his death in 1257. " The 
 actual grant to him of the manor of Wallbury was 
 made in 1240 (Dec. 6).'' When Aymer de 
 
 ' Cal. of Charter Rolls, I, J i. 
 
 ' 7V/A?, pp. 107, 115, 134. See p. 259 above. 
 
 ' " WiUelmus Cissor tenet xl s[olidatas] terre in Neuinton per 
 servicium reddendi quasdam forffices ad warderobam domini Regis " 
 (/3«</., p. 1 18). 
 
 * "De serjeanciis dicunt quod per serjantiam solvendi... unam 
 
 acum argenteam." 
 
 ' Morant cites a Plea roll of 1 245 recording the render of the silver 
 needle by " Rogerus de Ross, Scissor Domini Regis." 
 
 ° Cal. oflnq. I, No. 397. 
 
 'Gift to Master Roger de Ros, king's tailor, of all the land 
 
264 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Valence, Earl of Pembroke, died in 1325, Wall- 
 bury figured among his vast possessions, still " held 
 of the king in chief by service of a silver needle. " ^ 
 As for Roger de Ros, we find him employed as 
 tailor in a way that indicates the increase of luxury 
 and extravagance under Henry III. He is sent to 
 the fairs of Provins and of ' Lendit ' to buy, at 
 great cost, silks and precious stuffs, the king bor- 
 rowing in all directions and becoming indebted to 
 the Lucca merchants, in order to provide him with 
 cash, while at home, in 1256, Henry, having "no 
 ready money to pay for purchases " which Roger 
 was to make at Boston fair, wrote urgently to the 
 justices in eyre on the northern circuit, and the 
 sheriffs of the northern counties, commanding them 
 to send up 700 marcs from the proceeds of the 
 eyre to Roger and his colleague " with all speed 
 as they would save him from loss and perpetual 
 scandal. " ^ 
 
 THE WYMONDLEY SERJEANTY 
 
 This serjeanty, with its well established corona- 
 tion service, is somewhat difficult to class. It is 
 
 called ' la Walle ' in Hallingebiri, which Gilbert de Hauvill held of the 
 king's bail, to hold by rendering one silver bodkin (acum) or id. 
 yearly" (Cal. of Charter Rolls, I, 255). At the same time, Gilbert de 
 Hauvill, " out of pity and in compassion for his infirmity," was allowed 
 to retain the land for life, though he had only held it of the king's 
 bail, on paying yearly half a marc " to the king's Serjeant, Master Roger 
 de Ros, the king's tailor" {Cal. of Vat. Rolls, 123 2- 1247, p. 240). 
 This disposes apparently of the puzzling statement, in the Red Book 
 (p. 457, 507) and the Testa, that, in 1 212- 12 18, Walter de Hauville 
 held Wallbury by falconer serjeanty, of the gift of Henry II, or 
 Richard I, or John. 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq.Wl,^. 318. 
 
 ' Cal. of Pat. Rolls, p. 483. 
 
THE WYMONDLEY SERJEANTY 265 
 
 nowhere spoken of as ' butler ' service or assigned 
 to the butler's department, although the silver 
 covered cups on the Argentine coat of arms are 
 associated with ' Butler ' coats. If we style its 
 service that of cup-bearer, we shall hardly be mis- 
 taken, and this, indeed, is the accepted view. It 
 has already (p. 61) been pointed out that the cup- 
 bearers {escantiones) are prominent in the Constitutio, 
 although they are not afterwards officers of the 
 Household. It is, therefore, significant that this 
 serjeanty, of which the origin has hitherto been 
 wrongly stated, can be carried back, as I shall now 
 show, to the days of Henry I. In 1903 there was 
 published the calendar of the Patent Rolls for 
 1 399-1401, in which we find an Inspeximus (iith 
 May 1400) for Sir William Argentein of a Charter 
 of King Stephen granting to John de Argentein 
 the land and office of his father, Reginald de 
 Argentein. ^ As no place is mentioned, it would 
 escape notice that this charter relates to Great 
 Wymondley, Herts., and to the service attached to 
 its tenure. Reginald de Argentein, the former 
 holder, was already dead in 1130, for his widow 
 Maud then had license to marry again. * 
 
 The returns of 1 2 1 2 contain a full record of this 
 ancient serjeanty : — 
 
 Ricardus de Argentein tenet Wilemundeslea de domino 
 Rege per serjeantiam, scilicet ad serviendum de una cupa 
 argentea ad coronacionem dicti Regis, et antecessores sui 
 
 ' " sciatis me reddidisse et concessisse Johanni de Argentein totam ter- 
 ram que fuit patris sui Reginaldi de Argentein cum ministerio suo " 
 (p. 293). "Terra et ministerium " was the regular phrase for a ser- 
 jeanty on the Pipe Roll of 1 1 30. 
 
 » Pipe Roll, 3 1 Hen. I. 
 
266 THE KING'S HOUSEHOLD 
 
 de antecessoribus domini Regis de veteri feofFamento ^ per 
 idem servidum. * 
 
 It is, probably, quite unknown that Richard 
 joined the Crusade of 121 8, and, after the capture 
 of Damietta (5 Nov. 12 19), founded and hand- 
 somely endowed a church there in honour of St. 
 Edmund, his patron saint {advocatus). In 1220 
 he wrote in exultation to his kinsman the Prior of 
 (Bury) St Edmunds that St. Edmund had already 
 performed a miracle as soon as the church was 
 opened. A Fleming, who bore a grudge against 
 the saint, abused the nice new statue of him, which 
 Richard had had carved and jpainted. But the 
 saint had his revenge. As the Fleming, snarling, 
 left the church, he was caught by a saintly booby 
 trap, * and was too stunned to walk home without 
 help. 
 
 When Richard de Argentein died on his pil- 
 grimage to the Holy Land in 1 246, the Inquisition 
 returned similarly that he held Wymondley by 
 service of serving with a cup at the king's chief 
 feasts when directed by the king's steward. * His 
 son Giles, a valiant knight, succeeded. * At the 
 coronation of Richard II the claim to serve was 
 duly allowed, but at that of Henry IV the claim of 
 Sir William Argentine was unsuccessfully opposed 
 by Sir John® Fitz Warren in right of his wife 
 
 ' This again carries back the serjeanty to the days of Henry I. 
 
 ' Testa, p. 270. Cf. Lib. Rub., p. 507. 
 
 ' " accidit miraculose quod lignum quoddam supra ostium dictas 
 
 ecclesiae de alto corruens grave vulnus inflixit" (MS. Bod. 240). 
 
 * Cal. oflnq. Henry III, No. 93. 
 
 ' Mathew Paris. 
 
 ° There seems to he some confusion here. The husband of Maud 
 (the eldest daughter) was Sir Ivo Fitz Waryn. 
 
THE WYMONDLEY SERJEANTY 267 
 
 Maud, daughter and heir of Sir John de Argentine. 
 William was not legitimate, but his tenure of the 
 manor gained the day, for this was of the essence 
 of serjeanty. 
 
 The manor passed with an heiress from the 
 Argentine family to the Alingtons, and in i486 
 William Alington was found to have held it, at his 
 death, " in chief by serjeanty, viz. serving the King 
 and Queen on their coronation days with the first 
 silver-gilt cup. "^ From the coronation of Charles 
 II to that of George IV, both inclusive, the lords 
 of Great Wymondley had their claims duly allowed, 
 the cup forming the fee. But with the cessation 
 of the banquet, the service lapsed. 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq. Henry VII, I, No. 31. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 We are most of us aware that our Norman kings 
 were consumed with a passion for the chase. The 
 schoolboy learns that the first William " loved the 
 tall deer as though he had been their father, " and 
 that his son and successor met in their pursuit his 
 death. But less familiar is the fact that the last of 
 our English kings ^ was as ardent as themselves in 
 sport. For, in Freeman's words, it is " the pastime 
 which seems least suited to the character of a saint. " 
 Never did he fail to attend mass ; but, as soon as 
 mass was over, it was Edward's greatest joy to hear 
 the cry of hounds or to watch his hawks in flight. ^ 
 If one of his Berkshire squires should die, the 
 hawks and hounds he left had to be offered to the 
 king. ' 
 
 Even Harold, his darling hero, " shared, " I fear, 
 the " savage pastime, " in Freeman's words, of the 
 " saintly " king. This I prove from the Bayeux 
 
 ' I ignore, as Domesday does, the upstart Harold. 
 
 ' " Plurimum temporis exigebat circa saltus et silvas in venationum 
 
 jucunditate jocundabatur plurimum coram se allatis accipitribus 
 
 vel hujus generis avibus, vel certe delectabatur applausibus multorum 
 motuum canibus. His et talibus interdum deducebat diem, et in his 
 tantummodo ex natura videbatur aliquam mundi captare delectationem." 
 
 ' " Tainus vel miles regis dominicus moriens si essent ei canes vel, 
 
 accipitres presentabantur regi ut, si vellet, acciperet." (Domesday 1, 566). 
 
THE KING'S SPORT 269 
 
 tapestry, dear to the Professor's heart. After 
 taking leave of his sovereign, we see him riding to 
 Bosham, the hawk as ever on his wrist. Before 
 him go his hounds, deserving more attention than 
 they have, I think, received. For here again the 
 famous stitchwork contrives to set before us 
 minute and accurate detail. As for centuries 
 after, the hounds are a mixed pack. In front are 
 a couple of the small hounds {canes currentes) duly 
 giving tongue ; behind them a leash of the great 
 hounds {leporarii or valtrarii), distinguished by 
 their long legs, their powerful hind quarters and 
 the collars about their necks. ^ We shall meet 
 with them repeatedly in these pages as forming 
 part of the mediaeval pack, and no one who com- 
 pares the tapestry, for instance, with that illumin- 
 ated picture of an early king hunting the deer in 
 Cott. MS. Claudius D. II.* can doubt that the 
 designer of the stitchwork sought to indicate a 
 mixed pack. Although for convenience the larger 
 hounds have to be described as greyhounds 
 [leporarii), they were a more powerful breed, built 
 on coarser lines, and with a dash of the mastiff. * 
 We are further shown in the ' Tapestry ' Harold 
 going on board, still with his hawk on his hand, a 
 hound under his arm, while another hound is held 
 
 ' " Et Encaynne comme vialtre ou levrer," (Ogier k Danois). 
 
 ' It similarly shows, as typical of the pack, a couple of the smaller 
 hounds and two of the larger (wearing collars). 
 
 ' Under John we find valtrarii as in some way distinct from leporarii. 
 They were, I think, boarhounds, like the French veaultres. " L'autre 
 nature d'alanz veautres sont auques taillez comme laide taille de levrier, 
 mais il ont grosses testes, grosses levres et granz oreilles et de ceulz s'aide 
 Ten Xxh, bien et a chascier les ours et les porcz." 
 
270 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 by the man who follows him. ^ When captured 
 and brought to William, he has still his hawk. 
 
 Although Domesday reveals to us the fact that 
 William retained in his service a number of 
 English huntsmen, the terms used for hawks and 
 hounds were, we shall find, French. ^ This, as I 
 shall show, enables us to recognise wolf-hounds 
 and fox-hounds in the days of John. So also the 
 English " fewterer " is derived from the French 
 veautrier, the man in charge of greyhounds, * while 
 the French original of braconarius is represented by 
 the word that now denotes a poacher. 
 
 It is impossible to deal with the various serjeant- 
 ies connected with the training and keeping of 
 hounds without some explanation of mediaeval hunt- 
 ing. Those who have had to interpret mediasval 
 records are familiar with the difficulties caused by 
 the varying names of hounds, difficulties which 
 arise partly, no doubt, from actual developments and 
 changes of breed since those far-off days, and partly 
 from the different system of hunting then in vogue. 
 
 ' These details are not without historical significance. Mr. Freeman, 
 who discussed at some length this voyage of Harold, strove to persuade 
 himself that it was merely a " pleasure trip " in the Channel. William 
 of Malmesbury, he observes, makes him " set out from Bosham purely 
 on a voyage of pleasure and for the purpose of fishing." But the whole 
 evidence of the tapestry is against this view. And by its showing us 
 hawk and hound, but no horses, taken with him, it implies that he 
 intended to cross the Channel and would find horses on the other side. 
 In the 1 2th cent., as the Pipe Rolls show, Henry II used to send his 
 hawks and huntsmen across when he was going to Normandy. 
 
 ' " Osturs, girfaus, e espervers, 
 
 Seus e veaultre e levrer." 
 
 That is to say, goshawks, gerfalcons, and sparrow-haWks ; (ordinary) 
 hounds and boarhounds and greyhounds. The French words were 
 latinized, but only, of course, in records. 
 
 ' Vellrarius or Valtrarius in mediasval Latin. 
 
THE KING'S SPORT 271 
 
 Broadly speaking, it is possible to trace in the 
 early part of the twelfth century the same combin- 
 ation in hunting of three distinct hounds that we 
 meet with in the latter part of the sixteenth. This 
 may seem a bold statement, but I hope to make 
 it good. Our starting-point, here again, is that 
 record of the King's household {Constitutio domus 
 regis) which preserves its constitution as it stood at 
 the death of Henry I. We there read 
 
 Valtrarii, unusquisque .iij. d. in die ; et .ij. d. hominibus 
 suis ; et unicuique leporario, obolum in die. Mueta regis 
 .viij. d. in die.... Ductor liemarii .j. d. et liemarius, 
 obolum. Bernarius .iij. d. in die ; et magni Harrede 
 .iiij. debent habere .j. d., et de parvis Harrede VII .j. d. 
 Ad niagnos Harrede .ij. homines, et unusquisque .j. d. in 
 die. Braconarii, unusquisque .iij. d. in die. Luparii, 
 .XX. d. in die ad equos et ad homines et canes ; et debent 
 habere .xxiiij. canes currentes et .viij. leporarios. ^ 
 
 Employing later evidence to illustrate this passage, 
 we may clearly distinguish in it : — (i) the velter- 
 ers with their greyhounds ; (2) the " berner " and 
 the ordinary hounds ; (3) the " liam hound " {.liem- 
 arius) with the man who kept him in leash {ductor). 
 The Close rolls of the reign of Edward II, early 
 in the fourteenth century, afford numerous instances 
 of royal huntsmen sent in detachments to kill deer 
 for the royal larder. And the normal detachment 
 contained, in addition to the huntsmen themselves, 
 (i) velterers with their greyhounds, (2) berners 
 with their " running hounds", (3) a " berselet " in 
 charge of a " berseletter." It is also very remark- 
 able that the pack of " running hounds " was nor- 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 813. 
 
272 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 mally of twelve couples, the very number named 
 in the Constitution which were in charge of two 
 berners. The number of greyhounds [leporarii) 
 accompanying them varied, but each velterer, 
 normally, had charge of from four to six, the reason 
 being that he would lead a brace or a leash with 
 each hand, or a brace with one and a leash with 
 the other. As for the " befselet ", it must have 
 performed the function of the " Liam-hound," of 
 earlier and later date, namely that of harbouring the 
 quarry by scent.^ 
 
 As an earlier example of the pack of twelve 
 couples and of its combination with greyhounds, 
 we rnay take the payment by William de Braose, 
 in 1205, for seisin of three famous Monmouthshire 
 castles, viz: 500 marcs, three war-horses, five 
 hunters {chacuros), twenty-four hounds [seusas), and 
 ten greyhounds.^ There is also an interesting in- 
 stance of a pack of six couples, with a "berner", in 
 a fine from the bishop of Ely, in 1 202, for a tres- 
 pass by his huntsman.^ 
 
 Although a good deal has now appeared in print 
 
 ' One may cite, as instances, John Lovel with 24 " running dogs, " 
 six greyhounds, two berners, and a "veutrer " (1311) ; two huntsmen, 
 " whom the king is sending with two berners, six veutrers, twenty-four 
 haericii dogs, twenty-two greyhounds, and a bercelet " (i 3 1 3) ; a hunts- 
 man " with two berners, four ventres, twenty-four running daemericit 
 dogs, a bercelet, and sixteen greyhounds" (13 13) ; a huntsman "with 
 two ventres, two berners, a bercelettar, ten greyhounds, twenty-four 
 running dogs and two bercelets " (1313) ; two huntsmen " with two 
 haericii berners, five veutrers, and one bercelletar, and twenty-four 
 daemericit running dogs, twenty-four greyhounds, and two bercelets" 
 
 (1314)- 
 
 ^ Rot. fin. 7 John, m. 7 (cited by Blount). 
 
 ' " Episcopus Eliensis debet xii. canes de mota et j. limerum" 
 (Pipe Roll, 4 John, rot. 10.) The mota was the French meute.- 
 
THE KING'S SPORT 273 
 
 on hunting in the 14th and 15th centuries, the 
 only actual drawings of hounds which appear to be 
 known are those in the Phillips MS. of Gaston de 
 Foix, which Sir Henry Dryden gave in his 'Twici' 
 (1844)^ and which were taken thence by Dr, Cox 
 in his Royal Forests of England. It appears to have 
 been overlooked that there is earlier and English 
 evidence in the very remarkable grotesque drawing 
 found in the Rydeware cartulary.^ Here the 
 victims of the hounds are seen triumphant over 
 them : a hare carries a small slain hound ; a fox 
 leads a brace of greyhounds ; and a big animal be- 
 strides a much larger hound with his nose to the 
 ground, which can hardly be other than the ' liam- 
 hound ' [Hemarius) . The same difference in size 
 between this hound and the ' running dogs ' is seen in 
 the drawings from Gaston de Foix' work spoken 
 of above. 
 
 The serjeanties connected with the "liam-hound" 
 will be duly found below ; but the point I would 
 insist on here is that his use in hunting, and by the 
 same name, connects the two periods I have named. 
 In Turberville's Book of Hunting (i 576) we have two 
 woodcuts of the huntsman — still called " The 
 Hunte " — holding in his " liam-hound " (pp. 60, 
 71), in one of which the hound has his nose to the 
 ground picking up a scent. 
 
 I am the Hunte, which rathe and earely rise, 
 
 ' 2nd edition, 1908. 
 
 * It was reproduced in Charters and Muniments of the Gresley family 
 (1895), pp. 1 1 8-9, and as a frontispiece to The Rydeware Cartulary 
 (WiUiam Salt Arch. Soc. 1896). 
 
274 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 Then take my Hownde, in Ham me behinde, 
 The stately Harte in fryth an fell to finde 
 
 And when my Hownde doth streyne upon good vent 
 I must confesse the same doth me content. 
 But when I have my coverts walkt about 
 And harbred faste the Harte for comming out 
 Then I returne, to make a grave reporte. 
 
 This system of harbouring the quarry beforehand 
 with the help of the " Ham-hound " is the practice 
 which unites the two ages, and Turberville's book 
 describes it in great detail/ 
 
 Although he speaks of the ' Lyam ' by which 
 the hound was held, the hound itself he terms 
 throughout, significantly enough, the blood-hound.* 
 The resemblance of the lyam-hound in tlie Gaston 
 de Foix MS. to a bloodhound had been observed. 
 
 Almost contemporary with the appearance of 
 Turberville's book' (1576) — itself largely a trans- 
 lation from the French — was that of Fleming's 
 English translation of Dr. Caius' monograph " of 
 English dogs " (1576) and Harrison's well-known 
 
 ' e.g. " in a morning a hounde shall drawe better beeing helde shorte 
 than if he were lette at length of the Lyam : And yet some Hunters 
 will give them all the Lyam, but they do not well " (p 76). 
 
 * pp. 71, 106-7, iiSj 129, 130. These passages relate to hunting 
 the Hart ; but in dealing with the wolf and the bear he terms it the 
 ' lyamehound '. 
 
 It is noteworthy that he should write " The best finding of the Beare 
 is with a lyamhounde," for in the Rydeware cartulary drawing it seems 
 to be a bear that is bestriding that hound. 
 
 He further identifies the two hounds in his directions for hunting the 
 otter, where he writes that the huntsmen "should first send four 
 servants or varlets with bloodhounds, or such houndes as will draw in 
 
 the lyame If any of theyr lyamhounds finde of an Otter let y 
 
 huntesman lodge it even as you would do a Deare or a Bore." 
 
 ' Re-printed (Tudor and Stuart Library) 1908. 
 
THE KING'S SPORT 275 
 
 description of Elizabethan England. The latter, 
 unfortunately, does but copy from Caius, the Eliza- 
 bethan parson being, one presumes, no sportsman 
 himself. As for Caius' book, it appears to me to 
 be that of a fantastic pedant and to compare most 
 unfavourably with Turberville's treatise, which is 
 that of a practical huntsman. The learned doctor ^ 
 discourses of " the dog called Leviner or Lyemmer ; 
 in Latin lorarius, " and observes ^ that 
 
 It is called in Latin lorinarius, "a levitate", of lightness, 
 and therefore may well be called a lighthound. It is also 
 called by this word Lorarius, a Loro (a thong), wherewith 
 it is led. 
 
 It is certain that the ' Lyemmer ' was, on the 
 contrary, a big, heavily-built hound, while of its 
 distinctive use in harbouring the quarry Caius says, 
 and apparently knows, nothing. When, however, 
 we turn to the Art de Venerie, * attributed to a 
 huntsman of Edward II, William ' Twici ', this 
 work, which takes us back more than half way to 
 the Constitution shows us the Lyamhound used, 
 precisely as in Turberville's day, for harbouring and 
 unharbouring the quarry. * A survival of the 
 practice lingers with the Devon and Somerset, 
 where, the harbourer having communicated to the 
 master, as in mediseval times, the presence of a 
 warrantable stag, two couples of " tufters " are 
 
 ' Caius, moreover, treats the Bloodhound {sanguinarius) as a wholly 
 distinct breed. 
 
 ' As rendered by his translator. 
 
 ' Edited by Sir Henry Dryden. 
 
 * " quantez des bestes sunt meuz de lymer Sire, touz ceaus 
 
 qe suntenchaces sunt meuz de lymer." 
 
276 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 thrown into cover to unharbour him and drive 
 him into the open for the pack. 
 
 Turning now to the use of greyhounds, hunting 
 of course by sight, in conjunction with other 
 hounds, hunting by scent, we again find the prac- 
 tice of Turberville's day illustrating the far earlier 
 Constitutio domus regis. In that document it seems 
 strange to find eight greyhounds combined with 
 twenty-four ' running dogs ' in the pack that 
 hunted the wolf. But Turberville cites an author 
 who writes : — 
 
 Greyhoundes are more afrayde of a Foxe than of a 
 greater beast. For I have seen Greyhounds which would 
 runne hardly at an Hart, yea, would not refuse the wild 
 Bore, nor the Wolfe, and yet they would streyne curtesie 
 at a Foxe (p. 188). 
 
 He himself, while explaining that, at that time, 
 wolves were only found in Ireland, observes : — 
 
 I have scene a Wolfe (being emptie) out runne four or 
 five brace of the best Greyhoundes that might be founde 
 
 and unlesse he be coursed with Greyhounds 
 
 or IVLastives, he keepeth the covert A Wolfe 
 
 will stand up a whole day before a good kennel of houn- 
 des unless y® Greyhoundes course him (p. 208). 
 
 He also describes in great detail the way in 
 which greyhounds should be set beforehand to 
 intercept the wolf, after which 
 
 " lette the Huntsman go with his Lyamehounde and 
 drawe from the carion unto the thickes side where the Wol- 
 ves have gone in : and there the Huntes shall caste oiF the 
 thyrde parte of their best houndes . . . The Huntesmen 
 must holde neare in to theyr houndes, blowing harde and 
 encouraging them with the voyce, for many houndes will 
 
THE KING'S SPORT 277 
 
 streyne curtesie at this chace, although they bee lustie 
 
 and arrant at all other chaces Note that 
 
 bothe houndes and Greyhoundes will requyre greater 
 fleshing and encouragement to a Wolfe than to any other 
 chace" (pp. 213-5). 
 
 Here the three kinds of hounds are seen working 
 in conjunction. ^ 
 
 If greyhounds were used, as we find they were, 
 for hunting the wolf and the wild boar, they must 
 have been fiercer and more akin to the Irish wolf- 
 hound. ^ Here we may learn something from 
 Caius, for he speaks of the greyhound (Jeporarius) as 
 
 taking the buck, the hart, the doe, the fox, and other 
 beasts of semblable kind ordained for the game of hunt- 
 ing ; but more or less, each one according to the measure 
 and proportion of their desire ; and as might and hability 
 
 of their bodies will permit and suffer. For some 
 
 are of a greater sort and some lesser ; some are smooth- 
 skinned, and some are curled. The bigger therefore are 
 appointed to hunt the bigger beasts, and the smaller serve 
 to hunt the smaller accordingly. ' 
 
 Caius, however, has plunged the subject into great 
 confusion by classifying the ' harrier ' as leverarius, 
 a hound hunting by scent. For the ' levrer ' was, 
 in old French, the greyhound ; * and the Maulev- 
 erer family bore greyhounds on its shield. More- 
 
 ' Turberville notes that young hounds should never be entered to the 
 hare in conjunction with greyhounds,- for, instead of hunting by scent, 
 they would do nothing but " lifte up their heades and looke alwayes to 
 see the Hare before the Greyhoundes, and will never put nose to the 
 grounde, nor beate for it, nor hunte" (p. 170). 
 
 * See the remarks above on the hounds in the Bayeux Tapestry. 
 
 ' That greyhounds varied a good deal is implied by an entry on the 
 Pipe Roll of 1207 (9 John), where John le Teingre offers 100 marcs 
 " et X leporarios magnos,. pulchros, et bonos " (Rot. i+d.) 
 
 * They are lefrers in ' Twici '. 
 
278 THE KING'S St^ORT 
 
 over, their name was already Latinised early in the 
 1 2th century as ' Malus leporarius, ' which gives 
 us the French-Latin equation. Further confusion 
 has been caused by Caius' section " of the dog 
 called Gazehound, in Latin Agaseus, " used for 
 hunting " the fox and the hare. " No one seems 
 able to explain what this dog was. 
 
 The greyhounds depicted as hunting in con- 
 junction with other hounds are usually shown as 
 white. They are so seen in the illumination of an 
 early king hunting (Cott. MS., Claud. D ii), which 
 is said to be of about the time of Edward III, ^ in 
 that of the death of the boar reproduced in Miss 
 Dryden's The art of hunting (1908), and in the 
 illumination prefixed to the same work. In all 
 these cases the contrast with the darker colour of 
 the other hounds is marked. This, probably, 
 explains the service of rendering two white grey- 
 hounds for the manor of ShefEeld, " which has led 
 to much sententious speculation in the later editions 
 of Blount's work as to whether white hares {lepores) 
 were meant. 
 
 Mention of " a pack of white hounds " is afford- 
 ed by a Hampshire serjeanty, that of Oakhanger, 
 the holders of which were alleged to have changed 
 a hunting tenure into the service of finding a Ser- 
 jeant in war, without being authorised to do so. ' 
 
 ' But in this case they have black spots. 
 
 ' Inq. p. m. on Thomas de Furnival (1333) in Cal. oflnj.Vll. 
 No. 470. 
 
 ' " Serjantia Jacobi de Hochangre in Ochangre pro qua debuit custo- 
 dire unam albam motam canum domini Regis, et quam serjant[iam] ante- 
 cess' dicti Jacobi mutaverunt in aliud servicium sine waranto, scilicet 
 inveniendi domino Regi unam servientem in exercitu suo cum uno 
 habergello per quadriginta dies, " etc. {Testa, p. 238). In an entry of 
 
LIAM-HOUND SERJEANTIES 279 
 
 THE LIAM-HOUND SERJEANTIES 
 
 In the Constitutio domus Regis the liam-hound, we 
 saw, figures thus : — 
 
 Ductor liemarii j d., et liemarius, obolum. 
 
 The editor renders this, " Leader of the limmers " 
 (p. ccxciii),^ but it is important to observe that only 
 one liam-hound {liemarius) is entered. This hound 
 was so named from being held in leash, so that the 
 word ductor expressly suggests its character.^ It 
 hunted by scent and had " hanging ears something 
 like a bloodhound." The low pay of the man in 
 charge of it (a penny a day ') should be observed. 
 One of the serjeanties connected with this hound 
 was at Aislaby, co. York, where^ in 1 198,* Guy the 
 huntsman {Wido venator) held two carucates by the 
 
 earlier date (p. 235) the tenure is described as " per veneriam ", but in 
 1 3 1 7 Oakhanger is returned as held of the king in chief by seijeanty, by 
 service of keeping the king's white pack of hounds when he shall come 
 into the Forest of Woolmer {Ca/. rflnj. VI. No. 46). For unauthorised 
 change of service see p. 48 above. 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 813. Even a little earlier, v'tT.. on the Pipe Roll of 
 1 1 30, we have this hound mentioned (p. 3): "j Liemer et iiij sens" 
 (hounpls). 
 
 ' Prince Henry, son of James I, had, in 1610, a ' Bowe Bearer and 
 Master of the Lime Hounds. ' This officer appears in the Queen's 
 Household of 1631 as "Master of the Bows and String Hounds." It 
 would seem possible that this office occurs even so early as 1377, when 
 we have an appointment, during pleasure, of John Lovell (a name 
 familiar as that of a huntsman under Edward II, and even under John) 
 " as master of the king's hounds, called bercektz. " (Cal. Pat. Rolls, i-'iJJ- 
 1381, p. 71). But his " licence to expeditate them " {Ibid.) is so start- 
 ling that one turns to the Latin text, where the word is " expediendi. " 
 " Expedire " would seem to have been here mistaken for " expeditare. " 
 
 ' The berners and veutrers had threepence a day each. 
 
 * I established this to be the date of the return. 
 
28o THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 service of training one liam-hound. ^ His son 
 Richard is entered as holding them by the service 
 of training " the king's Umehound." ^ In 1 250 this 
 serjeanty was " arrented," and its service commuted 
 for the payment of forty shiUings a year/ Accord- 
 ingly, in 1262, when Richard de 'Aslakeby' 
 died, the land was returned as " held of the king in 
 chief by 40 s, yearly." * 
 
 But I have been able, with some difficulty, to 
 trace another serjeanty of the kind, which did not 
 so come to an end, but continued long enough to 
 prove the connexion of the ' berselet ' with the 
 liam-hound. 
 
 In the great Norfolk Inquisition of 1212, as 
 recorded in the Testa, we read : — 
 
 "Willelmus May tenuit in Causton' xx solidatas terre 
 per veneriam de done domini Regis Henrici antiqui et 
 Willelmus May filius Roberti May tenet adhuc per idem 
 servicium (p. 293). 
 
 Willelmus May tenet unam carucatam terre in villa de 
 Stanhoie de domino Rege per serjantiam venacionis 
 (p. 295).^ 
 
 In spite of the return that the land in Cawston 
 was given to William May by Henry I (' Henrici 
 
 ' " aptandi unum limer[ium]. " Testa, p. 377. 
 
 ' Lil>. Rub., p. 467, and Testa, pp. 375, 376 : " limerium Regis " and 
 Testa, p. 378 : — - " aptandi unum can em lyemerium. " Blount misread 
 the word as " lizierium, " which puzzled his editors. 
 
 ' It was then described as " servicium afFe(c)tandi et custodiendi 
 unum limerium ad custum suum. " The service was " redeemed " for 
 the above payment, and the land was to be held as a twentieth of a 
 knight's fee, " Et ipse et heredes sui quieti erunt imperpetuum de pre- 
 dicto servicio " {Testa, p. 376). 
 
 * Cal. oflnq. Hen. Ill, p. 146. 
 
 ' William May is found acting as one of King John's huntsmen just 
 before this {^ot. de Prest. iz John, p. 249). 
 
LIAM-HOUND SERJEANTIES 281 
 
 antiqui '), I cannot trace the tenure further back 
 than Easter 1 1 64, when William May began to 
 draw twenty shillings a year from Cawston, all of 
 which had previously been held by William the 
 King's brother. ^ 
 
 In these extracts the serjeanty, we see, is only 
 defined as a hunting tenure ; but in later entries we 
 have more detail. On p. 290 the land in Cawston 
 and Stanhoe is said to be held " per serjantiam 
 custodiendi unum Livarium, " and on p. 299 the 
 hound becomes "unum lunar[ium]." On p. 285 
 William May " paseit unum liverium, " and on 
 p. 283 (a return which I assign to 1236) the 
 hound is " unum luvarium." Here, the minims 
 being the same in number, I propose to read " lim- 
 arium," as I also do in the case of " lunarium." 
 As for the forms ' Livarium ' and ' Liverium ', they 
 are but a minim short. This makes perfect sense 
 of unintelligible words. The later history of this 
 land — known as May's manor in Cawston — con- 
 firms this reading ; for in 1285 (to quote Blome- 
 field) the land is stated to be held " per serjantiam 
 custodiendi unum burtelettum (/. e. bercelettum) ad 
 voluntatem sumptibus suis propriis," and in 1 309 
 Joan, relict of Robert de Bedingfield, was found to 
 hold her lands in Cawston and Stanhoe of the king 
 in chief " by the service of keeping a bercelet 
 {bercellum) for the king, when he wishes to send a 
 bercelet, there to be kept, receiving for keeping it 
 1 4 d. weekly. " ^ 
 
 But there is a third variant for this same hound. 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 10 Hen. II, p. 34. 
 
 * Cal. of Close Rolls, 1307-1313, p. 163. 
 
282 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 In the Testa return (p. 299) early in the reign of 
 Henry III the tenure of Cawston by a 'lunar[ium] ', 
 /. e. limarium, is immediately followed by that of 
 Stanhoe " per servicium custodiendi unuiii brache- 
 tum" while in the Inq. p. m. on William le May, 
 1256, the whole of his lands are said to be held 
 "by service of keeping one bracket" {bragetti)} 
 
 Having thus shown that in this serjeanty the 
 liam-hound becomes not only a ' berselet ', but a 
 ' brachet ', I turn to that of Coton in LuUington, 
 Derbyshire, for further identification of the two 
 latter hounds. In the Testa de Nevill Stephen de 
 Beauchamp holds this manor, in 12 12, 'per unum 
 brachetum ' at the king's coming into Derbyshire 
 (pp. 18, 22); ^ but in 1284-5 Nicholas de Segrave 
 holds it " pro uno berselet cum ligamine ".* His 
 father Gilbert held it " rendering yearly one ber- 
 selet in leash" {in ligamine),^ his father Stephen 
 having bought it of the heirs of Stephen de 
 Beauchamp to hold by the yearly service of a 
 'brachet'.* 
 
 Mr. Turner has similarly shown that, in the 
 case of the interesting Whitfield serjeanty, the 
 ' brachet ' which had to be trained by the holder 
 of this Northamptonshire manor " ad currendum 
 
 • Cal. of Inq. Hen. Ill, No. 34;- 
 
 ' It is a ' brachet ' also on p. 20, and in the Calendar ef Charter Rolls, 
 I, 81. 
 
 ' Feudal Aids, I, 248. I have shown that Mr. Pym Yeatman rendered 
 * berselet cum ligamine ' as * one bow with a string ', and * brachet ', on 
 p. 388 of his ' Feudal History of Derbyshire ', as an ' armlet '. 
 
 * Cal. of Inq. Henry III; No. 334, where, by a luckless shot, it becomes 
 Cothes in Prestwold, Leicestershire. 
 
 ' Close Rolls, 1 3 Hen. Ill, m. 20 ; and Staffs. Collect., Vol. V, part i, 
 p. 10. 
 
LIAM-HOUND SERJEANTIES 283 
 
 ad cervum et bissam et damum et damam, " ^ 
 becomes a ' berselet ' on the Hundred Rolls. It is 
 a ' brachet ' in an Inq. p. m? This serjeanty 
 appears to have been ended by arrentation in 1250. 
 
 If it were not that a ' berselet ' is well recognised 
 to have acted as liam-hound (i;iz. to track and 
 harbour the game), the phrase "ad currendum" 
 would suggest a " canis currens," hunting in the 
 pack. The same point arises in a curious little 
 serjeanty in Woodham Mortimer and Hazeleigh, 
 Essex. It was alleged in 1284-5 ^^^^ ^ certain 
 Hardekin held 1 1 5 acres in Woodham Mortimer 
 in capite by the serjeanty of bringing up a brachet 
 of the king, when the king sent it him, and keep- 
 ing it till it was able to run,^ which serjeanty had 
 been " dismembered " for forty years past. 
 
 This would take us back to Passelew's arrent- 
 ation in 1250. But we cannot trace this serjeanty 
 in the Tesia^ though there is an entry that Harde- 
 kin de Hailesl' holds Hailesl' (Hazeleigh), worth 
 twenty shillings, " sed nescimus quomodo." * 
 
 Bedfordshire had a ' brachet ' serjeanty at Farn- 
 dish, where the service was that the holder " debuit 
 custodire domino Regi unum brachetum ad sum- 
 monicionem Regis." The land was found to be 
 partly alienated in 1250, and, Ralf Basset exchan- 
 ging its tenure for that of the thirtieth of a knight's 
 fee, the serjeanty came to an end.^ 
 
 ' Testa, p. 28. It is also a 'brachet' on pp. 32, 33. 
 
 ' Cal. of Inq. Henry III, No. 915. 
 
 ' " nutriendum unum brachettum et custodiendum quousque 
 
 habilis fuerit ad currendnnj." Pleas at Chelmsford, 1 3 Edw. I, cited in 
 Morant's Essex. 
 
 * p. 67. The entry is of the early days of Henry III. 
 
 ' "sit quietus de servicio dicte serjantie " (Ibid., pp. 256, 257). 
 
284 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 The Honour of Lancaster presents, in the survey 
 of 1 2 1 2, two instances of lands held by the service 
 of finding a ' brachet '. One is that of Peter de 
 Mundeville, who held three bovates at ' Angortby', 
 in Lincolnshire " per servicium unius bracheti unius 
 colons: " ^ the other is that of William Fitz Wil- 
 liam, who held a carucate and a half in ' Ware- 
 bere ', Notts, " per j brachetum " and sundry 
 incongruous objects in addition/ One may close 
 this section with the tenure of Grafton, Northants, 
 in 1 284, by the service of keeping one white hound 
 {pdorinseci)? There was a similar serjeanty at 
 Waltham, co. Line, where land was found, 1325, 
 to be held " as parcel of a serjeanty of keeping 
 a white brachet." * 
 
 It is significant that in all these serjeanties a 
 single hound is mentioned, while in the case of 
 ordinary hounds {canes de moid) a pack {moid) seems 
 to have been kept. 
 
 'HARRIER' AND WOLF-HOUND 
 SERJEANTIES 
 
 Of the royal packs of hounds to which we are 
 npw coming, the two that can be traced furthest 
 back are those of the wolf-hounds and the ' harriers.' 
 I hope to show that they both existed in the latter 
 days of Henry I. But, while the latter were of 
 
 ^ Testa, pp. 407, 409 ; Lib. Rub., p. 571. 
 
 ' Testa, pp. 17, 409 ; Lib. Rub., p. 571. 
 
 ' Feudal Aids, IV, 12. The odorinsecus was a hound that hunted by- 
 scent, and the term is found as an equation of a 'brachet' in the 12th 
 century. 
 
 * Cal. oflnq. VI, No. 706. 
 
'HARRIER' AND WOLF-HOUND 285 
 
 long continuance, ^ the former must have ended 
 very early with the rapid hunting down of the 
 wolves. 
 
 Let us now take in conjunction two hunting ser- 
 jeanties. They are conveniently brought together 
 in the Testa de Nevill un^Qv Wiltshire (p. 143): — 
 
 Ricardus de Heyraz tenet dimidiam hidam terrae in 
 Alwarebir' pro heyrez domini Regis custodiendo. 
 
 Willelmus de Loverez tenet unam hidam terrae in 
 Cuvelesfeld pro loveriz domini Regis custodiendo. 
 
 In each case the serjeanty is that of keeping cer- 
 tain hounds for the king ; in each the holder of the 
 serjeanty takes his name from the hounds. ^ 
 
 We will first deal with ' Heyraz '. Among the 
 Wiltshire serjeanties in the ' Red Book ' we duly 
 find : — 
 
 Ricardus de Hairez per serjanteriam custodiendi canes 
 Regis (p. 461.) 
 
 But we do not find the relative entry in the 
 Wiltshire serjeanties (pp. 485-8), of the great 
 Inquest in 1 2 1 2. Why ? Because the entry there 
 appears as : 
 
 Radulfus de Baire ' j virgatam in Aldwardbiriae hun- 
 dredo per serjanteriam (p. 486). 
 
 Whether the name has been correctly read by 
 the editor (Mr. Hubert Hall) or not, he has failed 
 to detect the identity of the holding, and we conse- 
 quently find ' Baire ' and ' Hairez ' indexed separa- 
 
 ' Christopher ' Tanchard ' (one of the Yorkshire Tancreds) figures in 
 the national accounts, 1688-1691, as ' Master of the Harriers '. 
 
 ' So also Thomas ' Porcherez ' took his name from the boarhounds. 
 ' The italics are mine. 
 
286 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 tely, with no cross-reference, although, conversely 
 he insists, as we shall see, on combining in his index, 
 to the student's distraction, names which are wholly 
 distinct as ' variants ' of one and the same. 
 
 Returning to the Testa, in which the returns are 
 very full for Wiltshire, we find this serjeanty on 
 p. 149, ^ p. 147, ^ and pp. 146-7, where we have 
 duplicate entries of the ' arrentation ' of this ser- 
 jeanty by Robert Passelewe (in 1250). In the 
 fuller form it there stands : — 
 
 Serjantia Willelmi de Heyrez in Alwardebur' pro qua 
 debuit custodire in Curia dominl Regis canes haeriez 
 domini Regis ad custum Regis; 
 
 This ' arrentation ' brought the serjeanty to an 
 end, the service being commuted, in the usual 
 fashion, for that of the thirtieth of a knight's fee 
 and two shillings a year. ' In spite of this, how- 
 ever, we find an Inq. p. m. of 1257 on Richard 
 Heyraz (alias, de Herez, de Heyrez, de Heraz) 
 recording that he held one virgate in ' Alwarburi ' 
 " in chief by service of keeping a pack of harriers 
 at the king's cost... and his pack-horse and groom." * 
 
 Hitherto we have been dealing with the Wilt- 
 
 ' " Ricardus de Hanez (sic) per serj. custodiendi canes Regis " 
 ('Hairez' in a duplicate entry). 
 
