¹⁴ ibid., 106; so Garnier—

¹⁵ 'Veniens itaque legatus ad curiam, convenit tutores regis ... Willelmum de Sancto Johanne, Willelmum filium Aldelinae, Hugonem de Gundulfivilla, Randulfum Stephani' (i. 108-9).

¹⁶ 'Qui de portu Suthamtune transfretaturi erant' (i. 111). Geoffrey sent back a scornful reply (see also Garnier) expressing his wonder that the young king could think of meeting a man who meant to disinherit him. This statement agrees with Becket's own complaint (vii. 406) that his archidiabolus Geoffrey was instructed to make this charge.

¹⁷ III. 120. 'Duo archidiaconi ... jam in Cantiam venerant, ad regem illac transfretaturi. Audito autem quod archiepiscopus appulsus Cantuariae esset, lora statim diverterunt, ad occidentals maris portus tendentes.' This convicts Mr Eyton of error in asserting that on December 1st the two archdeacons were at Dover, waiting to cross (p. 149).

¹⁸ ibid., i. 111

¹⁹ Memorials, iii. 127.

THE FIRST KNOWN FINE (1175)

In his masterly introduction to Select Pleas of the Crown,¹ Professor Maitland, with his usual skill, discusses the evolution of the Curia Regis and the relation of the central to the itinerant courts. An appendix to this introduction is devoted to 'early fines'; and the conclusion arrived at, as to the date when regular fines began, is that 'the evidence seems to point to the year 1178 or thereabouts, just, that is, to the time when King Henry was remodelling the Curia Regis; thenceforward we have traces of a fairly continuous series of fines' (p. xxvii). More definitely still, in his latest work, he traces the existence of fines 'from the year 1179'.

The earlier document I here print from the valuable cartulary of Evesham (Vesp. B. xxiv., fo. 71, etc.) is, I contend, a true fine, and is fortunately dated with exactitude (July 20th):

Hæc est finalis concordia facta in curia domini Regis apud Evesham ad proximum festum sancte Margarete post mortem comitis Reginaldi² Cornub' coram Willelmo filio Audelini et Willelmo filio Radulfi et Willelmo Basset et aliis justiciariis domini regis qui ibi tunc aderant, inter Rogerum filium Willelmi et Robertum Trunket de terra de Ragl' unde placitum fuit inter eos in curia domini Regis. Scilicet quod predictus Wibertus Trunket clamavit quietam predicto Rogero terram illam de Ragl' et [sic] feud[um] et hereditatem suam et totum jus suum quod in predicta terra habebat, et ipse trunchet reddidit in curia domini Regis terram illam de Ragl' in manu [sic] abbatis de Evesham, et ipse abbas ibi statim in curia Regis reddidit eam predicto Rogero. Pro hac autem concessione dedit predictus Rogerus predicto trunchet xx. marcas argenti, et predictus abbas dedit truchet unum anulum argenteum cum cural.

The transcript of this fine is immediately followed by a royal charter confirming it, and establishing Roger in possession:

H. dei gratia ... Sciatis me concessisse et presenti carta confirmasse finem que factus fuit in curia mea inter, etc., etc. ... et Wibertus eam reddidit solutam et quietam in manu abbatis de evesham de cujus feodo terra illa est.... Et ideo volo et firmiter precipio.... Test. Willelmo Audelin', Willelmo filio Radulfi, Willelmo Basset, Berteram de Verdun, Gaufrido Salvagio. Apud Evesham.

Mr Eyton, to whom this fine was unknown, does not, in his Court and Itinerary of Henry II, include Evesham among the places visited by the king in 1175, but makes him visit Feckenham about October (p. 196). But as we learn from the above fine that Henry was at Evesham on July 20th, Mr Eyton's conclusions must be reconsidered. Henry, according to him, was at Woodstock July 8th and at Nottingham August 1st. Now this latter date is derived from a Nottingham charter (p. 193), among the witnesses to which are William fitz Audelin 'Dapifer', William Basset, and William fitz Ralf, the very three justices before whom our fine had been levied at Evesham on July 20th. I hold, therefore, that Henry proceeded (possibly through Lichfield, as Mr Eyton asserts) from Woodstock to Nottingham via Evesham; and, further, that he visited Feckenham (to the north of Evesham) on this occasion, and not, as Mr Eyton imagined, in October. We find accordingly that of the Feckenham charters quoted by that writer (p. 196), one is witnessed by all three of our officers, William fitz Audelin 'Dapifer', William fitz Ralf, and William Basset; one by William fitz Audelin and William fitz Ralf; and the third by William fitz Ralf and William Basset.

Now, working from the Pipe-Rolls, Mr Eyton discovered that:

while the king was in Staffordshire there were pleas held in that county which are expressed to have been held by William fitz Ralph, Bertram de Verdon, and William Basset in curia Regis (p. 193).

