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of my mother, all my Tenemts with all the rents and appurtnances in Kirkby. Dat. 28 Ed. 3 [1354].

itm.

K [vol. 133] 103 William de Bellomonte Kt gaue to Robert his sonne all his lands which he had of his inheritance after the decease of William de Bellomont his father, & Sr Richard de Bellomonte his brother, in Holdernesse, Crosselandfosse, North Crosseland, Meltham & South Kirkby [sive aliqu'o (Dodsworth)], to haue &c. to the said Robert & the heires of his body lawfully begotten.

sans date.

In the writeings of Richard Beaumont, Kt & Baronet. 4 No. 1629. K [vol. 133] 110 Robert son of St John de Beamont Kt gaue &c. to Henry his brother, & the heires of his body, All the Mess, Lands, & Tenements, which he had in the Towne of Kirkeby in Elmet [sic]. Wittnesse Hugh de Brereley, &c. Dat. at Kirkby, Feb. 35 Ed. 3 [1361-2].

ibm.

K [vol. 133] 111 Richard [Henricus (Dodsworth)] Beaumond of Fosscrosseland gaue to John Wath, vicar of Hodresfeild,87 John Sayvill of Shelley, his Mann's of Crosseland, with the appurtnances, with all the Messs, Lands, &c. which he had at the day of the makeing these p'sents within the bounds of Crosland, Hodresfeld, Whitley & Kirkby, together with the revertion of a certaine yearly rent of 40 which Alice late wife of John de Mirteld held for terme of life. Wittnesse St John Savile Kt. &c. Dat. 1 May, 12 R. 2 [1389].

itm.

K[vol. 133] 124 Henry Beaumond gaue to Thomas Sayvell of Thornhill, Henry Savill of Coppley, & Richard Dronsfeild, Rector of the Church of Hetton, all the Lands & Tenemts in the Townes of Qwittlay, Crosseland, Hudresfeild & Kirkby in the County of Yorke. Wittnesse, John de Lascelles, &c. Dat. 2 H. 5 [1414].

K [vol. 133] 132

ibm.

Henry de Eyuill & Agnes his wife gaue to John de
Bellomonte all his rent in South Kirkby which he

held of the Doure of Agnes his wife in the said Towne, & allso his rent in North Crosland. Wittnesse, Thomas de Bellomont. Dat. 1342 [16 Ed. III.]

K[vol. 133] 142

ibm.

John de Bellomont Kt. gaue to Roger Hirneland all his Lands & Tenemts within the Bounds of South Kirkby with Wards, Releifs, Escheats, &c. to be holden, &c. Dated at South Kirkby, 1337 [11 Ed. III.]

$7 As evidence of the poverty of this Vicarage, it may be noted that between 1268 and 1444, not a single vicar is recorded to have died in possession of the

VOL. XIII.

benefice. That two of them were promoted to the Church at Huddersfield may be attributed to the interest of the Beaumonts in both places.

I

Jn Sir John Ramsden's Custody, c. 80, alibi Charta. [3 R. 2 [1379] n. 14, is added in another hand.]

Y [vol. 155] 92 [Given under PRESTON, vol. xii., p. 56.]

Out of Giffard's Register, fo. 10.

B [vol. 28] 13 The Prior of St Oswald of Nostell p'sents to the church of South Kirkby, 1267.

Jn Rotulo De Quo Warrant. 21 Ed. 1 [1293] Ebor.

E [vol. 41] 50

It. the Prior of St Oswald holds one part of the towne of South Kirkby.

Out of St Maries Tower, Ebor.

88

$9

B [vol. 118] 151 Wydo de la Vall [Laval, Dodsworth, correctly].
Confirmed the guift which the Prior of St Oswald of
Nostell, & Covent of the same place, made to Symon de Aputt
Chancelour of the Church of Yorke, of the Church of Sukerby" (a South
Wittnesses-h s9
Kirkby, in the margin) with the appurtnances &c.
p'centor of the Church of Yorke, h Archdeacon of Cleueland, W. Arch-
deacon of Notts.

89

[A pen-and-ink drawing of the seal follows: OBVERSE, the usual man on horseback with sword and shield; inscription SIGILLUM WIDONIS JUNIORIS DE LAVAL; REVERSE, a bull passant, having his tail porrected even with his back; inscription, ANTE SIGILL . . . . Gİ.]

Out of the Coucher booke" of the Hospitall of St Nicholas in Pontefract, fo. 27.

A [vol. 116] 19

To all the sonnes of the holy mother church Robert de
Lacy greeting. Know ye that for the health of my

91

88 It is singular how perversely seventeenth-century writers, even with the correct orthography before them, miswrite this name. Here, once more, the translator, with Dodsworth's correct "de Laval" before him, goes out of his way to translate it into de la Vall; an indication that he knew nothing of Laval in Guion, the cradle of this family who followed first Roger Pictavensis when dispossessed in Lancashire, and secondly Robert de Lascy, when dispossessed in Yorkshire.