 ' where the entry in preceding note recurs in the first column. 
 
 ' " dictus Willelmus fecit inde finem... per annum ly.... Et insuper 
 ipse Willelmus faciat servicium tricesiine partis feodi unius militis et 
 solvet residuum dicti finis ut sit quietus de dicta serjantia " (p. 146). 
 
 * Cal. of Inq. Hen. Ill, No 374. One cannot go into minute detail, 
 but I suspect, on comparing this inquest with No. 436, on Richard or 
 Ralf de Hayres or Hayraz, that there is some confusion. If the former 
 is indeed all one, then its earlier portion must relate to a holding in 
 Clarendon forest ; and, indeed, the writ is directed to the bailiff of 
 Clarendon as well as to the sheriff of Wilts. 
 
'HARRIER' AND WOLF-HOUND 287 
 
 shire portion of the serjeanty; but, on crossing the 
 Berkshire border, we promptly come to what may 
 have been another portion, at Bockhampton in Lam- 
 bourne. In the Red Book serjeanties for Berkshire 
 we read (p. 451) : " Willelmus Bachamtone tenet 
 per serjanteriam Heiriz, " and " Willelmus de 
 Bokhamtone, xx solidatas terrs per serjanteriam 
 custodiendi haerez " (p. 513). On turning to the 
 Testa, we find the entry, in the return which I 
 assign to 1212, — 
 
 Willelmus de Bochampton et Hubertus Hoppesort 
 tenuerunt xl solidatas terrae per serjantiam custodiendi 
 
 Heyret sed pars quae fuit Huberti Hoppesort qst in 
 
 manu domini Regis post mortem Huberti Hoppesort 
 (p. 128) 
 
 On the previous page the entry runs, — 
 
 Raerus {sic) de Bachampton et Radulfus Hoppeshort 
 tenent tres hidas terrae in Bachampton de domino Rege 
 per serjantiam custodiendi canes hayrar' (p. 127). 
 
 The ' three hides ' should be noted. This entry 
 is followed by four others referring to alienations 
 by Humfrey " avus ipsius Raeri, " On p. 125 
 there is another entry, but it is of no consequence. 
 
 Now here we can identify the serjeanty without 
 question on the roll of 1130. For, under Berk- 
 shire, we there read (p. 126) that Walter de 
 Hairez was excused payment of six shillings Dane- 
 geld, and six shillings represent exactly three hides. 
 With this clue we press back to trace the holding 
 in Domesday. In that record we find ' Edward ', 
 holding of the King at ' Bochentone ' land assessed 
 "pro iij hidis, modo pro dimidia hida" (63 b). 
 
288 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 Here then we learn something more. The high 
 Prae-Domesday assessment, which Domesday shows 
 us as reduced, had been restored to its original 
 figures when the roll of 1 130 was compiled. I 
 drew attention, long ago, to other evidence that 
 this was so.^ And even this is not all. It was an 
 ' Edward' also who held of the king at Alderbury 
 (' Alwarberie ') that virgate which we have seen, 
 in later days, held by ' Haeriz ' serjeanty, as it was 
 an ' Edward ' who similarly held the land at Bock- 
 hampton (' Bockentone ') held afterwards by this 
 ' Haeriz ' serjeanty. The whole thing fits together 
 like a 'jigsaw' puzzle. 
 
 But we must not forget our master document, 
 the Constitutio domus regis. In the midst of its 
 hunting section we find this passage : — 
 
 Venatores del Harrede, unusquisque iij^. in die ; et 
 magni Harrede, iiij debent habere j d. et de parvis Harede, 
 vij (debent habere) j d. Ad magnos Harrede, ij homines, 
 et unusquisque )d. in die. ^ 
 
 It is significant that in the Uber Niger version 
 ' Harrede ' thrice appears as ' Haired ', and once 
 only as ' Hared '. ^ The reader will doubtless per- 
 ceive that we are here dealing with ' Hairez ' (as 
 they were styled above), with hounds, of which four 
 large ones cost a penny a day to keep, and seven 
 small ones the same. And this record is all but 
 contemporary with the tenure by Walter de ' Hairez' 
 of the Bockhampton serjeanty. 
 
 The entry cited by Blount, as from the Oxford- 
 
 ^ Domesday Studies, yp- 1I4-S- 
 'Lib. Rub., p. 813. 
 ' Ibid. 
 
' HARRIER ' AND WOLF-HOUND 289 
 
 shire plea-rolls of 1 3 Edw. I, illustrates this serjeanty 
 at a rather later date. John de Baa there holds 
 two hides at ' Bokhampton ' " per serjanciam cus- 
 todiendi unam meutam caniculorum haerettorum 
 ad custum domini regis. " That the pack was 
 kept at the king's cost is a statement confirmed by 
 the Hundred Rolls at a slightly earlier date. We 
 there read (I, 11) that the land is held in capite of 
 the King " per serjanciam, scilicet, pro custodiendo 
 viginti et quatuor canes haerett ' domini regis, " for 
 the keep of which the king paid sixteenpence a day. 
 In the fifteenth century, and even the fourteenth, 
 the mastership of these hounds, as of other royal 
 packs, was no longer a serjeanty, but an office filled 
 by appointment. In 1388, as the keepership of 
 the ' heriers ', it was granted for life to the king's 
 esquire, Adam Ramesey, as it had been held by 
 John Tichemessh and his predecessors, Adam, 
 however, releasing to the king 71 d. a day payable 
 to him when staying in the household. ^ It was 
 again granted for life, 17 July 1461, to John 
 Wroth, esquire, as that of master of the King's 
 hounds called ' hereres ', his pay and that of his 
 assistants being charged on the revenues of certain 
 counties. Richard Strickland, esquire, had been his 
 predecessor. It should be observed that the Bock- 
 hampton pack had consisted of twelve couples (the 
 old unit), but John Wroth had a mixed pack, his 
 eighteen couples being supplemented by nine grey- 
 hounds, and his three berners, accordingly, by two 
 yeomen ' veauterers '. ^ 
 
 ' Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1 385-1 389, p. 526. 
 ' Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1461-7, p. 22. 
 
 19 
 
290 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 Although these hounds are always styled ' har- 
 riers ', it is by no means etymologically certain that 
 their name is derived from ' hare '. The preval- 
 ence, in early sport, of French terms would rather 
 lead one to doubt it. Mr. W- H. Stevenson is 
 inclined, he tells me, to derive the word from a 
 Norman dialectical form for ' hare ' given by Moisy. 
 In any case it seems improbable to me that the 
 ' Haired ' or ' Harrede ' of the Constitutio — the 
 ' Hairez ' of the Pipe Roll of 1 1 30 ^ — can be derived 
 from an English word. The official editor of the 
 Red Book renders ' Harrede ' as ' the Hart ' (p.ccxciii) , 
 and must, therefore, believe that, of these ' harts ', 
 four large ones, or six (or seven) small ones, were 
 entitled to a penny a day (p. 813). 
 
 Let us turn from the ' Hairez ' to the ' Loverez '. 
 In the preface to ' The Red Book of the Exchequer ' 
 the editor explains his index system, for personal 
 names, as follows : — 
 
 Personal names have been grouped together wherever 
 there was a reasonable prospect of identification, and the 
 numerous variants (sic) have been indicated by means of 
 cross references. The result, though far from complete 
 or satisfactory, is highly instructive, and not a little 
 diverting. A glance at the twenty variants {sic) of such 
 a name as De Chaorciis will show the outward dissimilar- 
 ity of even the best marked forms. It is far different in 
 the case of a confused personality, the name, for instance, 
 of Lovel, which, with its variants {sic) of Le Lutre, 
 Lutrel, Luterel, Lupellus, LupuUus, Loverez, Luverez, 
 Veres, Luvel, Luel, suggests a combination of two bran- 
 ches of venery in one famous serjeantry. ^ 
 
 ' See p. 287. 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., pp. ccclxxvii-viii. 
 
' HARRIER ' AND WOLF-HOUND 29 1 
 
 Now 'De Chaorciis', in its various forms, is the 
 Latinisation of ' De Chaources ', a name derived 
 from Chaources, the present Sourches (Sarthe),not 
 far from Le Mans. ^ Mr Hall's index gives us no 
 fewer than twenty-two ' variants ' of the name, 
 among which one is startled to find ' Jorz '. This 
 is the perfectly distinct name of a family connected 
 with a Leicestershire serjeanty, holding, as they 
 did, by usher service, at Wymeswold and Hough- 
 ton. ^ They probably derived their name from 
 Jort (Calvados), for Robert ' de Jorz ', who appears 
 in the returns of 1 166 * as a holder on the Blyth 
 fief, is entered, as a Tickhill knight, on the Pipe 
 Roll of 1162 as Robert ' de Jort '. If ' Jorz ' is, 
 as Mr. Hall imagines, a ' variant ' of ' Chaorciis, ' 
 the cross-reference under ' Jorz ' should be to 
 ' Chaorciis. ' To our amazement, however, we 
 find that it is to ' Guiz ' ! Here then is another and 
 a different name of which ' Jorz ' is made a variant. 
 Needless to say, the family of Gouiz or Guiz had 
 nothing to do with that of Jorz, but had a substan- 
 tial holding (five fees) of the Honour of Gloucester, 
 far away in the South-west. 
 
 But let us complete the alleged variants of the 
 name ' De Chaorciis '. We find that nearly half 
 of them seem to be varying forms of the well- 
 known name, Cauz, Chauz, Chaus, etc., which is 
 
 ' See Cauvin's ' Historical Geography of Maine ' and Le Chateau de 
 Sourches etses seigneurs, by A. Ledru (1887). 
 
 ' Testa, pp. 88, 93. Members of the family also held by knight- 
 service on the Eincourt fief and of the Honour of Blyth (Tickhill). The 
 early Winchester surveys show us Anchetil de Jorz holding houses in that 
 city under Henry I and Stephen. 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 373. He is indexed by Mr. Hall under Guiz ! 
 
292 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 duly dealt with, under Cauz, in Dugdale's Baronage 
 (I, 679). The family of this name held a consi- 
 derable barony, ^ the return for which is duly 
 found, under Nottinghamshire, in this very work,.* 
 Dugdale, of course, knew better than to confuse 
 this house with that which he dealt with under its 
 Anglicised name, ' Chaworth '. To treat these 
 two names as identical, and to throw in also that 
 of ' Jorz ', is a good example of that absolutely 
 wanton and uncalled-for confusion, the introduction 
 of which is one of the chief reasons why I call on 
 the authorities to cancel this misleading work. 
 
 As for the great house of Chaworth [De Chaorcm) , 
 its wide estates, acquired through heiresses, even- 
 tually passed, with its own heiress, to the royal line 
 of Lancaster. But froiti cadets, apparently, there 
 sprang the Viscounts Chaworth and Byron's Mary 
 Chaworth, — 
 
 The solitary scion left 
 Of a time-honour'd race. 
 
 But the point that I would here make is that the 
 lords of Chaources (Sourches) were lords also of 
 Mondoubleau (' Mundublel ') ^ of which the ruined 
 donjon, rent asunder as if by some upheaval of the 
 earth, is passed by the traveller of to-day on his way 
 from Chartres to Saumur. The names of either 
 lordship were consequently borne by the house, as 
 we see in this very work. * This, therefore, is 
 
 * It owed the service of fifteen knights. 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 343. 
 
 ^ It lies in the Department of Loir et Cher, N. W. of Vend6me and 
 E. of Le Mans. 
 
 * " Dedit Paganus de Mundublel Hugoni de Chaurcis fratri sue... 
 Patricius de Chaurcis avus Pagani de Mundublel " {Lib. Rub., pp. 297-8). 
 
' HARRIER • AND WOLF-HOUND 293 
 
 essentially a case in which cross-references should 
 be given under ' Chaorciis ' and ' Monte Dublel '. 
 But, as these would be right and helpful, we here 
 look for them in vain. Instead of them, the editor 
 gives us those tissues of wanton confusion which 
 he is pleased to term " laborious attempts at con- 
 centration " (p. ccclxxviii). 
 
 Their result — though hardly in the sense he 
 meant — is indeed " highly instructive, and not a 
 little diverting. " 
 
 Let us pass to the second serjeanty of those in 
 the above entries. What has Mr. Hall to tell us 
 about this "famous serjeantry" (p. 290)? What it 
 was, or why it was ^' famous ", he does not inform 
 his readers. But he does combine, we have seen, 
 as " variants " of the name ' Lovel ' — ' Le Lutre, 
 Lutrel, Luterel, Lupellus, LupuUus, Loverez, 
 Luverez, Veres, Luvel, Luel. ' Surely, even 
 Mr. Hall must know that Loutre is French for 
 otter, that ' Le Lutre ' is the personal nickname 
 ' Otter ', and that ' Lutrel ' and ' Luterel ' are the 
 diminutives thereof. ^ Surely also he must be 
 aware that Lovel {Lupellus) is a personal nickname, 
 meaning merely '^ the little wolf, and that with 
 serjeanty or with each other neither of these names 
 had anything in the world to do. ^ 
 
 If one has to write vigorously of this wanton 
 confusion, it is because of the intolerable trouble 
 
 ' Sir John Luttrell of Dunster (d. 1430) bore upon his signet the 
 device of an otter, with ' Trell ' above it {Dunster and its Lords, 1882, 
 p. 109). 
 
 ' Loup (' lou '), with its diminutives, Louvet and Louvel (or Louveau), 
 all gave rise to personal names (see Godefroi), and the families of Low 
 and Lovet, in mediseval England, bore wolves upon their shields. 
 
294 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 caused thereby to the student. When, for instance, 
 the object of our search is the name ' de Loverez ', 
 we have to hunt through more than thirty entries 
 grouped under Lovel (p. 1235) to discover that 
 only two of them relate to the name we want. 
 These are : — 
 
 (i) Galfridus de Loverez, j hidam, per serjanteriam 
 venarias (Wilts). ^ 
 
 (2) Willelmus de Veres (Wilts). * 
 
 As the latter held by knight-service, this reduces 
 the serjeanty entries, under Loverez, here to one ! 
 We will first dispose of William, the tenant by 
 knight-service. He is found in the above entry 
 holding of Walter Waleram's fief. Now if we 
 search the Testa under Hampshire, we find this 
 entry : — 
 
 Willelmus de Loverays tenet unam hidam in West- 
 uderlig per quartam partem feodi unius militis de veteri 
 feoff' de Aubr' de Boteraus, et ipsa de Domino Rege in 
 Capite (p. 234). 
 
 This represents the holding, in 1166, of William 
 de ' Veres ', and proves that form to be an error 
 and the ' Luverez ' of the Black Book right. Then, 
 turning to Domesday Book, we duly find under 
 ' Tiderlei ' (West Tytherley) this same hide held 
 of ' Waleran ' the huntsman by Roger. ' 
 
 The ground is thus clear for tracing the ' Loverez ' 
 serjeanty. But we soon discover that there were 
 two. For, in addition to the above entry as to 
 Geoffrey's tenure, we read also under Wilts, 
 
 • Lib. Rub., p. 485. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 242. In the Liber Niger the name is ' Luverez '. 
 
 ^ Walter de Luveraz was its under-tenant in 56 Hen. Ill (flal. oflnq.) 
 
' HARRIER ' AND WOLF-HOUND 295 
 
 Willelmus Michael, terram in Middeltone per serjan- 
 teriam de loverez, et recipit per diem iij d. ob. ^ 
 
 These entries both come from the 1 2 1 2 returns ; 
 and we find the correlatives of both in the later 
 Testa return on p. 143. The entry there relating 
 to the ' Cuvelesfeld ' serjeanty has been already 
 cited : that of William Michael is represented in 
 the Testa by this : — 
 
 Ricardus Michel tenet unum cotsetil in Midelton pro 
 duobus canibus loverez custodiend' ad custum Domini 
 Regis. 
 
 Here, at last, we are on sure ground ; the ' loverez ' 
 were hounds. 
 
 But what kind of hounds ? In vain we seek 
 assistance from Godefroi or Ducange ; the word, 
 apparently, is not known. Again we turn to our 
 record. In the Testa we find the Middleton ser- 
 jeanty entered further on as that of keeping 
 " lepores " (p. 148), " duos canes luverettos " 
 (pp. 147, 149), "canes luporarios " (p. 147b). 
 It is clear that we must walk warily. The prev- 
 alence, however, of French origin in early hunting 
 terms leads one to guess that ' loverez ' or ' luverez ' 
 were wolf-hounds, as ' leverers ' (or ' levrers') were 
 hare-hounds. And then we find evidence that this 
 conjecture is correct. For Blount has copied for 
 us this record of the days of Henry III : — 
 
 Willielmus de Limeres («c) tenuit de Rege in com. 
 Southampton {sic) i car. terr. in Comelessend {sic) per 
 servic. fugandi ad lupum cum canibus regis. 
 
 Allowing for his usual misreadings, it is clear that 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., p. 487. 
 
296 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 William de Lw-ueres ^ held this carucate by the 
 service of acting as master of the wolf-hounds. 
 Finally, we get from another source absolutely 
 definite evidence on William de Loverez and his 
 serjeanty. We learn from ' Bracton's Note-Book * 
 that in 1225 William de ' Leueriz' was impleaded 
 for the hide in ' Cuneleffeldia ' ^ and claimed that 
 he held it of the King " by the service of catching 
 [capiendt) wolves in the King's forest, of which ser- 
 vice the King is in seisin, as is testified by Hugh 
 de Neville, the chief forester." ' This, it will be 
 seen, is akin to the ' Pytchley and Laxton ' service. 
 That, as early as the reign of Henry I, the king 
 did possess a special pack of hounds for hunting 
 the wolf is clear from the Constkutio domus regis : — * 
 
 Luparii xx d. in die ad equos et ad homines et canes ; 
 et debent habere xxiiij canes currentes et viij leporarios, 
 etc. etc. 
 
 But although this implies the existence of a 
 special pack, it does not necessarily involve that of 
 a special 6reed. Indeed the pack, it will be seen, 
 appears to have been one of the normal mixed 
 character. Even in very recent times we find an 
 instance in point, for the late Duke of Beaufort 
 attempted wolf-hunting in Poitou with hounds 
 from the famous Badminton pack. 
 
 The other serjeanty, that at Middleton (Wilts), 
 does not call for special investigation. Its chief 
 value consists of the forms it supplies for the names 
 
 ' TJie number of minims is the same. 
 ' This is yet another erroneous form. 
 ' 0/1. cit., p. 1670. 
 ''Lib. Rub., p. 813. 
 
3 
 
 ' HARRIER ' AND WOLF-HOUND 297 
 
 of these wolf-hounds, ^ and for the proof it affords 
 that they actually were wolf-hounds^ {canes luparit). 
 
 I have kept to the last, because it appears to be 
 unconnected with either of these two serjeanties, the 
 evidence which establishes beyond question the fact 
 that ' luverez ' were wolf-hounds. On the Rotulus 
 Misce of 1 1 John we find a payment at Gillingham 
 (Dorset) " Odoni et Ricardo duobus Luverez ad se 
 et canes suos" (p. 118), and another at Christmas, at 
 Odiham, " Ricardo Luverez et Odoni valtrariis 
 pro duobus lupis captis apud Clarendone " (p. 144). 
 These wolves were evidently caught as infesting the 
 king's forests in Dorset and Wilts. 
 
 It is clear that Gillingham Forest (see p. 42 above) 
 was infested with wolves, for the 1212 survey 
 shows us a small wolf-hound serjeanty as instituted 
 by Henry I. * 
 
 In the summer of 121 2 Stephen of Guildford 
 received 5 sh. reward for capturing, with his master's 
 hound, a wolf at Freemantle, John's hunting seat 
 in North Hants,* and the same roll records the 
 payment of i o sh. to Norman valtrarius and Wilekin 
 
 ' i.e. ' loverez ', ' luverettos ', * luverlcios ', etc. This last form 
 resembles closely the form ' lutericios * for ottter hounds (from 'lutre'). 
 
 * See the document of 1320 cited by Blount's editors from Harl. MS. 
 34, p. 80, being the relief of William Michell for his holding " in Midd- 
 leton Lillebon ten't de Regi in capite per serjantiam custodiendi canes 
 luparios Regis. " But cf. Cal. oflnq. VI, No. 212. 
 
 ' I look upon the term ' valtrarii ' as implying the use of large hounds 
 of the greyhound (leporaritu) kind. 
 
 * " Willelmus de Hanton tenet dim ' virgatam terre de dono Henrici 
 regis primi per servicium serjantie de Luverez. Et idem Willelmus tenet 
 quartem partem unius virg' terre de dono predicti Regis que solebat 
 reddere manerio de Gillingham ij /. per annum per servicium predicte 
 serjantie de Luverez" (jTesta, p. 164). 
 
 ' Rot. Mssa, 1 4, John, p. 233. 
 
298 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 Doggett for capturing two wolves in the Here- 
 fordshire forest of Trivel. ^ 
 
 THE 'OTERHUNTE'. 
 
 Otter-hunting, I propose to show, is a sport of 
 great antiquity ; it can even be carried back to the 
 days of Henry II. As with other packs of hounds, 
 the master of the king's otter-hounds appears to 
 have originally held by serjeanty, but eventually 
 became an appointed officer. 
 
 The otter, of course, was the vermin of the 
 water, the poacher of the streams and ponds. But 
 for hunting him there was more reason then than 
 now : it was, in fact, a necessity. The large num- 
 ber of days of abstinence, combined with the impos- 
 sibility of obtaining sea- water fish inland, involved 
 a large consumption of freshwater, that is, coarse 
 fish, which were kept extensively in fishstews con- 
 structed for the purpose.'' Pike were presented to 
 a man for stocking his ponds, as bucks would be 
 given him for his park. The coarse fish, however, 
 on which King John relied would seem to have 
 been mainly bream. ' From Marlborough, for 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 246. 
 
 ' This is well seen in an entry of 13 Nov. 1232, on the Patent Rolls, 
 giving " protection for Simon Lutrarius (j.e. the otter-hunter), retained 
 in the king's service to keep his stews throughout his manors and to take 
 otters destroying the said stews " {Cal. of Pat. Rolls, p. 2). 
 
 ' Pike and bream appear to have been reckoned the pick of the 
 coarse fish, for the Inq. p. m. on Ralph Wymer in 1273 shows that he 
 was keeper of the king's fishstew outside the east gate of Stafford on the 
 terms that " when the king shall be pleased to fish there, the king shall 
 have aU the pike and bream (lufos aquatkos et breymas), and Ralph all the 
 other fish, with the eels. This keepership was numbered among the 
 Staffordshire serjeanties, and was held earlier in the century by Walter 
 Wymer {Testa, pp. 52, 54). 
 
THE ' OTERHUNTE ' 299 
 
 instance, the sheriff of Gloucester was directed to 
 provide two of the king's servants with bream 
 {breimes) from Tewkesbury/ and ^7... 7.. 5 was 
 allowed to him for the carriage of " our bream " 
 from " our fishstew " at Hanley to Marlborough.^ 
 But it was not only as a beast of prey that the otter 
 was hunted ; his pelt also had a certain value.' 
 
 It is not surprising, therefore, to find that at 
 least as early as the year 1 1 79 Henry II had an 
 otter-hunter, Roger Follus, to whom, as " lutrario 
 suo, " he granted a messuage and three virgates in 
 Aylesbury — 
 
 by the service of finding straw (literiam) for the king's 
 bed, and straw (stramen) or grass for decking his chamber 
 (hospicium) * thrice a year, straw if he should come in 
 winter, and grass if in summer, and of rendering two grey 
 geese (gantas) in the latter case, and three eels in the 
 former, that is to say, six geese or nine eels a year, if he 
 came thrice a year, by which service the said Roger and 
 his heirs are to hold the land and the office of otter-hunter 
 (lutracionem). ^ 
 
 I date this charter in 1179 because of the relative 
 entry on the Pipe Roll of 25 Hen. II (p. 73) — 
 
 Et Rogero Folio Lutrario xvjs. in Ailisberia in terra 
 que fuit Ernisii prepositi per cartam regis. 
 
 The text is preserved in an ' Inspeximus' of 1378, 
 
 ' Writ of 31 March 1204 {Rot. de Lib. 5 John). 
 
 ' A writ of 16 March 1204 orders the sheriiFto find carriage for 80 
 bream to Marlborough i^ot. de Lib.). 
 
 ' In Ireland the Prior of Kilmainham gave a " pellem Int', " to have 
 letters patent, in 1206 {Rot. de Fin.). In England Master Michael the 
 Clerk gave in 1204 five marcs and six " pelles de lutre " to obtain the 
 land he was entitled to in the city of London {Rot. de Obi. 6 John, p. 198). 
 
 ' I should prefer to render kospicium as " house". Cf. pp. 109-1 10. 
 
 ' Cal. Pat. Rolls, 1377-1381, p. 176. 
 
300 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 which also confirms letters patent of John " declar- 
 ing that Ralph and Geoffrey are the king's otter- 
 hunters (lutrarii)^ and are to be permitted to 
 exercise their office where they can and where 
 they will, without let or hindrance in respect either 
 of their nets or lances." ^ It is interesting to meet 
 with a gift of ten shillings to Ralf " Lutrarius " 
 and his cousin on the Rotulus Misa of 1 1 John 
 (1209), and to find it repeated on the same roll 
 (pp. 122, 160) at Scarborough the next year, 
 when the otter-hunters were going to the sheriff's 
 at Nottingham. 
 
 The same ' Inspeximus ' gives us the royal char- 
 ter of 1 2 June 1235 confirming the transfer, by a 
 charter of the same date, from Ralf the otter- 
 hunter of Aylesbury to Robert son of David of all 
 this holding, rendering the service prescribed in the 
 charter of Henry 11." Although it is not found 
 among the lists of serjeanties, this holding must be 
 classed among them, for the Bucks plea of 14 
 Edw. I (1285-6) cited by Blount enters William 
 son of William of Aylesbury as holding it " per 
 serjantiam," the service being precisely that which 
 the charter of Henry II prescribed.' And this is 
 confirmed by an official record among the Memo- 
 randa of 18 Edward I, cited on the Fine Roll of 
 7 Henry VII,* which shews that William son of 
 William held it as heir of Master Richard of 
 Aylesbury. 
 
 ' Ibid. 
 
 ' Cal. of Charter Rolls, I, 204. 
 
 ' This service is also found in the Inq. p. m. (1278) on the elder 
 William, who was son of the Robert of 1235. 
 * Madox, Baronia Anglica, p. 247. 
 
THE ' OTERHUNTE ' 301 
 
 So late as the reign of Henry VII this ' manor,' 
 then called ' Otterarsfee ', was held by exactly the 
 same service as in the days of Henry II. ^ But long 
 before this the mastership of the king's otter- 
 hounds had become dissociated from it. So early 
 as 1290 we have a payment to John 'le Oterhunte' 
 for the keep (puturd) of his eight otter-hounds 
 {canum lutericiorum) ,^ and further light is thrown 
 on the history of the pack by an interesting paper 
 on " The Milbournes of Essex and the King's otter 
 hounds" (i 385-1439).' From it we learn that 
 members of this Dorset family kept the pack 
 throughout that period, its expenses being charged 
 on the issues of Essex and Herts, as were those of 
 the buckhounds on the Counties of Sussex and 
 Surrey. The fees of the master and his deputy 
 were merely those of the hunt servants of the 
 buckhounds, two pence and three halfpence a day, 
 so that they probably represent the two lutrarii of 
 John's day, their low wages pointing to a time at 
 least as early as that. For the hounds, however, 
 there was allowed three farthings a day each, 
 instead of a halfpenny as for the buckhounds. Of 
 these hounds there were at first eight (as under 
 Edward I), but a ninth was added in 141 8. The 
 total cost of the pack varied from ^^15.. 11.. o to 
 
 Edward IV granted for life to Thomas Harde- 
 
 ' See it set forth in the Inq. p. m.. on Richard Baldewyn, its holder, in 
 I Hen. VII, and in the record of his brother John's line for his relief as 
 printed by Madox as above. 
 
 ' Wardrobe account cited by Mr. Turner {Select Pleas of the Forest, 
 p. 14s). 
 
 ' Essex Arch. Trans. (N. S.), V, 87-94. 
 
302 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 grove 1 8 July, 1461, the office called 'Oterhunt ', 
 with all the same allowances, " from the issues of 
 the counties of Essex and Hertford, as allowed in 
 the great roll of 48 Edward III," but the pack 
 was now reckoned as two greyhounds and ten 
 ordinary hounds {canes currentes) . ^ Under Eliza- 
 beth the whole allowance was j^ 13.. 6.. 8 (/. e. 
 20 marcs) for the master.^ 
 
 To come to much later times, we find " Symon 
 Smith, otter-hunter " — successor to the " Rogerus 
 lutrarius " we met with under Henry II — figuring 
 in the national accounts under William III (1688- 
 1691) between the Poet Laureate and the Master 
 of the Harriers.' In addition to his proper pay, 
 j^yc. 2.. II, he secured in addition as Harbinger, 
 X524.. 9.. 1 1 
 
 Of a private pack of otter-hounds the earliest 
 mention I have noted is in 1227, when the king 
 confirmed a charter of Geoffrey, bishop of Ely, 
 confirming one of his predecessor John (d. 1225) 
 granting to John de Awelton that he " may have 
 his otter hounds {canes lutrarios) and other dogs 
 free, and that they be not expeditated {espeautez)." * 
 This was at March in the fen country. But otter- 
 hunting is included in mixed sport as early as 
 1200, when William Fitz Walkelin of Stainsby, 
 Derbyshire, gave the king ^^40 for permission to 
 have his hounds for hunting the hare, the fox, 
 the (wild) cat {murilegum) and the otter in Der- 
 
 ' Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1461-14.67, p. 127. 
 
 * Household Ordinances (Soc. of Antiquaries). 
 
 ' House of Lords MSS. 1 690- 1 691 (13th Report Hist. MSS., App. 
 V), pp. 373-4- 
 
 * Cal. of Charter Rolls, I, 55. 
 
THE MARSHAL OF THE HAWKS 303 
 
 byshire and Notts, and for confirmation of Stainsby.^ 
 It may seem improbable to us that the same 
 pack of hounds should be used for all these pur- 
 poses, but in 1315 the king's pack of haericii 
 hounds (with their accompanying greyhounds and 
 bercelets, five in number) " were sent to take foxes, 
 cats, and badgers " in Northamptonshire forests, 
 though their normal prey was deer ! Even in the 
 days of Queen Elizabeth, although Turbeville 
 sometimes speaks of otter-hounds as ' bloodhounds ', 
 the breeds appear to have been so imperfectly 
 differentiated that we find him writing: — 
 
 for if the Houndesbe good Otter hounds and perfectly 
 entred, they will come chaunting and trayling alongst 
 by the rivers side, and will beate every tree roote, every 
 holme, every osier bedde, and tufft of bvdrushes ; yea 
 sometimes also they will take the ryver and beate it like 
 
 a water spaniell and thus may you have excellente 
 
 sport and pastime in hunting of the Otter, if the houndes 
 
 be good, and that the rivers be not over great A 
 
 good Otter hounde may prove an excellent good buck- 
 hound, if he be not too old before he be entred (pp. 202-3). 
 
 THE MARSHAL OF THE HAWKS 
 
 This was an important serjeanty in more ways 
 than one. Its lands comprised three manors ; its 
 ' service ' was a very real one and placed it in a 
 prominent position ; and it gave rise in later times 
 to a coronation claim. 
 
 In the reign of John, Aubree de Jarpenville is 
 returned as holding lands in Buckinghamshire and 
 
 ' Rot. de obi. etfin., p. 57. 
 
304 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 in Kent by a service which is variously described. ' 
 As yet we only gather that it had to do with 
 falcons or with goshawks. Shortly before these 
 returns, that is in 1 2 1 1 , we find her owing to the 
 king two palfreys that Ralf her grandson {nepos) 
 and John Fitz Bernard may discharge for her the 
 serjeanty of goshawk service.* But we have to 
 turn to an earlier document for further light on 
 her identity and on the family relationship. This 
 is a charter of 18 March 1204 (5 John), printed 
 in Lipscomb's ' Buckinghamshire' from Cart. Ant^ 
 I, 30. It is a grant of the marshalship of the 
 hawks {avium). 
 
 Sciatis quod ad petition em et assensum Albride de 
 Rumenel, que fuit uxor Willelmi dejarpunvill', qui cum 
 eadem Albrida ejus hereditatem et marescalciam avium 
 
 nostrarum, dedimus et concessimus Thome filio 
 
 Bdrnardi, qui habet filiam et heredem predicti Willelmi et 
 predicte Albride in uxorem, marescalciam avium nostra- 
 rum, quam predictus Willelmus habuit tenendam. et 
 
 habendam sibi et heredibus suis ex se et filia predictarum 
 Willelmi et Albride descendentibus imperpetuum. 
 
 This is the grant of an office in gross, not of land 
 to be held by serjeanty, and the strict limitation is 
 
 ' In Kent she holds " per servicium quod sit mariscallus de falconibus 
 domini Regis.... debet servire Regi de ostriceria sua " (Testa, Tpp, 216, 
 z 17, 219 ; Cf. Lib. Rub., p. 468). In Bucks she holds " per serjanteriam 
 marskalsie avium Regis " {Lib. Rub., p. 557). 
 
 ' " Albreda de Jarpunvill debet ij. palefridos ut Radulfus nepos ejus 
 et Johannes iilius Bernardi possint supplere vices ejus hoc anno de ser- 
 janteria Austurcariae quam Regi debet " {Pipe Roll, 13 John, Kent). As 
 a matter of fact, John Fitz Bernard is duly found acting for her on the 
 Prestita Roll of 12 John and receiving the ' Prestitum factum austur- 
 cariis ' at Marlborough, York, etc., through the winter (p. 252). And 
 on the Misce Roll of 14 John we find mention of letters sent to John 
 Fitz Bernard and little Ralf {Rauelinum) Fitz Bernard at Aylesbury 
 (Cole's Documents, p. 245). 
 
THE MARSHAL OF THE HAWKS 305 
 
 a recognition that the right was in the wife's 
 blobd. ^ In spite of this, however, the office is 
 subsequently entered, as we have seen, in records 
 as a serjeanty connected with land. 
 
 Aubree, we shall find, was, in John's days, already 
 an elderly widow, by no means fitted to take charge 
 of the King's falconers, and still less to cross the 
 sea for the purpose. The lands she held by this 
 service were Ilmer and Aston (MuUins) in Bucks 
 and ' Essetone,' ^ on which I shall have much to 
 say, in Kent. When they had descended to her 
 grandson Ralf — that is, Ralf Fitz Bernard — the 
 service is again recorded,' The alienations from 
 it were ' arrented' in 1250. 
 
 The service, however, continued. Ralf Fitz 
 Bernard had died in 1238, and in 1251 it was 
 "John Fitz Bernard, king's yeoman, marshal in 
 fee of the king's goshawks " who was sent " to buy 
 and take such birds at the king's market through- 
 out England," with special recommendation to the 
 wardens of the fairs of Boston, King's Lynn, and 
 Derby, " where goshawks and sparrowhawks are 
 for sale."* He was despatched oh similar quests 
 in 1253, 1256, and 1258.* He died in the 
 following year, and the jurors found that he held 
 the Buckinghamshire lands by serjeanty. * 
 
 ' See p. 42. 
 
 ' The name is thus given in the Testa and the Lib. Rub. 
 
 ' " pro qua debuit esse marescallus Aiisturcorum et avium domini 
 Regis" {Testa, pp. 255, 257). 
 
 * Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1247-1258, p. 86. Here we have again, in the 
 mention of Boston and Lynn (to which Yarmouth is added in one entry) 
 a hint of the trade with Norway in these birds. 
 
 ' Gal. of Pat. Rolls, pp. 175, 415, 534- 
 
 ' Cal. ofln^.p. m. I, No. 468. 
 
 20 
 
3o6 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 Let us see if we can trace the history of this 
 serjeanty, the lands belonging to which are in two 
 such distant counties as Buckinghamshire and 
 Kent. From a lawsuit of 1220 relating to Aston ^ 
 (MuUins), which is somewhat obscurely reported 
 in ' Bracton's Note-Book,' * we learn that Aubree, 
 whom Alice de Jarpenville vouched to warranty, 
 had claimed Aston as her rightful inheritance in 
 the days of Henry II, and, in conjunction with her 
 husband, William de Jarpenville, had impleaded 
 William de Lisurs and his mother, then in posses- 
 sion, for that land, continuing the suit for six years 
 till it was ended by a fine {cyrographum) in the 
 King's court, in his 28th year (11 8 1-2).' 
 
 The Pipe Rolls prove that at that date William 
 de Jarpenville was actively performing the duties 
 of this serjeanty. That of 1 1 80 shows us ^6. 1 5. 3 
 spent on the passage across from Dover of king's 
 goshawk-men (austurcarit) and falconers " per 
 Willelmum de Gerponvilla " (p. 148). That of 
 n8i records ^^43. 17. 5 as spent on the goshawk- 
 men and falconers who crossed with William de 
 ' Gerpunville ' and 31^-^. on 'hutches' for their 
 birds (p. 1 60) . On that of r 1 8 2 is the payment 
 of j^4 to him for the five goshawk-men who 
 crossed (the channel) to the King (p. 115). So 
 also there is a charge on that of 1 1 8 5 for the 
 passage, at Dover, of William and the King's 
 ' birds ' {aves) . It is evident that he had charge 
 of this department. 
 
 * It is wrongly identified as Easton, Berks, in the Index. 
 
 ' Ed. Maitland, Case 302. 
 
 ' The land was quitclaimed to them, by this fine, for ^^107 etc. 
 
THE MARSHAL OF THE HAWKS 307 
 
 But we have not yet traced the history further 
 back than 1 1 80. Can we discover a connexion 
 between the Kent and Bucks manors ? The two 
 latter were held of the Bishop of Bayeux, in 1086, 
 by a certain ' Robert ' ; but no ' Essetone ' is found 
 in Kent. ^ The Red Book editor suggests Ashenden, 
 but this, obviously, will not do. We turn, there- 
 fore, to Feudal Aids and there find (III, 3) not 
 ' Essetone ', but ' Effetone ' in Langport Hundred,* 
 which is duly entered as part of this serjeanty. ' 
 
 ' Effeton ' could not be identified by the editor, 
 and the form might well be wrong. But when 
 we turn to Domesday all doubt is dispelled, for we 
 there find ' Afettune ' in Langport Hundred (down 
 in Romney Marsh) and held of the bishop of 
 Bayeux by Robert ' of Romney ' {de Romenel). * 
 My suggestion is that this was the ' Robert ' who 
 held Ilmer and Aston of the same bishop in Bucks. 
 
 Can we span that dark period of no less than 
 ninety years between 1086 and the year in which 
 Aubree stated, in 1220, that she had begun her 
 suit ? We first discover a statement in the 1220 
 plea that a certain {quidam) ' David Romenel ' had 
 been seized of Aston ' ut de feodo '. Our task is 
 to connect David with the Kentish lands, and so 
 with ' Robert de Romenel '. With ' Effeton ', 
 however, we cannot connect him. But, in addi- 
 
 ' See p. 305 note z above. 
 
 ' The ' Essetone ' of the Testa is in Langport Hundred. 
 
 ' " partem terre de serjantia, que vocatur Effeton, de Radulfo filio 
 Bernardi, et idem Bemardus {sic) tenet.... per servicium custodie unius 
 falconis. " 
 
 * There is a grant in this * Effeton ' to Robertsbridge Abbey in 
 Campb. Chart, xxvii, 19. 
 
3o8 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 tion to holding ' Afettune ', with its fifty burgesses 
 in Romney, of the bishop of Bayeux, Robert of 
 ' Romney ' also held ' Lamport ' with twenty-one 
 burgesses in Romney, of the archbishop of Can- 
 terbury, as one of his knights {milites) . These two 
 holdings must be kept quite distinct. Let us try 
 to trace the second. We have, unfortunately, no 
 returns of the Archbishop of Canterbury's knights 
 in 1 1 66, but, luckily for us, we have a flood, and 
 the flood fills the gap. In 1 1 68 we have an entry 
 of the payments " de militibus Archiepiscopatus," * 
 and among the remissions we find : — 
 
 Et in defectu feodorum David de Rumenel et Robert! 
 de Sancto Leodegario quae perierunt in marisco de 
 Rumenel xb 
 
 Here then is David ' de Rumenel ' holding of 
 the Archbishop by knight-service, down in Rom- 
 ney marsh, as ' Robert de Romenel ' had held 
 before him.^ 
 
 Is this doubted ? Then I produce the record of 
 Aubree de Jarpenville holding a knight's fee and a 
 half of the Archbishop in ' Langeport ',' which is 
 where Robert of Romney had held of him by 
 knight-service. Here, therefore, as at Aston, 
 David ' de Romenel ' must have been her pre^ 
 decessor. 
 
 And now we will go further. Between Robert 
 (1086) and David (1159) 'of Romney' I find 
 the missing link in that Lambert ' de Rumenel ' 
 
 ' Pipe Roll, 14 Hen. II, p. 154. 
 
 ' t)avid appears also, under Kent, on the Pipe Rolls of 5 and 1 1 
 Hen. II. 
 
 ' Lib. Rub., pp. 470, 725. 
 
THE MARSHAL OF THE HAWKS 309 
 
 whom we meet with on the Pipe Roll of 1 1 30 
 under Kent. The entire passage is this: — 
 
 Hugo de Albertivilla r.c. de £ii. 6. 8 pro recto de 
 
 terra quam clamat de Archiepiscopatu Lambert' de 
 
 Rumenel r.c. de xl marcis argenti et j dextrario ut teneat 
 in pace terrain quam Hugo de Albertivilla clamat, etc. 
 etc. (p. 64) 
 
 In other words, Lambert ' de Rumenel ' was 
 holding land of the Archbishop (of Canterbury) of 
 which Hugh de Auberville {Albertivilla) was seek- 
 ing to dispossess him. Now Robert and David 
 also, we have seen, so held. With this dispute 
 fresh in our minds we turn back to the Aston 
 suit of 1220^ and are reminded that Aubree's 
 opponents in 11 76-1 182 were William de Lisours 
 and his mother Alice. But who was this Alice ? 
 She was a sister of William d'Auberville. ^ Here 
 then are the litigants of 1 130 represented half a 
 century later by Aubree and Alice respectively. 
 In 1 22 1 the co-heirs of David 'de Romenel ' 
 quitclaimed their shares to Aubree, which ended 
 the struggle. 
 