He also noted that

the Pipe-Roll of 1175, after duly recounting the results of the ordinary assizes, held by William de Lanvall and Thomas Basset (who appear to have visited York while the king was there), contains the following (in regard to a different kind of judicature than that at which the two justiciars presided), and which probably took place in a court of which the king in person was president:

'Placita et conventiones per Willelmum filius Radulfi, Bertram de Verdon, et Willelmum Basset, in curia Regis.' These Placita were apparently nothing more than fines with the crown (p. 194).

So, too, he found that at Northampton

the three justiciars who had attended him in his special curia in Staffordshire and at York, negotiated a fine by Robert de Nevill, 'pro rehabenda saisina de Uppetona quæ fuit Radulfi de Waltervilla' (p. 194).

My own evidence proves that the same three justiciars had been with him, earlier in the summer, in his special curia at Evesham, where an actual fine was levied.

Thus we have proof that in the summer of 1175 the king was accompanied on his progress by a special group of justices, with whose assistance he held pleas, just as, a generation later, John, in his ninth year, 'was journeying about the country with three judges in his train—Simon Pateshull, Potterne, and Pont Audemer'.³ While he was doing this, as Eyton has shown, two great eyres were going on throughout the country, one of them conducted by William de Lanvall[ei] and Thomas Basset, the other by Ranulf de Glanville and Hugh de Cressi. It is noteworthy that all these four are found, with William fitz Audelin, among the witnesses to a royal charter assigned by Mr Eyton—rightly, no doubt—to the king's stay at York (circ. August 10, 1175), as they also are among the witnesses to the Nottingham charter mentioned above (p. 385), assigned by Eyton to August 1st. The latter, therefore, brings together the king's own party of three or four justices with the four justices in eyre.

The great importance of this royal iter consists in its bearing on the evolution of the curia regis. The years 1175 and 1176 form a critical epoch in this institutional development. Dr Stubbs, writing on this subject, reminds us that 'the first placita curiæ regis mentioned by Madox are in 1175' (i. 600), and speaks of the 'two circuits of the justices in 1175, and the six circuits of the judges in 1176' (ibid.). So far, indeed, all is clear. The two judicial eyres of 1175 are known to us from the Pipe-Rolls; the six of 1176 are found in the chronicles also, for they were settled by the Assize of Northampton in January of that year (i. 484-5). The really difficult subject is the king's own iter, for which, we have seen, there is clear evidence, but of which Dr Stubbs, working from Madox, seems to have been unaware. His words are:

All the eighteen justices of 1176 were officers of the Exchequer; some of them are found in 1175 holding 'placita curiæ regis' in bodies of three or four judges, and not in the same combinations in which they took their judicial journeys. We can scarcely help the conclusion that the new jurisprudence was being administered by committees of the general body of justices, who were equally qualified to sit in the Curia and Exchequer, and to undertake the fiscal and judicial work of the eyre.

[Note: For instance, in 1176, William fitz Ralf, Bertram de Verdun, and William Basset hear pleas in Curia Regis touching Bucks. and Beds.; yet on the eyre, these two counties are visited by three other judges, etc.]

These statements are based on Madox's extracts from the Pipe-Rolls,⁴ which afford, however, more definite evidence than Dr Stubbs discovered. In the Pipe-Roll of 1175 and its immediate successor we find 'Placita in Curia Regis' held by a single group of judges—William fitz Ralf, Bertram de Verdon, and William Basset (Thomas Basset is a substitute in one case and William fitz Audelin, we have seen, in another)—quite distinct from the 'placita' of the justices in eyre, which were not described as 'in curia regis'. The view, therefore, that I now advance is that these pleas, 'in curia regis', were held by a separate group of judges in the train of the king himself, whose iter began at Reading, June 1175.⁵ It was there, I believe, that were held the 'placita' for Bucks and Beds, duly recorded in the Pipe-Roll of 1175. That this royal iter was continued through the Exchequer year 1175-6 seems to be well established, and the chronological difficulty of distinguishing between the two years renders the discovery of a fixed point, such as that afforded by the Evesham fine, of special value. Its evidence also establishes the presence of the king in person,⁶ whose charter of confirmation should be carefully noted on account of its reciting the fine.

Having now traced the royal iter, of which the pleas are distinguished on the Pipe-Rolls as held 'in curia regis', I turn to the circuits of the judges. I have fortunately lighted, in the course of my researches, on two more fines earlier than any known to Professor Maitland. And, better still, one of these is the original document itself. The date of the first is July 1 and of the second June 29, 1176. The justices named in each case are those who are known to have gone the circuits, in which Leicester and Oxford were respectively comprised.⁷ The importance of these documents demands that they should be printed in extenso.