89 Simon de Apulia was afterwards dean, and Hamo was precentor from 1155 to 1186.

90 This volume had been for some generations in the Winn family at Nostell, and was so till about 1865, when (after a kindly loan of it to me) I returned the volume personally to Mr.

The

Charles Winn, the grandfather of the present lord. My impression is that Mr. Winn was about to lend the volume to some one else, I think at Wakefield, or in the neighbourhood. This I fear was done, but in any case the book cannot now be found at Nostell. It is a rather thin volume of about foolscap folio size, bound in leather, and slightly repaired at the back towards the lower part. leaves are of parchment, and the handwriting not earlier than late fifteenth century. As it is quite possible that the borrower is now dead, and that the volume has taken its place among those that were his own, I feel it my duty to place what I know concerning it on record, in order that at some future time these remembrances may lead to its identification by its present possessors and its return to the repository to which

soule and of all my Ancestors & heires haue granted & by this my p'sent Charter confirmed to God & the Church of St Oswald of Nostell & the Regular Canons of the same place halfe a Carucate of Land wherein the Church of the said Canons is scituate &c. J allso grant & Confirme & as much as to me and my heires belongeth of the foresaid Cannons, in pure & ppetuall Almes the Church of South Kirkby & the Church of Fetherston with all their appurtnances &c. Wittnesse Osbert Archdeacon, William de Frist [Fryston], Adam son of Peter de Birkin & multis aliis.

Out of Nostell Priory Coucher, fo. 6.

MM [vol. 138] 2 Henry the I. confirmed (inter alia) to God & St Oswald & the Canons of Nostell &c. the Church of Sukerbia [Sukirbia (Dodsworth)] the Church of Bateleia & the Church of Huderesford [Huderesfeld (Dodsworth)] with the lands belonging therevnto which Hugh de la Val gaue unto them.

ibm.

MM [vol. 138] 9 [Entered under FETHERSTON, vol. x. 535.]

MM [vol. 138] 15

ibm. 42.

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Discord between the Prior of St Oswald of the one pte & S Adam de Wannervill of the other pte about the wages [the word translated "wages is viijs in Dodsworth] of the foresaid Prior from his Priory to his Mann's of South Kirkby & Sherborne &c. Dat. 2 Ed. 2.

[Other references are CCC (vol. 34) 64, 66, and F (vol. 125) 3, 71

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it belongs. It was one of the very earliest which Roger Dodsworth used for his A. volume (now classed as Vol. 116!), and he records that the volume was then "in the keeping of Mr. Skipton in Pontefract, who lent it me most friendly and freely, 17 Aug. 1619,"-274 years ago. It is lamentable to think that a similar loan, I have no doubt also "most friendly and freely," should two centuries and a half afterwards have led to the loss of this interesting coucher book.

91 This second Robert was lord from 1187 to 1193 between Henry de Lascy and Roger of the second house.

92 This is the usual misreading. The witness was Adam de Birkin, son of Peter. There is no evidence that Peter fitz- Asolf, a very great man in his time, ever called himself "de Birkin." seems to have divided his large posses

He

sions among his sons, or at least given them large estates in his lifetime, and Birkin fell to the share of Adam, who was thenceforth "de Birkin,"-Adam fitzPeter, de Birkin. See also vol. xi., 461.

93 So called, as belonging to the Hospital of St. Nicholas, and to distinguish it from East Hardwick, an outlying hamlet of Pontefract in the opposite direction. It belonged to the manor of Pontefract, of which it was about the tenth part. It is referred to in Domesday as "the alms land of the poor," 2 carucates out of 18. It seems to have been the tithe of the manor, and was probably the gift of some early royal possessor, the founder of the Hospital of St. Nicholas. St. Ive's well, another indication of an eighth-century foundation, is on the estate a few rods distant from the house. Spital Hardwick never became a centre

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et

AAA [vol. 26] 24 [now 20] Fulco Paynel by the Consent of Lecellina his wife [et heredum meorum hominum (Dodsworth)] for the soules of his father & mother &c. gaue granted to the Church of St Nicholas of Drax & the Canons there serving God &c. the Jsle called Holmholm & Middelholm, &c., & the Church of Drax, with 2 bovates of Land & one Toft in the said Towne, with the Chappell of Stanhill,95 &c. Wittnesse &c.

Stapleton.96

Fines, 39 Ed. 3 [1365–6].