 The lands remained in the family of Fitz Bernard 
 till 131 5. In 1346 they were confirmed to Sir 
 John de Molyns, Ilmer, and Aston Bernard (now 
 Aston MuUins) being recorded as held by the old 
 service. They then descended, in due course, 
 through Hungerford to Hastings, but were alienated, 
 in the i6th century, to the Dormers. For the 
 coronation of James II the earl of Carnarvon, as 
 lord of the manor of Ilmer, claimed to be " Mar- 
 
 ' See p. 306 above. 
 
 ' Rotulus de Dominabus : Northants. 
 
3IO THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 shal. Surveyor, and Conservator of the King's 
 hawks in England," but the claim was not allowed. 
 Three years later, the first Duke of St. Albans, 
 who had been granted in his youth the reversion 
 to the sinecure office of hereditary Master Falconer, 
 succeeded to the post. 
 
 THE KEEPER OF THE FALCONS 
 
 This was an important serjeanty involving active 
 service, and it figures from an early date in our 
 public records. Unfortunately, our chief source of 
 information on serjeanties, the Testa de Nevill, 
 affords us, in this instance, little or no help. As to 
 the nature of the service, the only clue it gives us 
 is that it speaks of the Norfolk portion of the ser- 
 jeanty as held by " falconer service. " It does, 
 however, in one entry, taken from the 1 2 1 2 Inquest, 
 definitely assign to Henry II the creation of this 
 serjeanty and trace its descent. ^ Happily, however, 
 under Henry III there are several ' Inquisitions 
 after death ', the returns to which do throw considr 
 erable light on the service. In 1253 we find that 
 the lands consisted of Haconby in Lincolnshire and 
 Dunton with Raynham in Norfolk, that Haconby 
 was held " by serjeanty in augmentation of the ser- 
 jeanty of Dunton of keeping falcons, " that Dun- 
 ton was held " by serjeanty of keeping the king's 
 falcons " and that the lastage of Boston was held 
 
 ' " Dunton cum pertinentiis fuit eschaeta domini Regis et fuit dat' 
 Radulfo de Hauvill' primo per manus Henrici Regis patris domini 
 Regis, et postea descendit ad Radulfum filium suum, et de Radulfo ad 
 Henricum filium suum, qui earn tenet per falconariam de domino Rege 
 in capite" (Testa, p. 293). 
 
THE KEEPER OF THE FALCONS 3 1 1 
 
 " by service of receiving the king's presents as well 
 of falcons as of other things. " ^ In a later Inqui- 
 sition Haconby is returned as held " by serjeanty 
 of keeping the king's falcons, " ^ and, finally, when 
 the serjeanty had been re-united,' we find Haconby 
 returned, in 1 27 1 , as " held of the king by serjeanty 
 of receiving at Boston the gerfalcons sent to the 
 king, " and Dunton as similarly held " by serjeanty 
 of keeping the king's falcons. "* 
 
 Another function of this serjeanty is revealed to 
 us by the Pipe Rolls of Henry II. From them 
 we learn that the Hauvilles were the buyers of the 
 hawks required for the king. As early as 1 1 64 
 ten marcs were expended thus by Ralf de Hauville. * 
 In the year of the crowning of the young king 
 (i 170) it was William de Hauville who was char- 
 ged with buying hawks [accipitres) for him and for 
 the Scottish king, * but Ralf, who (with William 
 of Yarmouth) was paid ^26. 10. o for "birds" 
 sent to Normandy for the King's use. ^ Later 
 Rolls show that he was paid ^^20 in 1179, £,2%. 
 6. 8. in 1 180, and so forth for buying " birds " for 
 the king's use. Passing to the reign of John we 
 find the younger Ralf, in 1200, buying from the 
 king the daughter of Richard " Masculus " with 
 her inheritance for his nephew Gilbert at the cost 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq. I, No. 281. 
 » Ibid., No. 685. 
 ' See below. 
 * Ibid., No. 756. 
 
 ' " Radulfo de Hauvilla VI li et XIII s et IIII d. ad emend' accip' • 
 (fife Roll 10 Hen. II, p. 34). 
 « Ibid., 16 Hen. II, p. 15. 
 ' Ibid., p. 2. 
 
312 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 of" a good gerfalcon for cranes " {gruarium) } But 
 Gilbert had to give the king, in 1205, ten marcs 
 and a falcon for herons ^ (William of Yarmouth 
 and Hugh de Hauvill being his pledges) to obtain 
 seisin of her heritage, Southrop, Hants, Blomefield, 
 in his History of Norfolk, observes that John in 
 his sixth year (1204-5) "ordered the bailiffs of 
 several ports to secure all the hawks arid gerfalcons 
 which should be brought beyond sea till the said 
 Henry and Hugh should choose what they thought 
 fit for the king's use ; and no one was allowed to 
 buy any till this was done. " The Hauvilles now 
 developed into a family of falconers. The Rotulus 
 Misce of the 14th year (1212-3) is crammed with 
 Hauville entries. For instance, five of the family 
 are in one place mentioned together 
 
 Henrico de Hautvilla ad iiij"'^ girfalcones et j gentilem 
 falconera et ad i poignatorem suum Hugoni de Haut- 
 villa (two and one).... Gaufrido de Hautvilla (4 gerfal- 
 cons).... Waltero de Hautvilla (4 gerfalcons).... Gilberto 
 de Hautvilla (3 gerfalcons). * 
 
 In another place we have a payment to Walter and 
 Geoffrey de Hautville and Walter de Merc, * going 
 with the King's falcons to teach {faciend') them to 
 fly, ^ and in yet another one to Hugh de Hauville 
 and his fellows, " portitoribus girfalconum, " going 
 to Aylesbury by the King's command with their 
 gerfalcons. * The actual holder of the serjeanty, 
 
 ' Rot. de Dbl. 2 John, p. 1 04. John was devoted to hawking for cranes. 
 
 ^ "j actum falconem lanerium " {Rot. de Fin. 6 John, pp. 264-5). 
 
 ' Cole's Documents, p. 251. 
 
 * who held the " laner " falcon serjeanty at White Roothing. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 254. 
 
 ^ Ibid., p. 245. 
 
THE KEEPER OF THE FALCONS 3 1 3 
 
 Henry de Hauville, is mentioned with Hugh de 
 Hauville and William (" Wilekin ") de Merc as 
 going to Dovercourt to receive four gerfalcons and 
 three " falcones gentiles " and then bringing them 
 to Windsor. ^ 
 
 Apart from the actual lands appertaining to their 
 serjeanty, the Hauvilles had a very interesting 
 connexion with the " lastage " dues of certain ports. 
 Henry de Hauville, we have seen, was said to have 
 held those of Boston by the service of receiving the 
 king's falcons, and those of King's Lynn were simi- 
 larly alleged to have been held by him " per servi- 
 cium falconer , " ^ those of Yarmouth by a " service 
 unknown, " and those of Ipswich " by serjeanty of 
 falconry " {falconarum) . ' Now we have seen that 
 "the marshal of the hawks " frequented specially 
 the fairs of Boston, King's Lynn, and Yarmouth, 
 as those where hawks were sold, * and this would 
 seem to be the explanation of the Hauvilles' con- 
 nexion with the ports named. The Wash, leading 
 up to Boston and to Lynn, appears to have been 
 the main channel by which birds from Norway 
 reached England, and the lands of the Hauville 
 Serjeanty were most conveniently situate ; for Dun- 
 ton in North Norfolk lay to its east, and Haconby 
 in South Lincolnshire to its west. 
 
 Indeed, we have actual evidence that the Hau- 
 villes bought birds at Boston, for, as I observed in 
 my introduction to the Pipe Roll of 1 176 : ^- — 
 
 ' IbU., p. 263. 
 
 * Cal.oflnq., I, No. 361. 
 ' IbU. 
 
 * See p. 305 above. 
 
 * Rot. Pip. 22 Hen. II (1904), p. xxv. 
 
314 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 It is to Boston fair that the King's falconer goes to buy the 
 birds that come, probably, from Norway or from Iceland. ^ 
 For under Lincolnshire we meet not only with Norway 
 hawks, but with an Iceland gerfalcon, and in that county 
 the birds appear to have been treated almost as currency. 
 
 That is to say that hawks and falcons were offered 
 in payment or part payment of amercements or 
 were offered to the king to secure his favour in 
 lieu of actual coin. ^ 
 
 The Inquisitions to which reference has been 
 made were due to a disputed succession. Those 
 who desire to localise in Norfolk the scene of'* The 
 babes in the Wood " might keep an eye on Thomas 
 de Hauville, who endeavoured, in 1253, to defraud 
 his infant nephew, the sons of his elder brother. 
 The pedigree was this : — 
 
 Henry =Ellen. 
 de Hauville. 
 d. 29 June 1253 
 at Little Linford, 
 Bucks. 
 
 I 
 
 Ralf Henry Thomas 
 
 de Hauville. de Hauville. de Hauville. 
 
 ob. V. p. of Little Linford, 
 
 I Bucks, d. 1266. 
 
 Henry Thomas Henry 
 
 b. about 1246. b. about 1254.. 
 
 ' " Radulfo de Hauvill' viij /. ad emendas aves ad opus regis in nun- 
 dinis apud Sanctum Botulfum" {Ibid., p. 77). 
 
 ' A good instance is aiForded by the way in which William de 
 " Werbintona " and Enguerrand de " Muntcellis " paid up the large 
 sum of 500 marcs which they had offered for the inheritance of Juliane, 
 wife of William Fitz Audelin whose heirs they claimed to be. See p. 
 93 above. It is recorded in 1199 that they had then paid in 234^ 
 marcs in cash, a ruby ring, a charger, a palfrey, two goshawks, and two 
 gerfalcons {Rot. lie obi. I John, p. 19). 
 
THE KEEPER OF THE FALCONS 315 
 
 The Lincoln and the Norfolk juries, though 
 both aware that Ralf the eldest brother had left 
 sons, made return independently that Henry, the 
 father, a week before his death, had enfeoffed 
 Thomas of Haconby and of Dunton and that 
 Thomas was already in full seisin before his father 
 died.^ But the Lincolnshire jury added that " Henry, 
 son of the said Henry, is believed to be his next 
 heir, " that is, to the exclusion of the eldest brother's 
 sons. This statement is of some interest for legal 
 history, as it bears on the casus regis, for here, 
 nearly thirty years after the latest case cited by the 
 authors of the History of English Law^ we find a 
 jury expressing, not a doubt upon the question, 
 but an actual opinion that a surviving son was heir 
 in preference to the sons of his deceased elder 
 brother, ' But in the case of Thomas, it was not 
 a question of a moot point of law, but of sheer 
 deception and fraud. Early in 1 267 a jury returned 
 that " the said Thomas the younger brother, after 
 the death of Henry his father, deceived the King's 
 court so that he recovered seisin of his father's 
 lands. " * For a time, however, "the wicked uncle " 
 appears to have retained possession. An important 
 entry on the Patent Rolls, 10 June 1256, runs 
 thus : — 
 
 Respite from knighthood for Thomas de Hauvyle of 
 Norfolk, who holds of the king by the serjeanty of keep- 
 ing the king's gerfalcons, and not by knight-service, for 
 
 * Cd. oflnq. I, No. 281. 
 
 * Op. cit. I. 498, from Bracton'sNote Book. 
 ' See my Peerage and Pedigree, I, 214. 
 
 " Cal.oflnq. I. No. 657. 
 
3i6 THE KING'S SPORT 
 
 a fine of half a mark of gold ; until he will take up the 
 arms of a knight of his own will. ^ 
 
 Here we have another distinction between 
 knight-service and serjeanty. Distraint for knight- 
 hood was affected by the tenure. 
 
 As early as June 1255 ^^ ^^^ recognised that the 
 infant son of Ralf was the rightful heir to his 
 grandfather's " lastage " of Boston, and was in the 
 King's wardship. * And a similar return followed 
 for the other ports, ' so that the Lincolnshire jurors' 
 view of heirship * was evidently disregarded. Finally 
 the fraud of Thomas was detected and the wardship 
 of his young nephew, with " the lands late of Henry 
 de Hauvyle, " granted by the Crown to William 
 de Renham, " king's yeoman," I2 March 1257.* 
 This suggests the interesting thought that the 
 Crown's right to wardship, oppressive though it 
 has been deemed, may have sometimes caused it, 
 in its own interest, to protect that of the infant 
 heir. The Keepership of the King's falcons con- 
 tinued in the family, and we have an order on the 
 Close Rolls, 3 June 1276, to the Constable of 
 Corfe Castle " to deliver to Thomas de Hauvill, 
 the king's falconer of fee, four laner falcons of the 
 falcons that Elias took in his bailiwick for the 
 King's use, to be kept by Thomas until the king 
 shall cause them to be sent for. " * 
 
 It is a most interesting fact that the coat blazoned 
 
 ' CaL of Pat. Rolls, 1247-125 8, p. 479. 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq. I, No. 337 ; Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1247-1258, p. 418. 
 
 ' Ibid., I, No. 361. 
 
 * See p. 3 1 5 above. 
 
 * Cal. of Pat. Rolls, 1247-1258, p. 545. 
 ' Cal. of Close Rolls, 1272-9, p. 293. 
 
THE KEEPER OF THE FALCONS 317 
 
 for ' Sir Thomas de Hauville ' on the ' Parliamen- 
 tary Roll ' is " de azure a iij girfauks de or e une 
 daunce de or, " ^ that is to say, azure, a dance 
 between three gerfalcons, or. I feel no doubt that 
 this coat was derived from the family's office, as 
 with the covered cups borne by Butlers and the 
 keys in Chamberlain coats. 
 
 ' Mr. Oswald Barron, F. S. A., whose knowledge of medieval heraldry 
 is unsurpassed, has kindly given me this blazon and tells me that the 
 word " girfauks " has greatly puzzled the commentators, though it is 
 clear. He considers the arms clearly ' canting, ' i.e. haw(k)-vill, in his 
 article on " Heraldry " in the Enc. Brit., but the requisite complete 
 syllable (as in pel-ican for Pel-ham) is wanting. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Apart from those serjeanties which were direct- 
 ly associated either with the king's household or 
 with the king's sport, there were many of a miscel- 
 laneous character and others of a distinctly military 
 nature, which owed their service, chiefly, in wars 
 against the Welsh. But this chapter deals with 
 services connected only with coronations, services 
 which, with the exception of that of the king's 
 champion and of ' the glove and sceptre, ' cannot 
 be described as serjeanties, but were deemed to be 
 appendant, by prescription, to tenure or to a 
 dignity or to inheritance in blood. 
 
 But the word ' coronations ' is here used in a 
 wider sense than that in which it is now employed. 
 There has been frequent mention, in the pages of 
 this work, of the great ' crown-wearing ' days of 
 the Norman kings, to which allusion has been 
 met with in the records of ancient serjeanties. 
 " These were the great annual courts, " as Dr. 
 Stubbs terms them, " held on the great Church 
 festivals, Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide ; 
 generally at the great cities of Southern England, 
 London, Winchester, and Gloucester. The king 
 
CORONATION SERVICES 319 
 
 appeared wearing his crown ; a special peace was 
 maintained, necessarily, no doubt, in consequence 
 of the multitude of armed retainers who attended 
 the barons ; and magnificent hospitality was ac- 
 corded to all comers. ' Thrice a year, ' says the 
 chronicle, ' King William wore his crown every 
 year that he was in England ; at Easter he wore 
 it at Winchester, at Pentecost at Westminster, and 
 at Christmas at Gloucester. And at these times 
 all the men of England were with him, arch- 
 bishops, bishops, and abbots, earls, thegns, and 
 knights. ' A similar usage was observed by his 
 
 sons The cessation of the solemn courts under 
 
 Stephen was regarded by Henry of Huntingdon as 
 a fatal mark of national decline. " ^ These cere- 
 monies occupied an intermediate position between 
 such modern functions as the state opening of 
 Parliament and the actual coronation at the com- 
 mencement of a new reign. When William the 
 Conqueror, in 1070, held his great Easter Court, 
 in accordance with custom, at Winchester, the 
 Papal Legates took the opportunity of crowning 
 him with all solemnity. " 
 
 It was, normally, on these occasions, the prero- 
 gative of the Archbishop of Canterbury to place 
 the crown upon the King's head. In the year 
 1 109, when the See of Canterbury was vacant, the 
 Archbishop of York desired, at the great Christmas 
 
 ' Constitutional History (1874), I. 369 ; so too, I, 268 : " The king 
 sat crowned three times in the year in the old royal towns of Westminster, 
 Winchester, and Gloucester. " See also pp. 201-2 above. 
 
 ' " Cardinales Romanae Ecclesiae coronam ei soUenniter ei imposue- 
 runt. " " Eum in paschS, coronam regni capiti ejus imponentes, in 
 Regem Anglicum confirmaverunt. " 
 
320 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Court, ^ to exercise this functioh. But the Bishop 
 of London, as Dean of Canterbury, successfully- 
 claimed it for himself, placed the Crown on the 
 King's head, * and sang the solemn mass. ' 
 
 Later in the reign (i 121) Archbishop Ralf, who 
 then held the See, hearing, at the crowning of 
 Queen ' Adeliza, ' the day after her marriage at 
 Windsor, that the King was seated on his throne, 
 already wearing the Crown, hastened to him and 
 angrily enquired who had dared to place it on his 
 head. The wretched king, humbly standing, out 
 of respect for the prelate, feebly murmured, with 
 downcast looks, that, as he had not taken much 
 notice, he could, not remember.* The primate 
 refused to proceed with the ceremony until he had 
 removed with his own hand the crown from the 
 King's head, the King unfastening the fillet under 
 his chin, which kept it from wobbling on his head. 
 The prelate then consented to replace it formally 
 and proceeded with the mass. 
 
 It was observed by Stubbs that, at the three 
 
 ' " Regnum Anglic ad curiam Regis Lundoniae pro more convenit at 
 magna solemnitas habita est atque solemnis " (FiVa Eadmer't, p. 212). 
 
 ^ " Coronam capiti regis imposuit eumque per dextram induxit eccle- 
 sis " {Ibid.), 
 
 ^ This also was the Archbishop of Canterbury's prerogative. 
 
 ^ " Ad regem accedens, eo sibi suppliciter assurgente, sciscitatus est 
 quisnam capiti ejus coronam impossuisset. Ad quod ille, demisso vultu, 
 se non magnam curam inde accepisse, et iccirco memoriae id elapsum 
 modesta voce respondit " {Ibid., p. 292), So abject wras the Sovereign's 
 position before the church in Prae-Reformation days that the ritiul 
 directed him to lie " grovelling " in the abbey for a part of the Coron- 
 ation service. 
 
 ' " Pontifex igitur elevatis manibus sustulit coronam de capite regis, 
 ipso dissolvente ansulam quae sub mente innodata erat ne capite insidens 
 vacillaret." 
 
 * Const. Hist. (1874) I, 369. 
 
CORONATION SERVICES 321 
 
 annual courts, " the crown was placed on the 
 King's head, by the archbishop in his own chamber, 
 before he walked in procession." For this he 
 cites Eadmer and the two authorities for Richard's 
 great re-coronation in 1194. But this last event 
 was not an ordinary crown-wearing. At Christ- 
 mas 1 1 09 ^ the crown, no doubt, was placed on 
 the king's head before he was brought to the 
 church. The record of Queen Eleanor's corona- 
 tion in 1236 has a curious possible allusion to this 
 practice when describing the ' rayed ' cloth over 
 which the King walked in the procession — " ince- 
 dentis ab aula vel camera^ sua, uii sumit regalia^ 
 usque ad pulpitum in Ecclesia Westmonasterii ", 
 As he himself had been crowned before, he here 
 assumes the regalia before proceeding to the Abbey. 
 The record goes on to say that the portion of this 
 cloth which lies within the church is its sacrist's fee 
 in whate'ver church the king is crowned. ^ This brings 
 us to the notable document with which we must 
 now deal. 
 
 One of the most amazing links between the days 
 of the Conquest and our own has only come to 
 light within the last few months. In his learned 
 monograph on ' Gilbert Crispin, abbot of West- 
 minster', * the Dean of Westminster * has printed, 
 among his ' selected charters, ' one of Henry the 
 First, which he, doubtless rightly, assigns to the 
 year 1 100. It is a writ, ' tested ' by his chancellor, 
 
 ' Sfee p. 320 above. 
 
 ' For the atda and camera, see p. 66. 
 
 ' " In quacunque fuerit ecclesia coronatus Rex. " 
 
 * Cambridge University Press. 
 
 ' Now Dean of Wells. 
 
 21 
 
322 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 the bishop-elect of Winchester, and addressed to 
 Eudes the steward {ddpifero) and Herbert the cham- 
 berlain, and it runs thus : — 
 
 Precipio quod conventus Westm' et Winton' et Gloec- 
 estrie, in omnibus festivitatibus quibus in eisdem ecclesiis 
 coronatus fuero, plenariam de me habcant liberacionem, 
 et earum cantores uhciam auri habeant, sicut Mauricius 
 episcopus London' testatus est tempore predecessorum 
 meorum eos habuisse. 
 
 The importance of this document is very great. 
 In the first place we have the direct mention of 
 the three annual crown-wearing days of the Norman 
 kings ^ with the strong expression " when I shall 
 be crowned, " and the added phrase " in these chur- 
 ches. " ^ Secondly, we have the testimony of 
 Maurice, bishop of London (i 08 5-1 107) that, in 
 the Conqueror's days, it was the practice on these 
 occasions for the convent to receive from the king 
 " full livery " with an ounce of gold for the pre- 
 centor. Here then, clearly, we have the origin of 
 that strange and ancient claim which is made at 
 ^very coronation by the Dean and Chapter of 
 Westminster, as representing the Abbot and Con- 
 vent. Its two clauses are: — (i) "The Great Chantor 
 of the Church to have an ounce of gold by the 
 hands of the Treasurer of the King's Chamber " ; 
 (2) " An hundred manchets, the third part of a 
 Tun of Wine, and Fish according to the bounty 
 of his said Royal Majesty for the said Dean and 
 Chapter's Repast on the Coronation Day. " This 
 
 • Seep. 318. 
 
 * It is of importance to note, in connexion with this document, that. 
 Henry I himself was re-crowned {tterum coronatus) at Winchester at Easter 
 1 10 1 {Annales Monast., II, 4.1). 
 
CORONATION SERVICES 323 
 
 claim was "referred to the pleasure of his Majesty," 
 King Edward VII. It is a literal translation of 
 the claim in Old French that was made at older 
 coronations. But when we get back to the Liber 
 Regalis itself, we have this variant : — 
 
 Et providebitur illo die conventui Westmonasterii per 
 regies ministros quod dictus conventus percipiet die 
 eodem de rege centum similas {sic) et modium vini ac 
 eciam de piscibus quantum convenit dignacioni regali. 
 
 Here we discover that the hundred ' manchets ' 
 represent a hundred of the simnels [siminelld) that 
 figure so largely in Henry I's ' Establishment of 
 the King's household ' among the ' liberationes ' 
 due to its officers. It seems strange that the 
 liberacio to which the convent was entitled on 
 coronation day ^ included only fish, not meat. 
 
 There is another charter, which purports to be 
 even earlier, being granted by the Conqueror him- 
 self, in which a grant is made to the abbot of 
 Battle and two of his monks of similar ' livery ' at 
 court, on the days of the three crown-wearings, in 
 simnels and, wine and messes of food {fercula)^ but 
 these are to be of fish or of something else ^ Of 
 this charter I made a transcript, many years ago, 
 from a Battle cartulary at Lincoln's Inn, and it has 
 recently been printed in the Calendar of Charter 
 Rolls (III, 196), where it seems to be accepted as 
 genuine. I should, however, reluctantly class it 
 with the other Battle charters there printed as 
 
 ' Cf. Lib. Rub., 759, on Queen Eleanor's coronation (1236): " libera- 
 times autem assisas predictis a tempore Regis Henrici senioris invenistis 
 alias." 
 
 * " Aut de hoc quod erit in curia ". 
 
324 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 spurious, if only because it contains the formula 
 " quam fundavi ex voto ob victoriam quam michi 
 Deus ibidem contulit." 
 
 The last point of interest in this Westminster 
 document is of more technical character, but of 
 distinct historical importance. This writ is ad- 
 dressed to Eudes the steward [dapifero) and Herbert 
 the chamberlain. Why ? Because the former, 
 in virtue of his office, would have charge of 
 the liveries {liberaciones) , while the chamberlain 
 would be responsible for finding the ounce of 
 gold. ^ The proof of the latter statement is that 
 the claim at the coronation of James I was to 
 receive the ounce of gold " par les mains del 
 Treasurer du Chambre le Roy. " This implies that 
 the gold was originally a charge on that Camera 
 Regis or Camera Curie which figures so prominently 
 on the Pipe Rolls of the 1 2th century ; ^ and it 
 carries back the system of payment direct into 
 " the Chamber " to the close of the i ith century. 
 
 Even when the three Crown- wearing Courts had 
 been finally discontinued, early in the reign of 
 Henry II, the old practice lingered on. John, 
 who had been duly crowned in May 1 199, is said 
 to have been crowned again, on his second marriage, 
 late in the year 1 200, but the precedent of Henry I's 
 second mariage, in 1 1 2 1 , was evidently followed : 
 
 ^ See p. 1 2 1 for Herbert the chamberlain (" regis cubicularius et the- 
 saurarius. ") The Great Chamberlain formerly carried, as the King's 
 offering in the Abbey, " dix livres sterling d'or et un marque d'or " 
 (p. 1 20), but now " an Ingot or Wedge of Gold of a pound weight ", 
 which he receives from " the Treasurer of the Household. " 
 
 ' See for instance the Roll of 1165, with its numerous payments to 
 Ralf Fitz Stephen (a chamberlain). 
 
CORONATION SERVICES 325 
 
 for the king it was a solemn crown-wearing ; for 
 the queen a coronation. ^ The next year, the king 
 and queen kept Easter at Canterbury, and sat 
 crowned in the Cathedral, having received their 
 crowns, as in 1 121, from the Archbishop. 
 
 Distinct, and intermediate between a coronation 
 and a crown-wearing, were the re-coronations of 
 Stephen and of Richard I, when captivity had 
 dimmed the lustre of their crowns. 
 
 Gervase, in whose chronicle alone ^ is recorded 
 the re-coronation of Stephen after his captivity, — 
 an event which I assign to Christmas, 1141,' — 
 makes a statement with regard to Richard's re- 
 coronation which, in view of his contemporary 
 authority and of his Canterbury knowledge, has 
 not received, it seems to me, so much attention as 
 it deserves, if, indeed, it has received any. Before 
 describing the actual proceedings, he tells us that, 
 as there had been no precedent for such a re-corona- 
 tion since that of Stephen * (who had been, like 
 Richard, a prisoner), the authorities sent to Can- 
 terbury for a record of the ceremonial then employed. 
 He then gives us an abstract of the directions sent 
 in reply, including the headings of the prayers to 
 be used, which appears to have been drawn up like 
 the later Liber Regalis. ^ We may say, therefore, 
 with some confidence, that the coronation of 
 
 ' " Rex.... coronam gestaturv)? ;... uxor sua in reginam consecranda." 
 {R. Coggeshall, p. 103). 
 
 ' and only in one of its three MSS. 
 
 ' See my Geoffrey de Mandeville, pp. 1 3 7-9. 
 
 * More than fifty-two years before. 
 
 ' This is, surely, by far the earliest dated and definite record of the 
 ■prayers at a coronation service, and it would have added greatly to the 
 interest of Mr. Legg's valuable collection. 
 
326 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Richard I in 1 1 89 is not, as is supposed, the earliest 
 of which details are known. The re-coronation of 
 Stephen may claim that position. Applying this 
 to one point, difficult and apparently unique, in 
 the coronation ceremonial of 11 89, namely the 
 mention of four barons carrying four golden can- 
 dlesticks in the midst of the bishops,^ we learn from 
 Gervase that the Canterbury precedent included the 
 direction " barones cereos ferant, " and that four 
 barons carried four lighted candles before the King, 
 in the procession, both coming and going. ^ This, 
 therefore, implies that candles had been so carried 
 at the re-coronation of Stephen. 
 
 In this chapter there is no mention of the 
 ' Hereditary Grand Almoner, ' because his func- 
 tions, at a coronation, had dwindled down to noth- 
 ing, even before the abolition of the banquet and 
 of the procession had put an end to his fees. For 
 the coronation of Edward VII the Marquess of 
 Exeter petitioned the Court of Claims for his right 
 to be ' Almoner ' and 
 
 to take from the table of our Lord the King, on the day 
 of his Coronation, a silver bason to the Almonry accus- 
 tomed, being before the Lord the King on the day of his 
 Coronation, and to have the distribution of all the alms 
 that shall be deposited in the said bason, and one fine 
 cloth or towel to wrap up the money that shall be given 
 in alms.... and to have the distribution of all the cloth 
 that covers the ground,... and likewise to have a tun of 
 good wine, etc., etc. 
 
 ' " in medio illorum ibant quatuor barones portantes quatuor cande- 
 labra aurea. " Legg, op. cit. pp. xxiv, 48. 
 
 ' " portantibus iiij baronibus iiij cereos accensos ante eum... in eundo 
 et redeundo portati sunt cerei coram eo. " (I. 526). 
 
CORONATION SERVICES 327 
 
 But the wine, though always claimed, was never 
 allowed, and the rest of the claim was not argued. 
 
 In early days the office was of rather more 
 importance, for in 1236 the almoner had jurisdic- 
 tion over all quarrels and offences of paupers and 
 lepers, and if one of the latter stabbed another, he 
 ordered the culprit to be burnt, — a sound sanitary 
 precaution. Another reason for not discussing this 
 office in detail is that its rightful descent is, histor- 
 ically, very doubtful. It was claimed by Lord 
 Exeter in 1901 as " rightfully possessed of and in 
 the Barony of Bedford in the County of Bedford, 
 and has the present possession of it (which Barony 
 he holds of our said Lord the King in chief to per- 
 form and execute the office of Almoner at each 
 Coronation). " But even if the claimant were 
 indeed possessed, as alleged, of that Barony, or even 
 of a portion thereof, it is certain that the said 
 Barony was held of the King ' in chief ' by knight- 
 service. 
 
 Mr. Legg's account, under ' Officers and ser- 
 vices', greatly increases the confusion. From him 
 we learn that 
 
 The Grand Almoner for the day is the Lord of the 
 
 Manor {sic) of Bedford Before Richard ll's time the 
 
 manor {sic) of Bedford belonged to the family of Beau- 
 champ. But the manor {sic) of Bedford consists of 
 several scattered properties, and consequently since 1377 
 (j^V), when this branch of the family of Beauchamp 
 became extinct, there have been several lords of the 
 manor {sic) of Bedford. In 1377 it was claimed by John 
 de Latimer and Thomas {sic) de Mowbray in virtue of 
 their joint inheritance of the manor {sic) of Bedford. It 
 was aQlowed, but as Thomas {sic) de Mowbray was a 
 
328 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 minor, Sir Thomas Grey was appointed to the office 
 with {sic) John (sic) de Latimer (p. Ixxiv). 
 
 Now (i) the office was claimed in respect of the 
 whole barony of Bedford, not of the manor ; (2) the 
 last Beauchamp of Bedford fell at Evesham, /. e. in 
 1265, not 1377; (3) "in iZJj" the claimants, as 
 is shown by the record actually printed by Mr. 
 Legg, were William ' de Latimer ' and yohn, son 
 and heir of John de Mowbray, (pp. 142, 161). 
 As the latter was in the king's wardship, it was 
 found that the king himself would be entitled to 
 perform the service jointly with William ! There- 
 fore William de Latimer was admitted to perform 
 
 it " both for himself and for the aforesaid heir 
 
 and received after dinner the said silver dish for 
 his use and that of the aforesaid heir " (pp. 16 1-2). 
 But while, for these reasons, the Almoner's 
 office is omitted, there is, on the other hand, men- 
 tion of a service which was formally claimed this 
 year, namely, that of carrying " the King's silver 
 harp " at the Coronation. One had not previously 
 associated His Majesty with that instrument. 
 
 THE CANOPY BEARERS 
 
 The canopy which was borne over the sovereign 
 in the coronation procession is, no doubt, a feature 
 of immemorial antiquity. For the coronation of 
 Edward VII, the barons of the Cinque Ports prayed 
 that, as it had been their privilege to bear this 
 canopy, they might be assigned a place within the 
 Abbey. Their case was ably argued by Mr. Indgr- 
 
THE CANOPY BEARERS 329 
 
 wick, K.C.;^ and the Court, of course, admitted 
 that, if there were a canopy, they were " entitled 
 to bear it ". Their counsel went so far as to assert 
 
 that " from the Conquest every King has used 
 
 the Canopy ". Mr. Legg, however, holds that 
 the barons of the Cinque Ports are first mentioned 
 at the coronation of Queen Eleanor (1236), and 
 that, although the canopy was used at that of 
 Richard I, it was then " carried by four nobles ". ^ 
 Undoubtedly, the Cinque Port ' barons ' are not 
 named by Hoveden in his narrative of Richard's 
 coronation, ' but a passage of singular importance 
 is found in one of the ' Canterbury letters ' of the 
 time, which throws a flood of light on the subject. * 
 We there read (? 1189) that 
 
 pallium etiam quoddam, quod baron es Doveriae et 
 Quinque Portuum de consuetudine antiqua in coronatione 
 regis habuerunt, ab ipsis baronibus super altare Christi 
 oblatum est in memoriam aeternam. 
 
 That this canopy {pallium) should already be des- 
 cribed, in 1 189, as due "by ancient custom " to 
 the barons of the Cinque Ports is a very remarkable 
 fact and carries back, not only their connexion 
 with the coronation canopy, but also the existence 
 of their confederation further, perhaps, than any 
 other real evidence yet discovered. 
 
 ' See Wollaston's Court of Claims, pp. 39-46. See also p. 4.9 above. 
 
 ' English Coronation Records, pp. xxiv, ]xxx. 
 
 ' " quatuor barones portaverunt super eos " (the king and two bishops) 
 " umbraculum sericum super quatuor lanceas proceras. " 
 
 * Chronicles and Memorials of the reign of Richard I (Ed. Stubbs) II, 308: 
 ' Epistolse Cantuarienses '. The importance of this passage was duly 
 mentioned by Mr. Charles Dawson in his paper on the coronation 
 privilege of the Cinque Ports (Sussex Arch. Coll. div, 46.) 
 
330 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 The fact, however, that a canopy [pallium] was 
 carried by ' barons ' of some kind at the re-coron- 
 ation of Stephen in 1 1 4 1 is proved, in my own 
 opinion, ' by the fact that it is mentioned in the 
 ceremonial sent as precedent from Canterbury to 
 Winchester in 1 194. ' This was sought for at the 
 re-coronation of Richard I, when, Hoveden tells 
 us, the canopy of silk {pannus sericus) was borne 
 by the Earls of Norfolk, Devon (' De Insula Vecta'), 
 Salisbury, and Derby (' de Ferreres '). ' 
 
 At the coronation of Queen Eleanor, in 1236, 
 the Cinque Ports' " claim to this duty was disputed," 
 Mr. Legg tells us, " by the barons of the march of 
 Wales. " But careful reading, I think, shows that 
 what the Marchers [Marchiones) claimed was, not 
 the right to perform the service, but to carry off 
 the spears on which the canopy was upheld. * It 
 is, indeed, with the fees that the record is chiefly 
 concerned. These spears, with the bells at the 
 corners of the canopy, were also persistently claimed 
 
 ' See p. 325. 
 
 ' " portantibus iiij baronibus... pallium in iiij'"' hastis supra caput ejus... 
 In eundo et redeundo portati sunt cerei coiam eo et pallium " 
 {Gervase, I, 526). 
 
 ' Possibly it was considered that the Cinque Ports privilege did not 
 extend to a rf-coronation. 
 
 * The canopies borne by the barons over the king and the queen were 
 of purple silk, " quos quidem pannos sues esse de jure vendicant, et illos 
 optinuerunt in Curia, licet Marchiones de Marchis Wallias.... jus Mar- 
 chiae esse dicerent kastas inveniendi et iUds deferendi. " Mr. Legg renders 
 this : — " And they claimed the cloths to be theirs by right, and main- 
 tained {sic) them in the court : so did the wardens of the march of Wales.... 
 and they said that it was the right of the march to find the lances and 
 carry (sic) them " (p. 92). I cannot find the italicised words in his 
 Latin text and the word used by the record for ' carry ' is, not deferre 
 (which means ' carry away'), but gestare (" gestabant Barones de v 
 Portibus "). But one must not press this unduly. 
 
THE KING'S HARP 331 
 
 by the Dean and Chapter of Westminster/ but the 
 Cinque Ports' claim to the pallium itself seems to 
 have been undisputed. 
 
 The mention of the four (Lord) Marchers is, 
 however, of great interest. They were John 
 FitzAlan, whose Shropshire castles of Clun and 
 Oswestry * (' Oswaldestre ') guarded the Shropshire 
 border, and afterwards provided titular baronies for 
 the Earls of Arundel and Dukes of Norfolk ; to 
 the south of him, Ralf de Mortimer, lord of Wig- 
 more, the guardian of north Herefordshire ; in the 
 middle of that county's western border, at its angle 
 salient into Wales, Walter de Clifford of Clifford 
 castle guarding, on its sandstone rock, the pass of 
 the upper Wye ; furthest south, John of Monmouth, 
 whose castle at Monmouth blocked, where three 
 counties meet, the valley of the lower Wye. 
 
 Thenceforth, the Lords of the March, as claim- 
 ants, disappear from view till a real live ' Lord 
 Marcher' descended from his Welsh fastness on 
 this year's Court of Claims. Sir ' Marteine ' Owen 
 Mowbray Lloyd " is the only Lord Marcher in 
 the kingdom, and still exercises his rights. " ' 
 
 This is a statement of extreme interest : it is, 
 indeed, a revelation. For the authors of the History 
 of English Law class " the marcherships on the 
 Welsh border " among " the most splendid instan- 
 ces " of " the lords who had more exalted jurisdic- 
 
 ' " les quater hastils ou bastons que supportont le Canope et quater 
 Campanells qui pend al chacun corner du Canope. " 
 
 ' ' Album Monasterium ' in Latin. One would have supposed that 
 it was needless to identify this FitzAlan castle under that name, but the 
 oificial Feudal Aids (1906), IV, 602, 604, renders the name 'Whitchurch'. 
 
 ' Wys Who. See also Burke's Peerage, etc. 
 
332 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 tional powers" (I, 570). Of their powers and 
 their position Dr. Owen writes, — in a valuable 
 paper on English Law in Wales and the Marches^ — 
 
 The powers of the Earls Palatine were so great that 
 the Crown, when it was sufficiently strong, annexed their 
 earldoms, but the powers of the Lords Marcher were 
 
 greater The Lord of Kernes tells us that the Lords 
 
 Marcher were sworn to perform covenants as full and 
 absolute princes are, whereas Earls Palatine tied themselves 
 by covenants and bonds as subjects do. 
 
 ... the lords appointed sheriffs, coroners, constables of 
 the castle, chamberlains, chancellors, escheators, and other 
 officers. The writs ran in the name of the Lord, and 
 not of the King ;...,. the Lords had the rights of wardship 
 and marriage in respect of their tenants-in-chief, levied 
 
 scutages they had judgment of life and limb, pardoned 
 
 felons and murderers, " set them to fine or hanged them 
 
 at their pleasure, " They made war and peace with 
 
 their neighbours at their pleasure It will be seen 
 
 that the Lords Marcher were in theory and in practice 
 sovereign princes. ^ 
 
 That of these potentates a solitary survivor " still 
 exercises his rights " in the far west of our island 
 is a strange and thrilling thought. One wonders 
 what would be the fate of Mr. Lloyd George's 
 myrmidons if they tried to penetrate with Form 
 IV to the shores even of that Irish Sea which 
 barred its further progress. Would they be com- 
 pelled to swallow it, in mediasval fashion, by the 
 vassals of the Lord Marcher ? 
 
 The existence of such a phenomenon cannot be 
 too widely known ; it should draw shoals of tourists 
 to this oasis of feudalism in a land which the 
 
 ' Y Cymmrodor, Vol. XIV., pp. 17-8, 22. 
 
THE KING'S HARP 333 
 
 historian associates with piety, perjury and plunder.^ 
 Seriously speaking, however, the reader must 
 turn for information, on this alleged Lord Marcher- 
 ship, to the works of Dr. Henry Owen, who has 
 laboured with such patient industry on the history 
 of Pembrokeshire. He has edited with sympathy 
 and learning the writings of that George Owen 
 whose father had " purchased " the Kemes barony 
 and who seems to have originated this claim in the 
 reign, as Dr. Owen puts it, of " that stout old 
 Welshwoman, Elizabeth Owen — wrongly called 
 Tudor. " But he has to admit that " the Kemes 
 lords were unable to maintain their independence,"" 
 and when George Owen tried to revive it, Eliza- 
 beth Owen's Privy Council made short work of 
 the would-be Lord Marcher. Our island could 
 not hold two ' sovereign princes ', The sheriff 
 was ordered " to repeire unto the howse of the said 
 
 ' See the instructions of ' Gerald the Welshman ' (Giroldus Combrensis) 
 to the clergy of his archdeaconry : — " parochianos vestros, qui nimis proni 
 sunt ad pejerandum, consilium est diebus Dominicis... super his corripiatis 
 ...Dicatis etiam, et cum assertione proponatis, quia qui super evangelia 
 frequenter aut irreventer ex consuetudine, sicut in partibus illis plus quam 
 alibi faciunt pejerare prassumunt, divinam ultionem gravissimam, " etc. 
 (II. 157-8). Also his character of the Welsh : — " quicquid commodi, 
 quicquid temporalis emolumenti, sacramenti transgressione provenire 
 potest, passim perjurio parant " (VI. 206). As to plunder, " rapinis 
 
 insistere, raptoque vivere, furto et latrocinio etiam inter se proprium 
 
 habent " " ierrasque modis omnibus vel occnpare vel dilatare, gens 
 
 prae gentibus aliis ambitiosa ". After explaining that they seek to grab 
 for themselves the lands they rent, he sums them up as " tot peccatis 
 vitiorumque voragini datos, perjuriis, puta furtis, latrociniis, rapinis " 
 (VI. 216). Cf.h\% statement that " populi Walliae fures et raptores 
 erant rerum aliarum " (I. 39). Cf. Domesday, I. 179 : — " Si quis 
 Walensium furat' hominem aut feminam, equum, bovem, vaccam,... 
 De ove vero furata vel fasciculo manipulorum " etc. etc. It is interest- 
 ing to trace these peculiarities in later times. 
 