I

Hec est finalis concordia facta apud Legr[ecestr]am proxima die Jovis post proximum festum apostolorum petri et pauli postquam Hugucio legatus Rome pervenit in Angliam,⁸ coram Hugonem de Gundevile et Willelmo filio Radulfi et Willelmo Basset, Justiciariis domini Regis, et ceteris Baronibus qui ibi tunc aderant Inter Galfridum Ridel et Bertramum de Verdun de terra de Madeleye, unde placitum fuit inter eos in curia Domini Regis, Videlicet quod Galfridus Ridel dedit Bertrammo [sic] de Verdun feodum i militis in Leycest'syre, scilicet servitium viii. car. terre quas Robert Devel tenet in Swineford et in Walecote et servitium ii. car. terre quas Walterus de Folevile tenet in parva Essebi et servitium i car. terre quam peverel tenet in Flekeneye, et servitium i. car. terre quam Hardeui[nus] tenet in eadem Flekeneye. Et has xii. car. terre dedit ei et concessit in feodo et hereditate per servicium unius militis. Et in Staffordesyre dedit predictus Galfridus prenominato Bretamo [sic] xii. bov. terre quas habebat in Crokestene de feodo de Madelye et servitium de Foxwiss et de Hanekote per v. sol. inde annuatim reddendos Galfrido pro omnibus que ad illum pertinent. Has vero terras in Leycest'syre et in Staffordsyre dedit Galfridus Ridel et concessit Bertramo et heredibus suis tenendas de illo et de heredibus suis in feodo et hereditate libere et quiete per prenominatum servitium pro omnibus que ad illum pertinent, et pro ista donatione et concessione Bertrammus [sic] de Werdun [sic] totam calumpniam quam habuit versus Galfridum in Madeleye quietum clamavit de illo et de heredibus suis Galfrido Ridel et heredibus suis.⁹

II

Hec est finalis concordia que facta fuit apud Ox[eneforde] in curia Regis coram Ricardo Giffard et Rogero filio Reinfr[idi] et Johanne de Caerdif Justitiis Regis ... proximum festum apostolorum petri et pauli postquam dominus Rex cepit ligantiam baronum Scotie apud [Ebo]racum¹⁰ inter Canonicos Oseneie et Ingream et tres filias eius scilicet Gundream et Isabella et Margaretam de terre de Oxenef[orde] unde placitum fuerat inter eos in curia Regis scilicet quod Ingrea et tres filie sue prenominate clamaverunt predictis canonicis quietam terram illam in Oxenenef[orde] de se et de heredibus suis pro xx. sol. quos canonici illi dederunt et omne jus quod in eadem terra habebant quietum illis clamaverunt.¹¹

It will be observed that the Oxford fine is described as made 'in curia regis', while the Leicester one is not. It would seem, then, that in spite of the distinction drawn at first on the rolls, the phrase 'curia regis' was already creeping in as describing a court at which the king was not present.

I have also discovered, in MS., a 'fine' of some ten or twelve years earlier, most valuable for comparison with those which I have here discussed. We have there a similar charter of confirmation, in which the king describes the transaction as 'finem illum quem Abbas Willelmus de Hulmo fecit coram me',¹² and the document confirmed, moreover, describes itself as a 'finis' between the Abbot of Holme and William and Henry de Neville, brothers.¹³ But the form is very different from that of the true fine, which is fully developed in our example of 1175. The Holme 'fine' may be safely assigned to March 1163-March 1166,¹⁴ and as it was 'made' at Westminster, it not improbably belongs to the series of proceedings there circ. March 8, 1163. It may fairly be presumed that if, at the date of this fine, the fully developed form existed it would have been duly employed at Westminster on this occasion. We may therefore safely assert, at least, that it came into use between the dates of these two transactions.

As bearing on the evolution of the fine, the charter of Henry II, confirming a 'finis et concordia', and assigned by me to 1163-70,¹⁵ ought to be compared with the Holme charter, as indicating, perhaps, some advance, through the close resemblance between the clauses, in these royal charters, confirming the fine points to an almost common stage of development.

The part played by William fitz Audelin in the affairs, at this time, of Ireland, gives also some importance to this proof of his presence at Evesham on July 20, 1175. It brings us, indeed, in contact with the great 'Laudabiliter' controversy. Miss Norgate holds that William fitz Audelin was sent to Ireland in charge (with the Prior of Wallingford) of that contested document in 1175.¹⁶ Professor Tout, in his biography of William, writes on the contrary, oddly enough, that he was 'sent in 1174 or 1175' [sic] on this mission, but 'soon left Ireland, for he appears as a witness of the treaty of Falaise in October 1174 [sic], and in 1175 and 1176 he was constantly in attendance at court in discharge of his duties as steward or seneschal'.¹⁷ This confusion, however, is slight when compared with the statements as to William's tenure of the government of Ireland. It is agreed that he was sent to succeed Earl Richard (who died April 5, 1176); but while Miss Norgate holds that 'early in the next year Henry found it necessary to recall him',¹⁸ Professor Tout places his recall in 1179, consequent on complaints against him to the king in January of that year. Without undertaking to decide the question, I may suggest that William had returned to England by May 1177—for he is proved by charters to have attended the Oxford council of that date—when Henry replaced him, as governor, by Hugh de Lacy, but entrusted him, as Hoveden states, with Wexford. We have only to assume that Gerald, by mistake, assigns to 1172 his Wexford appointment, which really belonged to 1177 (Professor Tout thinks this probable), and then the solution I suggest satisfies all the requirements.