G [vol. 127] 32 [See under CAMPSALE, vol. x. 361.]

of population, though its founder had carefully given to the foundation both banks of the small stream which is sup. posed to bound it, and to which Pontefract has no access throughout the principal part of its course. The house (now a farm house, and for some time the residence of the bailiff of Lord Galway, the owner) is built as such early ecclesiastical foundations generally were, at a little distance north of the stream, and defended by higher ground from the north winds. One of the neighbouring closes is called the Coal Pit Close, as having contained surface coal, of which there is a bed there, and to the west. It is however valueless. Roman remains have been found here, but in modern days it did not attract population, is not named in the Poll Tax Rolls, and was not formed into an Elizabethan township for poor law purposes.

94 This hamlet had no separate rating to the Poll Tax, nor was it an Elizabethan township.

95 The Charter which is at full in Monasticon II., 96, 97, contains the addition cum alneto eidem capella antiquitùs pertinenti.

96 In the time of King Edward the Confessor, the manor of Stapleton, together with those of Beal, Campsall, Kellingley and Kirk Smeaton, had been owned by Baret, Ulchil having a moiety of Stapleton. But when the Domesday Survey was compiled, twenty years afterwards, these manors were all in the hands of Ilbert de Lascy, who had subinfeuded mostof them and had given both moieties of Stapleton to one Gislebert or Gilbert. Gislebert had then held the manor for some little time; for subse

quent to this grant (though still before the time represented by the Domesday volume), when the Chapel of St. Clement's in the Castle of Pontefract was in course of endowment under the patronage of the chief lord Ilbert de Lascy, Gislebert made a contribution thereto, and as he was then called Gilbert, son of Dama, that record, by supplying the name of one of his parents, carries the pedigree a step higher. Stapleton is returned in the Survey as two manors, the entry adding, "In Stapelton, Baret, and Ulchil had 4 carucates of taxable land, where there may be 5 ploughs. Now Gislebert has it from Ilbert. He himself has there 2 carucates. There are 4 villans, and 12 bordars, with 4 ploughs and an acre of meadow. The whole manor is one leuga long and a half broad. In the time of King Edward [the Confessor, i.e. in 1065], the value was £4; now [in 1086] it is £3." Stapleton was thus at that time a comparatively prosperous place, as judged by its comparative geldable value.

At the time of the Domesday Survey Gislebert had no name, so far as is known, but Gilbert son of Dama; he never seems to have been called de Stapleton. In the time of his son Hugh, however, the fashion of taking place-names sprang up, and he was called indifferently Hugh son of Gilbert and Hugh de Stapleton, being (and the point cannot be insisted upon too strongly as he is thereby separated entirely from the Stapletons of Carlton and Wighill) the first inheritor of this manor who adopted the territorial name of Stapleton, which cognomen was therefore not brought to the place by the newcomers but assumed by them from the

name of the manor. For the Stapletons of this Stapleton Park, in the Parish of Darrington, were not a branch of the Durham family as is sometimes supposed; but the first of this family called by that surname was the Hugh whose father was Gislebert or Gilbert, and his grandfather or grandmother, Dama. In other words Hugh did not receive the name of Stapleton from his ancestors, but at a time when such an assumption was getting to be almost a necessity, he assumed it from this manor of which he was lord, on which he resided, and which as far as can be ascertained was

his sole possession. Henceforward, however, Hugh's descendants in the elder branch bore that name; but in some remarkable instances in which the younger branches hived out, they adopted the name of the place in which they settled. For example, Robert, the second son of Hugh, obtained a grant of land at Swillington, and thenceforth abandoning the name of Stapleton, he became known as Robert de Swillington (or Robert, son of Hugh, de Swillington), and was the head of a very important family. The youngest brother Walter also entirely dropped his patronymic, preferring to be known as "Walter the king's bailiff," or "the bailiff of Staincross and Osgoldcross." Similarly in a

later generation, the great family of Horton de Horton, near Bradford, were really Stapletons coming from this Stapleton in Darrington, their ancestor being a later Hugh (son of Robert, son of Hugh, son of Gilbert) to whom the second Robert de Lascy about 1190 made a graut of four carucates of land at Great Horton, Little Horton and Clayton. The following memorandum of this transaction is on record in Dodsworth, vol. 118, fo. 122b :

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Robert de Lascy, lord of the Honour of Pontefract who lived in the time of Henry II., and died in the 4th of Rich. I., gave and granted to Hugh son of Robert de Stapleton, 4 carucates of land in fee and inheritance, to be held from him as a third part of a knight's fee. To wit in Great Horton, 20 bovates of land, in Little Horton 14 bovates of land, and in Clayton 6 bovates of laud with their appurtenances. Witnesses: Paynill and.. Reineville." In a later generation still, William son of Hamericus the younger brother of this Hugh de Horton similarly hived out, and had land at Whitwood and Whitwood Mere, where he was styled indifferently "of Stapleton," " of Whitwood," and " 'of Mara," that is The Mere, or Whitwood Mere. The following short pedigree will make this statement clear.

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