 ' Owen's Pembrokeshire (Ed. H. Owen), 1 892-7, p. x. 
 
334 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Owens " {sic) and to arrest him and send him up 
 to London, as accused of " forging of certen charter 
 deedes etc. to the greate prejudice of the freeholders 
 of the lordship of Kaymise. " ^ 
 
 I am not, of course, expressing an opinion on 
 any legal matter, but I can at least affirm, on a 
 matter of genealogy, that the barony of Kemes 
 cannot, as alleged, have " passed by right of in- 
 heritance to the Owens of Henllys " * in the i6th 
 century, for the reason that they were not the 
 heirs of its lords, the Martins, whose true heirs 
 are, at this moment, claiming their peerage barony. 
 Dr. Owen, indeed, puts forward a pedigree which 
 would make them such heirs, * but it is at direct 
 variance with the statement of his author, George 
 Owen, himself ; * it is directly opposed to record 
 evidence ; and it is even opposed to the family 
 pedigree as now given in Burke's Peerage ! It is 
 the way of Welsh genealogists to be somewhat 
 primitive in their methods, * but Dr. Owen's version 
 involves such impossible chronology that I cannot 
 accept as proved even a descent in blood of the 
 Owens of Henllys from the Martins. 
 
 Nevertheless, Sir ' Marteine ' Lloyd, in his 
 petition to the Court of Claims (191 1), asserted his 
 descent froni Sir Martin ' de Turribus ', the Nor- 
 man conqueror of Kemes, and claimed as ' Lord 
 Marcher ' thereof " to carry the King's Silver 
 
 ' Acts of the Privy Council, 1578-1580, p. 303; Ovicn'i Pembrokeshire, 
 pp. 510-512. 
 
 ' " Burkes Peerage, " 191 1. 
 
 ' Op. cit., p. 491. 
 
 * Hid., p. 454. 
 
 ' See my remarks on Welsh pedigrees in Ancestor, V, 47-51. 
 
THE KING'S HARP 335 
 
 Harp at the Coronation. " ^ His counsel is re- 
 ported as stating that " the ancestors of the 
 petitioner on divers occasions attended at Coron- 
 ations as bearers of the King's Silver Harp, " but 
 as admitting, in reply to the Lord Chancellor, that 
 " he had no documentary evidence in proof of the 
 claim, which rested on tradition " ! The Court, 
 therefore, naturally, " disallowed the claim as not 
 being supported by evidence. " ^ As I ventured 
 to observe of Welsh pedigrees some years ago, 
 " the miserable evidence of records on which we 
 English rely is swept aside by the champion of the 
 Welsh in favour of that of tradition. " * 
 
 Within a few weeks of the failure of this claim 
 * the only Lord Marcher in the kingdom ' again 
 figured in the public press. " A descendant of 
 kings " was the heading of some paragraphs in the 
 Daily Mail (22 Feb. 191 1),* from which I cull 
 these statements : 
 
 In Mr. Lloyd's family are vested several curious 
 ancient privileges. He traces his descent from Martin 
 de Tours, who accompanied William the Conqueror to 
 England. His father claims to be directly descended 
 from Edward I, and his mother from Robert II of 
 Scotland. 
 
 The guarded word ' claims ' is here quite unne- 
 cessary : it is needless to question a descent shared, 
 so far as the first Edward is concerned, with 
 thousands of others at the present day, while, as for 
 
 ^ I take all this from the careful report of the hearing in the Morning 
 Post of 28 Jan. 1911. 
 
 ' Morning Post, 28 Jan. 191 1. 
 
 ' Ancestor, V, 47. 
 
 * \ Repeated in the Evening Standard of that date. 
 
336 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Robert II, the father of a huge family,^ his des- 
 cendants are to-day a multitude beyond the power 
 of computation. In view, however, of this publi- 
 city one may respectfully suggest that ' tradition ' 
 is perhaps mistaken as to the silver harp, and that 
 what the family was privileged to carry was, 
 originally, a trumpet. 
 
 To return to the ' Barons ' of the Cinque Ports. 
 Mr. Charles Dawson's valuable paper on their 
 coronation services,^ which came to be known as 
 their ' honours at court,' supplemented by Mr. T. 
 Ross' paper, with its extracts from local records,* 
 will be found to supply full details. The ' Barons ' 
 were thirty-two in number, sixteen for the king's 
 canopy and the same number for the Queen's. 
 One canopy, in early days, was carried off by the 
 Eastern ports, and presented by them to Canterbury 
 cathedral ; the other by the Western ports, and 
 presented to Chichester cathedral. The service of 
 the ports was regularly performed down to and at 
 the last unabridged coronation, that of George IV, 
 and the ' Barons ' enjoyed the further privilege of 
 sharing in the coronation banquet, which was 
 recognised in 1236 as that of sitting at table on 
 the king's right {sedendi in mensis regiis eadem die a 
 dextris Regis). Banquet and procession have passed 
 away, but the loss of the latter has been regretted.* 
 
 ' See the great Stewart pedigree, compiled for the St.ewart Exhibition 
 by Mr. W. A. Lindsay, K.C., Windsor Herald. 
 
 ' Sussex Jrch. Coll. XLIV, 45-54. 
 
 ' Ibid., vol. XV. 
 
 * " Greatest of these losses has been the solemn Liturgical Procession 
 on a raised staging, from Westminster Hall to the Abbey. . . It would have 
 been much to have that great ceremonial and constitutional ' Proceeding ' 
 given back to England and the Church." Church Times, 7 April 191 1. 
 
THE CORONATION SWORDS 337 
 
 One may perhaps venture to express the wish that 
 canopies could still be borne, in accordance with 
 the ancient custom, over the King and Queen up 
 the nave, at least, of the Abbey Church as of old/ 
 
 THE CORONATION SWORDS 
 
 Of the royal emblems by which an English king 
 was surrounded on his Coronation^ day the swords, 
 perhaps, can claim the greatest proved antiquity. 
 In the Bayeux Tapestry a bared sword is held, the 
 point upwards, before Harold at his crowning, and 
 in the so-called " coronation of St. Edmund " in 
 Captain Holford's MS. of the nth Century'' we 
 are distinctly shown a bared sword on each side of 
 the King, resting on the shoulder of its bearer. 
 
 As the right to bear these swords was somewhat 
 keenly contested, and was at times alleged to be 
 hereditary and at others claimed by tenure, they 
 are entitled to a place in these pages. 
 
 It is shown by an entry on the Pipe Rolls that 
 the swords were used in 1 1 70 at the coronation of 
 
 ' There is, in Waurin's Chronicle, a very curious statement that over 
 the corpse of Henry V, when brought home in state to England, " in 
 passing through the large towns, there was carried aloft over the chariot 
 a rich canopy of silk, like that which is usually borne above the holy 
 Sacrament. " This may point to the use of a canopy as marking the 
 sacrosanct status of the Sovereign. 
 
 ' It is styled " an eleventh century MS. " on the illustration of this 
 scene in Mr. Legg's English Coronation Records, but in the " Notes on the 
 Illustrations" (p. 385) itisspoken of as " this twelfth century Manuscript." 
 Mr. St. John Hope, however, in his paper on " The King's Coronation 
 ornaments " {Ancestor, No. i.), gives it as illustrating a coronation temp. 
 William the Conqueror " and speaks of it in his text (p. 1 30) as " nearly 
 contemporary with the Bayeux Tapestry. " 
 
 22 
 
338 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Henry's son, Henry the young king. "^^ In 1172 
 the Pipe Roll contains a charge for cleaning and 
 adorning " the king's swords, " which are possibly 
 the same, ^ and in 1188 the sheriff of Hampshire 
 charges three shillings " pro gladiis thesauri fur- 
 biandis. " * These treasury swords were clearly 
 those we are dealing with, still preserved in the 
 old treasury at Winchester. For, a year later, at 
 the coronation of Richard I, Hoveden styles them 
 " tres gladios regios sumptos de thesauro regis ". 
 They were clearly among the regalia, and had 
 scabbards covered with gold. * 
 
 He tells us that the middle sword was carried 
 by John, Count of Mortain (the King's brother), 
 and those on each side of it by David, earl of 
 Huntingdon, brother to the Scottish King, and 
 Robert, Earl of Leicester. ® These are great names 
 and imply the honour of the post. 
 
 It is usual, in tracing coronation practice, to pass 
 from the first great precedent, that of Richard I 
 (1189), to the second, that of Queen Eleanor in 
 1236. * But, in this one matter of the swords, the 
 second crowning, or quasi-crowning, of Richard 
 (11 94) is, it appears to me, of very great im- 
 
 ' " Et pro auro.... ad reparandos enses ad Coronamentum Regis" (filii 
 Regis). Pipe Roll, i6 Hen. II, p. 1 6. 
 
 ' " pro gladiis Regis furbandis (jic) et pro auro ad eosdem adornandos ; 
 et ad puntos et heltos eorundem gladiorum " (p. 1 14). This may have 
 been for the young king's re-coronation at Winchester (27 August, 
 1 172), which is mentioned on the same page. 
 
 ' Eyton, p. 291. 
 
 ' " quorum vagine desuper per totum auro contexte erant. " 
 
 ^ It has been suggested that Earl Robert may have borne a sword as 
 steward (see p. 71 above). 
 
 * Mr. Legg does so in the case of the swords {Op. cit. p. Ixxiii). 
 Mr. WoUaston begins his precedents throughout in 1377. 
 
THE CORONATION SWORDS 339 
 
 portance. Indeed, without it we cannot under- 
 stand the keen dispute on the subject in 1236. 
 Hoveden tells us that the three swords were borne 
 on that occasion by the King of Scots, with the 
 chief sword, Hamelin, Earl Warenne (/. e. of 
 Surrey), and Ranulf, earl of Chester. ^ The King 
 of Scots thus replaced his younger brother David 
 (to whom he is said to have handed over the 
 earldom of Huntingdon), and probably bore the 
 chief sword as being himself a king. Earl Hamelin 
 was the King's uncle ^ and had been loyal to his 
 cause. The mention of the Earl of Chester is of 
 special importance, because it gives us, in my opin- 
 ion, the origin of the later Lancaster claim to bear 
 " Curtana. " There is no contemporary authority 
 for the earl taking part in the first coronation 
 (i 189). ' Perhaps he was a minor or passed over 
 in favour of the Count of Mortain, who was now 
 (1194) in disgrace. We cannot tell if he owed 
 the honour in 1 194 to his recent exploits on behalf 
 of Richard against that rebel Count or — which is 
 a tempting view — to his tenure of the greatest of 
 English palatinates. * 
 
 At the Coronation of Queen Eleanor in 1236 
 
 ' " Et tres gladio de thesauro regis sumpti gestabantur ante regem, 
 quorum unum gestabat Willelmus rex Scottorum, et alterum portabat 
 Hamelinus comes de Warenna, et tertium gestabat Ranulfus comes 
 Cestrise ; medius autem illorum ibat rex Scottorum, et comes Warennae a 
 dextris ejus, et comes Cestriae a sinistris ejus " (III, 247). The repeated 
 phrase " glaidii dethesauro " should be obs erved. 
 
 ' As a natural son of Geoffrey of Anjou. 
 
 ^ iSee my life of him in the Diet. Nat. Biogr. (under Blundeville). 
 
 * It is worth noting that Gervase of Canterbury writes as if the 
 nobler and greater English earls were the bearers : — " Tres vero 
 coniites nobiliores Angliae portaverunt tres gladios in vaginis aureis " 
 (I, 526). 
 
340 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 We again read of the three swords ; but the right 
 to bear them was in dispute. John, son of earl 
 David (mentioned above), claimed to carry one of 
 them as earl of Huntingdon and also the one called 
 ' Curtana ' * as, in right of his mother, earl of 
 Chester, and the latter claim was allowed. ^ We 
 have now seen that his uncle, earl Ranulf, had 
 actually borne the sword in 1 1 94. But earl Warenne 
 we learn, claimed one of the swords. This also can 
 now be accounted for by the fact that his father 
 had borne one in 1 1 94. The King, it is added, 
 to avoid a tumult, postponed the settlement ' of 
 the dispute and decided that, without prejudice to 
 either, the Earl of Lincoln (John de Laci) should 
 carry one of the swords on that occasion (ea die). * 
 The third sword was then allotted to Thomas (de 
 Newburgh), earl of Warwick, who claimed it as 
 his right. * 
 
 As I understand this arrangement, the earl of 
 Lincoln merely officiated as appointed for that 
 occasion by the King. The hereditary claims were 
 four : viz. the earl of (i) Chester and (2) Hunting- 
 
 ' This appears to be the first mention of the name. 
 
 ' " Comite Cestrise gladium S. Edwardi qui ' Curtein ' dicitur ante 
 legem bajulante, in signum quod comes est palatii, et regem, si oberret, 
 habeat de jure postestatem cohibendi " (M. Paris). The mention of 
 the sword as ' St. Edward's ' and the statement of the earl's right (as 
 Palatine) and powers are very noteworthy. 
 
 ' " Rege instante, quievit contentio usque ad praedictum terminum 
 (Quindenam Paschas sequentem), ne oriretur tumultus " {Lib. Rub., 
 
 P-7S6-) 
 
 * I do not gather that the earl claimed this as a right, but his wife 
 was a niece and junior coheir of the earl of Chester who had borne a 
 sword in 1 1 94. 
 
 ' "Tertium vero gladium gestavit Thomas, Comes de Warewic, suo, ut 
 dicebatur, jure " {Lib. Rub. p. 756.) 
 
THE CORONATION SWORDS 341 
 
 don to two swords ; the earl (3) Warenne (of Surrey) 
 to one ; and the earl of (4) Warwick, to the third 
 sword. This seems to be the origin of the state- 
 ment in the Liber Regalis that the three earls who 
 should bear the swords are : — 
 
 Comes quidem Cestrie qui primatum vendicat deferendi 
 portabit gladium qui vocatur curtana. ^ Et alium portabit 
 comes Huntyngdoun.Tercium vero portabit Comes Ware- 
 wyk. * 
 
 Now the interest of this statement is that it does 
 not correspond with the facts at any known coron- 
 ation. It appears to recognise the claim of the 
 earl of Chester and Huntingdon (in 1236) to two 
 of the swords, as if that of the Earl ' of Warenne ' 
 had been subsequently disallowed, and it ignores 
 the earl of Lincoln, who officiated in 1236, and 
 whose successor officiated in 1308 (see below). 
 It cannot represent the intervening coronation of 
 Edward I (1274), for the earldoms of Chester and 
 Huntingdon were then, if anywhere, in the Crown. 
 On the whole, it appears to me to be based, as I 
 suggested, on Queen Eleanor's Coronation (1236). 
 For the coronation of Edward II (1308) we 
 have record evidence that the three bearers were 
 " the earls of Lancastre, Lincoln, and Warwyk, 
 carrying three swords, and the sword called Curtana 
 was carried by the earl of Lancastre. " * The earl 
 of Warwick, * it will be seen, again carried the 
 
 ' This is actually the same phrase as that in the record of Queen 
 Eleanor's coronation : — " vendicavit primatum deferendi gladium qui 
 appellatur Curtana. " 
 
 ' Legg, op. cit. p. 85. The Earl of Warwick's claim is practically the 
 same as in 1 2 36 (see note above). 
 
 ^ Cal. of Chse Rolls, 1307-13 13, p. 53. 
 
 ' Now a Beauchamp, inheriting from Newburgh through Mauduit. 
 
342 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 third sword ; there was no earl of Huntingdon to 
 claim the second, which was obtained by the grand- 
 son of that earl who had borne it in 1236,^ and 
 the principal sword is now carried by the King's 
 cousin, the earl of Lancaster. Why ? the explan- 
 ation, I think, is that, the earldom of Chester having 
 been annexed to the Crown in 1 246 and granted 
 to the future Edward I in 1254, the right to bear 
 " Curtana " was held to have passed with it, and 
 was made over to Edward's younger brother, 
 Edmund, earl of Lancaster, * I have been thus 
 particular in setting forth the facts because they 
 are somewhat inaccurately stated in Mr. Legg's 
 " Introduction. " We there (p. Ixxiii) read, af 
 the sword Curtana, that at Edward II's coronation 
 it was given to the Duke {sic) of Lancaster, although 
 there were then no dukes, while his own foot-note 
 has " portabat Comes Lancastria ". We further 
 read, of the second sword, that it was carried " at 
 the coronation of Queen Eleanor in 1236 by the 
 King of Scots as Earl of Huntingdon, " although 
 the King was neither present nor earl of Hunting- 
 don, while the actual bearer was the earl of Lin- 
 coln ! 
 
 For the coronation of Richard II we have the 
 record of the Court of Claims, so that our inform- 
 ation is exceptionally complete. John of Gaunt, 
 who, as High Steward, presided over the Court, 
 claimed for himself, as Duke of Lancaster, the 
 right to carry " Curtana." His claim was allowed 
 
 ' The earl Warenne is ignored. 
 
 ' He may well have borne the sword at his brother's coronation 
 (1274). 
 
THE CORONATION SWORDS 343 
 
 as tenant by the curtesy of England,^ and he bore 
 the sword till other duties made him hand it over 
 to his son (afterwards Henry IV) as his deputy. 
 The earl of Warwick claimed and obtained the 
 third sword " come ses Auncestres as coronementz 
 des Rois Dengleterre ont porte la tierce espie." 
 There remained the second of the swords. Had 
 there been an earl of Lincoln, he would doubtless 
 have claimed it ; but if that earldom then existed, 
 it was in John of Gaunt, who had already more to 
 do than he could manage.* Of the two com- 
 petitors for this sword the claims, at first sight, 
 puzzle us. John, the infant son and heir of John 
 (Hastings), earl of Pembroke, claimed the right, 
 in virtue of his tenure ' of Pembroke castle and 
 other lands. And Richard, earl of Arundel and 
 Surrey claimed it as that " que lui appartient de 
 droit pur le Counte de Surrey.* From what we 
 have seen above it is clear that this claim was a 
 revival of that by earl Warenne (of Surrey) in 
 1236.* The earl's claim was disallowed, but we 
 meet with it again, in later days, at the coronation 
 of Charles II. As for the Hastings claim, I find 
 its explanation in the extraordinary return made in 
 1325 on the death of his predecessor Aymer (de 
 
 ' He seems to have deemed the earldom of Lancaster as represented 
 for this purpose by the Dukedom. 
 
 * He had successfully claimed, as Earl of Lincoln, to be carver. 
 
 ' " Come il tient. " He was not technically their holder, not having 
 had seisin. 
 
 * It should be observed that this claim is precisely parallel to the earl's 
 claim on the same occasion to the office of Chief Butler " pur le Counte 
 Darundell." 
 
 ' See p. 340. 
 
344 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Valence), earl of Pembroke/ that " the county " 
 (? comitatus) of Pembroke was held of the King by- 
 service of carrying the {sic) king's sword before 
 the King on the day of his coronation," which 
 county included the town, castle and Hundred of 
 Pembroke, the town and castle of Tenby, etc. etc.* 
 Here we have the same allegation as that made 
 before the Court of Claims 1377. Its origin I 
 will not guess. 
 
 The next coronation was that of Henry IV. in 
 1 399. Henry, we have seen, had borne " Curtana," 
 part of the time, as his father's deputy in 1 377. 
 He now made his own son, Henry, Duke of Lan- 
 caster,^ his deputy for the purpose. The third 
 sword was again allowed to the earl of Warwick. 
 For the second there was a fresh dispute. It was 
 claimed by Lord Grey de Ruthyn, who was heir 
 of the whole blood to John Hastings, but who did 
 not inherit Pembroke castle ' etc. in virtue of the 
 tenure of which the claim had alone been made. 
 His claim, therefore, was disallowed. The success- 
 ful claimant was a mighty man, Henry, Earl of 
 Northumberland, to whom the new King had 
 largely owed his crown, and who, with other re- 
 wards, received the Isle of Man — 
 
 by the service of carrying at the left shoulder of the king 
 or his heirs on the day of coronation the sword called 
 " Lancastre sword, " with which the King was girt when 
 he put into the parts of Holdernesse. * 
 
 ' John Hastings was his youngest coheir. 
 ' Cal. oflnq. VI. p. 333. 
 
 • This had passed to the Crown at John's death. 
 
 * Cal. of Pat. Rolls. 1 399-1401. p. 27. The actual patent is dated 
 six days after the Coronation, though the claim was made' before it. 
 
THE CORONATION SWORDS 345 
 
 It might be supposed that this sword would be 
 borne in addition to the three which had been 
 borne till then ; but the record of the Court of 
 Claims shows that it was one of the three which 
 were allowed. Moreover, Waurin tells us that 
 Henry at his Coronation " had on either side the 
 sword of the church, and the sword of justice .... 
 and the sword of the church was borne by Sir 
 Henry de Percy, Earl of Northumberland." Now 
 we know that at the Coronation of Richard III 
 (1485) the sword borne on the left of the King 
 was that of " Justice to the Clergy " and we may, 
 therefore, infer that the " Sword of the Church " 
 borne by the earl in 1399 was borne " at the left 
 shoulder of the King " as required by the grant, in 
 the old position of one of the three swords. 
 
 The contest on that occasion appears to have 
 been the last, save for one or two stray claims ; but 
 one notes that in 1485 " the second sword" was 
 borne by the Earl of Kent, who was Lord Grey 
 de Ruthyn. 
 
 The claim of Lord Hastings to carry " the 
 second sword " at the coronations of Edward VII 
 and George V, it is now decided by the Court, 
 " has not been established. " ' This, it will have 
 been seen, was clearly right. For the successful 
 claim in 1377, on which reliance was placed, was 
 made solely in respect of tenure of Pembroke 
 Castle etc. and was derived, I have shown, not from 
 the Hastings family, but from the Earls of Pem- 
 broke. Indeed one does not see why this claim 
 should have been mixed up with that to carry 
 
 ' Morning Post tepoTt, 28 Jan. 191 1. 
 
346 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 the spurs, for the two petitions were entirely 
 distinct in 1 377. 
 
 With regard to Lord Huntingdon's petition and 
 claim to carry the Sword of State at the Coronation 
 of the late King, this Sword had been always 
 separate from the three coronation swords. It 
 appears to have been based upon the fact that earls 
 of Huntingdon, his predecessors, but not his an- 
 cestors, ^ had been selected for that honour at the 
 coronations of George II and George III. These, 
 at least, are the only actual precedents vouched in 
 the petition. It is extremely difficult, in this case, 
 to ascertain the facts. According to Bell's Hun- 
 tingdon Peerage (1821), the seventh earl, " as lineal 
 descendant {sic) of the Beauchamps, Earls of War- 
 wick, preferred his claim to the honour of carrying 
 the third sword, and of being Pantler, * at the 
 Coronation" of James II (p. 139), and his son, 
 the 9 th earl, " carried the sword of state, an 
 honour now considered established as a prescriptive 
 and hereditary right, " at that of George II (p. 145). 
 According, however, to Doyle's Official Baronage 
 it was at the coronations of George I and George III 
 that the earls bore " the sword of state. " Lastly, 
 the Complete Peerage asserts that the earls bore 
 " the third {sic) sword of state " at the coronations 
 of George I, George II, and George III. 
 
 It was formerly with ' the Sword of State ' that 
 the King was solemnly girt ; but now " the Lord 
 who carries the Sword of State, delivering to the 
 
 ' The earl of 1727 was erroneously styled in the petition "your 
 petitioner's ancestor. " 
 
 ' See p. 341 above, and the section on * The King's Pantler.' 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 347 
 
 Lord Chamberlain the said Sword... shall receive 
 from the Lord Chamberlain, in lieu thereof, an- 
 other sword in a scabbard of purple velvet, provided 
 for the King to be girt withal ". ^ 
 
 THE GREAT SPURS 
 
 Although the office (or alleged office) of carry- 
 ing the great (or gilt) spurs in the coronation 
 procession is neither held by serjeanty, nor is among 
 the offices of state, it is sufficiently akin thereto to 
 deserve inclusion here. 
 
 It is, of course, a well-known fact that the 
 coronation ceremony and the coronation ornaments 
 are survivals from a very distant past, and are rich 
 in symbolical meaning. But, although so much 
 has been written on the subject, the point usually 
 emphasised is the consecration of the King in his 
 ecclesiastical capacity. ^ Mr. St. John Hope, for 
 instance, in his most valuable papers on " the king's 
 coronation ornaments, " * observes at the outset 
 that 
 
 The ornaments which are put upon the king at his 
 coronation have likewise from a very early date been of a 
 peculiar character, closely resembling those anciently put 
 
 upon a bishop at the time of his consecration The 
 
 coronation order has also a striking resemblance to the 
 order for the consecration of a bishop, * 
 
 But he makes no mention of another striking 
 parallel, which seems, although of no less interest, 
 
 ' 'Form and Order' (191 1). 
 
 * See Legg's English Coronation Records, pp. xvi-xviii. 
 ' The Ancestor (1902), Nos. i and 2. 
 
 * Ibid. No. I, p. 127. 
 
348 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 to have been generally overlooked. I refer to that 
 portion of the ceremony which corresponds with 
 the creation of a mediseval knight. 
 
 This portion is numbered IX in the oiBcial 
 ' Form and Order ' of the coronation service (i 91 1) 
 and is headed " The Presenting of the Spurs and 
 Sword, and the Girding and Oblation of the said 
 Sword. " 
 
 It has, indeed, been vaguely recognised that the 
 spurs are the emblems of knighthood, ^ but they 
 only are so, it must be remembered, because they 
 are gt/t spurs. To cite Ducange : — 
 
 Calcarea aurea militum propria erant, cum enim armis 
 
 accingebantur, ipsorum pedibus aptabantur Calcarea 
 
 argentea scutiferorum erant. 
 
 Of such antiquity is this distinction that he quotes 
 the case of Bernard, King of Italy, son of Pepin, 
 who was formally given the gilt spurs, ^ while 
 Geoffrey ' Plantagenet ' of Anjou, when knighted 
 by our own King Henry I in 1 127, had gold spurs 
 bound upon his feet. ' It was from this distinction 
 that the knight in later times was styled egues 
 auratus. It may be that the presence of the spurs 
 among the English regalia was an imitation of the 
 practice in France, where the spurs similarly 
 figured in the coronation procession and were 
 known as " the spurs of Charlemagne. " * They 
 are, it seems, first heard of at the coronation of 
 Richard I, that knight-errant of chivalry, when 
 
 ' The idea survives in the phrase that a man has ' won his spurs.' 
 ' " Bernardi pedibus ita calceatis aurata induerunt calcaria." 
 ^ "Calcaribus aureis pedes ejus astricti sunt." (John of Marmoutier). 
 * In England they were styled at one time " the spurs of St. Edward. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 349 
 
 they were borne in the procession by John the 
 ' master ' Marshal.^ Under his successor, Mr. Hope 
 has shown, they are nanjed among the regalia in 
 1203 and 1207 and are described in the latter year 
 as of gold {aurea) . * A fresh pair of golden spurs 
 was made for the coronation at Westminster, in 
 1220, of the youthful Henry III, at the cost of 
 5^6.13.4, and given by him towards the building of 
 the new chapel of St. Mary there. 
 
 It is not, however, on the spurs alone that the 
 parallel with knighthood rests, although it has 
 been so supposed. I claim the sword with which 
 the King is girt as in truth the sword of knight- 
 hood. This, indeed, is not the meaning which is 
 usually assigned to it, but ' belting ' with the sword 
 of knighthood * was no less essential to the knight 
 than his investiture with the gilt spurs. * Perhaps 
 it is not generally known that even at so recent a 
 date as 1837, when the last " writ of right " was 
 tried and the procedure of the ' Grand Assize ' * 
 followed, the " four knights " required by it, to 
 choose the twelve " recognitors, " ^ " appeared in 
 
 court, each girt with a sword The attendance 
 
 of the four knights girt with swords is indispensably 
 
 ' See below. 
 
 * The " Order of the Golden Spur " is still among the distinctions 
 conferred by the Pope. 
 
 ' Cingu/us (or balteus) militaris. 
 
 * William of Malmesbury makes Alfred confer knighthood on 
 ^thelstan by investing him "chlamyde coccinea, gemmato balteo, ense 
 saxonico cum vagina aurea," which shews at least what the chronicler 
 considered to have been essential. All the things he mentions are 
 included in the coronation ritual. 
 
 ' Instituted by Henry II. 
 
 ° " per quatuor legales mUites de comitatu et de visineto eligantur 
 duodecim milites," etc. Glanvill. 
 
3 so CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 necessary, " ^— or that, at least as late as 1868, 
 newly-elected knights of the shire were still, as 
 such, girt with the sword. * 
 
 The reason why the girding or " belting " with 
 the sword has not been recognised, in this case, as 
 emblematic of knighthood is, no doubt, that it was 
 also, an essential element in the creation or in- 
 vestiture of an earl, both in England and in Scot- 
 land, from very remote times. ^ It was not, 
 therefore, so distinctive of knighthood as were the 
 gilt spurs. But that the sword and spurs were 
 indissolubly connected is particularly well seen in 
 the ancient English ceremonial for creating knights 
 of the Bath. High above those modern distinctions 
 that are now so freely scattered there stands, still 
 unsullied, that " Most Honourable Order, " which 
 wealth cannot purchase or the trade of politics 
 procure. The gilt spurs of its Knight Commanders 
 testify to its mediaeval origin, even as its ancient 
 device takes us back to days when religious ritual 
 and the mystic bath proclaimed that high ideal of 
 the knight, on his creation, riding forth to war 
 for God and for the right. It was one of the 
 essential ceremonies at the crowning of an English 
 king that he should create Knights of the Bath, 
 and the culminating act of that creation was when 
 in front of the neophyte, as he rode to receive the 
 
 ' As a matter of fact, two of them were baronets. See the news- 
 paper report quoted in Pixley's Itistory Oj the Baronetage, p. 233. 
 
 ^ The repeated insistence of the Crown, in the 14th century, that 
 the knights of the shire should be real knights, " milites gladiis cinctos, " 
 and the difficulty of enforcing this condition, will be found dealt with 
 by Stubbs in Const. Hist. (1878) III, 397-402. 
 
 ' It was afterwards extended to Marquessates and Dukedoms when 
 these dignities were introduced. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 351 
 
 honour, there were brought and presented to the 
 king the spurs hanging on the sword. The order 
 prescribed was this : — 
 
 And there must b6 provided a young Esquire, court- 
 eous, who shall ride before the Esquire, bareheaded, and 
 carry the Esquire's sword, with the spurs hanging at the 
 
 handle of the sword And the youth shall hold the 
 
 sword by the point and so soon as they come before 
 
 the hall dore, the Marshalls and Huishers ^ are to be 
 ready to meet him, and desire him alight : and, being 
 alighted, the Marshall shall take the horse for his fee, 
 or else c s. 
 
 And when the King is come into the hall he shall 
 
 aske for the swotd and spurs, which the chamberlain 
 shall take from the youth, and shew to the King ; and 
 thereupon the King, taking the right spur, shall deliver 
 it to the most noble and gentile person there ; and shall 
 say to him : ' Put this upon the Esquire's heel ; ' and he 
 kneeling on one knee, must take the esquire by the right 
 leg, and putting his foot on his own knee, is to fasten 
 the spur upon the right heel of the Esquire ; and then, 
 making a cross upon the Esquire's knee, shall kiss him ; 
 which being done, another knight must come and put on 
 his left spur in like manner. And then shall the King, 
 of his great favour, take the sword and gird the Esquire 
 
 therewith And the King, putting his own armes about 
 
 the Esquire's neck, say : ' Be thou a good knight, ' and 
 afterwards kiss him. 
 
 The new knight is then led to the altar, where 
 he kneels with his right hand on the altar and 
 promises to maintain the rights of Holy Church. 
 
 And then he shall ungird himself of his sword, and 
 with great devotion to God and Holy Church, offer it 
 there, praying unto God and all his saints that he may 
 
 ' See p. 83 above. 
 
352 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 keep that order which he hath so taken, even to the end.-' 
 
 The swords thus offered up in theking's chapel 
 were, in prosaic practice, the fee of the Dean of 
 Chapel {Liber Niger Domus, Edw. IV). 
 
 That this ceremony was actually performed, in 
 the case at least of the spurs, is proved by the nar- 
 rative of the knighting of the young Duke of 
 Buckingham by Henry VII at his accession. 
 
 The same day (28 October, 1485) before dinner the 
 banes ' (sic) was prepared in a great Chamber in the 
 
 as of old tyme hath bene accustomed, and when it 
 
 was night, the King himself of his benigne goodnes, nobly 
 accompanied with the Duke of Bedford, the Earle of 
 Oxford, the E. of Derby, the E. of Devon, with many 
 other Noble Lords, Knights, and Esquires... them in the 
 bayne (sic) the advertisement of the order of knighthood 
 and after him other Lords and Estates, etc. On Saturday 
 when the Esquires which had been in the baynes and a,fter 
 other observants (sic) as of old tyme accostomed were 
 come into the Hall, the King in a rich gowne entred 
 into the Hall and stood under the Cloth of Estate, to 
 whom the Duke of Buck : was presented by two Estates, 
 and the Henchmen that bare the Sword and the Spurs 
 presented them to the Earl of Oxford. And he tooke 
 the right spur and presented it to the King, and the King 
 tooke it to the Duke of Bedford commanding him to putt 
 it upon the Duke of Buck : heel of his right legg, and in 
 likewyse the Earle of Darby the left spurre, and the King 
 girt the sword about him and dubbed him Knight. ' 
 
 Here the King chooses his own uncle, the newly- 
 created Duke of Bedford, and the newly-created 
 
 ' From " The order and manner of creating Knights of the Bath in 
 the time of peace, according to the custom of England, " printed in 
 Dugdale's Warwickshire (1730), p. 708. 
 
 ' i.e. the baths {bains). 
 
 ' State Papers (Domestic J, vol. 8. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 353 
 
 Earl of Derby, to whom he chiefly owed his 
 throne, as the noblest persons present, to place the 
 spurs upon the duke's feet. It is remarkable that, 
 although the spurs were eventually fastened to the 
 King's feet by the Lord Great Chamberlain, yet, at 
 our earliest example, the coronation of Richard I, 
 the office was performed by " two earls." ^ 
 
 Now if the creation of a Knight of the Bath be 
 compared with the coronation of the sovereign, we 
 observe a parallel procedure. 
 
 THE KNIGHT THE KING 
 
 (i) is invested with the (i) is invested with the 
 
 spurs. spurs. 
 
 (2) is, immediately after- (2) is, immediately after- 
 wards, belted with wards, belted vdth 
 the sword. the sword. 
 
 (3) subsequently ungirds (3) subsequently ungirds 
 the sword. the sword. 
 
 (4) offers the sword upon (4) offersthe sword upon 
 the altar. the altar. 
 
 Mr. Legg's description runs thus : — 
 
 Over the supertunica is put the girdle or swordbelt ^ so 
 that the sword may be put on. The sword is that which 
 is known as the sword of state, which is carried in the 
 procession and laid upon the altar. It is now blessed by 
 the Archbishop with the prayer Exaudi quiesumus Domine. . . 
 
 ' " Deinde duo comites calciaverunt ei calcaria qux Johannes mares- 
 allus portaverat." 
 
 ' Mr. St. John Hope, at the outset of his monograph, claims the 
 girdle as part of the bishop's gear, observing that a * belt or girdle ' was 
 put upon the Kling as upon a Bishop (p. 1 27), but on p. 1 50 he speaks 
 of " the sword and its girdle " as put upon the King, which is, clearly, 
 the right view. The jewelled belt' (balteus) was among the regalia. 
 
 23 
 
354 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 The sword is then taken from the altar and brought by 
 the bishops and given into the King's hands. 
 
 The Lord Great Chamberlain girds the King with it, 
 while the Archbishop says Accipe gladium per episcopos (p. 
 
 xli) ^ the King ungirded his sword, and went to the 
 
 altar, where he offered the sword (p. li.) ^ 
 
 I have quoted Mr. Legg's version of the ritual 
 that I may not be supposed to have adapted it to 
 my theory. Should it be objected that the sword 
 of knighthood is conferred by the Primate, this, one 
 replies, is but a survival of a very early practice ; 
 William Rufus had received knighthood at the 
 hands of Archbishop Lanfranc,' and so had Henry I 
 in 1086.* 
 
 The point, however, that I wish to make is that 
 the spurs, the gilt spurs,* though the most distinct- 
 ive emblems, were not the only emblems of the 
 King's investiture as a knight. One cannot sepa- 
 rate the sword and spurs. Even in the days when 
 ' the Gothic revival ' flourished with the side- 
 whisker they were still deemed essential to the 
 dignity of a golden knight {eques auratus) . 
 
 In 1836 that egregious person Mr. Richard 
 Broun claimed the right to be knighted as the eldest 
 
 ' The full prayer was : " Accipe hunc gladium tibi conlatum in quo 
 per virtutem spiritus sancti resistere et ejicere omnes inimicos tuos valeas 
 et cunctos sancte Dei ecclesie adversaries regnumque tibi commissuta 
 tutari atque protegere castra Dei per auxilium," etc. 
 
 ' " super altare deo offerat " {Liier Regalis). 
 
 ' " Eum militem fecerat." (Will. Malms.) 
 
 ' " Hunc Lanfrancus, dum juvenile robur attingere vidit, ad arma pro 
 
 defensione regni sustulit, eique, ut Regis filio et in regali stemmate 
 
 nato, militia dngulum in nomine Dei cinxit " {Ord. Fit.). 
 
 ' Giltspur Street, London, preserves their name, and a pair of gilt 
 spurs was a frequent render for land in the Middle Ages. For this 
 purpose they were valued in 1 1 97 (according to the Pipe Roll of 9 Ric. I.) 
 as the equivalent of sixpence. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 355 
 
 son of a baronet. ^ An official refusal, grimly 
 referring to his " alleged ancestor, " did not dis- 
 concert him. The ' Committee of the Baronetage 
 for privileges, ' of which he was honorary secretary, 
 was at length stirred to action ; in 1842 they 
 claimed that the eldest sons of baronets were enti- 
 tled to " be inaugurated knights [Equites Aurati), " 
 and Mr. Broun was " required, " as " a knight de 
 Jure, as the eldest son of a Member of the Order of 
 ancient creation, " to " vindicate this fundamental 
 
 and unalienable privilege by henceforth using, 
 
 taking, and enjoying the ancient chivalrous dignity 
 of a knight {Eques Auratus). " Mr. Broun was 
 not reluctant. He at once " formally assumed 
 knighthood, throwing the responsibility of his 
 doing so upon the Lord Chamberlain and the Prime 
 Minister who sanctioned the Lord Chamberlain's 
 conduct. " In the full flush of his new dignity, he 
 compiled an account of his family, the following 
 year, as " Sir Richard Broun, Eq[ues] Aur[atus], 
 K. J. J., * hon. sec. of the Committee of the 
 Baronetage for Privileges. " He had also produced 
 a pamphlet on " British and Continental titles of 
 honour, " which Mr. Pixley treats as anonymous, 
 
 ' His father, a Dumfries solicitor, had assumed the baronetcy of 
 Brown of Coulston (1686) in or after 1826. 
 
 ' These mystic letters stand for Knight of St. John of Jerusalem. 
 Kemble, the historian, wrote in language of not unnatural scorn, in his 
 preface to Larking's *' Knights Hospitallers in England" (1847): — 
 " Least of all shall I vouchsafe a word either of ridicule or indignation 
 upon a number of persons whom one meets with in various European 
 Courts ; and who are Knights of St. John of Jerusalem by virtue of a 
 white cross upon a black coat, and the nomination of some lung or other, 
 who claims to be Grandmaster of a non-existent order, which once was 
 a great truth, and not a sham and a matter of ribbons. " (p. xiii). But 
 the title doubtless appealed to Mr. Broun's chivalric soul. 
 
356 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 but the authorship of which is betrayed by its 
 insistence on the nobility and antiquity of the house 
 of Broun. Grateful for his vindication of their 
 rights and of his " natitial dignity, " the, baronets' 
 committee resolved to present to "Sir Richard 
 Broun " the " insignia appertaining to the degree 
 of Eques Auratus, " including, of course, the spurs. 
 They comprised also a sword and ring and, actually, 
 " a golden collar of S.S " ! Mr. Pixley candidly 
 admits that the right to this collar is " exceedingly 
 doubtful. " ' 
 
 The reason for insisting on the close connection 
 of the gilt spurs with knighthood is that it seems 
 to me to offer a possible explanation of their being 
 borne in the procession, when we first hear of them, 
 by the Marshal. The Court of Claims which sat 
 in 1 90 1-2, after hearing three conflicting claims, 
 arrived, if I may say so, at the perfectly proper 
 decision that 
 
 Because no sufficient evidence has been adduced as to. 
 the nature of the said office or hereditary privilege, there- 
 fore the court considers and adjudges that no one of the 
 said petitioners has established a claim to perform the said 
 service on the day of their Majesties' Coronation. 
 
 It is a most extraordinary fact that, according 
 to Mr. WoUaston's report, ^ the all-important 
 evidence that the spurs were carried by John the 
 Marshal at the coronation of Richard I, when they 
 are first mentioned, was not brought before the 
 court. 
 