William fitz Audelin, I may add, has been peculiarly the sport of genealogists. Having been selected by them as ancestor to the great Irish house of Burke ('De Burgo') he was further transformed, by a flight of fancy even wilder than usual, into a lineal descendant of Charlemagne. Who he really was seems to have remained unknown, for his life in the Dictionary of National Biography treats with suspicion, though duly mentioning, his alleged descent from Charlemagne. Moreover, his very name would seem to have been left in doubt. It would, of course, be difficult to distinguish 'Aldelinus' from 'Aldelmus' in MS., and I confess to having looked on the latter—which is the form adopted by Professor Tout in the Dictionary of National Biography, as by Miss Norgate and others—as probable enough from its likeness to the English 'Aldhelm'. But the 'fitz Audeline' of the Anglo-Norman poem on the Conquest of Ireland seems decisive. 'Willelmus filius Audelini, domini regis dapifer' was the style he used in his own charters.¹⁹

Having always kept a look-out for him in Yorkshire, I recognized William at once in a charter which is among those abstracted in the Report on the Portland MSS.²⁰ This is a confirmation by Roger de Mowbray of a grant to Fountains by 'Aldelin de Aldefeld and Ralph his son and his other sons'. Among the witnesses are 'Ralph son of Aldelin, William his brother', and at the close, 'Amelin son of Aldel'. Now, if we turn to the cartæ of 1166, we find, under Yorkshire, that Ralph 'filius Aldelin' held half a knight's fee of Roger de Mowbray, and William filius Aldelin one fee of Henry de Lacy. Here we recognize the two brothers mentioned in the charters above.²¹ The small fief of William 'filius Aldelin' himself is entered under Hampshire, where it is described as 'terra quam dominus Rex dedit Willelmo filio Aldelin, Marscallo suo, cum Juliana filia Roberti Dorsnelli'.

It is through this Juliana that we obtain the coping-stone of proof. Her charter granting Little Maplestead, Essex, to the Hospitallers, has for its first witness 'Radulfo filio Adelini', who, as we have seen above, was her husband's brother.²² And he is also the first witness to William's confirmation of her gift.²³

The parentage and the true name of William fitz Audelin are thus, at length, clearly established.

¹ Vol. i. (Selden Society).

² 'Reg.' MS. The earl died July 1, 1175. This fine further confirms the accuracy of the Gesta Henrici (see Eyton, p. 192)]

³ Maitland's Select Pleas of the Crown, I. xv.

⁴ History of the Exchequer (Ed. 1711), pp. 64, 65.

⁵ Eyton's Itinerary p. 191.

⁶ Prof Maitland has explained that this presence was formal (Select Pleas of the Crown, I. xiv).

⁷ Except that Robert fitz Bernard's place is taken by John of Cardiff.

⁸ October 27, 1175.

⁹ Sloane Charter xxxi. 4, No. 34. See also Addenda.

¹⁰ August 1175.

¹¹ Cotton Charter, xi. 73 (original).

¹² Galba, E., II. fo. 31b.

¹³ ibid., 62b.

¹⁴ The witnesses to the fine and the charter confirming it included Richard Archdeacon of Poitiers and Robert Earl of Leicester. The former gives us the limit March 1163, and the king was not in England in the lifetime of the latter after March 1166.

¹⁵ See my Ancient Charters, pp. 67-8.

¹⁶ 'It is acknowledged on all hands that there is no sign of any attempt on Henry's part to publish the letter in Ireland ... before 1175. In that year Gerald states that the letter was read ... at Waterford.' English Historical Review, viii. 44. Cf. p. 31. See also Angevin Kings, ii. 182.

¹⁷ Dictionary of National Biography. I differ wholly from both writers, and take the view, based on record evidence, that, contrary to the accepted belief, William visited Ireland some two years earlier.

¹⁸ England under the Angevin Kings, ii. 183.

¹⁹ The name of 'Audelin' is extant as a surname. I have met with it in London.

²⁰ 13th Report Hist. MSS., App. ii., p. 4. We are indebted, I believe, to Mr Maxwell Lyte for these interesting abstracts.

²¹ The name seems to be preserved in Thorpe-Audlin (vulgo Audling), a township in the West Riding of Yorkshire, some 4-1/2 miles from Pontefract.

²² It seems to be printed only in a footnote to Morant's Essex (i. 282). 'Radulfo filio Willelmi domini mei' is a witness, which certainly suggests that William had been married before.

²³ See Monasticon. Prof Tout seems to have been unaware of these charters of William, one of which is dated. Indeed he only says that William 'is said to have married' Juliana, giving the carta (1166) as his authority.