 On that occasion, and again in 191 1, there were 
 
 ' See, for this Broun episode, Pixley's History of the Baronetage. 
 ' The Court of Claims : cases and evidence (1903). 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 357 
 
 three claims to carry the spurs in the coronation 
 procession. Although the whole matter is clear 
 enough to an expert, it is exceedingly difficult to 
 convey clearly to the reader what were the questions 
 at issue. The starting point for all three claims ^ 
 was the record of the first Court of Claims in 1377, 
 It was admitted by that Court that John de Has- 
 tings, then a minor, son of the deceased John de 
 Hastings, who was Lord de Hastings and Earl of 
 Pembroke, was entitled " of right " to carry the 
 spurs. Had he left lineal heirs, they would pro- 
 bably have had their right recognised, without 
 dispute, ever after. He was, however, slain at a 
 tournament, still a minor and without issue, twelve 
 years later. There thus arose a question, at that 
 time not unfrequent, as to who were his right 
 heirs. But here we are only concerned with his 
 right to bear the spurs. Broadly speaking, the 
 point to be decided, in 1901-2 and again in 191 1 
 — p-if the Court was prepared, as apparently it was, 
 to investigate the question de novo without being 
 bound by the precedents, — was whether he derived 
 that right through his great-great-grandfather, 
 John, Lord Hastings, or through that John's first 
 wife, Isabel de Valence, youngest co-heir of the 
 earls of Pembroke (through whom that earldom 
 had come to him) . In the former case, the right- 
 ful heirs would be the representatives of Sir Hugh 
 Hastings, that John's son by his second wife ; in 
 the latter case, the rightful heirs would be the 
 representatives of Elizabeth de Hastings, that John's 
 
 ' Except, it will be seen, to some extend that of Lord Grey de 
 Ruthyn. 
 
358 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 daughter by his ^rj^ wife, who married Lord Grey 
 de Ruthyn. ^ 
 
 Unfortunately, the claim made in 1 377 was not 
 in respect of either of these two descents, but was 
 based on the wholly false allegation that William 
 Marshal, who had carried the spurs at the coron- 
 ation of Edward II (1308), was the earl's "an- 
 cestor " ! It leaves us, therefore, wholly in doubt 
 as to the real source of his right, which was re- 
 cognised as based on " records and evidences. " 
 
 That the allegation was false is not a matter of 
 dispute, but I may add that the real heir of this 
 William Marshal, in 1 377, was Lord Morley, the 
 son of his daughter and sole eventual heiress, who 
 had succeeded to his office of hereditary marshal 
 of Ireland, but who made no claim to bear the 
 spurs. I would point out further that this erroneous 
 allegation is by no means so strange as counsel 
 seemed to ima,gine. On this same occasion Mar- 
 garet ' Marschall, ' as Countess of Norfolk, claimed 
 to execute the office of marshal " come Gilbert 
 Mareschall Comte de Strogoil fist as coronement 
 le Roy Henri Second, " and thereby threw the whole 
 history of the Marshalship of England into hopeless 
 confusion until I put it right by explaining that 
 the occasion when earl Gilbert officiated was at 
 the coronation of Queen Eleanor in 1236. ^ 
 
 ' I pass over the additional complication that, owing to the doctrine 
 of the half-blood then accepted, this Elizabeth and her heirs were 
 wrongly supposed, down to 1 64 1, to be entitled to the earl's barony of 
 Hastings. 
 
 ' So also, in the case of the Earls of Oxford, one of them obtained 
 the Great Chamberlainship by a demonstrably false allegation, and 
 another tried to obtain the Chamberlainship to the Queen (f . zi.) by 
 one no less false (see pp. 122, 139). 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 359 
 
 It will make the matter simpler if we begin by 
 disposing of the claim of Lord Hastings. In the 
 first place, it is difficult to understand what that 
 claim really was. Did his lordship claim as heir 
 of Sir Hugh Hastings/ or in respect of his holding 
 the dignity of Lord Hastings ? If the former, he 
 could not claim the office for himself alone, for he 
 was only the junior co-heir of the junior co-heir 
 of Sir Hugh. Yet he presented his petition "as 
 representative of and successor to his predecessor, " 
 the earl of 1377. His counsel's argument, how- 
 ever, according to Mr. Wollaston's report, was 
 based not upon heirship, but upon the allegation 
 that " The right to carry the spurs is attached to 
 the Barony of Hastings, " and that, as that barony 
 had remained dormant or in abeyance till 1841, 
 no one since 1389 had been in a position to advance 
 the claim at a coronation before. ^ 
 
 Mr. WoUaston, who ably argued the case for 
 Lord Loudoun, appears to have been as much in 
 doubt as myself as to the real basis of Lord Hastings' 
 claim. As he observed, with perfect truth : — 
 
 Lord Hastings' claim is based on suppositions which 
 are entirely contradicted by fact. He contends that the 
 right is attached to the Barony of Hastings ;... yet at the 
 Coronation of Edward II, the spurs were carried by 
 William le Marshall, and not by the second Baron 
 Hastings ' 
 
 If Lord Hastings rests his claim not on the Barony, but 
 
 ' See above. 
 
 * WoUaston, op. cit., p. 119. 
 
 ' This argument might have been strengthened by pointing out that 
 at the coronation of Richard I (then so strangely overlooked) they were 
 carried not by a Hastings, but by John the Marshal. 
 
360 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 on the ground that he is the representative of the rnale 
 line, as opposed to the female!, he is confronted with the 
 difficulty that the succession has twice gone through 
 coheirs, and that he is descended from the youngest 
 branch ; so that he cannot truly say that he is the 
 representative of the male line. ^ 
 
 Nevertheless, the claim was renewed in 1 9 1 1 
 with the same allegation that Lord Hastings was 
 " representative of " the earl of Pembroke, the 
 assertion being also made that he was " heir (not 
 ' co-heir ') of John Earl of Pembroke. " Although 
 it was not possible to produce any evidence what- 
 ever that the right was in the Hastings family, as 
 claimed, before 1313, an extraordinary pedigree 
 " was put in evidence, " ^ in which the house of 
 Hastings was traced back to the Conquest, presum- 
 ably on the supposition that this had a bearing on the 
 issue. 
 
 The beginning of this precious pedigree is enough 
 to betray its character. It starts thus : — 
 
 Robert de Hastings^ Lord of Fillongley, Portgreve of 
 Hastings, Dispensator or (sic) Steward to William the 
 Conqueror. * 
 
 On this my comment is : — that no such person as 
 Robert de Hastings was either Lord of Fillongley, 
 or ' Dispensator, ' or ' Steward ' under William the 
 Conqueror. 
 
 • Ibid., pp. 123-4. 
 
 ' It faces p. 124 of Mr. Wolkston's book. 
 
 ' Mr. Paley Baildon, reviewing Mr. WoUaston's book, observed : — 
 " In the sheet pedigree accompanying this case we are somewhat 
 surprised to see our old friend ' the Portgreve of Hastings ' sitting in his 
 wonted pride of place at the top ; we thought that he had decently 
 retired to the limbo of myths some time ago " {Ancestor, VII, 138). 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 361 
 
 Let us take the Fillongley story first. In the 
 Testa de Nevill Henry de Hastings is found holding 
 as an under-tenant a quarter of a fee in Fillongley 
 of the fief of Robert Marmion. ^ Now Marmion 
 and Beauchamp had shared between them the great 
 fief of Robert the Dispenser {Dispensator) ^ in 
 Domesday, Marmion receiving Tamworth castle as 
 the caput of his portion. Following this up, we 
 duly find half a hide in Fillongley, in 1086, held 
 by Robert ' Dispensator ' in the Warwickshire 
 portion of his fief. ' Robert, of course, was a well- 
 known man, brother to the dreaded Urse d'Abetot, 
 but, it will be seen, he is here converted into a 
 Robert " de Hastings, " with whom he had nothing 
 in the world to do, exactly as his brother Urse 
 d'Abetot has been converted into a Hanbury in 
 order to provide an ancestor for the Hanbury 
 family. * Thus was evolved the statement that 
 Robert "de Hastings" was " Dispensator or Steward 
 to William the Conqueror " ! From which state- 
 ment it is further evident that those who make it 
 imagine ' steward ' to be the meaning of ' dispen- 
 sator. ' The steward {dapifer) was, of course, 
 always and essentially distinct from the dispenser 
 {dispensator), but to those who concoct or repeat 
 pedigrees such as this they are doubtless all the same.^ 
 
 ' " De Fflungeleg de feodo Marmen H. de Hasting pro quarta parte 
 j militis " (p. 84) ; " de quarta parte unius feodi Henrici de Hastinges 
 de baronia Roberti Marmion " (p. 90). 
 
 'See my Feudal England, and compare the section on ' the king's 
 champion' (p. 381). 
 
 ' Domesday, I, 242b. 
 
 * See my Peerage and Pedigree, II, pp. 145-6. 
 
 ' It is to the credit of Dugdale that in the Hastings pedigree in his 
 Baronage (I. 574) he ignores this Robert altogether. 
 
362 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 As to Robert being " Portgreve of Hastings," 
 historians would be thankful for proof of the fact, 
 but the town, unfortunately, is one of Domesday's 
 omissions. A Robert " de Hastings " is entered as 
 a holder of two and a half hides on the abbot of 
 Fecamp's great manor of ' Rameslie ' or Brede, 
 which extended into Hastings, but his connexion 
 with other men of the name, if any, is unknown. 
 The origin of the later baronial house is still a 
 matter of speculation.^ 
 
 It seems, however, to have been overlooked that 
 there was a family of Hastings who were among 
 the chief tenants of the lords of Hastings and its 
 Rape, the Counts of Eu. In 1207 Robert de 
 Hastings was claiming against Simon de Etching- 
 ham " the stewardship of the Count of Eu's 
 Honour in the Rape of Hastings, " which, he 
 alleged, William his father had received in frank 
 marriage with Yda, daughter of the Count of Eu.^ 
 This Robert was holding seven knight's fees of the 
 Count in 1212.^ William the father was probably 
 son of Robert de Hastings, who held in 1 1 66 half 
 a fee (of the new feoffment) under the count * and 
 who seems to have been, with the counts, a bene- 
 factor to the abbey of Foucarmont.^ He also 
 appears, under Sussex, on the Pipe Roll of 1168 
 
 ' Mr. G. T. Clark professed to have solved the problem in his paper 
 on "The Rise and Race of Hastings" {Jrci. younliSeg], Vol. XXVI), 
 but his conclusions, as on some other matters, do not inspire conviction. 
 Indeed, I have torn his theory to pieces {Ancestor, No. 2, pp. 91-z). 
 
 * Rot. de Fin. (9 John), p. 376. 
 
 ^ Lii. Rui)., -pTp. 554,623. They were held by a later Robert in 
 1242-3 (Testa, p. 223). 
 
 * Hid., p. 203. 
 
 * See my Calendar of Documents preserved in France, No. 186. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 363 
 
 (pp. 195, 197). And he, again, may have been 
 the son of that WilHam de Hastings who is found, 
 with tenants of the Count of Eu, attesting charters 
 of Henry I in 1 1 30-1 131/ EarHer still (i 107- 
 1 1 1 6) there was Enguerrand [Ingelrannus) de 
 Hastings, who is found in charters of the Counts of 
 Eu,^ and who was doubtless the ' Ingelramnus ' who 
 is found in Domesday holding of the Count at several 
 places in the Rape, especially on the manor of 
 Wilting, which is found in far later days held of 
 the house of Hastings. 
 
 To return to the pedigree ' put in evidence ' 
 before the Court of Claims, we find that Robert is 
 succeeded by Walter (j/c), " Steward to Henry I, 
 Owner of Manor of Ashill, Norfolk, by Grand 
 Serjeanty, ' to take care of the Naperie {sic) at the 
 Coronation '." The phrase is obviously derived 
 from Dugdale, ^ who, however, gives the man's 
 name as ' William '. ' Walter ', indeed, fulfils the 
 function of a marked coin, for it proves that the 
 compilers of this pedigree cannot even have gone 
 to Dugdale, but must have reproduced his state- 
 ment through the medium of Burke s Peerage, 
 where ' Walter ' is carelessly given for ' William '. 
 Moreover, the ' Naperie ' business does not emerge 
 till more than a century later ! * ' Walter ' has a son 
 Hugh and grandson William, each of them, like 
 their predecessor, ' Steward to Henry I '. But the 
 last is also ' Steward to Henry II ', to whom, by 
 
 ' Ibid., Nos. 122-3. 
 
 ' Ib'td., Nos. 232, 141 7. 
 
 ' Baronage, I, 5 74, citing Glover. 
 
 * See p. 223 above. 
 
364 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 the way, in authentic records he was * Dispensator '. 
 A son of- the same name is followed by " Henry 
 Lord (sic) Hastings," who made the great match 
 with the Earl of Huntingdon's daughter, and he 
 by "Sir Henry de Hastings, ist Baron (sic) Has- 
 tings," the common ancestor of all the claimants. 
 If he was " ist Baron Hastings," how can his 
 father have been " Lord Hastings " ? And why, 
 moreover, is either of them styled ' lord ' or ' baron ', 
 when the Lord Chancellor, in the Hastings case 
 (1842), rejected even the son as a proved peer, and 
 dated the peerage from the next generation (i 290) ? ^ 
 Here we may leave this pedigree : it is always in- 
 structive to learn what lawyers mean by ' evidence '. 
 Having thus disposed of the Hastings claim, 
 which, indeed, was rejected by the Court in 191 1, 
 we may turn to that in respect of Elizabeth, Lady 
 Grey de Ruthyn,^ which was represented in 190 1-2, 
 and again in 1 9 1 1 , by two rival claimants. Lord 
 Loudoun claimed to be entitled alone, as her senior 
 co-heir, or, alternatively, to be entitled jointly with 
 her other co-heirs. Lord Grey de Ruthyn, the 
 second co-heir, claimed to be entitled solely, as 
 holder of the barony of Grey de Ruthyn, to which 
 the right, he alleged, was annexed.-' The question, 
 as between these claims, really turned on whether 
 the Court would consider itself bound by the decis- 
 ions of its predecessors in 1820 and 1831, which 
 favoured Lord Grey de Ruthyn's claim, or would 
 examine the question t:/e novo. If the latter, there 
 
 ' See my Peerage and Pedigree, I, 251-2. 
 
 ' See p. 358. 
 
 ' Wollaston, op. cit. pp. 10 1, 107, 109, 11 5- 1 19. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 365 
 
 was no doubt, as Mr. WoUaston clearly showed, 
 that the right was not annexed to the barony of 
 Grey de Ruthyn ; for the right could only have 
 been brought by Elizabeth Hastings to her husband. 
 Lord Grey de Ruthyn. Therefore the holders of 
 that barony could not have had the right before 
 this marriage ; nor, indeed, did they claim it at the 
 accession of Richard 11.^ We have here, indeed, 
 but a further illustration of the error and confusion 
 arising from the practice of former Courts of Claims 
 in looking only to the person in whom a right had 
 been allowed, without investigating the source 
 from which that right was derived.^ 
 
 There remained the claim of Lord Loudoun, as 
 the eldest co-heir of Elizabeth Hastings (Lady 
 Grey de Ruthyn), to exercise the oiEce solely, or, 
 alternatively, to be jointly entitled to it with the 
 heirs of the other four sisters between whom the 
 representation had fallen into abeyance in 1868. 
 This was a very interesting claim, for it raised at 
 once the question, so long and keenly discussed in 
 the Great Chamberlain case, ' whether in the case 
 of offices — or of dignities savouring of office — the 
 right, in virtue of esnecia, descended to the eldest 
 co-heir alone, or was inherited jointly by all. 
 
 But, unfortunately, this point does not appear 
 to have been discussed in 1 9 1 1 . The Gordian 
 knot was cut. Counsel for Lord Loudoun was 
 asked by the Lord Chancellor : 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 12 2. It was doubdess upon this account that the petition 
 of Lord Grey de Ruthyn {Ibid., p. loi) ignored the decision of 1377 
 and significantly began with the coronation of Henry IV (1399). 
 
 * See p. 1 5 2 above. 
 
 ' and affecting also the Lucas case. 
 
366 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 " You share with Lord Grey de Ruthyn, if you get 
 rid of the claim of Lord Hastings ? " 
 
 Counsel, without waiving the possible prior right 
 of his client as senior co-heir, admitted that Lord 
 Grey de Ruthyn " was a (sic) co-heir. " The 
 result was a strange decision of the Court, delivered 
 by the Lord Chancellor : — 
 
 Having heard further evidence the Court adjudges 
 that the Earl of Loudoun and Lord Grey de Ruthyn 
 have established their claim to perform the service of 
 carrying the Great Spurs, and that it be referred to the 
 pleasure of his Majesty how such service shall be per- 
 formed. ^ 
 
 ' A strange decision, ' for it certainly did not allow 
 the claim of Lord Grey de Ruthyn, which was 
 that he possessed the sole right in virtue of his 
 holding that barony ; nor did it allow Lord Loudoun's 
 claim as eldest co-heir, to the exclusion of Lord 
 Grey de Ruthyn ; nor did it allow his alternative 
 claim that the right was vested in a// the co-heirs. 
 What it allowed was, apparently, a claim which 
 they had not made — and which, in law, they could 
 not make — namely that the right was vested in 
 their two selves jointly. 
 
 It is to be hoped that, at a future Court, the 
 other co-heirs will claim their rightful share in the 
 privilege. 
 
 It will be observed that this decision speaks of 
 " further evidence. " This would seem to refer 
 to Mr. WoUaston's statement that " since the 
 petition was disallowed in 190 1-2 on the ground 
 
 ' I take all this from the Morning Pest report, which was specially full 
 and clear. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 367 
 
 of insufficient evidence, they had been able to 
 estabUsh a new fact, that the Great Spurs had been 
 borne by the Marshall family. " ^ But this " new 
 fact " appears to have been only what has always 
 been conamon knowledge (although as I have said, 
 overlooked in 190 1-2) namely that they were 
 borne by John (the) Marshal at the coronation of 
 Richard I. ^ The fact is duly given in Dugdale's 
 Baronage (1675) under Marshal (' Mareschall '), 
 and the right authority cited, which authority is 
 discussed in my paper on ' The coronation of 
 Richard I. ' ^ And, needless to say, the same fact 
 prominently figures in Mr. Legg's " English Coron- 
 ation Records" (1901). 
 
 Historically, therefore, the position is this : at 
 the coronation of Richard I (1189) the spurs 
 were borne by John (the) Marshal ; at that of 
 Edward II (1308) by William Marshal.,* We 
 have no other precedents previous to 1 377. Can 
 we find a consistent explanation of these two 
 facts ? 
 
 Clearly the case was not one of hereditary right, 
 for William Marshal, though descended from a 
 brother of John, was not his heir. A chart pedi- 
 gree is absolutely necessary to make the matter 
 clear. 
 
 ' Morning Post report. 
 ' See p. 356 above. 
 
 * The Commune of London (1899), pp. 201 et seq. 
 
 * Cal. of Close Rolls. 
 
368 
 
 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 (I) 
 
 John Marshal, 
 Marshal of England 
 carried the spurs 1 1 89 
 d. 1 1 94. 
 
 (2) 
 
 William Marshal, 
 Earl of Pembroke 
 
 jure uxoris 
 succeeded his brother 
 as Marshal of England, 
 d. 1219. 
 
 
 Marshal 
 
 1 
 John Marshal, 
 created Marshal 
 of Ireland in 1 207. 
 
 1 
 
 5 
 
 a quo 
 the Marshals 
 of England. 
 
 William Marshal, 
 Marshal of Ireland. 
 
 1 
 
 John Marshal, 
 
 Marshal of Ireland. 
 1 
 
 
 1 
 
 William Marshal, 
 Marshal of Ireland. 
 Carried the spurs, 
 1308. 
 
 John, created marshal of Ireland in fee, 1 2 Nov. 
 1 207, ^ received with that office certain Irish lands 
 (as five knight's fees), but, his chief possessions 
 being in England, he and his heirs were allowed to 
 execute the office by deputy. He was an intimate 
 counsellor of his uncle, the great earl, * and it was 
 doubtless through his uncle's influence that he 
 obtained a moiety of the Rye barony with his wife 
 in or before 121 1, besides receiving grants from 
 the Crown of Hingham and other forfeited lands. 
 His son William * was a great supporter of Simon 
 de Montfort and was grandfather of that William 
 Marshal who officiated in 1308 and who was 
 summoned to Parliament as a Baron in 1309. 
 
 Why was this William chosen to carry the spurs 
 in 1308 ? The answer I suggest is that the right 
 
 ' Charter Roll, 9 John. 
 
 ' Histoire de Guillaume le Marichal. 
 
 " Dugdale wrongly interpolates another John between them. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 369 
 
 (if we admit that there was a right) was not here- 
 ditary, but official. The Marshal family, on this 
 hypothesis, carried the spurs ex officio as Marshals 
 of England. When the male issue of the great earl 
 became extinct in 1245, the marshal's rod, as is 
 well known, passed to the Bigods, as his eldest 
 co-heirs, and remained with them until the death, 
 in 1 306, of Roger, earl of Norfolk, when it passed, 
 under his surrender, to the Crown. There it 
 remained till 1316^ when it was granted to the 
 king's brother, Thomas of Brotherton, in tail male. ^ 
 
 It was precisely in this interval that Edward II 
 was crowned (1308), and, on my hypothesis, the 
 question would naturally arise — who was to carry 
 the spurs ? The Crown would have to appoint 
 someone, and what appointment could be more 
 fitting than that of the hereditary rnarshal of Ire- 
 land, the only one remaining, who represented, 
 moreover, the cadet line of the marshals of England? ^ 
 It is, I think, a noteworthy fact that in that 
 * recension ' of the coronation service which is 
 represented by the Laber Regalis and is believed to 
 have been first used on this occasion, the direction 
 runs : — " unus de magnatibus ad hoc per Regem 
 designatus portans calcaria magna et deaurata. " ^ 
 It was the King's right to appoint. 
 
 In 1377 there was again no hereditary marshal, 
 as Margaret, daughter of Thomas of Brotherton, 
 unsuccessfully claimed the pfEce on the false alle- 
 gation that it was her ' droit heritage, ' though it 
 
 ' The Commune of London, p. 308. 
 
 ' I made this suggestion in the Commune of London (1899), p. 307. 
 
 ' Legg's English coronation records, p. 85. 
 
 24 
 
370 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 was limited to the male issue of •her father. How 
 the privilege was obtained for the earl of Pembroke 
 we do not know, but I suspect that the argument 
 was this : — it was held by his ancestors the Mar- 
 shals, Earls of Pembroke, whose earldom of Pem- 
 broke he held (though only their junior co-heir), 
 and should therefore be held by him. This would 
 be exactly parallel to the claim (also successful) of 
 the FitzAlan earls of Arundel to the butlership of 
 their ancestors the D'Aubigny earls of Arundel, 
 though they were only the junior co-heirs. In the 
 one case the Marshals had held as marshals, not as 
 earls ; in the other the D'Aubignys had held as 
 D'Aubignys, not as earls. But this distinction 
 would be too abstruse for the ' rule of thumb ' 
 methods of a Court of Claims. 
 
 After the successful claim by Lord Grey de 
 Ruthyn as heir to the earl of Pembroke, in 1 399\ 
 there would seem to be no claim recorded as 
 allowed till 1685,^ and during this interval of 
 nearly three centuries it is known that the spurs 
 were carried at the coronation of Richard III by 
 the (Herbert) earl of Huntingdon, ' at that of 
 Henry VII by the Earl of Essex, * at that of 
 Henry VIII by the Earl of Arundel, at that of 
 Edward VI by the Earl of Rutland, at that of 
 Mary by the Earl of Pembroke, at that of Queen 
 Elizabeth by the (Hastings) earl of Huntingdon. * 
 
 ' " en maniJre comme le dit Johan de Hastings nadgairs conte Pem- 
 brooke, et ses auncestres, a qui heir le dit suppliant est de tout temps 
 ont fait." 
 
 ' See the table in Mr. Wollaston's book. 
 
 ' Legg's English Coronation Records, p. 195. 
 
 * Ibid., p. 227 ('Little Device'). 
 
 ' State papers and Privy Council Records. 
 
THE GREAT SPURS 371 
 
 and at that of Charles II by the Earl of Pembroke 
 and Montgomery. ^ From 1685 the right of the 
 Lords Grey de Ruthyn was allowed, but the long 
 breach of continuity and the absence even of 
 claims on their part, so far as our evidence goes, 
 would seem to betray a consciousness on their part 
 that they could not prove their right. ^ 
 
 The object, however, of this paper is to advance 
 the theory that the king's chief marshal would be, 
 as such, the most likely person to carry the great 
 spurs at a coronation. Although I cannot prove 
 that this was the marshal's function, he was cer- 
 tainly the officer more especially associated with 
 the horse.' Etymologically, marescallus is derived 
 from an ancient word for horse, and, according to 
 Stubbs, " the mariscalcus " of the Salian law 
 answers " to the horsthegn " of the Old English 
 court.* In France, of course, the word marechal 
 retains, in the sense of farrier, the association with 
 the horse. Now the knight {chevalier, eques) was 
 essentially a horseman, and it is at least significant 
 that when a knight was created, his horse was the 
 marshal's fee. * 
 
 ■ Cal. of State Papers, 1661-2, pp. 584-5. 
 
 ' Counsel's opinion in 1685 was that it was an office in gross held in 
 fee and could not be entailed. 
 
 ' " Mareschall," writes Madox, in his History of the Exchequer, " was 
 a general name for several officers that were employed about horses." 
 In France " Johannes marescallus domini Ludovici regis " notifies " me 
 super sacrosancta jurasse ipsi domino regi quod non retinebo equos nee 
 palefridos nee roncinos redditos ad opus meum ratione ministerii mei " 
 {His Grace the Steward, p. 139). See also p. 85 above and Addenda. 
 
 * Const. History. 
 
 ' In 1236, at Queen Eleanor's coronation, the marshal's fee is thus 
 given : — ' Recipit de quolibet barone facto milite a Rege et quolibet 
 comite palefridum cum sella' (see my Commune of London, p. 312). In 
 
372 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 It is, indeed, of an ancient past that the great 
 golden spurs speak to EngHshmen to-day. When 
 knighthood has become the frequent guerdon of 
 the pushing trader or the party hack, it is well to 
 think of that distant age, eight hundred years ago 
 and more, when the knight's spur was buckled 
 to the heel of count and duke and king. In the 
 hour of his crowning the sword of knighthood is 
 still girt about an English king ; the spurs of 
 knighthood touch his heels ; and the great dream 
 of the Middle Ages is brought before our eyes 
 to-day when the holder of Lanfranc's see delivers 
 to the king his sword — to " use it as the minister 
 of God," — " by the hands of us the Bishops. " For 
 even so had Lanfranc girt the king that was to be 
 " with the belt of knighthood in the name of 
 God. " ^ With this sword he is still bidden to 
 " protect the holy Church of God " : for the 
 
 1 377, at that of Richard II, Margaret ' Marschall ' spoke of the marshal 
 as " pernant de chescun Baron et Conte faitz Chivaler au eel jour un 
 palfrey ove une sele " {Ibid., p. 303) And at the creation of knights of 
 the Bath the marshal took the horse (see p. 351 above). 
 
 ' See p. 354 above. As Hallam justly observes, "the purpose for 
 which men bore arms in a crusade so sanctified their use, that chivalry 
 acquired the character as much of a religious as a military institution. 
 For many centuries, the recovery of the Holy Land was constantly at 
 the heart of a brave and superstitious nobility ; and every knight was 
 supposed at his creation to pledge himself, as occasion should arise, to 
 that cause. Meanwhile the defence of God's law against infidels was 
 his primary and standing duty. A knight, whenever present at mass, 
 held the point of his sword before him whije the gospel was read, 
 to signify his readiness to support it. Writers of the middle ages com- 
 pare the knightly to the priestly character... and the investiture of the 
 one was supposed analogous to the ordination of the other. The 
 ceremonies on this occasion were almost wholly religious ;... his sword 
 was solemnly blessed ; everything in short was contrived to identify his 
 new condition with the defence of religion, or at least of the church. " 
 {Middle Ages [i860], III, 396.) See also p. 350 above. 
 
GLOVE AND SCEPTRE 373 
 
 ancient dream lingers yet ; the Church that made 
 the priest made the knight also ; ^ and the sword 
 that She had given him he did not bear in vain. 
 It was " in defence of the church, " and at the 
 Pope's command, that Simon de Montfort, with 
 his knights and priests, stormed the walls of Beziers 
 and put her ' heretics ' to the sword. It was as 
 the champion of the church, fighting beneath her 
 banner, that William, duke of the Normans, 
 triumphed on the hill of slaughter, ^ and taught to 
 men the grim meaning of knightly sword and spur. 
 The swords the Church had blessed were red with 
 English blood. For ' the great spurs ' are witnes- 
 ses to-day to the true title of our ancient kings, to 
 that bitter day when Edward's abbey was guarded 
 by Norman horse while a trembling primate set 
 the crown on their victorious chief. 
 
 THE GLOVE AND SCEPTRE SERJEANTY 
 
 Although this is one of the very few serjeanties 
 of which the service is still performed at the coron- 
 
 ' It has been pointed out that the Ordo Romanus, most ancient of 
 coronation rituals, directs that the Emperor should be " crowned, in 
 St. Peter's, at the altar of St. Maurice, the patron saint of knighthood " 
 (Bryce's Holy Roman Empire, 1871, p. 250). 
 
 ' Freeman wrote, of the banner sent to William by the Pope : — 
 " Rome was already beginning to practise her characteristic arts under 
 their greatest master. Slaughter, robbery, devastation, all the horrors 
 of an unprovoked war against an unoffending nation, were to be held 
 as nothing when the interest of the Roman See was in the other scale. " 
 In view of her obstinate demand for the lost ' temporal power, ' history 
 may, in Italy, repeat itself. 
 
 N^ sa quando una simile 
 Orma di pi^ mortale 
 La sua cruenta polvere 
 
 A calpestar verri. 
 
374 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 ation of the sovereign, there is a singular lack of 
 early evidence for its existence. The manor of 
 Farnham Royal, Bucks, was held by the Verdons 
 from the Conquest, as is proved by Domesday 
 Book, and yet, neither in the Testa de Nevill nor in 
 the Red Book of the Exchequer — those two great 
 repertories of serjeanties — can we find its tenure 
 mentioned. It is not, apparently, till the death of 
 Theobald de Verdon in 1316 that we find the 
 manor returned as " held of the King in chief by 
 service of finding a glove for his right hand on the 
 day of the King's coronation for supporting the 
 King's right arm with his said gloved hand whilst 
 the King shall hold his sceptre. " ^ 
 
 It should be observed that this service is quite 
 different from that which is now performed. 
 Theobald, if it is correctly rendered, is to find a 
 glove for his own right hand and " with his said 
 gloved hand " to support the King's arm. Dug- 
 dale's version of the same return gives the service, 
 on the contrary, as identical with that which is now 
 performed : — 
 
 " by the service of providing a glove, on the day of the 
 King's coronation, for his ^ right hand, and to support his 
 right arm, the same day during the time that the Royal 
 sceptre is in. his hand.* " 
 
 As the official translation, given above, is somewhat 
 obscure, — the " his " being ambiguous, I have had 
 the original Latin independently examined. It 
 runs thus : — 
 
 ' Cal. oflnq. VI (1910), pp. 36-7. 
 
 ' U. The King's. 
 
 » Baronage, (1675), I, 471. 
 
GLOVE AND SCEPTRE 375 
 
 de domino Rege in capite per servicivim ad invenien- 
 dum ad manum suam dextram die coronacionis domini 
 Regis unam Cirotecam et ad subportandum dextrum 
 Brachium domini Regis eodem die dum Regalem virgam 
 in manu sua tenu[er]it cum predicta manu sua cirotecata. 
 
 The text, it must be admitted, is itself ambiguous, 
 but the official rendering seems to be right. It is 
 the lord of Farnham who has to support with his 
 own gloved right hand the King's right arm. On 
 the other hand, Walsingham describes Richard II 
 as receiving a red glove and holding the sceptre 
 " in manu chirothecata. " As this was but some 
 sixty years after the above return, it seems unlikely 
 that the service can have thus changed and one can 
 only say that the return may have been inaccurate 
 in detail. 
 
 Farnham passed, with Theobald de Verdon's 
 eldest daughter and co-heir Joan, to the Furnivals, 
 by whom the service was claimed and performed at 
 the coronation of Richard II and at those of 
 Henry IV and V. From them it passed with an 
 heiress to Nevill, and through another to the 
 Talbots, Earls of Shrewsbury, till, in 1541, Francis, 
 Earl of Shrewsbury exchanged with Henry VIII 
 the Manor of Farnham Royal for " the site of the 
 late Priory or Manor of Worksop " and other lands 
 in the parish of Worksop, his service for all which 
 was to include the finding, " at the date of every 
 coronation, to the King of England for the time 
 being one glove for his right hand, and the same 
 day of his coronation to bear up his right arm as 
 long as his Highness the same day beareth in his 
 hand the Sceptre Royal. " In accordance with this 
 
3/6 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 arrangement, Gilbert, Earl of Shrewsbury perform- 
 ed the service in respect of the ' manor' of Worksop, 
 at the coronation of James I. He died in 1 6 1 6, 
 leaving no son, and his daughter Alethea brought 
 the *• manor' to the Howards, afterwards Dukes of 
 Norfolk, who thenceforth performed the service up 
 to and at the Coronation of Queen Victoria. ^ 
 
 Not long after that, viz. in 1839, or thereabouts, 
 the lands in virtue of which this service is rendered 
 were sold by the Duke of Norfolk to the Duke 
 of Newcastle, with the exception of some small 
 portions sold off to other owners. For the coron- 
 ation of Edward VII, the Duke of Newcastle 
 claimed the service as holding " substantially the 
 precise lands of the Priory of Worksop which 
 were possessed by the Duke of Norfolk in 1838."^ 
 
 A long counter-petition was presented by the 
 Earl of Shrewsbury, who contended, on the one 
 hand, that the alienation of a small portion of the 
 lands broke the integrity of the serjeanty, which 
 had therefore " lapsed and become extinct, and has 
 reverted to the Crown, and is in the absolute 
 disposal of his Majesty, " and, on the other, that 
 he himself had a preferential claim, in that event, 
 to a grant de gratia of the privilege. The latter 
 proposition was supported by a strange array of 
 arguments. It was firstly assumed that William 
 the Conqueror had granted the privilege to Bertram 
 
 ' It is to be observed that on that occasion, according to the official 
 repoj-t, the glove presented by the Duke was embroidered with the arms 
 of Howard. 
 
 * From statement on his behalf drawn up by his counsel, Mr. W. A. 
 Lindsay, K.C. and printed in Mr. WoUaston's valuable report of the 
 proceedings. 
 
GLOVE AND SCEPTRE 377 
 
 de Verdon, with Farnham " in support of the 
 maintenance of the said service ; " secondly, that 
 it " was a hereditary personal service granted to 
 the said Bertram and his heirs, " and not exercised 
 in respect of the manor ; thirdly, that his " an- 
 cestors, the Lords de Verdun performed the 
 
 said services at the coronations of the Kings and 
 Queens of England, providing the said glove em- 
 broidered with the arms of de Verdun until 
 
 1 3 1 6, " (for which there does not appear to be 
 any actual evidence at all) ; fourthly, " that he is 
 the heir in direct descent to his ancestor, Bertram 
 de Verdun, " which he most certainly was not, 
 being neither his heir male, nor his heir general. ^ 
 As a climax his Majesty was to be petitioned 
 
 " of His especial grace and favour to restore this honour- 
 able privilege to the family of De Verdun " (sic), who 
 alone are entitled to bear the arms of De Verdun, which 
 have immemorially been embroidered on the sard glove, ' 
 and to grant to your Petitioner and his heirs the right to 
 execute the said service at his ensuing Coronation. " 
 
 The Earl's counsel argued that " the grant of 
 this privilege was originally made to Bertram de 
 
 Verdun and his service was a personal one, and 
 
 descended in the blood of the de Verduns 
 
 Inasmuch as the original grant was to the de 
 Verduns to descend in their blood, and has now 
 reverted to the Crown, the Earl of Shrewsbury, as 
 
 ' The heirs ' in direct descent ' of the Verdons, through the 
 Furnivals, are Lord Mowbray, Segrave and Stourton, and the infant 
 daughter of the late Lord Petre, for the latter of whom the barony of 
 Furnival is now being claimed. 
 
 ' The family pf Ta/dot must be meant. 
 
 ' But compare p. 376, note l above. 
 
378 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 representing the blood of the dc Verduns (!), has 
 the best right to have it regranted to him by the 
 Crown. " ^ This extraordinary claim reminds one 
 of those 17th century Earls who, though their 
 baronies were inherited " through a lass, " would 
 not admit that they should " go with a lass. " 
 
 The Earl's claim was " disallowed " and that of 
 the Duke of Newcastle, as Lord " of the Manor of 
 Worksop, " allowed by the Court. ^ Appropriate, 
 perhaps, in the case of an old or a feeble monarch, 
 the claim to support the King's arm must seem, 
 for the coming coronation, singularly out of place. 
 Himself bred in that great service which is, before 
 all, a maker of men, the King needs no " support " 
 of man. The arm that wields his sceptre needs 
 no other's help. Even though a Duke be the 
 proffered prop, the protest rises to the lips : — 
 " Non tali auxilio ! " 
 
 THE KING'S CHAMPION 
 
 There is probably no feature of the ancient 
 coronation ceremony that is more familiar to the 
 public or on which more nonsense has been written 
 than that of the champion's challenge. Few of 
 those who have pictured to themselves a perfor- 
 mance, which, before it was abandoned, had already 
 verged on the grotesque, realise that it was merely 
 
 ' See, for all this, Mr. WoUaston's report of the proceedings {Op. cit. 
 pp. 144-5.) 
 
 * The one point, as it seems to me, that Lord Shrewsbury was able 
 to make was that the Priory lands were not a true " manor, " and that, 
 therefore, there were no manorial rights to remain intact and unaffected 
 by the sale of part of the actual lands. 
 
THE KING'S CHAMPION 379 
 
 a survival of Anglo-Norman law. It was, in the 
 highest sphere, that ' proof by battle ' which was 
 still, theoretically, part of our law till two years 
 before the champion's challenge was last heard in 
 Westminster Hall. In the words of the learned 
 authors of the History of English Law: — 
 
 The Anglo-Norman judicial combat belongs to a per- 
 fectly regular and regulated course of proceeding, is as 
 strictly controlled as any other part of it, and has no less 
 strictly defined legal consequences. ^ 
 
 The demandant in the Writ of Right " offered 
 battle by his champion's body ", which champion 
 must, in theory, have become his " man " by 
 homage. But the champion usually swore falsely,^ 
 and was frequently but a hireling.' I have myself 
 calendared a businesslike agreement, in 1272, duly 
 sealed and witnessed, by which a champion was to 
 receive ;^8 if he proved his employer's right by 
 the combat, the agreement to be void if the parties 
 came to terms before he " shall have struck one 
 blow with the horned staff ". * Even so, the 
 king's champion was only entitled to his fee, as of 
 right, if his challenge were accepted and the com- 
 bat were actually fought.^ 
 
 ^ Ed. 1895, I, 16. 
 
 ^ " pur ceo que rarement avient que le champion al demandaunt ne 
 seit perjurs" (Statute Westm. I, c. 41). 
 
 ' " For civil causes professional pugilists were shamelessly employed. 
 
 Apparently there were men who let out champions for hire there 
 
 was much talk of fighting, but it generally came to nothing." See the 
 same invaluable work, II, 630. 
 
 * Calendar of Duke of Rutland's manuscripts (Hist. MSS. Commission), 
 IV, 49. 
 
 * This is best seen in the Inq. p.m. on Alexander de Frevill, the 
 unsuccessful claimant, 24 June 1328. He was returned as having held 
 (with his wife) Tamworth Castle by the service ; " and if no one shall 
 
38a CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 It was justly pointed out by Taylor in his Glory 
 of Regality (pp. 315-6) that an Inq. p. m.^ of 1333 
 (7 Edw. Ill) returns a tenement as held of the 
 manor of Scrivelby, " which is held of the king in 
 chief by grand serjeanty, namely by finding on the 
 day of the king's coronation an armed knight on 
 horseback, to prove by his body, if necessary, against 
 whomsoever that the king who is crowned on that 
 day is the true and right heir of the kingdom. " 
 It is evident, therefore, that an actual combat was 
 originally contemplated as possible. With regard 
 to the champion's gauntlet, this also was a survival 
 of the old legal practice. I have discussed " the 
 glove as gage" in another work, ^ and have cited 
 passages from The Song of Dermot and the Earl 
 (i2th century),^ in illustration of Prof. Maitland's 
 remarks in his Introduction to The Court Baron. * 
 It figures also in the scenes between the King and 
 Williams and Fluellen in Shakespeare's ' Henry V '.^ 
 
 oppose him, the arms and horse are the King's {i.e. return to the king), 
 but if anyone shall oppose and engage in combat {congressum faciat), the 
 arms and horse shall remain to the aforesaid tenant " {flal. of Inq. VII, 
 No. 134). So also, for the coronation of Henry IV (1399) Sir 
 Baldwin de Frevill petitioned that he might perform the service " armis 
 regiis de liberacione Regis universaliter {i.e. ' cap-a-pie ') armatus, super 
 principalem dextrarium regium sedens,.... cui si nuUus contradixerit, 
 sint arma et equus domini Regis, si autem aliquis se apponat et con- 
 gressum fecerit, remanebunt equus et arma predicto Baldewino." Sir 
 John Dymoke's petition, for the coronation of Richard II, expresses 
 this more obscurely, but admits that if his challenge were not taken up, 
 he could only obtain the fee by grace, not by right. 
 
 ' See Cal. of Inq. VII, No. 439, and Taylor (p. 385) for the Latin 
 text. I take this opportunity of again insisting on the excellence of 
 Taylor's work. 
 
 ' The Commune of London, pp. 153-4. 
 
 ' Ed. Orpen. 
 
 * Selden Soc. publ. IV, 17. 
 
 ' Act. IV, Scenes I, 7, 8. 
 
THE KING'S CHAMPION 381 
 
 K. Hen, Soldier, why wearest thou that glove in thy 
 
 cap ? 
 Will. An't please your majesty, 'tis the gage of 
 
 one that I should fight withal, if he be 
 
 alive. 
 