THE MONTMORENCY IMPOSTURE

Many a jest has been levelled at the Irish family of Morres for seeking and obtaining permission from the Crown, some eighty years ago, to assume the glorious name of 'De Montmorency', in lieu of their own, as having been originally that of their family.¹ They have since borne, as is well known, not merely the name, but even the arms and the proud device of that illustrious house. Moreover, the introduction of the name Bouchard, borne by the present Lord Mountmorres, proves the determination of the family to persist in their lofty pretensions.

I am not aware whether these pretensions have ever been regularly exposed: they seem to have been thought too fantastic for serious criticism. At the same time, it must be remembered that they have been formally and officially recognized by Sir W. Betham as Deputy Ulster, by the English crown (on the strength of his statement) and by the Chevalier De la Rue, 'garde-général des archives du Royaume', on the French side, in 1818. On the other hand, it must not be forgotten that MM. de Montmorency at the time, in spite of the repeated and strenuous appeals of the Morres family, declined to admit their claim to be members of the house of Montmorency.

To the indignant protest of Col. Hervey Morres (styling himself 'de Montmorency-Morres') against this action of the French house, we owe the most complete exposition of the case on behalf of his family.² On it, therefore, my criticisms will be based. Nor will these criticisms be destructive only: they will show that the pedigrees upheld by Col. Morres and his opponents were both alike erroneous, and will establish the real facts, which, it will be found, completely vindicate the accuracy of Giraldus Cambrensis.

The controversy hinged on a well-known personage. 'Herveius de Monte Mauricii', as Giraldus terms him. The French house, taking their stand on the historians of their family, insisted that he was the only Montmorency who had gone to Ireland in his time, and that as he had, admittedly, left no legitimate issue, the Morres claim was untenable. The Irish house contended that, on the contrary, others of the family had come over also, and that they were lineally descended from one of Hervey's brothers, but the whole story undoubtedly sprang from the mention of this Hervey—the sole connecting link—and from the curious form in which Giraldus chose to latinize his name.

Now Duchesne, the historian of the house of Montmorency, whose version Desormeaux and Père Anselme did but follow in the main, wrote thus of Hervey:

Il espousa Elizabeth de Meullent veuve de Gislebert de Claire, Comte de Pembroc en Angleterre et mère de Richard de Claire, surnommé Strongbow, Comte de Pembroke, dompteur de l'Hibernie, duquel à raison de cette alliance un Autheur du temps le qualifie parastre ou beaupère (p. 92).³

But this 'Autheur' is Giraldus Cambrensis, on whom Duchesne based his account, and who, we find, does not speak of Hervey as stepfather, but as paternal uncle of Strongbow:

Herveius de Monte Mauricii, vir quoque fugitivus a facie fortunæ, inermis et inops, ex parte Richardi comitis cujus patruus erat, explorator potius quam expugnator advenit (i. 3).

Duchesne's version, therefore, is out of court, although it was repeated by Père Anselme, and even adopted in the Genealogist by so skilled and able a genealogist as Mr G. W. Watson.⁴

Col. Hervey Morres went so far as to accuse Duchesne and Desormeaux 'd'adulation, d'immoralité, et de mauvaise foi' in giving this account of his great namesake; and he proceeded to substitute a version of his own, severing the hapless man and converting him into two! To make this clear, I must print the essential part of the pedigree as given by him.

The explanation is extremely simple: the whole pedigree is concocted with a view to making the Irish Hervey uncle to Robert fitz Stephen. This was done to satisfy the supposed requirements of Giraldus, whose words Col. Morres thus triumphantly quoted:

Robertus Stephanides ... Inter cæteros Herveius de Montemaurisco Roberti patruus, nepoti suo se comitem præbuit (p. 77).

Unfortunately for him, he had gone, not to Giraldus, but to 'Stonyhurst de rebus Hibernicis i. 69-70, d'après Giraldus Cambrensis'. Stonyhurst had carelessly made Giraldus speak of Hervey as uncle, not to Earl Richard, but to Robert fitz Stephen, and the pedigree was accordingly constructed to fit this error. When the error is corrected, the pedigree collapses; and the very passage which is quoted to confirm it at once unmasks the concoction.

And now having made it clear that both sides were in error, I shall set forth the true explanation of the words of Giraldus. The clue is given us by those Deeping charters which, oddly enough, Col. Morres duly quoted and appealed to. The first is found in the Monasticon, ii. 601:

Adeliz, uxor Gilberti filii Ricardi et Gillebertus, et Baldewinus, et Rohaisia pueri Gilberti episcopo Lincolniensi ... salutem.... Hiis testibus, Gilberto filio Gilberti, Galterio, Hervæo, Baldwino fratribus ejus et Rohaisia sorore eorum, etc., etc.

The next is the confirmation of this grant by Robert Bishop of Lincoln (ob. 1123) as 'donum Adelidæ de Montemoraci' (p. 602). The third is a charter of 'Adeliz, mater comitis Gilberti' (p. 603), who is also styled in the Thorney Register 'Adelitia de Claromonte'. Col. Morres also relied much on a grant to Castleacre by 'Adalicia de Claromonte', to which the first witness is 'Her. de Montemorentino',⁵ but the relationship of the witness to the grantor is not stated.

Hervey de Montmorency is also mentioned in the Bilegh Abbey confirmation charter of Richard I, but it gives us no information.

We have now, however, sufficient evidence to recover the true genealogy, which is interesting enough. This shows us how Hervey was 'paternal uncle' to Strongbow,⁶ and why he witnessed his mother's charter (ut supra) with his brothers and sister, but did not join in their grant. We see, also, how Duchesne's error arose from his making the widow not of Gilbert, but of his son and namesake the first Earl of Pembroke, marry a Montmorenci. The error is not surprising in the case of such a family as the Clares, whose alliances and ramifications are made specially puzzling by the repetition of their Christian names.

On the other hand, the 'dimidiation' of Hervey in the pedigree put forward by the Morres family was merely the fruit of the resolve to make him at all costs uncle to Robert fitz Stephen, as the words of Giraldus were supposed to require, in their misquoted form.

Poor Hervey has, indeed, been the sport of genealogists and historians. Mr Dimock, in his Rolls edition of Giraldus, renders his name as 'Mont-Maurice', Miss Norgate as 'Mountmorris',⁷ Mrs Green as Mount Moriss,⁸ Mr Hunt, who has written his life in the Dictionary of National Biography as Mount-Maurice, and even Mr Orpen, in his admirable edition of the Anglo-Norman poem on the Conquest, as 'Montmaurice' (p. 335). This last is the strangest case, because the forms found in the poem are 'Mumoreci' and 'Momorci', while, as Mr Orpen duly points out, it is 'Munmoreci' in the Register of St Thomas's, and 'Mundmorici' in the Cartulary of St Mary's (p. 266). Hervey was constable to his nephew Earl Richard's troops in Ireland, and described himself as 'Marescallus Domini Regis de Hibernia, et senescallus de tota terra Ricardi Comitis'.

Having now shown that the alleged descent can be absolutely disproved so far as concerns the only Montmorenci whose name occurs in connection with Ireland, I proceed to glance at his supposed relatives, none of whom, it is important to remember, even bore the name of Montmorency.

The chart pedigree printed above (p. 357) will show how Robert fitz Stephen was converted into a Montmorenci, though the parentage of his father Stephen, constable of Cardigan, is wholly unknown. It need scarcely be said that no proof is, or can be, given for this filiation; but the following passage on Stephen is an excellent illustration of the sort of evidence which is vouched for this wholly imaginary pedigree:

Ce seigneur, très-jeune encore, en 1087, confirma conjointement avec son père et son aïeul Hervé, fils de Bouchard, la donation faite par Turillus le Gros à l'abbaye de St. Florent de Saumur de certaines bénéfices.

Sig. Hervei filii Burchardi, Sig. Roberti filii ejus, Sig. Stephani militis ejus.

All that is needed, we are told, is to read grandson ('petit fils') instead of filius for Robert, and great-grandson for miles—on the ground that miles sometimes meant 'un jeune homme'! Such is a type of the 'proofs' on which this pedigree rests. But its absurdities and inconsistencies go even further than this. The dates work out as follows:

Thus Stephen, who was born about 1080, and was a witness in 1087, would be son to a man who flourished in 1166, and brother to men who died in 1205 and 1211.⁹

But what are we to say when we learn further that this Stephen, who died in '1136', is the 'Stephanus de Marisco' who appears in the Liber Niger as a tenant of the Bishop of Ely in 1166! The probable, and indeed only, explanation is that Col. Morres did not even know when the returns in the Liber Niger were compiled. Their real date again destroys this cock-and-bull pedigree, or genealogical nightmare, which, for sheer topsy-turveydom, has, I venture to assert, never been surpassed.

I strongly suspect that the whole story arose from the occurrence in Ireland, in the thirteenth century, of the latinized name 'De Marisco' or 'De Mariscis', which represents of course, neither Montmorenci nor Morres, but simply Marsh. Genealogists, no doubt, were attracted by the form 'De Monte Maurisco' into tracing a connection; but, so far as can be understood, Col. Morres discarded this resemblance, and represented his alleged ancestors as 'seigneurs de Mariscis ou des marches' in England, connecting them with the fen district in Cambridgeshire. It would be easy to show that the early pedigree positively teems with absurdities similar to those I have already exposed, but it would be sheer waste of time to devote any more attention to proofs, which Col. Morres proudly boasted were 'vérifiés avec la plus scrupuleuse attention par l'autorité competente et sanctionnés désormais par l'autorisation du prince qui gouverne aujourd'hui l'empire britannique' (p. 25).