 The King's champion pledged himself by his 
 glove to fight either on the spot or on any future 
 day selected,^ 
 
 It is not my intention to supply the reader with 
 the crambe repeiita on the championship, with 
 which the public has been fed in books and in the 
 newspaper press. It is rather my wish to dissipate 
 some of the delusions on the subject. Of these the 
 worst and the most persistent is the statement that 
 Robert Marmion, champion of Normandy, received 
 Tamworth and Scrivelsby from the Conqueror, to 
 hold by the ' champion ' service in England. Even 
 the admirable Dugdale (owing to the silence of 
 Domesday) believed that Robert Marmion received 
 Tamworth from the Conqueror and had seen there 
 in " an antient window " William "in his Robes of 
 State" handing it by charter to Robert. As to 
 Scrivelsby, however, he made no such assertion. 
 That Tamworth with its castle was held by Robert 
 ' Dispensator ', a great Domesday baron, is proved 
 by a charter which I printed in Geoffrey de Mande- 
 ville (pp. 313-5), and I have dealt fully in Feudal 
 England with the early pedigree of Marmion (pp. 
 1 90- 195). It is clear that the lands held by Robert 
 ' Dispensator ' were shared between Marmion and 
 Beauchamp (of Elmley) under Henry I and that 
 
 > « ou a quel jour que lem affera." This became in the English 
 challenge " on what day soever he shall be appointed." 
 
382 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 Tamworth and Scrivelsby fell to the former's share. 
 The ludicrous idea that " this Robert " was " the 
 first English Champion " and that his alias was 
 " Sir Robert Marmion, the Sire or Lord of Fonte- 
 nay " ^ is on a par with the assertion that " the 
 family of Marmion enjoyed the peculiar privilege 
 of acting as Champions to the Dukes of Normandy, 
 and they held their lands on feudal tenure by 
 knight {sic) serjeanty subject to the performance 
 of this particular service," ^ — an assertion for which 
 no evidence is vouchsafed. 
 
 All such statements are due to foolish attempts 
 to carry back an ancient and interesting tenure 
 further than evidence permits. Even Mr. Wol- 
 laston, to whon we owe a valuable work on corona- 
 tion claims, has written of " the owners of the 
 manor of Scrivelsby — the ancient knightly house 
 of Dymoke who have held that manor since the 
 time when, to use the quaint legal phraseology, 
 ' the memory of man runneth not to the contrary'. " 
 He must have forgotten for the moment, although 
 himself a barrister, that the limit of legal memory 
 was 1 1 89,' and that Scrivelsby had no Dymoke for 
 its lord till 1350. 
 
 It is recognised by all those who have Written 
 on the subject that the first recorded recognition 
 and performance of the service was at the corona- 
 
 ' Lodge's Scrivelsby, the Home of the Champions (1893), pp. 34-5. This 
 work makes some parade of ' accuracy '. 
 
 ' Ibid., p. 30. So also we read in Hazlitt's Blount's Tenures (1874) 
 that " Robert de (sic) Marmion, Lord of Fonteney in Normandy-j and 
 hereditary champion to the dukes thereof, was by King William the 
 Conqueror, for his services rewarded with the Castle of Tamworth " 
 (p. 268). 
 
 ' History of English Law, I, 147. 
 
THE KING'S CHAMPION 383 
 
 tion of Richard II (1377), after a keen contest 
 between two claimants. These were Freville and 
 Dymoke, representatives respectively of the elder 
 and the younger co-heirs of the last of the Marmion 
 line, who had died in 20 Edw. I, and from whom 
 they had respectively inherited Tamworth Castle 
 and Scrivelsby. We may safely infer, no doubt 
 from their claims that the office of champion had 
 belonged to their common ancestor, Marmion, 
 although we have no direct evidence of the fact. 
 One turns, therefore, to the ' Inquisition ' (8 Jan, 
 1 29 1/2) on Philip, last of the Marmion line, to 
 learn the tenure of the two estates. This Inquisi- 
 tion I have had examined, ^ and, though it is now 
 damaged, we find Tamworth returned as held by 
 knight-service * and Scrivelsby as held" by Barony." ^ 
 Of the ' champion ' service, or even of serjeanty, 
 there is nothing. 
 
 The earliest mention of that service which has 
 yet come to light is, apparently, in an inquisition of 
 1 8 July 1 326, which returns a messuage in Coning- 
 sby as "parcel of the manor of Scrivelsby, which is 
 held of the King in chief by grand serjeanty."* Just 
 after this, Edward II died (20 Jan. 1326/7), which 
 brings us to the new fact. This fact is that Henry 
 Hillary, then tenant of Scrivelsby, claimed to perform 
 the service at the coronation of Edward III, that 
 
 ' Chanc. Inq. p. m. Edw. I, File 62. 
 
 ' " tenuit castrum de Tamworthe de domino Rege in capite per ser- 
 vicium militare faciendo et inveniendo (tres) milites sumptibus suis in 
 guerria Wall' per quadraginta dies." The text is eked out with the help 
 of Dugdale's Baronage. 
 
 ^ " tenuit manerium de Scryvelby cum pert, de domino Rege in capite 
 per Baroniam." 
 
 * Cal. of Inq. VI (1910), No. 734. 
 
384 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 the King dispensed with its performance and that 
 Hillary thereupon petitioned that his proffer might 
 be recorded and his fee paid him, in consideration 
 of the expense he had incurred. His petition is 
 here printed, I believe, for the first time. 
 
 A nostre seigneur le Reye e a son counseil prie Henr' 
 Hillary tenaunt del Maner de Scrivelby per resoun de 
 quel Maner il ceo deit profrer de fere son service alen 
 corounement de cheschun Rey, set asaver sil ieyt nul 
 home qe vodra dedire q'il ne seyt dreiturel Rey, il est 
 prest a defendre per son corps q'il ne dit ne bien ne verite, 
 cpur eel profre fere nostre seigneur le Rey ly durra le 
 meillour destrer q'il ad sauve un -^ e les meillours armures 
 estre un per son corps demeigne.* De puys q'il ne pleet 
 mye a nostre seigneur le Rey q'il face le profre a sete 
 feche,' q'il veille comaunder q'il seit entre en recourt q'il 
 est prest de fere le service avauntdit per le dit Maner issi 
 q'il ne chete en damage de ly ne des tenauns de Maner 
 avaunt dit per temps avenir e q'il veille comaunder qe son 
 
 fee ly seyt paye de sicom ment despendu per son 
 
 atir purvere * e apareiller. 
 
 This document is now^ ' Ancient Petitions, File 265, 
 No. 13230.' That careful antiquary, Mr. Joseph 
 Bain, saw it in 1887, when it was ' Privy Seals, i 
 Edw. Ill, File 3 ' and had still attached to it the 
 " writ ordering the Chancellor to pay the petitioner 
 his fee." This, which, I am informed, cannot now 
 
 ' i. e. the king's secmd-h^iX. charger. 
 
 ^ i. e. except one (reserved) for his personal use. In the petition of 
 Margaret, widow of John Dymoke, to Richard II the claim is to " le 
 melliour destrer ove trappure et le melliour armure du Kay forsfris un." 
 
 ^ i. e. cette fois. 
 
 * Miss Stokes, the very capable record agent, read this word as 
 * purnere ', but, as I think the sense requires ' purvere ', I have ventured 
 to change the ' n ' to ' u '. 
 
THE KING'S CHAMPION 385 
 
 be found, is of great consequence, if accurately 
 given, as a recognition of the claim. 
 
 It is diiEcult to explain the king's decision to 
 dispense, on this occasion, with the performance of 
 the service, unless he wsls in doubt as to the right, 
 owing to the rival claim of Alexander de Freville 
 of Tamworth. Alexander died shortly afterwards 
 and his Jnq. p. m. returned Tamworth castle as held 
 
 by service of coming to the king's coronation, armed cap- 
 a-pii {universaliter) with royal arms delivered by the king, 
 seated upon the king's charger {super principalem dextrarium 
 sedens), offering to make proof, etc. etc.^ 
 
 This return was accepted and recited by the King 
 in letters close of 25 August, 1328.'' It was evi- 
 dently relied on by Sir Baldwin Freville in the 
 great contest of 1 377 before the Court of Claims, 
 for, only twelve days before Richard's coronation, 
 he obtained an exemplification of the inquisition 
 and of the letters close.' 
 
 The claim, however, of the lords of Scrivelsby 
 was asserted at the same period no less confidently, 
 in Inquisitions relating to that manor.* And though 
 the question was fought out at the next coronation, 
 the contest was renewed at that of Henry IV. 
 
 In 1 377 Sir John ' Dymmok ' petitioned that 
 
 he might be received to perform his service on 
 
 coronation day, " que lui appent come de droit 
 
 Margarete sa femme de lour Manoir de Scryvelby 
 
 come les Auncestres le dit Margarete ont fait et 
 
 ' Cj/. ef /«?• VII, No. 134. 
 ' Calif Close Rolls, 1327-1330. P- 3I3- 
 
 ' Ctf/. of Pat. Rolls, 1 3 77- 1 38 1, p. 4. This proves that such docu- 
 ments were then accepted as evidence. 
 * Cal. eflnj. VII, Nos. 1 10, 439, 464. 
 
 25 
 
386 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 clayme." The actual wording of his petition is of 
 sufficient interest to be quoted. 
 
 C'est la demande que Johan Dymmok Chivaler de- 
 maunde a nostre sieur le Roi qil lui soeffre son service 
 certein avoir que a lui appent de fee et de droit le jour 
 
 de son Coronement cestassavoir que le Roi lui face 
 
 avoir le veille de son Coronement un des bons destrers 
 que le Roi eit ove le sele et ove touz les harneys bien 
 covert de feer, ensement ove touz les armures quappen- 
 dont au corps le Roi ansi entierment come le Roi mesmes 
 le duist avoir sil dust aler en un bataill mortell, En 
 yceU maner qeu le dit Johan doit venir arme de mesmes 
 les armes, et mounter mesme le destrer bien couvert le 
 jour de son Coronement, et chivaucher devant le Roi al 
 procession, et doit dire et crier al poeple trois foitz joint, 
 en audience devant tout le monde, qeu sil y a null 
 homme, haut ou bas, que dedire voille que son seignour 
 liege, sire Richard, Cosyn et Heir le Roi Dengleterre 
 Edward, que darrein morust, ne devie estre Roi Dengle- 
 terre coroune, qil est prest par son corps a darreiner 
 meintenant qil ment come faus et come tretre ou a quel 
 jour que lem lui afFera. Et si nulle le dedie, et il face la 
 darrein pur le Roi, le chival ove touz les harneis lui 
 demurra come son droit et son fee. Et si nul le dedie 
 tanque come la processioun dure, apres la tierce heure 
 meintenant apres la processioun et que le Roi soit enoint 
 et coroune, descend et soit desarme, et puis soit a la 
 volonte le Roi si le destrere et les armes lui devient 
 demurer ou noun. 
 
 The rival claimant. Sir Baldwyn de Freville, recited 
 his senior co-heirship of the Marmions ^ and alleged 
 that he held Tamworth castle, his share of their 
 inheritance — 
 
 ' " Heir a Leynesse file le dit Philip " (Marmion). Here we have 
 again the ' esnecia ' (ainesse) claim. Taylor, who did not understand 
 it, read the word "Lionessae" (p. 137). 
 
THE KING'S CHAMPION 387 
 
 par les services destre a la Coronement nostre dit sieur 
 le Roi en ses armures et sur un des dexstrers le Roi, si 
 nul voleit contredire son dit Coronement, de la deffendre 
 come a lui appartient. 
 
 He asked, therefore, that he might be ' accepted ' 
 to perform his service. 
 
 After keen and long dispute and hearing of 
 evidence,^ the Court decided that Dymoke had 
 produced " more and better records and evidences " 
 than Freville, and, as sundry miagnates had testified 
 before it that both King Edw^ard (III) and his son 
 the Prince had constantly asserted that Dymoke 
 should perform the service for Scrivelsby,^ it re- 
 solved, by the king's wish and direction, that he 
 should perform it on that occasion, reserving to 
 Freville the right to prove his case, if he could do 
 so VT^ithin a limited time. No allusion, it will 
 be observed, is made to the recognition of the 
 Scrivelsby claim at the coronation of Edward III, 
 but that king's expressed opinion may be accounted 
 for by the fact. 
 
 From 1 377 the right of the Dymokes as lords 
 of Scrivelsby has been invariably maintained ; but 
 the abolition of the ' banquet ' (after 1821) has 
 put an end to the service.^ There was, however, 
 a general feeling that a tenure so ancient and so 
 famous should still be recognised in some way at 
 
 ' " habita super serviciis predictis inter prefatos Johannem et Bald- 
 winum gravi et prolixa contencione, auditisque hicinde quampluribus 
 racionibus, recordis, et evidenciis." 
 
 ' " dictum servicium pro dicto manerio de Scryvelby de jure facere 
 deberet." 
 
 ' It should be observed, however, that Sir John Dymoke's petition 
 contemplates his riding, as challenger, in the coronation procession. 
 
388 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 the crowning of the king. By a singularly happy 
 thought (attributed to His late Majesty), Mr. 
 Dymoke, as the lord of Scrivelsby, was assigned the 
 duty of carrying ' the Standard of England ''■ — a 
 keenly coveted honour — in 1 902 and is to perform 
 the same service at the coming coronation. 
 
 It is peculiarly fitting that the only standard 
 which has come down to us without change from 
 medieval times should be borne in the procession 
 by one who is himself a survival from the Middle 
 Ages, as the champion of England's king. Five 
 banners were flown by Edward king of England, 
 as he marched north against the Scots in the 
 summer of 1300, and he planted all five on 
 Carlaverock's walls. Two were those of the lions 
 of England — the standard which the champion 
 will bear in the Abbey — and the other three were 
 those of St, Edmund, St. Edward, and St. George. 
 Five banners were flown by King Henry at 
 Agincourt : on one were seen his royal arms ; the 
 others were those of the Holy Trinity, of Our 
 Lady, of St. Edward, of St. George. Among, the 
 ten standards that will be borne in the Abbey, 
 in addition to that of the Royal arms, will be seen 
 those of the Sovereign's Kingdoms, Empire, and 
 dominions, and also one that is oddly supposed to 
 represent certain counties in the west of his English 
 realm. ^ We shall see such modern heralds' con- 
 coctions as the standards of India, of Canada, of 
 Australia ; but for the ancient banner of our nation 
 
 This standard is an innovation. At the coronation of George IV, 
 the standards were those of the three kingdoms, England, Scotland, 
 and Ireland. 
 
THE KING'S CHAMPION 389 
 
 we shall look, alas, in vain. It was under the 
 emblem of St. George that our fathers fought and 
 conquered ; but, save in the glorious ' white ensign,' 
 it is to-day merged and, practically, swamped in 
 that deplorable heralds' mess, the ' Union ' flag.^ 
 
 Up through the crowded ranks of a newly-gilt 
 nobility the standards of England and of Scotland 
 will be borne by country gentlemen, beside whose 
 ancient dignities their own are things of yesterday. 
 If I do not venture on the same assertion in the 
 case of 'The O'Conor Don', it is because that 
 tribal title must be borne at the presdnt day under 
 the strange impression that it descends, like a 
 modern peerage dignity, to heirs male of the body. 
 Its existence, of course, was inseparably connected 
 with the Irish and rival system of ' tanistry '.' 
 
 As to the third standard, that of Ireland, Mr. 
 Fox-Davies, even as I write, has come forward, 
 once again, to enlighten the public on heraldic 
 matters. The head-line " Triple Crowns of Sove- 
 reignty, " in large type, caught the eye, ' and under 
 it one found an article beginning : — " There seems 
 
 ' The excellent persons who delight in explaining this composition 
 (f.e. disentangling its elements) do not realise that the necessity for such 
 explanation is itself the condemnation of the jumble. As a flag, perhaps, 
 it is worthy of a people which appears to imagine that its ' national 
 colours ' are those of Republican France. 
 
 ' " These chieftainships, and perhaps even the kingdoms themselves 
 
 followed a very different rule of succession from that of primogeniture. 
 They were subject to the law of tanistry, of which the principle is 
 defined to be that the .... dignity of chieftainship descended to the 
 
 eldest and most worthy of the same blood ; the preference given 
 
 to seniority was to be controlled by a due regard to desert it was 
 
 not unusual to elect a tanist, or reversionary successor, in the lifetime of 
 the reigning chief." Hallam, Constitutional History. 
 
 * In the Daily Express, 19 May 191 1. 
 
390 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 to be so much confusion with regard to the Irish 
 flag that perhaps it will be well to put the real 
 facts upon record. " As the writer's "facts" are 
 often amusing, and his " real facts " more so, we 
 turn hopefully to those which prove his vaunted 
 " fulness of knowledge. " ^ And we are not disap- 
 pointed. 
 
 The original arms of Ireland were "azure, three 
 crowns or." That was the coat of arms granted by 
 Richard II as the arms of Ireland to be borne as an 
 augmentation with his paternal arms of De Vere by Robert 
 de Vere, Earl of Oxford, when he was created Duke of 
 Ireland. 
 
 Such are the " real facts. " Unfortunately, " azure, 
 three crowns or" was «o/" the coat of arms granted," 
 for it had a bordure argent, which made all the 
 difference ; ^ it was not granted " as the arms of 
 Ireland ; " and it was not granted to the Earl of 
 Oxford " when he was created Duke of Ireland, " 
 but more than nine months earlier. 
 
 But even this is not the worst. With his usual 
 confidence, Mr. Fox-Davies informs us that 
 
 This coat of arms with the three crowns appears upon 
 
 some of the old Irish coins The change from the 
 
 crowns to the harp was made by Henry VIII, who disliked 
 the papacy and any suggestion of the triple tiara of the 
 Pope. 
 
 Now in what the writer terms " the original arms 
 of Ireland", granted by Richard II, the three crowns 
 were " two and one " (in the language of heraldry), 
 
 ' This phrase is taken from the prospectus of his latest edition of 
 Armorial FamiRes. 
 
 ' Therefore a belief, in later times, " yt (sic) ye (sic) three cxownes 
 were the armes " of Ireland cannot refer to this differenced coat. 
 
THE KING'S CHAMPION 391 
 
 which could not possibly suggest the Papal tiara. 
 So we turn to " the old Irish coins " — which the 
 writer, evidently, cannot have seen — and discover 
 that what, in his loose way, he stylfes " the three 
 crowns " are a totally different design ; viz : three 
 crowns pale-wise ! This coat — if it was a coat, 
 which is doubtful, as no shield is shown,^ — -would 
 be that attributed, in those days, to King Arthur, 
 " gules, 3 crowns or pale-wise " (though he may 
 not be aware of the fact) , and is certainly suggestive 
 of the Papal tiara. ^ Only one who was ignorant of 
 heraldry or singularly careless of the facts could 
 possibly confuse the two coats. 
 
 From " real facts " we pass at once to the writer's 
 quaint beliefs. As to the three crowns of the coat 
 granted by Richard — 
 
 King Richard II, like his father Edward III, was styled 
 King of England and France and Lord of Ireland, and it 
 seems to me more probable that the triple crowns signified 
 the triple sovereignty than that they originated from the 
 arms attributed to St. Edmund. 
 
 Does it indeed ? Apart from the fact that our 
 sovereigns then were ' lords ', not ' kings ' of Ire- 
 land, and could not, therefore, claim a third kingly 
 crown, a knowledge of that mediaeval heraldry 
 whicli is so distasteful to Mr. Fox-Davies would 
 have taught him that the arms of ' St. Edward ' 
 and ' St. Edmund ' were familiar, in the Middle 
 Ages, on the banners of our kings in war, and that, 
 as Richard allowed his nephew the Duke of Surrey 
 
 ^ These coins had the royal arms, in a shield, on the obverse. 
 ' Fynes Moryson wrote, in his Itinerary : — " they had silver groats, 
 called Cross-Keale Groats, stamped with the Pope's triple crown." 
 
392 CORONATION SERVICES 
 
 to impale the arms of St. Edward with a bordure 
 ermine, ao he allowed his favourite, Robert, earl 
 of Oxibrd, to quarter the arms of St. Edmund with 
 a bordure argent.^ The arms, of course, attributed 
 to St. Edmund (" azure three crowns [2 and i ] or ") 
 were familiar then and long afterwards ; in a roll 
 of arms under Henry VI they are entered as those 
 of " Sainct Edmond Kynge of Yngelonde of old 
 tyme", ^ and even at so late a date as 1485 there 
 were made ready for the coronation of Henry VII 
 " trappours " {i.e. horse-trappings) of the ' arms of 
 St. Edward ' and ' arms of St. Edmund ', which 
 were still associated ex officio with the sovereign of 
 this country as they were in the days of Edward I * 
 and of Richard II ; as they were in the days of 
 Henry V, on whose great seal they were held by 
 angels, and who stamped them on his golden bowls; 
 as they had been since Henry III, in 1232, had 
 ordered St. Edmund and St. Edward to be painted 
 in his chapel at Woodstock and had, some years 
 later, bestowed on his own sons the names of these 
 royal saints. 
 
 ' I duly explained this in Peerage and Pedigree, II, 353-4. 
 ' Ancestor III, 208. 
 ' See p. 3 8 8 above. 
 
INDEX 
 
 Abergavenny, Lord, claim of to lar- 
 derer service,' 241. 
 
 Abingdon Abbey, relations of Dispen- 
 sers with, 189 seq. 
 
 — Cartulary account of Herbert the 
 Chamberlain, 121. 
 
 Accatry, connexion of with larder, 
 
 237- 
 
 — , wages, 215 «. 
 
 — , Serjeant of the, duties of, 237. 
 Accountant of the bread, (commutator 
 
 panis) 201. 
 
 " Act for placing the Lords " regu- 
 lates precedence of great offices, 
 122. 
 
 Adam, the queen's cook, lands of, .249, 
 250,. 
 
 — , le Despenser, 196. 
 
 — , of Yarmouth, (a Gernemue), 192, 
 
 193- 
 Addington serjeanty, 8, 23, 243 seq. 
 Adeliza, queen, 142, 320. 
 Aguillon, William, sergeanty of, 23, 
 
 245- 
 Ailward the Chamberlain, 126. 
 Aislaby, Yorks, serjeanty of, 279. 
 Albertivilla, Hugo de, see d'Auber- 
 
 ville, Hugh. 
 Alderbury, Writs, serjeanty of, 288. 
 Alfred, Knighthood conferred by, 
 
 349 «■ 
 Alienation from serjeanty, 17. 
 
 — , Aston Clinton case, 28. 
 Alington, family, 267. 
 Almeric, name, origin of, 195. 
 Almoner, claim to office of, 326 seq. 
 Alton Priors, serjeanty ef, 10. 
 Alvescote, Oxon, serjeanty of, 108, 
 
 109. 
 Amauri the Dispenser, son of Adam, 
 196. 
 
 — , son of Thurstan, 193. 
 Ambrosden, Oxon, holder of, 141. 
 
 Ancaster, Lord, petition of, see Great 
 
 Chamberlain case. 
 Andrewes, Lancelot, bishop, servile 
 
 spirit of, 8. 
 Angortby, Lines., serjeanty of, 284. 
 Angouleme, mayor of, robes made 
 
 for, 261. 
 Anne, Coronation of, claims, 113, 119, 
 • 140, 241. 
 Anselme, Pere, history of the grand 
 
 Panetiers of France, 221. 
 Archbishop's chamberlain, 113, 114. 
 Arch-Butler, symbol of office, 140 n. 
 Arch-Chamberlain, duties of, 115. 
 Archer service, in Domesday, 13. 
 Argentine, family, lands of, 265 
 
 — , Sir William, claim, 266. 
 
 Arms of Ireland, Fox-Davies on, 390. 
 Arrentation of 1250, 17, 18-9. 
 Art de Venerie, 275. 
 Artington, Surrey, 102. 
 Art of hunting, The, 278. 
 Arundel, earls of, claims by, 147, 
 iSise?., 170, 343. 
 
 — , — , Spurs borne t)y, 370. 
 
 — , William d'Aubigny, earl of, 142, 
 
 143- 
 
 — , Sussex, holders of, 142. 
 
 Ashill, Norfolk Serjeanty of, 223 feq. 
 Ashwell, Essex, serjeanty of, 254. 
 Aston Bernard, see Aston MuUins, 
 Aspland, family, 129. 
 Aston Clinton, Bucks, Serjeanty, 28 
 
 seq. 
 Aston MuUins, Bucks, Serjeanty of, 
 
 305 seq. 
 Aubrey the sapper, 16. 
 Austurcarii, see Goshawk-men. 
 Aylesbury, Bucks, Serjeanty of, 299. 
 
 B 
 
 Baa, John de. Serjeanty of, 289. 
 Bacon, making of, as serjeanty, 254. 
 
 26 
 
394 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Badlesmere, Bartholomew de, Ser- 
 
 jeanty of, 113 n. 
 Badminton pack, 296. 
 Baire, see Hairez. 
 Bake-House, Serjeant of the, 228. 
 Baker, the King's, 201, 232 seg. 
 
 — , dealings with Pantler, 219. 
 
 — , Odoin charters, 200. 
 Baker service, in Domesday, 14. 
 Baking irons, as fee, 231. 
 Balistarius, meaning of word, 15K. 
 Bampton Hundred, return for, 109. 
 Bardolf, family, serjeanty of, 247 seq. 
 " Bardolf ", recipe for, 249. 
 Barnwell Priory, lands of, 233. 
 Baronet's son, right to Knighthood, 
 
 355- 
 Barons, greater and lesser, origin of 
 
 distinction in Great Charter, 36. 
 Barron, Oswald, on Hauvill arms, 
 
 317 «. 
 Barstaple, hundred of, 253. 
 Basin, as fee, 133. 
 — , connexion, with Chamberlain, 
 
 123. 
 
 — , and towel service, 8, 114 seq., 
 ' 124 seq. 
 
 Basset, Ralf, lands of, 283. 
 
 Bath, Order of the, ceremonial for 
 
 creation of knights, 350 seq. 
 Battle, Abbot of, grant of livery to, 
 
 323- 
 
 Battle, trial by, connexion of cham- 
 pionship with, 379. 
 
 Bayeux, bishop of, lands of, 307. 
 
 Bayeux Tapestry, 269, 337. 
 
 Beaksbourne serjeanty, 39. 
 
 Bear, hunting of the, 274«. 
 
 Beauchamp, family, offices of, 202 
 seq. 
 
 — , Stephen de, lands of. 282. 
 Bed, as fee, 133. 
 
 Bedford, duke of, at Buckingham's 
 knighting, 352. 
 
 Bedford, barony of, connexion with 
 almonership, 327. 
 
 Bedingfield, Joan de, lands of, 281. 
 
 Beer-buyer's serjeanty, 185 seq. 
 
 Belet, Michael, as king's butler, 145, 
 165 seq., 192. 
 
 Bernarius, meaning of, 58. 
 
 " Berner ", the, 271, 272 ; Pay of, 
 279 «. 
 
 " Berselet ", hound, 271, 280 seq. 
 
 Bettoyne, Richard, mayor of Lon- 
 don, 169. 
 
 Bigod, family marshalship of, 91, 369. 
 
 — , William, serjeanty of, 253. 
 
 Billeting, harbingers' duties concern- 
 ing, 88. 
 
 Bilsington, Kent, serjeanty of, 172 seq. 
 
 Biset, Manasser, King's Steward, 192. 
 
 Bishops, consecration of, parallel to 
 consecration of King, 347. 
 
 Blaauw, on Catteshill serjeanty, 106. 
 
 Blomeiield, as an authority on the 
 butlership, 151. 
 
 Bloodhound, liam-hound identified 
 with, 274. 
 
 Blount (Tenures), misreading of 
 " buscellurti ", r8o. 
 
 — , misreading of Cauderie, 252. 
 Boarhounds, 269 «, 270 n. 
 Bockhampton, Berks., serjeanty of, 
 
 287 seq. 
 Bohun, family, descent of constable- 
 ship to, 790. 
 
 — , Humfrey de, grant of steward- 
 ship to, 74- 
 
 Boleyn, Anne, coronation of, 132, 
 172, 208. 
 
 Book of Hunting, see Turberville, 
 
 Boston, Lines, lastage of, 310 seq. 
 
 Bottles, groom of the, 181. 
 
 Boulogne, counts of, serjeanties cre- 
 ated by, 50. 
 
 Boveridge, William, claim of, 205. 
 
 Bow Bearer and Master of the Lime 
 Hounds, office of, 279 «. 
 
 Bowers Gifford, Essex, serjeanty of, 
 232. 
 
 ' Brachet ', service of a, 282. 
 
 Bracton, on scutage, 22. 
 
 Brandenburg, margrave of, as Arch- 
 Chamberiain of the Empire, 115. 
 
 Braose, William de, payment by, 272. 
 
 Bread, Pantler's connexion with 198, 
 201, seq. 
 
 Brede, Sussex, holder of, 362. 
 
 Breviate touching the Order and Go- 
 vernment of a Nobleman's House, 
 
 217 q. 
 
 Broc, Edeline de, lands of, 100 seq. 
 
 — , Randulf de, 99-103, 105. 
 Bromley, Kent, serjeanty of, 126. 
 Broun, Richard, assumption of Knight- 
 hood by, 354 seq. 
 
 Buckenham, Norfolk, tenure of, 148 
 
 seq. 
 Buckingham, Duke of, claim of, 43, 
 
 78, 80. 
 
 — , Knighting of, 352 q. 
 Burdelys, family, serjeanty of, 239. 
 Burgess, Sir J. Bland, 87 n. 
 Burnell, Robert, bishop of Bath and 
 
 Wells, 196. 
 
INDEX 
 
 395 
 
 Burton, Dorset, holders of, 123. 
 Buscellum, meaning of, 180. 
 Butler, 140 seq. 
 
 — , Antiquity of office, 63. 
 
 — , derivation of the word, 198. 
 
 — , the Assistant, 165 seq. 
 
 — , chief, see Chief Butler. 
 
 — , family, origin of arms, 317. 
 
 — , of Ireland, office of, 152. 
 Butlery, 140 seq. 
 
 — , usher of the, 185. 
 
 — , connection of hosarii with, 177, 
 
 214, 215 n. 
 Buttery, origin of word, 198. 
 
 — , of nobleman's household, 216. , 
 
 — , serjeanty, 183 seq. 
 
 Butler, serjeanty of Bilsington, 174, 
 175- 
 
 — , Wymondley serjeanty, 264 seq. 
 
 Cabinet Ministers, origin of, in Royal 
 Household, 65. 
 
 Cadenas, 221. 
 
 Cage, Daniel, claim of, 139. 
 
 Cailly, Thomas de, 157 n. 
 
 Caius, on English dogs, 274, 275, 
 277, 278. 
 
 Caldicot, manor of, 80. 
 
 Cambridge, earl of, as deputy, 129. 
 
 Cambridgeshire, Domesday serjean- 
 ties, 140. 
 
 Camera curie, 121, 324. 
 
 Camera Regis, see Chamber, King's. 
 
 Camerarius see Chamberlain, 
 
 Campbell, John, of Liston Hall, ser- 
 vice of, 231. 
 
 Candles, Salary of Lord Chancellor, 
 
 54- 
 
 — , at re-coronations, 326. 
 Canes currentes, 269. 
 Canopy, 328 seq. 
 
 — , as fee, 321. 
 
 — , funeral use of, 337 n. 
 Canopy bearers, 328 seq. 
 
 — , Court of claims, discussion, 49. 
 Canterbury, crown-wearing of 1201, 
 
 325- 
 Canterbury, arch"'' of, privileges of, at 
 crown wearings, 319. 
 
 — , right of presenting " maupyger- 
 noun " 249. 
 
 — , conferring of Knighthood by 334. 
 Canterbury cathedral, canopy presen- 
 ted by Barons of Cinque ports, 336. 
 
 " Canting " arms, 3I7». 
 
 Carolingean court, great officers of 
 
 state of, 63. 
 Castle Rising, Norfolk, serjeanty of, 
 
 148 seq. 
 Carucage of 1198, 30. 
 Carver, duties of, 212 q., 214, 217 q. 
 Carnarvon, earl of, claim of, 309. 
 CatteshUl Serjeanty, 97, 104 seq. 
 Cauz, surname, confused with De 
 
 Chaciis, 292. 
 Cawston, serjeanty of, 280, 281. 
 Cellar see Seller. 
 Chadwell, Essex, napery serjeanty of, 
 
 225. 
 Chamber, the King's, 67, 68. 
 
 — , Serjeanty of finding straw for, 
 
 299?. 
 Chamberlain, 112 seq. 
 
 — , Antiquity of office, 63 seq. 
 
 — , division of services of, 114-117. 
 
 — , origin of name, 67. 
 
 — , fees of, 68, 113. 
 
 — , connexion with king's treasury, 
 120, 324. 
 
 — , Functions confused with those of 
 Steward by L. Vernon Harcourt, 
 73- 
 
 — , services distinguished from those 
 of marshal, 83. 
 
 — , Origin of Key as badge of office, 
 121. 
 
 — , Deputy, 123 seq. 
 
 — , of the chavmdry, 115. 
 
 — , of the exchequer, 121 w. 
 
 — , municipal official, 121. 
 
 — , service, 123. 
 
 — , family, origin of arms, 121, 317. 
 Chancellor, originally member of 
 
 Kings household, 54, 193, n. 
 
 — , pay of, 62, 215 «. 
 
 — , fee of wine, 193 n. 
 
 Chaorciis de, confused with other 
 
 surnames, 291 seq. 
 Charles II, coronation of, claims, 120, 
 
 154, 162, 171, 176, 231, 241, 249, 
 
 371- 
 Chaucer, Geoffrey, Bilsington manor 
 
 held by, 175. 
 Chaundry, wages of heads of, 215 n. 
 
 — , Blount confuses with scalding 
 service, 252. 
 
 Chaworth, family, 292. 
 
 Chedworth, Glos, pantler serjeanty of 
 
 201. 
 Chesham, Buckes, napery serjeanty 
 
 of, 225 n. 
 Chester, earls of, hereditary Claim to 
 
 bear sword, 339 seq. 
 
396 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Chichester Cathedral, canopy .presen- 
 ted by barons of cinque ports, 336. 
 Chief Butler, 140 seq. 
 
 — , disputed claim (1377) 175, 176. 
 Christmas Crown wearing, 318. 
 Cinque Ports, barons of the, claim to 
 
 carry canopy, 49, 50, 328 seq. 
 
 — , service of, 336. 
 
 Clare, earls of, as Stewards, 72 n. 
 
 Clarendon, Wilts, 286 «. 
 
 Clerk of the Kitchen, 216 q, 218 q, 
 
 219?. 
 Clifford, Walter de, lord marcher, 
 
 331- 
 Clopton, Thomas, of Liston Halls 
 
 wafery claim of, 231. 
 Cloth of pleasance, origin and uses 
 
 of, 131. 
 Cloths as pantler's fee, 208, 220. 
 
 — , See also table cloth. 
 Coins, Irish, design of, 391. 
 Comberton, Cambs., baker serjeanty 
 
 of, 269, 233. 
 Committee of the Baronetage for 
 
 privileges, 355. 
 Complete Peerage, on bearer of sword 
 
 of state, 346. 
 Compton, Hants, connextion of, with 
 
 Marshal's service, 94. 
 Compton Abdale, Glos., 191. 
 Commutation of service, 17. 
 Commutator panis, see Accountant of 
 
 Bread, 82. 
 Confectionery, Wafery merged into, 
 
 228. 
 Coningsby, tenure of, 383. 
 Conquest, law of (Scotland) 156 n. 
 Constable, 76 seq. 
 
 — , antiquity and early character of 
 office, 63. 
 
 — , whether office held by tenure, 45. 
 
 — , relations with Marshal, 63, 77, 82. 
 
 — , Duke of Buckingham's case, 45, 
 78. 
 
 — , precedence of x, 122. 
 
 — , Lord High, 78 seq. 
 Constabularia, 76. 
 
 Constitutio domus regis, origin and 
 
 various editions of, 54. 
 — : , the authority for offices of state, 
 
 54- 
 
 — , date of, 61. 
 
 — , on harbingers, 87 q. 
 
 — , on marshals, 89, 92. 
 
 — , on hosarii, 177. 
 
 — , on usher of the butlery, 185. 
 
 — , on official corresponding to pant- 
 er, 201. 
 
 — , records ojf wages, 315 n. 
 — , on computaior panis, 219. 
 
 — , on napery service, 222. 
 
 — , on arrangement of larder, 234. 
 
 — , on kastelarius, 255. 
 
 — , on cupbearers, 265. 
 
 — , on hounds, 271, 272,276,279, 296. 
 
 — , on " Hairez ", 288. 
 Cornage, 250. 
 
 Coronation, ecclesiastical character 
 of, 347- 
 
 — , parallel with consecration of Bis- 
 hop, 347 y. 
 
 — , parallel with Knighthood, 349 seq. 
 
 — , ceremonial. King's offering at, 
 324 w. 
 
 — , girding of the king with sword, 
 346. 
 
 — , creation of Knights of the Bath, 
 
 350- 
 
 — , re-coronation, 325. 
 
 — , " of St. Edmund ", illustrations of 
 MS., 337. 
 
 — , services, 318 seq. 
 
 — , — , right of Crown to dispense 
 with, 49. 
 
 — , Cateshill serjeanty, 107, 108. 
 
 — , nature of, 318. 
 
 — , Almoner, 326. 
 
 — , Canopy bearers, 328. 
 
 — , harp, alleged carrying of, 328. 
 
 — , swords, bearing of the, 337. 
 
 — , spurs, carrying of the, 347. 
 
 — , see also under the various sover- 
 eigns. 
 
 — , banquet, effect of abolition, 49. 
 
 — , Pantler's fee, 220. 
 
 — , Eweryand Napery offices at, 220. 
 
 — , right to napery used at, 223. 
 
 — , Waferer service, 229. 
 
 — , Testa reference to, 247 y. 
 
 — , privilege of barons of the Cinque 
 Ports at, 336. 
 
 Coroner, hereditary Northumbrian, 
 
 serjeanty of, 41. 
 Cortburn Yorks, 242. 
 Cory (family) claim, 140. 
 Cothes, Leics., 282 «. 
 Coton, Derbyshire, hound serjeanty 
 
 of, 282. 
 Cotton, MS. Claudius D. 11, pictures 
 
 of hunting in, 269, 276. 
 Counter-tally, 260. 
 Count Palatine, as steward, 72. 
 Court of claims, steward as president, 
 
 74- 
 — , unhistorical methods of proce- 
 dure, 125. 
 
INDEX 
 
 397 
 
 — , stereotyped character of decisions 
 of, 130. 
 
 — , for queen's coronation, appoint- 
 ed, 138 y. 
 
 — , at coronation of Richard II, 
 (1377), 89, 107, 118, 139 ?., 17s. 176, 
 207. 
 
 — , temp. Elizabeth, 122. 
 
 — I (1727), 204. 
 
 — , igo2. Lord Great Chamberlain 
 petition, 112. 
 
 — , decision regarding canopy bea- 
 rers, 49. 
 
 — , decision regarding spurs, 356 q. 
 Court, of Chivalry, development of, 
 
 77- 
 
 — . of the Lord Steward, 85. 
 Couvrepain, see Coverpane. 
 Coverpane, 210-317 passim. 
 Crane, hawking for, 312. 
 Cre?y, battle of, 16. 
 Cresswell serjeanty, 178 q., 180. 
 Crispin, Gilbert, abbot of West- 
 minster, 321. 
 
 Crossbow, imported from Genoa, 16. 
 
 — service, 13, 14. 
 
 Crown, wearing of, before proceed- 
 ing to the Abbey, 321. 
 
 — , on Irish coins, 390. 
 Crown-wearing days, 123, 131. 
 
 — , Stubbs on, 318 j. 
 
 — , king's gifts at, 322. 
 
 — , survivals, 324. 
 
 — , pantler's service, 201. 
 
 — , waf ery service, 229. 
 
 — , turnspit service, 254, 255. 
 Cuvelesfeld, serjeanty of; 295. 
 Cup, as fee, 168, 170, 267. 
 
 — , as arms, 265, 317. 
 
 — , presented at corpnation by owner 
 of Bilsington, 176! 
 
 — , presented to mayor of Oxford, 
 176. 
 
 Cupbearer service, 266. 
 — • of Wymondley, 265. 
 Currency, hawks and falcons, as, 314. 
 Curtana (sword), origin of Lancaster, 
 claim, 339. 
 
 — , bearer of, 340., 342, 344. 
 
 D 
 
 Dalmatic (over-tunic), 261. 
 
 Danegeld, King's baker, excused pay- 
 ment of, 232 ; other remissions, 
 234, 236, 287. 
 
 Dapifer,.69 seq. ; pay of, 215 n. 
 
 " Darned linen ", as pantler's fee, pos- 
 sible misunderstanding of phrase, 
 214. 
 
 David I, of Scotland, misunderstand- 
 ing of name in Cal. of Charter 
 Rolls, II n. 
 
 David of London, Randulf de Broc, 
 purchases lands of, 102. 
 
 David the larderer of York, 242. 
 
 Dawson, Charles, on coronation privi- 
 lege of the Cinque Ports, 329, 336. 
 
 d'Abetot, Urse, 361. 
 
 d'Auberville, Hugh, claim of, to Kent 
 lands, 309 q. 
 
 de Albinl, William, see d'Aubigny, 
 William. 
 
 d'Aubigny, William, as chief butler, 
 141. 
 
 d'Aunay, le vicomte, chamberlam of 
 Poitou, claim to furniture of king's 
 chamber, 118 j. 
 
 De Chaorciis (de Chaources, Cha- 
 wo'rth), name of, 291, 292. 
 
 De la Hose (or Huse), surname, origin 
 of, 181, 182 n. 
 
 Delamere (De la Mere, De la Mare) 
 family, serjeanties of, 104, 108. 
 
 Delamere family (of Fisherton Dela- 
 mere), lands of, 108. 
 
 Delegation of functions of royal 
 officers, 7. 
 
 — , of services of tenants by ser- 
 jeanty, 8. 
 
 — , leads to confusion of gt. offices 
 of state with serjeanties, 48. 
 
 Delisle, Leopold, dates Odoin charter 
 
 incorrectly, 199. 
 Denford, 181. 
 
 Denham, Bucks, holder of, 146. 
 Deputy Chamberlain, 123. 
 
 — , Basin and towel service of, 114. 
 Derby, fair of, 305. 
 
 — , earl of, as canapy-bearer, 330. 
 
 — , James Stanley, earl of, Bucking- 
 ham's knighting, 353. 
 
 Despenser, Adam le, lands of, 191 
 
 see also Dispenser. 
 Devenish, Walter, Serjeanty of, 18, 
 
 19- 
 Devon, earls of, as stewards, 72 n. 
 
 — , earl of, as canopy-bearer, 330. 
 
 — Serjeanties enumerated in Domes- 
 day, 14. 
 
 Devon and Somerset Hunt, survival 
 of mediaeval practices in, 275. 
 
 Dialogus de Scaccario on marshal's 
 duties, 83, 84. 
 
 Dillegrout, use of word, 248. 
 
398 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Discthegn, 69. 
 
 Dispenser, the, in " Est. of the King's 
 household," 61, 
 
 — , his functions, 62. 
 
 — , sometimes confused with steward 
 (dapifer), 62, 361. 
 
 — , serjeanty in Domesday, 187. 
 
 — , genealogical table, 187. 
 
 — , in Odoin charter, 200 q. 
 
 — , pay of, 2i5n. 
 
 — , possible connexion of Beauchamp 
 pantlership with, 204. 
 
 — , connexion with pantler, 219. 
 
 — , confusion of office with napery 
 service, 222. 
 
 — , Ashjll tenure discussed, 223. 
 
 — , of the larder, 234. 
 Distraint for Knighthood, 316. 
 d'lvry, Hugh, as chief butler, 140, 
 Doddridge, on hereditary character 
 
 of office of Great Chamberlain, 47. 
 D'Oilly family, constableship of, 81. 
 Domesday Book. Classification of 
 
 serjeanties, 11. 
 
 — , Serjeanties Enumerated in, 13. 
 
 — , Surrey schedule of thegns, 13. 
 
 — , Hampshire schedule of thegns, 13. 
 
 — , ushership of King's Hall record- 
 ed in, no. 
 
 — , owners of Heydon recorded in, 
 
 125- 
 
 — , Herts, estates of Edgar Aetheling 
 
 in, 133- 
 
 — , assessment in, of lands held by 
 Queen's Chamberlain service, 134. 
 
 — , records of dispenser serjeanty 
 in, 187. 
 
 — , record of de Bolebec lands, 192. 
 
 — , records of King's bakers in, 232, 
 233- 
 
 — , record of maupygernoun ser- 
 jeanty, 243. 
 
 — , record of Ashwell turnspit ser- 
 jeanty, 254. 
 
 — , account of huntsmen, 270. 
 
 — , record of Bockhampton and 
 
 Hairez, 287. 
 Dormer, family, lands of, 309. 
 Dorset, serjeanties enumerated in 
 
 Domesday, 14. 
 Doveliz, Eustace de, serjeanties held 
 
 hy jure uxoris, 14. 
 Draycot, Wilts, 90. 
 Drayton, Johnde, napery service 
 
 claimed from, 224. 
 Dryden, Sir Henry, 273. 
 Duke of Buckungham's case, decision 
 
 as to king's right of refusal, 49. 
 
 Dudley, Ambrose, earl of Warwick, 
 grant of Kibworth to, by pantlery 
 service, 205, 206. 
 
 Dugdale, 79. 
 
 — , confused record of napery service 
 by, 223. 
 
 — , on Cauz family, 292. 
 
 — , on Hastings pedigree, 363. 
 
 — , on Marshal Spur-bearers, 367. 
 — , on glove and sceptre service, 
 
 374- 
 Dumleye, corrupt version of Elmley, 
 
 203. 
 Dnnstaple, Robert de, quidrent of, 
 
 258. 
 Dunton, Norfolk, serjeanty of, 310, 
 
 313. 
 
 Durward (surname), derivation of, 
 109 n. 
 
 Dymoke, Sir John, claim of to cham- 
 pionship, 385 seq. 
 
 Eadmer, as authority for crown 
 
 wearings, 321. 
 Earl, belting of, 350. 
 Earl Marshal's court, development 
 
 of, 77. 
 Earl's Colne, manor of, 44. 
 East Worldham, Hants, serjeanty of, 
 
 90. 
 Ecclesiastics, serjeanties held from, 
 
 51- 
 Eagar .^theling, lands of, 133. 
 Edward the Confessor, household of, 
 
 64, 121. 
 
 — , devotion of, to hunting, 268, 
 
 — I, defiance of, by barons, 76. 
 
 — , banners of, 388. 
 
 — , coronation of, 158. 
 
 — 11, coronation claims, 159, 341, 
 358,367. 
 
 — , orders concerning larderer, 243. 
 — , in, coronation claims, 160 n, 
 
 199, 240, 383. 
 
 — IV, 131, 302. 
 
 — , coronation, 161. 
 
 — VI, coronation of, butler, 162. 
 
 — , Great Chamberlain, 117. 
 
 — , Mayor of Oxford's service, 172. 
 — , pantler, 208. 
 
 — , Spur-bearer, 370. 
 — .VII, coronation of, almoner claim, 
 326. 
 
 — , butler claims, 146, 163. 
 
 — , canopy claim, 49, 328. 
 
INDEX 
 
 399 
 
 — , glove and sceptre claim, 376. 
 
 — , larderer claim, 234. 241. 
 
 — , sword claim, 345. 
 
 — , waferer claim, 231 «. 
 
 Eels, serjeanty by render bf , 299 ? . 
 Effeton, Kent, identification of, dis- 
 cussed, 307. 
 Eleanor of Aquitaine, gifts of, 250. 
 
 — , of Provence, coronation of, 73, 
 83, 89. 
 
 — , — , Basin and towel service, 117. 
 
 — , — , butlers, 144, 165, 167. 
 
 — , — , canopies, 321, 329. 
 
 — , — , Dispenser, 188. 
 
 — , — , Great Chamberlain, 114. 
 
 — , — , napery service, 196, 224. 
 
 — , — , pan tier, 202. 
 
 — , — , Queen's Chamberlain, 132. 
 
 — , — , Queen's Gold, claim regard- 
 ing, 139- 
 
 — , — , records of, 206. 
 
 — , — , sword-bearers, 339. 
 
 — , — , lisherships, 107. 
 Elizabeth, coronation of, 370. 
 
 — , household of, 181, 214, 228, 237, 
 251, 302. 
 
 — , of York, coronation of, 138, 208. 
 Ellen the usher, no. 
 
 Elmley Castle, identification of, 203. 
 Ely, bishop of, fine leved on, 272. 
 Encyclopaedia Britahnicd, heraldry, 
 
 article in, 317. 
 English Coronation Records, see Legg, 
 
 Wickham. 
 Enthronization of bishops, analogies 
 
 to coronation services, 51. 
 Eques Auraius, meaning of phrase, 
 
 348. 
 
 Escantiones, 61. 
 
 Escuage, see Scutage and Knight- 
 service. 
 
 Essetone, Kent, see Effeton. 
 
 Essex Serjeanties enumerated in 
 Domesday, 14. 
 
 — , earl of, Stewardship granted to, 
 
 74- 
 
 — , as spur-bearer, 370. 
 
 — , Henry de, constableship of, 81. 
 Establishment of the King's House- 
 hold, see Constitutio domus regis. 
 
 Estcourt, family, 241 n. 
 Eu, Counts of, 50, 226, 362. 
 Eudes the Steward, 322 y., 324. 
 Eustace, Count of Boulogne, 11 «. 
 Ewelme, Oxon, 191. 
 Ewer, as fee, 119, 170. 
 Ewery, 214 seq. 
 
 — , Serjeant of the, 222. 
 
 — , Yeoman of the, 216, 220. 
 Exctiange of tenure, 29. 
 
 Exeter, marquess of, petition bf, 326. 
 Eyton, on King's thegns, 12. 
 
 — , on Walter the usher, 195 n. 
 
 Fairs, of eastern counties, 305, 313. 
 Falcon, 312, 314. 
 
 — , as Arms, 317. 
 
 — , as currency, 314. 
 
 — Serjeanty by render of, 304, 310. 
 Falconer, fees of, 306. 
 
 — , Master, office of, 310. 
 Falcons, Keeper of the, 310. 
 Famuli Regis, not identified with Ser- 
 jeants, 12. 
 
 Faricius, Abbot of Abingdon, 189. 
 Farmanby, holder o£, 250. 
 Farndish, Beds, serjeanty of, 283. 
 Famham Royal, Bucks, serjeanty of, 
 
 374- 
 Feckenham, 194. 
 Fee, of berner, 279n. 
 
 — , of canopy-bearers, 330. 
 
 — , of chamberlain, 68, 119. 
 
 — , of great officers of state, 62. 
 
 — , of harbinger, 302. 
 
 — , of King's champion, 379. 
 
 — , of Marshal, 371. 
 
 — , of Master of the harriers, 289. 
 
 — , of naperer, 222. 
 
 — , of pantler, 213^. 
 
 — , of sacrist, 321. 
 
 — , of waferer, 231. 
 Fewterer, origin of word, 270. 
 Fillongley, holders of, 361. 
 Finchingfield, Essex, 254. 
 Fine, for alienated lands, 18. 
 Fingrith, Essex, serjeanty of, 133 seq. 
 Fish, carriage of, 298. 
 
 Fitz Ailwin, Henry, mayor, 246. 
 
 Fitz Alan, John, lord marcher, 331. 
 
 Fitz Bernard, John, marshal of the 
 hawks, 305. 
 
 Fitz John, John, claim of, 240. 
 
 Fitz Osbem, William, earl of Here- 
 ford, 9«. 
 
 Fitz Roscelin, Robert, lands of, 125, 
 126. 
 
 Fitz ■yValkelin, William, privileges 
 of, 302. 
 
 Fitz Warren, Sir John, claim of, 
 266. 
 
 Fitz William, William, serjeanty of, 
 384. 
 
400 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Foix, Gaston de, Philips MS. of, 273, 
 
 274. 
 FoUus, Roger, otter-hunter, 299?. 
 Fontevraud, archives of abbey of, 
 
 250. 
 Fork, arrangement of, on table, 221. 
 Forma et modus, on the marshalship, 
 
 91- 
 
 — , corrupt spelling of Elmley, 203. 
 Fox, hunting of the, Turberville on, 
 
 2767. 
 Fox-Davies, errors of, concerning 
 
 crowns, 389. 
 Fox-hounds, 270. 
 France, coronation procession, 348. 
 
 — , great offices of state, 66, 71. 
 Frankalmoin, i. 
 Freebridge, hundred of, 154. 
 Freeman, E. A., 179 n. 
 
 — , on devotion of English Kings to 
 hunting, 268.. 
 
 — , on Harold's voyage in the Cha- 
 nnel, 270 «. 
 
 Freemantle, Hants, 297. 
 
 Freville, Alexander de, claim of, 385. 
 
 — , Sir Baldwin, claim of, 385 seq. 
 FroUebury, Hauls, holders of, 103. 
 Fur, for lining King's tunic, 262. 
 Furniture, of king's chamber, as fee, 
 
 118. 
 Furnival, family, glove and sceptre 
 service of, 375. 
 
 — , barony of, 377 n. 
 Fytche, William, claim of, 140. 
 
 Gallon, Dorset, serjeanty of, 232, 233. 
 
 Galtres, forest of, Yorks, 243 n. 
 
 Gardiner, Richard, merchant, 207 n. 
 
 Gatton, Hamo de, 102. 
 
 Gaufres (wafers), 231. 
 
 Gazehound, 278. 
 
 Gentleman usher, duties of, under 
 Charles II, 215. 
 
 Geoffrey "de Hosa", fee of, 181. 
 
 Geoffrey " Marescal ", holder of mar- 
 shalship, go. 
 
 — , the marshal, of East Worldham, 
 13- 
 
 — , Plantagenet, count of Anjou, 
 348. 
 
 — , bishop of Ely, charter of {1227), 
 302. 
 
 George I, coronation of, chamber- 
 lain's fee, 49. 
 
 — ,' larderer's claim, 241. 
 
 George II, coronation of, W. Fytche's 
 claim at, 140. 
 
 — , claim to pantlership, 204. 
 
 — , larderer's claim, 241. 
 
 — , napery service claim, 225. 
 George III. coronation of, 73, 87. 
 
 — , Waferer service, 231. 
 
 — , " maup;^gernoun " presented at, 
 
 249- 
 
 George IV, coronation of, deputy 
 chamberlain's claim at, 125. 
 
 ^- , lord of manor of Heydon's ser- 
 vice, 130. 
 
 — , butlership, 154, 163. 
 
 — , presentation of maple cups, 176. 
 
 — , claim fornapery service, 225, 227. 
 
 — , waferer service, 231. 
 
 — , claims for. larderer service, 241. 
 
 — " maupygernoun " presented at, 
 249. 
 
 — , standards at, 388. 
 
 George V, coronation of, A.G. Mas- 
 kell's claim at, 140. 
 
 — , claim to bear sword, 345. 
 Gerfalcon, 370 n. 
 
 Gernemue, Adam a, see Adam of Yar- 
 mouth. 
 Gervase of Canterbury, 79. 
 
 — , Chronicle of Richard I's re-co- 
 rbnation, 325. 
 
 — , on sword bearers, 339 n. 
 Giffard, Walter, 192. 
 
 — , William, serjeanty of, 254. 
 Gilbert, (the marshal), claim of to mar- 
 shalship of, 89. 
 
 Gillingham forest, 42, 297. 
 
 Gu-aldus Cambrensis, on character of 
 
 the Welsh, 333 n. 
 Glanvill, on hereditas an4 quaestus, 
 
 156 «. 
 Glory of Regality, see Taylor. 
 Gloucester, Crown-wearing at, 318, 
 
 319- 
 Glove as gage, significance of, 380. 
 Glove and Sceptre serjeanty, 373 seq. 
 Gold, ounce of, 322. 
 Geese, serjeanty by render of, 299 y. 
 Goshawk, 270 n. 
 Goshawk-men, fees of, 306. 
 Goshawk serjeanty, 127, 304. 
 Gouiz (GuizJ family, 291. 
 Grafton, Northants, serjeanty of, 284. 
 Grand Chambellan (France) privilege 
 
 of, 112 n. 
 
 — , Eehanson (France), 61. 
 
 ; — , Panetier de France, 199, 220. 
 Grand serjeanty, distinguished from 
 knight-service, i seq. 
 
INDEX 
 
 401 
 
 — , Littleton's theory of, 2 f . 
 
 Great Chamberlain, 112 seq.. 114, 117. 
 
 — , fees, 118. 
 
 — , entitled to box in the Abbey, 119. 
 — , earl of Oxford's claims, 120 q., 
 
 122. 
 
 — , descent of ofEce, 122. 
 
 — , office combined with queen's 
 chamberlainship, 134. 
 
 — , carries King's offering of gold, 
 324 n- 
 
 — , Case, 21, 38, 44, 45, 117. 
 Great Easton, serjeanty of, 234 seq. 
 
 — , Farringdon, holding in, 182. 
 
 — , Hormead, Herts, serjeanty of, 
 
 133, 135- 
 Great offices of state, hereditary cha- 
 racter of, 46, 47. 
 
 — ,. not held by serjeanty, 47. 
 
 — , whether connected with fiefs or 
 manors, 47». 
 
 — , antiquity of, 63. 
 
 Great officers of state, delegation of 
 services leads to confusion with 
 serjeanties, 48. 
 
 — , of Carolingian Court, 63. 
 Great RoUright, Oxon., serjeanty of, 
 
 l86, 196, 197. 
 
 — , Wymondley, Herts, serjeanty of, 
 265. 
 
 Greaves, 180. 
 
 Gregory of London, 190. 
 
 Greyhounds, 270 seq., 276 seq., as 
 
 arms, 277. 
 Grey, de Ruthyn, Lord, claims of, 
 
 224, 344, 364 seq. 
 Groom of the privy chamber, origin 
 
 of tiUe, 67. 
 Guildford serjeanty, confusion with 
 
 Catteshill serjeanty, loi. 
 
 — , Randulf de Broc, 102. 
 
 — , service changed to knight's fee, 
 103. 
 
 — , Stephen of, reward paid to, 297. 
 Gurdon, Adam de, lands of, 16. 
 
 — , identity of, 17. 
 
 Guy the huntsman, holding of, 279. 
 
 Gwendale serjeanty, instance of par- 
 tition of tenement held by serjeanty, 
 41, 
 
 Gwyn, Nell, 178. 
 
 Gyron, mess de, 248. 
 
 H 
 
 Haconby, Lines, serjeanty of, 310, 
 313- 
 
 Hagenet (i. e. Haughley), honour of, 
 
 connexion with constableship, 81. 
 Hairez, Richard de, see Heyraz. 
 Hairez, confusion concerning, 285, 
 
 287, 288. 
 Halcfane, confuses knight service and 
 
 serjeanty, 21. 
 Halford, Sir William, claim of ^ 204, 
 
 209. 
 Hall, Hubert, on scutage of Toulouse, 
 
 24 n. 
 
 — , on Constitutio, 55. 
 
 — , on meaning of, " Sal ", 55. 
 
 — , critical mistakes of, 57 seq. 
 
 — , Kyntone, wrongly identified by, 
 l8l. 
 
 — , identification of ' Aumlega' 203 n. 
 
 — , on king's tailor, 258 j. 
 
 — , on " Baire " and " Hairez ", 285. 
 
 — , confuses surnames in Red Book 
 of Exchequer, 290 seq. 
 
 Hall, Ancient meaning of, 67. 
 
 — , connexion of Marshal with, 83. 
 Hallam, on knighthood, 372 n. 
 Hallingbury, Essex, serjeanty of, 263. 
 Hampshire, serjeanties enumerated 
 
 in Domesday, 13. 
 Hampstead, manor of, 90, 91. 
 
 — , Marshal, tenure of, 45. 
 Hampton, Emma de, serjej(nty of, 
 
 259, 262. 
 Hanbury, family, pedigree of, 361. 
 Hanley, Staffs, 299. 
 Harbinger, 87, 302. 
 
 — , pay of, 88, 215 n. 
 Hsffcourt, family, lands of, 204. 
 
 — , L. W. Vernon, on Steward, 68 
 seq., 73 seq. 
 
 — , on marshal, 90. 
 Harde, 257. 
 
 Hardegrove, Thomas, office of, 301. 
 Hardekin, holder of Hazeleigh, 283. 
 Harehounds, leverers identified with, 
 
 295- 
 Haresfield, manor of, 80. 
 Harlackenden, Richard, office of, 44. 
 Harold, Bayeux Tapestry, 269, 337. 
 
 — , devotion of, to hunting, 268. 
 Harp, claim to carry, 328, 335. 
 Harrier, Caius' incorrect classification 
 
 of, 277. 
 
 — , etymology of word, 290. 
 
 — , and Wolfhound serjeanties, 284 
 seq. 
 
 ■ Harriers, master of the royal, holders 
 
 of office, 289. 
 Hartwell, Northands, 225 n. 
 Harz, meaning of, 257. 
 
402 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Haseleigh, Essex, serjeanty of, 283. 
 Hasler, holders of, 123. 
 Hasted, on Bilsington serjeanty, 174. 
 Hastillarins, meaning of word, 255. 
 Hastings, family, confusion of des- 
 penasership and pantlership in, 204. 
 
 — , Dugdale on, 223. 
 
 — , lands of, 309. 
 
 — , pedigree of, 360, 362 seq. 
 
 — , John de Hastings, Lord, spur 
 claim, 357, 359 seq. 
 
 — , sword claim, 345. 
 
 — , Henry de, claim of, 188, 196, 224. 
 
 — , John de, napery serjeanty of, 
 224. 
 
 — , William de, 89. 
 
 — , napery serjeanty of, 223. 
 
 — , Sussex, Hastings family's lands 
 in, 362. 
 
 Haughley, see Hagenet. 
 Hauville, family, as king's falconers, 
 311 seq. 
 
 — , Gilbert de, lands of, 264 n. 
 
 — , Thomas de, fraud of, 314 seq. 
 Hawk, 270. 
 
 — , transport of, 306. 
 
 — , in Bayeux 'Tapestry, 269. 
 
 — , as currency, 314. 
 
 — , John's orders concerning, 312. 
 
 — , Norwegian trade in, 313. 
 
 — , purchase of, 31X, 313. 
 
 — , sold at fairs, 305. 
 
 Hearne, Establishment of King's 
 household published by, 54. 
 
 — , H. Hall's criticisms on, 55. 
 
 — , on meaning of " Sal ", 56, 57. 
 Henry I, anecdote concerning, 320. 
 
 — , confirms jurisdiction of panetier, 
 220. 
 
 — , re-coronation of, 322 n. 
 
 — , tailor of, 257. 
 
 Henry H, anecdote concerning, 192. 
 
 — , charter of, concerning larderer, 
 242. 
 
 — , charter of, concerning tailor, 257. 
 
 — , crown wearing days recorded by, 
 202. 
 
 — , action of, in Chamberlain case, 
 115- 
 
 ^— , marshal at coronation of, 89. 
 Henry HI, debts of, 264. 
 
 — , "Salsarius " of, 251. 
 
 — , spurs at coronation of, 349. 
 Henry IV, coronation of, cupbearer 
 
 claim, 266. 
 
 — , Glove and sceptre service, 375. 
 
 — , larderer's office, 241. 
 
 — , napery service claim, 224. 
 
 — , pantlership claim, 207. 
 
 — , sword bearers, 344. 
 
 — , waferer claim, 230. 
 
 Henry V, coronation of, glove and 
 sceptre service, 375. 
 
 — , larderer claim, 235, 241. 
 
 — , Pantler's fees, 207. 
 
 — , Waferer claim, 23d. 
 Henry VI, Sausery of, 251. 
 
 Henry VII, ordinances of,concerning 
 pantler, 214. 
 
 — Spur-bearer at coronation of 370. 
 Henry VIII, and Buckingham, 78. 
 — , ordinances on knight marshal, 
 
 85 seq. 
 
 — , ordinances on pantler, 214. 
 — , Sausery, 251. 
 
 — , Spur-bearer atcoronation of, 370. 
 Henry, son of Henry II, as dapifer, 71. 
 
 — , coronation of, 338. 
 
 Henry, Prince of Wales, household 
 
 of, 181, 279 n. 
 Hereditary offices, connexioii with 
 
 land tenure, 45 seq. 
 Herefordand Essex, earl of. Summons 
 
 of, as constable, 76. 
 Herbert the Chamberlain, 121, 322 q., 
 
 324- 
 Hering, Nicholas, claim of, 107. 
 Heydon, Cambs., serjeanty of, 125. 
 Heyraz, Richard de, serjeanty of, 
 
 285, 286. 
 Hildred of Carlisle, 189 n. 
 Hillary, Henry, petition of, 383, 
 Hincldey, honour of, 75. 
 Hinde, Hodgson, Odard of Carlisle 
 
 wrongly identified by, 190. 
 His Grace the Steward, see Harcourt, 
 
 L.W. Vernon. 
 Holderness. Yorks, 344 q. 
 Holding the King's head, serjeanty. of, 
 
 41- 
 Holy Roman empire as origin of 
 great offices of state, 63. 
 
 — , permanence of great offices, .66. 
 
 — , marshal's services, 84. 
 Holy Trinity, banner of the, 388. 
 
 — , Trinity priory, canons of, 126. 
 Hope, St. John, on girdle, 353 «. 
 
 — , on king's ornaments, 347 q. 
 
 — , on spurs, 349. 
 
 — , on Holford MS., 337 n.\ 
 Hothfield, serjeanty of, 113 n. 
 Hormead, serjeanty of, 139, 
 Horse, jnarshal's connexion with, 84. 
 
 371- 
 Horsey Pignes, Somerset, holders 
 of. III n. 
 
INDEX 
 
 403 
 
 Hose, Bartholomew de la, lands of, 
 181, 182. 
 
 — , meaning of word discussed, 177 
 seq. 
 
 — , serjeanty of the, 177 seq. . 
 Houghton, Leics., serjeanty of, 291. 
 Hounds, 269 seq., 277, 281, 301 seq. 
 
 — , masters of the, nature of appoint- 
 ment, 289. 
 
 Households of the nobles, 216. 
 
 — , royal, 5 seq., 52 seq. 
 Hoveden, on Richard I's coronation, 
 
 329. 338, 339- 
 Howard, family, glove and sceptre 
 service of, 376. 
 
 — , marshalship of, 82, 91. 
 
 Hugh " filius Ber," King's baker, 232. 
 
 — , the Chamberlain, 121 q. 
 
 — , the Dispenser, 188, 189. 
 Hungerford, family, lands of, 309. 
 
 — , Sir John, dispensership of, 197. 
 
 — , serjeanty of, 256. 
 Hunting, 268 seq., 302, 303. 
 Huntingdon, earls of, claims of, 338, 
 
 340, 346, 370. 
 -^ , Henry of, on cessation of crown- 
 
 wearings, 319. 
 Huntingdon Peerage, (Bell), on claims 
 
 of earls of Huntingdon, 346. 
 Hurst serjeanty, exchange of tenure, 
 
 29. 
 
 Iceland, falcons from, 314. 
 
 Ilmer, Bucks, serjeanty of, 305, 307, 
 
 309- 
 Impartibility of lands held by serjean- 
 ty, 38, 93. 
 
 — , of service, Seaksbourne case, 40. 
 Inderwick, Mr., K.C., Counsel in Ca- 
 nopy bearers case, 328. 
 
 Indexing, confusion in, 286, 290 j. 293. 
 
 Inferta, 69. 
 
 Inglesham^ Wilts, 182. 
 
 Inquest of service (1212) distinguishes 
 
 between serjeanty and knight ser- 
 
 vice^ 30. 
 
 — , usher serjeanty in, no. 
 
 — , entry of falconer service, 310. 
 Inquisitions after death, 314. 
 Ipswich, lastage dues of, 313. 
 
 J 
 
 James I, coronation of, Catteshill 
 claims, 108. 
 
 — , Sir Stephen Soame's claim for 
 basin and towel service, 129. 
 
 — , earl of Oxford's claim for Great 
 Chamberlainship, 138, 139. 
 
 — , service claim for napery, 226. 
 
 — ,contestforlarderer'so£&ceat,24i. 
 
 — , Westminster Abbey Claim, 324. 
 
 — , Glove and sceptre service at, 376. 
 
 — , Chamberlain's fee,. 119. 
 
 — , basin and towel service not 
 
 performed, 119. 
 James II, coronation of, 87. 
 
 — , Deputy chamberlain's unsuccess- 
 ful claim, 125. 
 
 — , Sir Peter Soame's claim for 
 towel service, 130. 
 
 — , Cory family's claim, 140. 
 
 — , Lord Mayor as assistant butler, 
 170. 
 
 — , Mayor of Oxford's fee, 176. 
 
 — , napery service claim at, 225. 
 
 — , waferer claim, 231 y. 
 
 — , contest for larderership at, 241. 
 — , claim for marshalship of the 
 
 hawks, 309. 
 Jarpenville, Aubree de, serjeanty of, 
 303. 30s, 308. 
 
 — , Aston lawsuit, 306, 309. 
 
 — , William de, hawk serjeanty of, 
 306. 
 
 John, king of England, estates granted 
 by, 15 sej. 
 
 — , siege-train of (1210), 16. 
 
 — , Banishment of alien soldiers 
 promised by, 16 n. 
 
 — , his " Salsarius ", 251. 
 
 — , grants to his tailor, 258. 
 
 — , letters patent concerning otter- 
 hunter, 300. 
 
 — , order concerning hawks, 312. 
 
 — , crown-wearing of, 324. 
 
 John of Gaunt as swordbearer, 342. 
 John (the marshal), claim to marshal- 
 ship, 89. 
 
 — , spurs borne by, 349. 
 
 John ' le Oterhunte', fees of, 301. 
 
 John the usher, 14. 
 
 Jordan Fantosme, 115 n. 
 
 Jort, Calvados, 291. 
 
 Jorz, family, H. Hall confuses with 
 
 " De Chaources, " 291. 
 Juliane, daughter of Robert Doisnel, 
 
 92,96. 
 
 — , marshal's office held by, 42, 98. 
 Juliana, wife of Geoffrey de Lucy, 
 
 claim to Wigginton advowson, 105. 
 Justice in eyre, 193. 
 Justiciar, 71. 
 
404 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Katheriiie of France.coronation claims 
 for chief butlership at, i6o. 
 
 Kernes, barony of, 333, 334. 
 
 Key, chamberlain's badge of office, 
 origin of, 121. 
 
 — , as arms, 317. 
 
 Kenninghall, Norfolk, serjeanty of, 
 
 148 j«j. 
 Kent, earl of, as deputy at coronation 
 
 of James II, 130. 
 — , Richard Grey, earl of, Ashill 
 
 alienated by, 225 n. 
 Kibworth Beauchamp, tenure of, 203. 
 
 — , Sir William Halford's claim as 
 owner of, 204. 
 
 — , Grant of with special limitation, 
 205. 
 
 — , pantler, serjeanty of, 206. 
 
 — , variant in serjeanty of, 206. 
 
 — , pantlership not connected with 
 tenure of, 209. 
 
 Kilmainham, prior of, 299 n. 
 King, selection of coronation officers, 
 43- 
 
 — , Right of appointing deputies for 
 coronation services, 48. 
 
 — , Right of, to alter character of 
 tenures, 48. 
 
 — , Right of dispensing with coron- 
 ation services, 49. 
 
 — , redemption by, of sword at cor- 
 onation, 119. 
 
 — , association of arms of St. Edward 
 and St. Edmund with, 392. 
 
 King's Chamberlain, precedence of, 
 
 123. 
 King's Champion, the, 378 seq. 
 
 — , fee, 177. 
 
 King's Dispensers, the, 186. 
 King's Lynn, fair of, 305, 313. 
 
 — , Lastage dues of, 313. 
 
 King's Serjeants, carucage of 1 198, 30. 
 Kings Worthy, Hants, obtained by 
 
 Amanri the Dispenser, 195. 
 Kington, Heref., identification of, 
 
 181 f. 
 Kitchen, royal, service in Domesday, 
 
 13. 14- 
 
 — , Maupygernoun serjeanty, 243. 
 
 — , turnspit serjeanty, 254. 
 
 Kivilly (family), origin of name, 183. 
 
 — , office held by, 185. 
 Knighthood, parallel of coronation 
 
 service and, 348 seq. 
 
 — , Spurs emblems of, 348. 
 
 — , belting with sword, 349. 
 
 — , significance of, 372. 
 Knight Marshal, 85 seq. 
 
 Knights of the shire, girt with sword, 
 
 35°- 
 Knight-service, confused with grand 
 serjeanty, i seq., 21 seq. 
 
 — , Littleton on, 2 j. 
 
 — , distinguished from military ser- 
 jeanty, 4. 
 
 — , tenure by serjeanty exchanged 
 for, 18, 29. 
 
 — , inquest of service (1212), distin- 
 guished from serjeanty in, 30. 
 
 — , Carucage of 1198 distinguishes 
 from serjeanty, 30. 
 
 — , writs of 1236 distinguished from 
 serjeanty, 31. 
 
 — , Professor Oman's errors con- 
 cerning, 33. 
 
 — , when convertible into serjeanty, 
 48. 
 
 — , as distinct from serjeanty, 316. 
 Knives, as pantler's fee, 207, 210. 
 
 — , arrangement of, on table, 212 j. 
 
 — , pantler's duties concerning, 216 
 
 ?. 217 ?■ 
 
 — , pantler's arrangement of, 218 q. 
 221 J. 
 
 Kyntone, identification of, 181. 
 
 Lamb, Sir C. Montolieu, as knight 
 marshal, 87 n. 
 
 Lambourne, Berks, 236. 
 
 Lancaster, earls and dukes of, stew- 
 ardship held by, 74. 
 
 — , earl of, sword bearer, 342. 
 
 — , honour of, brachet serjeanties in, 
 284. 
 
 Langport hundred, Kent, 307, 308. 
 
 " Land of the Normans ", 173, 174. 
 
 Langton tenure, 25. 
 
 Lapsley, Mr., 72 n. 
 
 Lard, making of, as serjeanty, 254. 
 
 Lardener, see Larderer. 
 
 Larderer, the King's, 233 seq. 
 
 — , claimants for office of, 8, 233. 
 
 — , office held by a woman, 240. 
 Larderers, local, duties and fees, 242, 
 
 243- 
 Larder, 233 seq. 
 
 — , connexion of, with accatry, 237. 
 Larders, local, 24J2. 
 
 Lastage dues, 313. 
 
 Latimer, William de, as almoner, 328. 
 
 Laverstoke, Wilts, holders of, 108. 
 
INDEX 
 
 405 
 
 Leckhaiiipton, Glouc, 191. 
 Legg, L. Wickham, on marshal's 
 office, 91. 
 
 — , on Soame family, 130. 
 
 — , on assistant butlership, 165. 
 
 — , 167. 
 
 — ^ on claim of citizens of Winches- 
 ter, 171. 
 
 — , on Lord Mayor's service as 
 assistant butler, 171. 
 
 — , on Bilsington serjeanty, 173. 
 
 — , on pantler's office, 202. 
 
 — , on pantler's claim, 206, 207. 
 
 — , on Kibworth-Beauchamp ser- 
 jeanty, 203. 
 
 — , identification of Ashill, 223. 
 
 — , on " maupygernoun " 248. 
 
 — , on almbnership, 327. 
 
 — , on canopy bearers, 329. 
 
 — , on sword bearers, 342. 
 
 — , description of girding, 353. 
 Leicester, earl of, grant of steward- 
 ship to, 74. 
 
 — , Robert, earl of, as sword bearer, 
 338. 
 
 — , earldom of, 74. 
 
 — , honour of, 75. 
 
 Leigh, family, " maupygernoun " pre- 
 sented by, 249. 
 
 Le Lutre, nickname confused by 
 H. Hall with Lovel, 290 seq. 
 
 Lenthall, Sir Rowland, 160 «. 
 
 Leporarii, 269. 
 
 Le Sauser, surname, origin of, 251. 
 
 Leveson, Sir John, napery service 
 claimed by, 226. 
 
 Leverers, identified with harehounds, 
 
 ^95- 
 "Levrer", meanmg of word, 277. 
 
 Lewes Priory charters, 244. 
 
 " Liam hound ", 271 seq. 
 
 — , origin of name, 279. 
 
 — , connexion with berselet, 272, 280. 
 
 — , serjeanties, 279. 
 
 Liber de Antiquis Z,e|i6«s (Stapleton), 
 
 244. 
 Liher Niger Scaccaru, 54. 
 
 — , of Edward IV's household, 161 y. 
 
 — , account of Pantler's office in, 
 211. 
 
 — , on napery officer, 222. 
 
 — , on waferer's office, 228. 
 Liber Regalts, 203. 
 
 — , on coronation liveries, 323 y. 
 
 — on sword bearers, 341 ?. 
 Liberaciones, see Livery, 324. 
 Lincoln, John de Laci, earl of, as 
 
 sword bearer, 340. 
 
 Lindsey, earl of, petition to Court of 
 claims, 113. 
 
 Lisle, John, Viscount, claim of, to 
 pantlership, 268. 
 
 Lisours, William de, 306, 309. 
 
 Liston, family, Waferer service of, 
 229. 
 
 — , Overhall, Essex, Waferer ser- 
 jeanty of, 229. 
 
 Littleton, on tenure by grand serjeanty 
 
 27- 
 
 — , definition of petty serjeanty, 37. 
 
 — , states that serjeanty can only be 
 held from King, 50. 
 
 Little Maplestead, 93, 96. 
 
 Little Missenden, Bucks, napery ser- 
 jeanty of, 225. 
 
 Little (or High) Ongar, Essex, con- 
 nexion with Marshal's service, 94. 
 
 Liveries, of Dean and Chapter of 
 Westminster, 322. 
 
 — , of abbot of Battle, 323. 
 
 Lloyd, Sir Marteine Owen Mowbray, 
 
 claim of, 331, 334. 
 London, city of, rights of citizens to 
 
 serve in butlery, 167, l68, 172. 
 
 — , mayor of, claim to act as an assis- 
 tant butler, 167 seq. 
 
 — , — , bishops served by, i68. 
 Lord Adrhiral, precedence of, 123. 
 
 — , Chancellor, Salary in Norman 
 times, 54. 
 
 — , Great Chamberlain, see Great 
 Chamberlain. 
 
 — , High Constable, see Constable, 
 Lord High. 
 
 — , High Steward, see Steward, 38. 
 
 — , Steward, see Steward. 
 Loudoun, Lord, claim of , to bear spurs, 
 
 364 seq. 
 Lovel, name, origin of, 293. 
 
 — , Confusion of with Luttrell, de 
 Loverez, etc., 293. 
 
 Lovell, John, master of the King's 
 
 hounds, 279 «. 
 Loverez (hounds) meaning and origin 
 
 of word, 295. 
 — , name confused by Hall with 
 
 Luttrell, Lovel etc., 293. 
 Loverez, William de, serjeanty of, 
 
 285, 294, 296. 
 
 — , confusion regarding name of, 294. 
 
 — , serjeanty of, 293. 
 Lovet, family, arms of, 293 n. 
 Low, family, arms of, 293 n. 
 Lucy, family, 107. 
 
 — , Geoffrey de, wardship of heirs, 
 104, 105. 
 
4o6 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Luel, see Lovel. 
 Lulworth, tenure in, 123. 
 Lupellus, see Lovel. 
 LupuUus, see Lovel. 
 Luterel, Lutrel, see Luttrell. 
 Luttrell, name, origin of, 293. 
 
 — , confused by H. Hall with Lovel 
 and de Loverez, 293. 
 
 — , Sir John, of Dunster, arms of, 
 293 «. 
 
 Luvel, see Lovel. 
 
 Luveraz, Walter de, see Loverez, W. 
 
 de. 
 Lnverez, see Loverez. 
 Lyam-hound, see hizm-hound. 
 Lyons, Richard purchases waferer 
 
 serjeanty, 230. 
 
 M 
 Mabel, daughter of Edeline de Broc, 
 
 lOI. 
 
 Maddington, Wilts, serjeanty of, 234, 
 
 237, 236, 241. 
 Maddingley, Carabs., held by Burde- 
 
 leys family, 239. n. 
 Madox, T., misconception regarding 
 
 tenure of land, 18. 
 
 — , On Addington serjeanty decision, 
 
 23- 
 
 — , misstates Langton serjeanty case, 
 
 25?- 
 
 — , on Comberton serjeanty, 26 q. 
 
 — , misinterprets Testa de Nevill in 
 Aston Clinton case, 28. 
 
 — , on early period of great offices 
 of state, 64. 
 
 — , on " dapifer " and " senescallus, " 
 69, 70. 
 
 — , on origin of constable's office, 
 
 79. 
 
 — , on Marshal's deputy, 85. 
 
 — , on nature of marshalship, 96. 
 
 — , on great chamberlainship, 121. 
 Magna Carta, Serjeanty divided into 
 
 two classes by, 33. 
 
 — , certain rights of wardship aban- 
 doned by, 35- 
 
 Maitland F. W., on thegns and thegn- 
 
 ship, 12 q. 
 Malet, Robert, great chamberlainship 
 
 held by, 121. 
 Malmesbury, William of, on emblems 
 
 of knighthood, 349 n. 
 Man, Isle of, sword for, 344 j. 
 Mandeville, Geoffrey de, 184. 
 Mantle {pallium), 261. 
 
 Map, Walter, story about the chief 
 butlership, 142. 
 
 — , anecdote of Thurstanthe Dispen- 
 ser, 192. 
 
 — , justice in Eyre, 193. 
 Marden serjeanty case, 41. 
 
 Mare, Gunnor de la, her tenure of 
 
 Alveacote, 109. 
 Mare (Mara) Henry de la, service of, 
 
 104, 109, no. 
 Mareschaucia (Marshal's department), 
 
 92. 
 Margaret, d. of Thomas of Brotherton, 
 
 Marshalship claimed by, 369, 
 Margaretting, Essex, serjeanty of, 133, 
 
 135- 
 
 Markham church, in possession of 
 Simon the Dispenser, 189. 
 
 Marlborough, Wilts, 298. 
 
 Marmion, (family), tenure of South 
 Langton, 26. 
 
 Marmion, Robert, lands of, 361. 
 
 — , alleged connexion with cham- 
 pionship, 381. 
 
 Marshal, the, 82 seq. 
 
 — , Coke on Marshalship, 45. 
 
 — , position compared with constable, 
 63. 
 
 — , connexion with constable, 70- 
 
 — , president of court of chivalry, 77. 
 
 — , place at coronation banquet, 78. 
 
 — , police function, 86. 
 
 — , claims to office of, 89. 
 
 — , descent of office of, 89. 
 
 — , confusion between two branches 
 of office, 89. 
 
 — , origin and descent of office, 89. 
 
 — , difficulty of distinguishing vari- 
 ous orders of, 92. 
 
 — , CatteshiU serjeanty case, 102, 103. 
 
 — , precedence of, X, 123. 
 
 — , spurs carried by, 356, 369, 371. 
 
 — , fee of, 371. 
 
 — , connexion of, with horses, 371. 
 
 — , of the Hawks, 42, 303 seq. 
 
 — , of the litter, service of, no. 
 
 — , family, as spur bearers, 367, 
 
 369. 
 
 — , pedigree of, 368 (table). 
 
 — , John, marshal of Ireland, lands 
 of, 368. 
 
 — , William, as bearer of spurs, 358, 
 368. 
 
 Marshalmen, 87. 
 
 Marshalsea, rolls of the, Marshal's 
 
 duties concerning, 82. 
 Marshalship at Court, a, 92 seq., 42. . 
 Martin, family, 334. 
 
INDEX 
 
 407 
 
 Mary I., coronation of, spur-bearer 
 
 at, 370. 
 Maskell, Adolphus G. claim of* to 
 
 queen's chamberlainship, 140. 
 Maud, empress, Beauchamp dispen- 
 
 sership conferred by, 204. 
 Mauleverer, family, arms of, 277. 
 
 — , Sir John, as pantler at archbis- 
 hop's banquet, 212 q. 
 