I do not hesitate to say that a more impudent claim was never successfully foisted on the authorities and the public. The chief sinner in the matter was, of course, Sir W. Betham, who certified (June 29, 1815) that this audacious concoction was 'established on evidence of the most unquestionable authority, chiefly from the ancient public records' (p. 203). The Crown naturally could only accept the statement of its own officer of arms, and accordingly described the alleged descent as being duly proved and recorded.¹⁰ As for the French expert, the Chevalier de la Rue, of whose investigation and favourable verdict (April 17, 1818) so much has been made, it will scarcely be believed that he actually, with the sole exception of the Monasticon, did not attempt to verify the 'proofs' set before him! It will be seen from his own words that his decision was subject to their genuineness:

Toutes les citations puisées par monsieur de Morrès dans les monuments, registres, et terriers publics d'Angleterre étant, comme je n'en doute pas, aussi exactes que celles du Monasticon (p. 37).

The value of his loudly-trumpeted verdict may be estimated from this admission.

It is only right that MM. de Montmorency and all those in France who are interested in historical genealogy should understand that no one among ourselves, whose opinion is worth having, would dream of defending this gross usurpation. We may hope and believe that in the present day no officer of arms would behave like Sir W. Betham, and certify, as 'established on evidence of the most unquestionable authority' a descent which is not merely 'not proven', but can be absolutely disproved. It cannot be stated too emphatically, or known too widely, that the house of Morres has no more right, by hereditary descent, to the name and arms of 'De Montmorency' than any of the numerous families of Morris, or indeed, for the matter of that, the family of Smith.¹¹

¹ See, for instance, the Complete Peerage of G. E. C. sub 'Frankfort de Montmorency'.

² Les Montmorency de France et les Montmorency d'Irlande, ou Précis historique des démarches faites à l'occasion de la reprise du nom de ses ancêtres par la branche de Montmorency-marisco-morres. Paris, 1828.

³ Histoire de la maison de Montmorency. Paris, 1624.

⁴ Vol. x., p. 6.

⁵ Blomefield's Norfolk, ix. 5.

⁶ Since this article was written, Mr Hunt's life of Hervey has appeared in the Dict. Nat. Biog. He has arrived at precisely the same conclusions as myself.

⁷ England under the Angevin Kings, ii. 101, 112.

⁸ Henry the Second, p. 159.

⁹ 'Etienne de Mariscis [sic] ... fut tué en 1136 par les Gallois lorsqu'il gouvernait ce pays' (p. 74). 'Il n'était agé lors de sa mort que de cinquante six ou cinquante sept ans' (p. 75).

¹⁰ London Gazette, September 9, 1815; Dublin Gazette, August 12, 1815.

¹¹ For an even more illustrious foreign descent, see my paper, 'Our English Hapsburgs: a great delusion' (Genealogist, N.S., x. 193).

THE OXFORD DEBATE ON FOREIGN SERVICE (1197)

Great importance is rightly assigned to the first instances of 'a constitutional opposition to a royal demand for money',¹ of which the two alleged earliest cases are 'the opposition of St Thomas to the king's manipulation of the danegeld [1163], and the refusal by St Hugh of Lincoln to furnish money for Richard's war in France [1197]'.² These two precedents are always classed together: Dr Stubbs writes of St Hugh's action:

The only formal resistance to the king in the national council proceeds from St Hugh of Lincoln and Bishop Herbert of Salisbury, who refuse to consent to grant him an aid in knights and money for his foreign warfare ... an act which stands out prominently by the side of St Thomas's protest against Henry's proposal to appropriate the sheriff's share of danegeld.³

And Mr Freeman repeats the parallel:

Thomas ... withstands, and withstands successfully, the levying of a danegeld.... As Thomas of London had withstood the demands of the father, Hugh of Avalon withstood the demands of the son. In a great council ... [he] spoke up for the laws and rights of Englishmen ... no men or money were they bound to contribute for undertakings beyond the sea.⁴

Having already discussed the earlier instance,⁵ and advanced the view that the Woodstock debate [1163] did not relate to danegeld at all, but to an attempt of the king to seize for himself the auxilium vicecomitis (a local levy) I now approach the later instance.

'This occasion,' we read, 'is a memorable one':⁶ it is that of an 'event of great importance',⁷ of 'a landmark in constitutional history'.⁸ No apology, therefore, is needed for endeavouring to throw some further light on an event of such cardinal importance. But, to clear the ground, let us first define what we mean by 'opposition to a royal demand for money'. However autocratic the king may have been—and on this point there is not only a difference of opinion but a difference in fact corresponding with his strength at any given period—there were limits set by law or custom (or, should we rather say, limits, both written and unwritten?) beyond which he could not pass. 'Domesday', for instance, was a written limit: if the king claimed from a Manor assessed at ten hides the danegeld due from twenty, the tenant need only appeal to 'Domesday' (poneret se super rotulum Winton'). Or, again, if from a feudal tenant owing the forty days' service the king were to claim eighty days, he would be transgressing unwritten custom as binding as a written record. But outside these limits there lay a debatable ground where that elastic term auxilium proved conveniently expansive. It was here that the crown could increase its demands, and here that a conflict would arise as to where the limit should be placed, a conflict to be determined not by law, but by a trial of strength between the crown and its opponents. We have, then, to decide to which of these spheres the action of St Hugh should be assigned, whether to that of the lawyer appealing to the letter of the bond, or to that of the popular leader opposing the demands of the king, though they did not contravene the law. If one may use the terms, for convenience sake, it was a question of law or a question of politics; and only if it was the latter had it a true constitutional importance.