 Maunsel, John, Bilsington serjeanty 
 
 granted to, 173, 
 Maupygemoun, 243. 
 Maurice, bishop of London^ 322. 
 May, William, holding's of, 280. 
 
 — , Serjeanty of, 281. 
 
 Maynard, Lord, petition of, for lard- 
 
 erer service, 241. 
 Maynard, Sir Henry, 239, 241. 
 Mayor of Oxford, fee at coronation, 
 
 176. 
 Menigar le Napier, 227. 
 Merc, Walter de, 312. 
 
 — , William de, 313. 
 Michael the Clerk, 299 n. 
 
 — , William, serjeanty of, 295, 297 n. 
 Middle Aston, Oxon, holders of, 108. 
 Middleton, serjeanty of, 295. 
 
 ■ — , Wilts, serjeanty of, 296. 
 Milbourne, family, masters of other- 
 hounds, 301. 
 Miles the porter, of Winchester, 14. 
 
 — of Gloucester, the constable, 79. 
 Military serjeanty of Watton at Stone, 
 
 246. 
 Mines, Use in war 13th cent., 16 n. 
 Ministers, the King's, Origin in the 
 
 King's Serjeants, 7. 
 Mohaut, Roger de, lands of, 154. 
 Moigne, Sir John, claim of, to larder- 
 
 er's office, 235, 241. 
 Molyns, Sir John de lands of 309. 
 Monceaux, Enguerrand de, see Mun- 
 
 ceaus, Enguerrand de. 
 Mondoubleau, 292. 
 Monmouth, John of, lord Marcher, 
 
 331. 
 Montacute Priory, iii. 
 Montague, Anthony, Viscount, rules 
 
 for household of, 217 y. 
 
 — , directions of, for laying the cloth, 
 220 ». 
 
 — , order concerning pantler'sl obei- 
 sance, 213. 
 
 Montaigne, account by, of cadenas, 
 
 221. 
 Montealt, family, claim qf, to chief 
 
 hutlership, 158. 
 Montfort (family), 69. 
 
 — , as stewards, 70, 75. 
 
 — , Amauri de, 75. 
 
 — , Hugh de, 81. 
 
 — , Robert de, 81. 
 Montgomery, Roger de, disposition 
 
 of prossessions of, 156. 
 Montmorency, Bouchard de, as grand 
 
 panetier, 221 q. 
 Moore, Sir George, claim of, to 
 
 ushership, 108. 
 Morant, erroneous record of count of 
 
 Eu's lands, 226 n. 
 
 — , account of Richard Lyons given 
 by, 230 q. 
 
 — , on turnspit serjeanty, 255, 256. 
 
 — , on tenure by needle, 263. 
 Morley, Lord, marshalship of Ireland 
 
 held by, 358. 
 
 Mortagne, Mathew de, Domesday 
 record of, 235. 
 
 Mortain, John, count of, as sword- 
 bearer, 338. 
 
 Mortimer, Ralf de, lord Marcher, 331. 
 
 Mowbray, Lord, claimant for chief 
 butlership, 147 scq. 
 
 — , descent of, 377 «. 
 
 Moyne, family, lands, 234 ; serjeanty, 
 
 237- 
 
 — , Geoffrey le, lands of, 236, see also 
 Moigne. 
 
 Munceaus, Enguerrand de, 93, 314 n. 
 
 — , Waleran de, 93. 
 
 Muncellis, Enguerrand de, see Mun- 
 ceaus, Enguerrand de. 
 Mundeville, Peter of, serjeanty of ,284. 
 Mundublel, see Mondoubleau, 292. 
 Municipal robes, 261. 
 
 N 
 
 Naperer, 222. 
 
 Napery, Keeper of the, 216. 
 
 — , service, 104, 206. 
 
 — , connexion of pantlership with, 
 211, 220 n, 222 Kf., 363. 
 
 Napier, surname, origin of, 222. 
 Napkins, 212 q. 
 
 Napper, surname, origin of, 222. 
 Nayler, Sir George, 130. 
 Needle, tenure by, 263 teq. 
 Nef, 221. 
 
 Nevill, family, glove and sceptre 
 service of, 375- 
 
 — , George, archbishop of York, en- 
 thronization feast of, 212 ?., 217, 
 220 n. 
 
 -^ , Hugh de. King's forester, 296. 
 
4o8 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Newburgh, family, chamberlain ser- 
 vice of, 123. 
 
 Newcastle, duke of, claim of, 376. 
 
 Newnham Priory, lands given to, 126. 
 
 Newton Purcell, Oxon, serjeanty of, 
 262. 
 
 Nicholas the carpenter, 16. 
 
 Nichols, on pantlejrship claims, 204, 
 205, 208. 
 
 Norfolk, earl of, as canopy bearer, 330. 
 
 — , earl of, grant of stewardship to, 
 
 75- 
 
 — , duke of, butlership daim, X47, 
 
 151. 
 
 — , Margaret Marschall, Countess of, 
 Marshalship claimed by, 358. 
 
 Normandy, chamberlains of, 115. 
 
 — , dukes of, pantler of, igg. 
 Northumberland, Henry Percy, earl 
 
 of, as sword bearer, 344. 
 Norway, trade in hawks, 305 n., 313, 
 
 314. 
 Nuneham Courtney, Oxon, disputed 
 
 tenure of, 132. 
 Nuthampstead Herts, serjeanty of, 
 
 I33> 135' 
 
 O 
 
 Oakhanger, Hants, serjeanty of, 278. 
 Oakington, Cambs., 239 «. 
 Obeisance, of the Pantl?r, 213, 218 y. 
 O' Conor Don, the origin of titl^, 389. 
 Odard, the crossbowman, of Moulsey, 
 
 13- 
 Odard of Carlisle, 189. 
 Odard the Sheriff, 189 «. 
 Odoin " de Mala Palude " charter to, 
 
 199, 219. 
 
 — , account of Panctaria in, 200 y. 
 Odorinsecus (hound), 284 n. 
 Officers of State, delegation of their 
 
 duties, 7. 
 
 — , at coronation, 72, 73. 
 
 — , precedence of , according to " Act 
 for placing the Lords ", 122. 
 
 — , " Establishment of the King's 
 household " earliest authority for, 
 54, 62. 
 
 — , origin, 63, 64. 
 
 Oilli, Henry de, charter of, 192 ; see 
 
 also D'Oilli. 
 Old Saling, Essex, holders of, 96 n. 
 Oman, Charles, Knight service and 
 
 serjeanty conifused by, 33. 
 Ombersley, identification of, 203 n. 
 Osbert " Petrarins ", 16. 
 
 Osmund the baker, 14. 
 
 — , recorded in Domesday, 333. 
 Otho, emperor, gift to wafererof, 228. 
 Otter, as device, 293 ». 
 
 — , pelt of the, 299. 
 
 " Otterarsfee ", manor of, 301. 
 Otterhounds, mastership of the king's, 
 298, 301. 
 
 — , earliest private pack, 302. 
 Otter-hunter, of Henry U, services of, 
 
 299?- 
 
 — , allowance to, 302. 
 Otter-hunting, 274 n, 298. 
 
 — , Turberville on, 303 ?. 
 Our Lady, banner of, 388. 
 
 Owen, Dr Henry, on Welsh marches, 
 
 332 seq. 
 Owermoigne (Ower Moigne), Dorset, 
 
 serjeanty of, 123, 234, 237, 238. 
 Oxford, earls of, and the great cham- 
 
 berlainship, 44, 117, 120 j., 122, 
 
 124, 137, 138, 139 f- 
 — , and Queen's chamberlainship, 
 134, 136, 138. 
 
 — , Alice de Sandford, countess of, 
 
 134- 
 
 — , countess of (de Bolebec) lands of, 
 191. 
 
 — , John de Vere, earl of, 136. 
 
 — , Robert de Vere,Iearl of, lo6, 107, 
 136 ; arms of, 390, 392. 
 
 — , Mayor and Citizens, claim of, to 
 serve in the butlery, 171. 
 
 — , as assistant butler privilege of, 
 . 172. 
 
 — , at coronation of Anne Boleyn, 
 172. 
 
 — , service at Edward VI's corona- 
 tion, 172. 
 
 — , fees of, 176. 
 
 Pack, of hounds, 269, 271, 289, 296, 
 301 seq. 
 
 Palfreys given, 128, 304. 
 
 Pantler, the king's, 197 seq. 
 
 Pantry, 198, 216. 
 
 Parmentier, Ralf le, Addington ser- 
 jeanty held by, 245. 
 
 Partition of lands among coheirs, 96. 
 
 — , case of Juliane Fitz Audelin, 93. 
 
 — , performance of service after,i35. 
 Passelewe, Robert, 17, 233, 286. 
 Pastry, department of the, 251. 
 Peers, trial of, Steward presides over, 
 
 74- 
 
INDEX 
 
 469 
 
 Pelisse, rendered by taUor to king, 
 
 258. 
 Pembroke, earlg of, as spur-bearers, 
 
 370, 371- 
 
 — , Aymer de Valence, earl of, 264, 
 343- 
 
 — , Gilbert de Clare, earl of, claim to 
 Catteshill Wardship, 104 scq. 
 
 — , Gilbert Marshal, earl of, marshal- 
 ship of, 89, 358. 
 
 — , John Hastings, earl of, claim of, 
 to bear sword, 343. 
 
 — , Wales, alleged tenure of, 344. 
 Pepper, tenure by render of, 249. 
 Petty serjeanty, 20, 33, 36, 197 «., 
 
 ■ 252. 
 
 Petworth, Sussex, holders of, 156. 
 Philberts (Filberts), manor house of, 
 
 origin of name, 178. 
 Philip Augustus, coronation of, 71, 
 
 72. 
 Philippa of Hainault, coronation of, 
 
 chamberlain's fees at, 136. 
 Picot, family, serjeanties of, 127. 
 
 — , Laureta, holder of larderer ser- 
 jeanty, 239. 
 
 — , Peter, serjeanty of, 128. 
 
 Pinel, the miner, 16. 
 
 Pipe Roll (1234) on Addington ser- 
 jeanty decision, 23, 24. 
 
 Pishill, Oxen, change in tenure of, 
 227. 
 
 Pixley, Mr., on Broun case, 355. 
 
 Pleas of the Hall, 85. 
 
 Polechart, H. Hall's misconception 
 of meaning of, 58. 
 
 Police functions, marshal's 86, 96. 
 
 Ponsard, family, serjeanty of, 256. 
 
 Porcel, Geoffrey, 99. 
 
 Porcherez, Thomas, origin of name, 
 28s «. 
 
 Port, Adam de, fees held of, 181. 
 
 Porter service, 14. 
 
 Portskewet, 80. 
 
 Prayers used at coronation, 325. 
 
 Prebende, meaning of, 84. 
 
 Privy Seal, office of, 161. 
 
 Punchard, family, see Ponsard. 
 
 Punsard, family, see Ponsard. 
 
 Purpyn, or pour-pain, 218 q., 219. 
 
 Pytchley and Laxton service, 296. 
 
 Q 
 
 Queen's Chamberlain, 132 seq. 
 
 — , Basin and towel service, 114. 
 
 — , fees of, 113, 117, 133, 137- 
 
 — , Lands held by service of, 133. 
 
 — , office combined with great cham- 
 berlainship, 134. 
 
 — , office passes to earls of Oxford, 
 
 134- 
 
 — , claims for office at various coron- 
 ations, 140. 
 
 — , Privy Kitchen, wages of head of, 
 215 n. 
 
 Quevilly, France, 183. 
 
 Quit rent, Sausei^s render, 252. 
 
 Rainald, Abbot of Abingdon, 189. 
 Ralf, archbishop of Canterbury, 320. 
 
 — , the crossbowman, of Burgh, 14, 
 — , ' le Moyne ', 235, 236. 
 
 — , ' Naper ' or le ' Napier ', 227. 
 
 — , the otterhunter, gift to, 300. 
 
 — , of Prestbury, 16. 
 
 — , Purcel, 99, 100. 
 
 — , the Sauser, grant to, 251. 
 Ramesey, Adam, Master of the har- 
 
 riei's, 289. 
 
 Randulf de Broc, Catteshill in posses- 
 ion of, 100. 
 
 Ratcliffe on Soar, Goshawk serjeanty 
 of, 127. 
 
 Raynerius Taliator, record concer- 
 ning, 259. 
 
 Raynham, Norfolk, serjeanty of, 310. 
 
 Re-coronation, ceremonial of, 325. 
 
 Red, favorite colour for robes, 261. 
 
 Red Book of the Exchequer, H. Hall's 
 edition, 55. 
 
 — , Urri the engineer's land in, 15. 
 
 — , on Addington serjeanty case, 
 (1234) 23, 24 ?. 
 
 — , Addington serjeanty records, 245. 
 
 — , " Establishment of king's house- 
 hold " printed in, 54. 
 
 — , on divided Marshal serjeanty, 94. 
 
 — , Teversham Manor case, 95. 
 
 — , Catteshill serjeanty, 104. 
 
 — , hose serjeanty in, 177. 
 
 — , on meaning of hosarii, 177. 
 
 — , West Hendred serjeanty, 185. 
 
 — , Dispenser estates, 195 n. 
 — , incorrect edition of, 246. 
 
 — , entries of Adam the cook, 251. 
 
 — , on turnspit serjeanty, 256. 
 — , entries of tailor seirvice, 259. 
 
 — , on king's tailor, 258. 
 
 — , on Wallbury serjeanty, 264 n. 
 
 — , on Hairez 285. 
 
 — , Bockhampton serjeanty, 287. 
 
 27 
 
4l6 
 
 INDEX 
 
 — , on " harrede ", 290. 
 
 — , index system of, 290 q. 
 
 — , suggested identification of Esse- 
 tone, 307. 
 
 Redemption of services by cash, 119. 
 Regalia, swords, 338. 
 
 — , spurs, 34.8. 
 
 Relief, Paid on succession to tenure 
 
 by serjeanty, 35. 
 Renham, William de. King's yeoman, 
 
 316. 
 Rhuddlan, charier granted at, 192. 
 Richard I, coronation of, 71 seq. 
 
 — , Hoveden's narrative of, 329. 
 
 — , services, 329, 330, 338, 348, 356, 
 
 367. 
 
 — , re-coronation of, 321 seq. 
 
 — , claim of citizens of Winchester, 
 
 in- 
 
 Richard II, coronation of, records of, 
 206. 
 
 — , first record of court of claims, 
 107. 
 
 — , claims at, 130, 168, 203, 230, 240, 
 266, 357, 385 n. 
 
 — , services at 107, 219, 224, 248, 
 342- 375> 
 
 Richard III, coronation of, services 
 at, 70 ?, 34S> 37°- 
 
 — , Queen's " cloth of pleasance " at, 
 
 131- 
 Richard, Duke of Normandy, House- 
 hold of, S. 
 
 — , " de Bosco " as King's pantler, 
 201. 
 
 — , de Damfrunt, Shipton, lands of, 
 236. 
 
 — , de Kelsall, Heydon serjeanty of, 
 128. 
 
 — , de Lillebonne, 181. 
 
 — , of Wigborough, no, ill. 
 Ripariis, Margery de, countess of 
 
 Devon, alleged serjeanty of, 132. 
 Rivenhall, Essex serjeanty, of, 4 n, 41. 
 Robert Despenser, lands of, 203. 
 
 — , the Dispenser, lands of, 361, 381. 
 
 — , Dispensator, see Robert the Disr 
 penser. 
 
 — , Doisnel, marshal serjeanty of, 92. 
 
 — , de Gatton and Catteshill ser- 
 jeanty, 103 n. 
 
 — , son of Thurstan, 187. 
 
 — , " de Hastings ", lands of, 361. 
 
 — , de Welles' as King's baker, 232. 
 Robes, made by King's tailor, 261. 
 Rochester, tithes of Bilsington given 
 
 to, 174. 
 Roger de Esvyell, inquest on, 256. 
 
 Romenel de, see Romney. 
 Romney, houses held in, 308. 
 
 — , David of, 307 seq. 
 
 — , Lambert of, 309 q. 
 
 — , Robert of, 307 seq. 
 Romsey, 11, 188. 
 
 Ros, Roger de, King's tailor, 263,264. 
 
 Ross, on barons of the Cinque Ports, 
 336. 
 
 Rouen, archbishop of, 200. 
 
 Runham serjeanty, 41, 42. 
 
 Rutland, earl of, as spur-bearer, 370. 
 
 RydewareCartulai-y,dra wings of hun- 
 ting in, 273, 274 n. 
 
 Sacrist, fee of, 321. 
 
 St Albans, 1st duke of, becomes 
 Master falconer 310. 
 
 Ste Barbe, priory of, chamberlain's 
 basins in, 116. 
 
 St Clair, Geoffrey de, towel serjeanty 
 held by, 131. 
 
 St Edmund, church of, Damietta, anec- 
 dote concerning, 266. 
 
 — , banner of, 388. 
 
 — , use of arms of, in mediaeval 
 heraldry, 391, 392. 
 
 — Edward, banner of, 388. 
 
 — , use of arms of in mediaeval 
 heraldry, 391, 392. 
 
 St Edward's Crown, 74. 
 
 St George, banner of, 388, 389. 
 
 — , abbey of Tancarville, chamber- 
 lain's basins in, 116. 
 
 St Paul, Robert de, chamberlain of 
 
 Henry II, grant to, 257. 
 St Philibert, Roger de, holder of hose 
 
 serjeanty, 177. 
 ' Sal ' meaning discussed, 55, 56, 57. 
 Salisbury, assemblage of barons at 
 
 (1297), 76. 
 
 — , earl of, as canopy-bearer, 330. 
 Salkeld, Cumberland serjeanty of, 249. 
 Salt-cellar, as pantler's fee, 207, 210. 
 — ■ , of Richard II and Richard III, 
 
 207 n. 
 
 — , arrangement of on table, 212. 
 
 — , pantler's duties concerning, 216, 
 217. 
 
 — , pantler's arrangement of, 218, 
 221. 
 
 Sandf ord, baron of, title held by earls 
 of Oxford, 135. 
 
 — , Gilbert de, queen's chamberlain, 
 133, 139- 
 
INDEX 
 
 411 
 
 Saricus, English thegn, 108. 
 Saxony, duie of, as arch-marshal, 
 
 84 y. 
 Sauser, the King's, 249, 252. 
 Sausery, 251, 252. 
 Scalding serjeanty, the, 9, 252. 
 
 — , of hogs, method of, 253 q. 
 Scarborough, 300. 
 
 Scots, King of, as sword-bearer, 339. 
 Scrivelsby, Lines., holders of, 381 seq. 
 
 — , tenure of, 25. 
 Scnipa, Robert da, 191. 
 Escudet (Scudet) William, 10 seq. 
 Sculton (Scoulton)Burdeleys, larderer 
 
 serjeanty of, 8, 233, 239, 241. 
 Scutage, serjeanty never liable to, 21. 
 
 — , confined to military tenures, 22. 
 — , Addington serjeanty decision 
 
 (1234), 23- 
 
 — , of Toulouse, 23, 25. 
 Scyredun, David de, 19. 
 Segrave, Nicholas de, 128, 282. 
 Seller Cellar, 214, 
 
 — , Wages of heads of, 215 n. 
 
 — , of nobleman's household, 216. 
 
 — , temp. Elizabeth, 181. 
 
 — Ye9man of the, duties of, 217. 
 Senescallus, 69. 
 
 Sens, Cardinal de, Cadenas of 221. 
 Serjeant, distinguished from thegn, 13. 
 Serjeanty, definition, i. 
 
 — , Original character, 3. 
 
 — , in 13th cent. 3. 
 
 — , Pollock & Maitland's, definition 
 criticized, 4. 
 
 — , military distinguished from 
 knight seryice, 4, 30. 
 
 — , pre-Domesday, ir. 
 
 — , Domesday classification, 11. 
 
 — , principle of, 14. 
 
 — , Alteration in condition of, c. 12th 
 cent., 14. 
 
 — , Robert Passelewe's enquiry, 17. 
 
 — , changed into knight service, 18, 
 29, 48. 
 
 — , not subject to payment of scut- 
 age, 21 seq. 
 
 — , confused with knight-service, 22. 
 
 — , effect of Magna Carta on, 33. 
 
 — , Mr. Oman's errors concerning, 
 
 33- 
 
 — , Taxation of, 35. 
 
 — , not subject to aids, 35. 
 
 — , Littleton's misconception of 
 petty — , 37. 
 
 — , inalienability of tenements, 37 seq. 
 
 — , Cases of partition of, 41, 42. 
 
 — , double character of, 42. 
 
 — , cases of severance of service 
 from land, 42, 43. 
 
 — , liability for service in divided 
 serjeanties, 43. 
 
 — , offices in gross unconnected with 
 tenure of land, 44. 
 
 — , Bearing of Lord Great Chamber- 
 lain case on, 45, 46. 
 
 — , Great offices of state not held by 
 47- 
 
 — , Character of, unalterable, 48. 
 
 — , created by mesne lords, 50. 
 
 — , Littleton on, 50. 
 
 — , held from ecclesiastics, 51. 
 
 — , connexion of stewardship, 74, 75, 
 
 — , droit d'ainesse in respect of ser- 
 vice retained by elder co-heir, land 
 being divided, 94. 
 
 — , possible connexion of consta- 
 bleship with, 80. 
 
 — , Venoix case, 89, 90. 
 
 — , possibility of chief marshalship 
 being held by, 90. 
 
 — , case of Juliane inheritance, 93 
 seq. 
 
 — , Sirefeld manor case, 95. 
 
 — , joint holder of, 167. 
 
 — , usher of the King's Hall, 108. 
 
 — , Catteshill case, 108. 
 
 — , redemption of services by pay- 
 ment, 119. 
 
 — , Great Chamberlainship not a 
 serjeanty, 121. 
 
 — , Chamberlainship of the exche- 
 quer held by, 121 n. 
 
 — , deputy chamberlainship, 124. 
 
 — , Heydon serjeanty, 125 seq. 
 
 — , division of basin and towel ser- 
 vice, 128. 
 
 — , performance of service in divided 
 serjeanties, 135. 
 
 — , chief butlership discussed, 164. 
 
 — , combined tenancy of Hose fa- 
 mily, 182. 
 
 — , purchase of, 230. 
 
 — , the sauser, 252. 
 
 — , surnames originate in, 285. 
 
 — , case of marshalship of thoHawks, 
 
 304- 
 
 — , distinct from knighthood, 316. 
 
 — , coronation services, 318. 
 Serviens, position of, 34. 
 Sewer, "Taylor on, 72. 
 
 — , Development from dafifer 69. 
 
 — , connexion of waferer with, 228 q. 
 Shakespeare, reference to pantler, 
 
 2iSf- 
 Shalford, Essex, 254. 
 
412 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Sheffield, manor of, serjeanty of, 278. 
 Sherfield upon Loddon, connexion 
 
 with marshal's service, 24, 98. 
 Sheriff, writs of 1236, 31. 
 
 — , Assumption by of surnames from 
 county town, 190 «. 
 
 Shropham, hundred of, holder, of, 154. 
 Sheen, Surrey, 166, 167. 
 Shrewsbury, earls of (Talbot) glove 
 
 and sceptre service of, 375 seq. 
 Shipton Moyne, Glos. serjeanty of, 
 
 234 seq., 241. 
 Shears, tenure by, 263. 
 Silver scullery, serjeanty of the, 8. 
 Simnel bread, Westminster Abbey, 
 
 323. 
 Simon the Dispenser, 189. 
 Skirradon, Devon, 19. 
 Snettisham, Norfolk serjeanty of, 
 
 148 seq. 
 Soame, Sir Stephen, towel service 
 
 claimed by, 129. 
 Socage, free, i. 
 — , writs of 1236 distinguish from 
 
 other tenures, 31. 
 — , Littleton confuses with petty 
 
 serjeanty, 37. 
 
 — , Petty serjeanty passing into, 252. 
 Somerset serjeanties enumerated in 
 
 Domesday, 14, no. 
 Song ofDertnot and the Earl, 380. 
 Sotheron-Estcourt, G.J.T., claim of to 
 
 larderer service, 241. 
 Sourches, name "Chaorciis" derived 
 
 from, 291. 
 
 — , Mondoubleau possessed by lords 
 of, 292. 
 
 Southrop, Hants, serjeanty of, 312. 
 Sparrow-hawks, 270 n. 
 Sparsholt, held by Dispensers, 189. 
 Spear, serjeanty of, the confusion of 
 with turnspit serjeanty, 255, 256. 
 
 — , as lords marchers' fee, 330. 
 Spencer family, genealogy of falsified, 
 
 186. 
 Spersholt, William de, lands of, 186. 
 Spiritual peers, Stewards of, 72 n. 
 Spit, making of, included in ' maupy- 
 
 gernoun ', serjeanty, 247. 
 
 — , turnspit serjeanty, 255. 
 Spoons, pantler's claim to as fee, 207. 
 
 — , arrangement of on table, 212 q. 
 
 — , pantler's duties concerning, 216 ?. 
 217?. 
 
 — , pantler's arrangement of, 2l8 ;. 
 221 J. 
 
 Sport, the King's, 268. 
 
 Spur, Order of the Golden, 349 n. 
 
 Spurs, carrying of the, 347. 
 
 — , emblems of Knighthood, 348. 
 
 — , gilt, significance of, 348. 
 
 — , as insignia of Order of the Bath, 
 
 3S°- 
 S,S., collar of, presentation of to R. 
 
 Broun, 356. 
 Stafford, serjeanty of, 298 n. 
 Stagsden, Beds., held by Burdelys 
 
 family, 239 n. 
 Stainsby, Derby, 302. 
 Standard of England, now borne by 
 
 King's champion, 388. 
 Standard of England, identity of, 389. 
 Standard of Ireland, Fox-Davies on, 
 
 389- 
 Stanhoe, serjeanty of, 281. 
 Stanley Regis, Glos., obtained by 
 
 Amauri the Dispenser, 195. 
 Staplegate Edmund, claim of to chief 
 
 butlership, 175 q., 176. 
 Stapleton, on Bilsington serjeanty, 
 
 174- 
 
 — , on Addington serjeanty, 245. 
 State apartments (of Palace) ancient 
 
 equivalent of, 67. 
 Stawell, Adam de, lands held by, 101. 
 Steepleton, Dorset towel serjeanty of, 
 
 131- 
 Stephen, charter of concerning local 
 larderers, 242. 
 
 — , re-coronation of, 325. 
 
 — , cessation of crown-wearing days 
 
 by, 319- 
 Stepney, held by Robert Fitz Rosce- 
 
 lin, 125. 
 Stevenson, W. H., on derivation of 
 
 " harrier ", 290. 
 Steward, 62. 
 
 — , Coke on Stewardship held by 
 tenure, 45. 
 
 — , Dispensers sometimes confused 
 with, 62, 361. 
 
 — , confusion with constable, 64. 
 
 — , functions of, 324. 
 
 — , Lord as deputy for Lord High 
 Steward, 7. 
 
 — , Distinguished from Lord High 
 Steward, 69. 
 
 — , precedence of, 123. 
 
 — , Lord High, 68. 
 
 — , Distinguishedfrom Lord Steward, 
 09. 
 
 — , development of o£3ce, 69. 
 
 — , functions, 71. 
 
 — , confusion with Lord Chamber- 
 lain, 73. 
 
 — , trial of peers, 74. 
 
INDEX 
 
 413 
 
 — , as president of court of claims, 
 
 74- 
 
 — , crown carried by, 74. 
 
 — , hereditary character of office, 74. 
 
 — , grailts of office, 74. 
 
 — , connexion of office with ser- 
 jeanty, 75. 
 
 — , deputy of, 85 n. 
 
 Stonrton, family, Great Easton pos- 
 sessed by, 238. 
 
 — , John, ist lord, as king's -larderer, 
 338. 
 
 Stratford at Bow, nuns of, lands ob- 
 tained by, 126. 
 
 Straw, serjeanty by finding, 299 ?. 
 
 Strickland Richard, Master of the 
 harriers, 289. 
 
 Strogoil see Pembroke, 89. 
 
 Stubbs, his greatness as a historian, 
 
 52. 
 
 — , on King's palace of Westminster, 
 
 52, S3- 
 
 — , on " the establishrnent of the 
 King's Household ", 54. 
 
 — , on origin of great offices of state, 
 
 63- 
 
 — , on dates of great offices of state, 
 64. 
 
 — , on development of ministers from 
 great officers of state, 65. 
 
 — , on constable and marshal, 76, 77, 
 82. 
 
 — , on court of chivalry, 77 n. 
 
 — , on crown wearing days, 202, 
 318, y., 320. 
 
 Succession, Norman principle of, 155. 
 
 — , to offices, rights of, 365. 
 
 — , Lord Ancaster's claim, 209. 
 
 — , through wife, 305. 
 
 — , Hauville dispute, 315. 
 Sudeley, Ralph Butler, Lord grant of 
 
 butlership to, 161. 
 Suffolk, Serjeanties enumerated in 
 
 Domesday, 14. 
 Surnames, origin in serjeanty, 285. 
 Surrey Serjeanties enumerated in 
 
 Domesday, 13. 
 
 — , duke of, arms of, 391. 
 
 — , Hamelin, earl of, see Warenne, 
 339. 
 
 Sutton, Robert de. Scalding serjeanty 
 
 of, 252, 253. 
 Swereford, on scutage of Toulouse, 
 
 25- 
 
 — , Mr. Hall's defence of, 57. 
 Sword, of Knighthood parallel with 
 
 King's sword, 349. 
 
 — , as emblem of Knighthood, 350. 
 
 — , in creation of Knights of the Bath, 
 
 3SI- 
 
 — , coronation, 71, 337 seq. 
 
 — ,ThomasBeauchMip'sclaim(i377), 
 206. 
 
 Table, Pantler's arrangement of, 212 y. 
 216 J., 217 ?., 218. 
 
 Table cloth, laying of, 219, 220 n. 
 
 — , as fee, 208, 220. 
 
 Table-linen, naperers duties concer- 
 ning, 222. 
 
 Tadmarton, 190. 
 
 Tailor, the King's, 60, 2S7, 258, 260. 
 
 Tailor's bills, 201. 
 
 Talbot, Earl, as Steward, 73. 
 
 Taini regis, see Thegn. 
 
 Taleator, as surname, 260. 
 
 Tallator, 257. 
 
 Tally, accounts by, 219, 228 q. 
 
 Tally-Cutter, confusion of with tailor, 
 260. 
 
 Tally-Cutting, entries concerning, 
 260. 
 
 Tamworth, holders of, 381 seq. 
 
 — , castle, 361. 
 
 Tancarville, William de insistence on 
 rights of Chamberlain, 115. 
 
 Tancred, Christopher, master of the 
 harriers, 285 n. 
 
 Tanistry, law of, 389. 
 
 Tateshale, Robert de, lands of, 154, 
 156. 
 
 — , claim to chief butlership, 157 ?• 
 Taylor, on dapifer and sewer, 72. 
 
 — , on marshalship, 84 y. 
 
 — , on championship, 380. 
 
 — , P.O., Mr. Claimant for chief 
 
 butlership, 147 seq. 
 Tenby, Wales, holder of, 344. 
 Tenures, classification of, i. 
 Testa de Nevill, 1250, authority for 
 
 serjeanties, 17 seq. 
 Teversham, Cambs, 94, 95. 
 Tewkesbury, 299. 
 Tezelin the cook, 13. 
 
 — , serjeanty of, 243. 
 
 Thegn, Maitland's definition of, 12. 
 
 — , definition of word, 13. 
 Thegns, the king's, 12 seq. 
 Thomas of Brotherton, marshalship 
 
 granted to, 369. 
 
 — , " de Heyden ", 128. 
 
 Thorel, John, napery service of, 
 225 «. 
 
414 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Thurstan, persistence of name of 
 among Dispenser family, i88. 
 
 — , the Dispenser, son of' Simon, 190 
 foil. 
 
 — , the Dispenser, claim at queen's 
 coronation (1236), 188, 196, 224. 
 
 — , son of Thurstan the Dispenser, 
 
 I93> 194- 
 Tichemessh, John, master of the 
 
 harriers, 289. 
 Tirel, Hugh, 195 n. 
 Tisted, Hants, serjeanty of, 17. 
 Torel, family, holders of West Thur- 
 
 rock, 225, 226. 
 Torell's Hall, Essex, tenure of, 226. 
 Treasury, association of chamberlain 
 
 with, 120. 
 
 — , claims regarding Queen's gold, 
 
 139- 
 Trenchers, pantler's arrangement of 
 
 on table, 212 y, 218 ?. 
 Triket, Ida, lands held by, 126. 
 Trivel forest, Heref. 298., 
 Tunic, royal, 261. 
 Turberville (Book of. Hunting), on 
 
 breeds of hounds, 303 y . 
 
 — , on uses of the liam-hound 273 y. 
 
 — , Woodcuts in, 273. 
 
 — ■ , on use of liam hounds, 274. 
 
 — , reliability of, 275. 
 
 — , on greyhounds, 276 q. 
 
 " Twici " William, huntsman of Ed- 
 ward II, 275. 
 
 Turner, Mr. on Whitfield serjeanty, 
 282. 
 
 ■Turnham, Stephen de, claims to Cat- 
 teshill lands, 100. 
 
 — , holder of manor of Frollebury, 
 103. 
 
 Turnspit serjeanties, 254, 257. 
 
 U 
 
 Union Jack, confusing character of, 
 
 389-! 
 Upperby, bestowed on Adam the 
 
 Cook, 250. 
 Urri (Orri) the engineer, serjeanty 
 
 of, IS. 
 Ursarius, meaning of word, 59. 
 Usher of the King's Hall, 108, seq. 
 ^- , Catteshill case, 102, 103. 
 
 — , of the larder, 234. 
 
 — , service, in Domesday, 14. 
 
 — , Marshals' s performance of, 83. 
 
 — , held by a woman, no. 
 
 V 
 
 Valirarii, 269. 
 
 Valtrarius, Norman, reward paid to, 
 
 297. 
 Velterer, 271, 272. 
 
 — , pay of, 279 n. 
 
 Velvet, as chamberlain's fee, 119. 
 Venison, storage of 241, 243. 
 Venoiz, Robert de, marshal serjeanty 
 
 of, 89. 
 Venour, William, Waferer service 
 
 performed by, 230. 
 Ver, Robert de, constableship of, 81. 
 Verdon, family, services of, 374, 377. 
 
 — , Theobald de, serjeanty of, 374. 
 Vere, family, see Oxford, earls of. 
 
 — , Alphonso de, as Queen's Cham- 
 berlain, 136. 
 
 Veres, alleged variant of Lovel, 293. 
 
 — , William de, se^ Loverez, William 
 de. 
 
 Vernon, William de, 16. 
 Victoria, coronation of, Knight mar- 
 shal at, 87. 
 
 — , larderer claim at, 234, 241. 
 Villiers, Sir Edward, fees as Knight 
 
 marshall, 87. 
 Vinegar, King's supply of, 251. 
 
 W 
 
 Wace, on household of Duke Richard 
 
 of Normandy, 5 q. 
 Waferer, serjeanty, 227, 228, 229. 
 Wafers, 229, 230 q. 
 Wafery, The, 228. 
 Waleram de Munceaus, 93. 
 Wallbury, Essex, 263, 264. 
 Walter de Chesnei, (de Chesneto, 
 
 Chesneio), 106, 194. 
 Walter the usher son of Thurstan, 
 
 193, 194, 195- 
 
 — , the cook, 14. 
 
 — , son of Roger (de Pitres) as first 
 constable, 79. 
 
 Waltham, Essex, holders of 142. 
 
 — , Holy Cross, Chronicle of, 142, 
 148, 227. 
 
 Waltham, Lines., serjeanty of, 284. 
 
 Watton at Stone, Herts; serjeanty of, 
 246. 
 
 Warberton, William de, 93, 314 n. 
 
 Warblinton, John de, marshal ser- 
 jeanty of, 97. 
 
 Wardrobe, connexion of hosarii with, 
 177. 
 
Index 
 
 415 
 
 Wardship, Rights claimed by crown, 
 
 35. 516. 
 Wardship, Catteshill serjeanty case, 
 
 104, 105, 106. 
 
 — , crown's right to, 316. 
 
 " Warebere", Notts serjeanty of, 284. 
 Warenne, Earl, hereditary claim of to 
 bear sword, 341. 
 
 — , as chief butler, 144. 
 
 — , Hamelin, Earl, as sword bearer, 
 339- 
 
 Warren, Sir Ralph, Lord Mayor as 
 
 King's larderer, 238. 
 Warrington, Lanes, acquisition of by 
 
 Richard Butler, 194. 
 Warwick, Earl of, hereditary claim of 
 
 to bear sword, 341. 
 
 — , earldom of, doubt as to holder of, 
 (temp. Henry VII), 208. 
 
 -^ , Th. Beauchamp earl of, pantler- 
 ship claimed by, 203, 206, 207 q. 
 
 — , Thomas de Newburgh, earl of, 
 as sword bearer, 340. 
 
 — , William Mauduit, earl of, 201. 
 Wash, The, 313. 
 
 Waurin's chronicle, 337. 
 
 — , on Henry IV's coronation, 345. 
 Wedon, Richard de, relief of, 225 n. 
 Welsh March, lords of the, coronation 
 
 claim of, 330. 
 
 Wars, serjeanties connected with, 318. 
 
 Wenlock, Lord, chief butlership gran- 
 ted to, 161. 
 
 Werbintona, William de, see Warber- 
 ton William de. 
 
 Westbury, Wilts, Escudet's manor at, 
 10. 
 
 West Hendred, Berks., serjeanty of, 
 i8S, 186. 
 
 Westminster, annual court at, 175. 
 
 — , crown wearings at, 318, 319. 
 
 — , Stubbs on palace and abbey of, 
 S2 seq. 
 
 — , Dean and chapter of, coronation 
 claim of, 322, 331. 
 
 — , Abbey, great chamberlain, entitled 
 
 to box in, 119. 
 West Thurrock, Essex, serjeanty of, 
 
 22s, 226. 
 West Tytherley, Hants, 294. 
 Whitfield serjeanty, 282. 
 Whitsunday court, Butler service at, 
 
 175- 
 
 Whitsuntide, crown-wearing, 318. 
 
 Wife, succession through, 305. 
 
 Wigborough, Somerset, ilo, ill, 112. 
 
 Wigginton, Herts, suit of 1217, con- 
 cerning, 105. 
 
 William, I., gifts of land to his cook, 
 9 seq. 
 
 — , disposition of possessions of, 155. 
 
 — , charter of to abbot of Battle, 323. 
 
 — , Easter court of 1070, 319. 
 
 — , crown- wearing's of, 319. 
 William III, household of, 181, 
 
 — , otter-hunter of, 302. 
 William the archer, of Bentley, 13. 
 William Fitz Audelin, claim of to 
 
 Marshalship, 92. 
 William Fitz John, 190. 
 William ' Monachus ', 234. 
 William the porter, Exeter Castle, 14. 
 William, the King's tailor, bills of, 259, 
 
 261, 262. 
 William the usher (" Hostiarius "), 
 
 lands of, in. 
 William ' de Welles ' as King's baker, 
 
 232. 
 William of Yarmouth, 311, 312. 
 William and Mary, coronation of, 
 
 Cory family's claim at, 140. 
 
 — , coronation of, claim for pantler- 
 ship at, 20s n. 
 
 — , contest for larderership at, 241. 
 
 — , royal household under, 215. 
 
 — , Pastry and Sausery under, 252. 
 Willoughby d'Eresby, lords, as Ste- 
 wards, 72. 
 
 Wiltshire, John, petition for towel 
 
 service, 129. 
 Windrush, Glos., arrentation of, 109. 
 Winchester, claims of citizens, 172. 
 
 — , crown-wearing at, 318, 319. 
 
 — , treasury swords at, 338. 
 
 Wine, connexion of hose serjeanty 
 with, 178. 
 
 Winfrith-Newburgh, Dorset, deriva- 
 tion of name, 123. 
 
 -^ , baker serjeanty in, 232. 
 
 Winterbourne Gunner, 108, 109. 
 
 Withies, for hanging meat, serjeanty 
 of finding, 257, 
 
 Wolf, rewards for killing, 297. 
 
 — , as charge, 293 «. 
 Wolf, hounds, 270. 
 
 — , Kinship of to grey hpund, 277. 
 
 — , loverez identified with, 295, 297. 
 
 — , mastership of the, 296. 
 
 — , Middleton serjeanty, 297. 
 
 — , hunting, 276 q. 285. 
 
 — , serjeanty by, 296. 
 
 — , Tuberville on, 276, j. 
 
 — , by the duke of Beaufort in Poi- 
 tou, 296. 
 
 WoUaston, Court of Claims, butlership 
 petitions in, 146. 
 
4i6 
 
 1NDE3C 
 
 — , on Oxford butler service, 171, 
 
 — , on word " dillegrout, " 248. 
 
 — , on Hastings claim to carry spurs 
 
 359- 
 
 — , on Grey de Ruthyn spur claim, 
 365. 
 
 — , on bearing of the spurs, 366. 
 
 — , on championship, 382. 
 Woodham Mortimer, Essex, brachet 
 
 serjeanty of, 283. 
 Woodstock, Oxon, 190. 
 Wool, Dorset, Baker serjeanty of, 123, 
 
 232. 
 Woolmer, forest of, 278 n. 
 Woolverston, Essex, serjeanty of, 133, 
 
 135. 
 Worksop, Notts, glove & sceptre 
 
 service of, 375. 
 Writs of 1236, 30 seq. 
 " Writ of right " 349. 
 Writtle inquest (1212) 183 j., 227. 
 
 Wroth, John, master of the harriers, 
 
 289. 
 Wymer, Ralph, keeper of the King's 
 
 fishstew, 298 n. 
 Wymeswold, Leics. serjeanty of, 291. 
 Wymondham, Norfolk, serjeanty of, 
 
 48, seq. 
 Wymondley, serjeanty, 264, 265 q. 
 
 Yarmouth, 305 «., 313. 
 
 Yeatman, Pym, mistranslations by, 
 
 282. 
 Yeoman of the Bottles, functions of 
 
 iSi. 
 — , Usher, 218 y. 
 
 York, archbishop of, pantler of, 212 j. 
 — , claim of to crown the King, 
 
 319-