The two chief accounts of the Oxford debate are found in Roger Hoveden and the Magna Vita St Hugonis. As they are both printed in Select Charters, I need not repeat them here. There is, however, an independent version in the Vita of Giraldus Cambrensis, which it may be desirable to add:

In Anglicanam coepit [rex] ecclesiam duris exactionibus debacchari. Unde collecto in unum regni clero, habitoque contra insolitum et tam urgens incommodum districtiore consilio, verbum ad importunas pariter et importabiles impositiones contradictionis et cleri totius pro ecclesiastica libertate responsionis, in ore Lincolnensis tanquam personae prae ceteris approbatae religionis authenticae magis communi omnium desiderio est assignatum (vii. 103-4).

Gerald's editor impugns the correctness of these statements, on the grounds that the assembly was not clerical merely and that the bishop did not speak on behalf of the whole church. But the passage seems to me to refer to a meeting of the clergy in which it was decided that St Hugh should be their spokesman at the council. Of the other objection I shall treat below.

According to Hoveden, Richard asked for either (1) three hundred knights who would serve him, at their own costs, for a year, or (2) a sum sufficient to enable him to hire three hundred knights for a year at the rate of three shillings a day. The Magna Vita, however, implies that the former alternative alone was laid before the council. The grounds on which St Hugh protested are thus given by our two authorities:

Respondit pro se, quod ipse in hoc voluntati regis nequaquam adquiesceret, tum quia processu temporis in ecclesiae suae detrimentum redundaret, tum quia successores sui dicerent, 'Patres nostri comederunt uvam acerbam, et dentes filiorum obstupescunt' (Hoveden).

Scio equidem ad militare servitium domino regi, sed in hac terra solummodo exhibendum, Lincolniensem ecclesiam teneri; extra metas vero Angliae nil tale ab ea deberi. Unde mihi consultius arbitror ad natale solum repedare ... quam hic pontificatum gerere et ecclesiam mihi commissam, antiquas immunitates perdendo, insolitis angariis subjugare (Magna Vita).

Two points stand out clearly—one that St Hugh took his stand on the prescriptive rights of his church, rights infringed by the king's demand; the other, that he spoke for himself alone, not for the church, still less for the barons, and least of all for the nation. Our authorities, however, are so vague that they leave in doubt the precise point 'taken' by the saintly prelate. Mr Freeman, we have seen, confidently assumes that he 'spoke up for the laws and rights of Englishmen'; Miss Norgate holds that he took up the position of Thomas and Anselm as 'a champion of constitutional liberty',⁹ whatever that may mean; even Dr Stubbs claims that he 'acted on behalf of the nation to which he had joined himself'.¹⁰

I venture to think that the clue to the enigma is to be found in quite another quarter. In the chronicle of Jocelin de Brakelond we find a most instructive passage, which refers, it cannot be doubted, to the same episode. The story is told somewhat differently, but the point raised is the same. King Richard, we are told, demanded that knights should be sent him from England, in the proportion of one from every ten due by the church 'baronies'. The servitium debitum of St Edmund's being forty, the abbot was called upon to send four.¹¹ That the principle of joint equipment, which had been adopted under Henry II in 1157,¹² and again I think by Longchamp in 1191,¹³ was resorted to on this occasion is the more probable because a few years later (1205) we find King John similarly demanding 'quod novem milites per totam Angliam invenirent decimum militem, bene paratum equis et armis, ad defensionem regni nostri'. I admit, however, that it is not mentioned in the other versions of our episode, and Jocelin speaks only of the demand upon the church fiefs. But the point is that when the abbot consulted his tenants as to sending the four knights required, they protested that they were liable to pay scutage, but not to serve out of England.¹⁴ Now this is a locus classicus on the institution of scutage. Its bearing I shall examine below, after finishing the story. The abbot, we read, finding himself in a strait, crossed the sea in search of the king, who told him that a fine would not avail; he wanted men, not money.¹⁵

Surely we have here the key to the position taken by St Hugh. When he claimed that his fief was not bound 'ad servitium militare ... extra metas Angliae' he cannot have referred to the payment of scutage, for that had been paid by his predecessors and himself without infringing the liberties of their church.¹⁶ He must, therefore, have referred not to 'money', but to personal service outside the realm. But was this exemption peculiar to the church of Lincoln? If we find the same privilege existing at St Edmund's and at Salisbury, may we not infer that the church contingents were only bound to serve in person for 'defence, not defiance',¹⁷ and that we have here the perfect explanation of the fact that scutage, as commutation for service, is an institution, when it first appears, peculiar to church fiefs? The mediaeval dread of creating a precedent preyed on the abbot as on the saint. From the council of Lillebonne to the Bedford auxilium (1224) it was always the same cry: