The name is supposed to be derived from Dimmok, in the county of Gloucester, but the pedigree is not proved beyond Henry Dymmok in the second year of Edward III. His grandson John married Margaret, sole grand-daughter and heir of Sir Thomas de Ludlowe, by Joan youngest daughter and coheir of Philip last Lord Marmyon, Baron of Scrivelsby, and by the tenure of that manor hereditary Champion of England, which office, since the Coronation of Richard II. has been held by the Dymoke family.

See Banks's Family of Marmyon, p. 117; and Allen's Lincolnshire, ii. 83.

Arms.—Sable, two lions passant argent crowned or. Borne by Monsr. John Dymoke in the reign of Richard II. (Roll of the date.)

Present Representative, The Honourable and Rev. John Dymoke.

John Heneage stands at the head of the pedigree; he was living in the 38th Henry III. From him descended another John, who in the 10th of Edward III. was Lord of the Manor of Hainton; according to Leland however, "the olde Henege lands passid not a fyfetie poundes by the yere." The family evidently rose on the ruins of the monastic houses: "Syr Thomas Hennage hath doone much cost at Haynton, where he is Lorde and Patrone, yn translating and new building with brike and abbay stone."

See Leland's Itinerary, vii. fol. 52; and Allen's History of Lincolnshire, ii. 67.

Arms.—Or, a greyhound courant sable between three leopard's heads azure, a border engrailed gules.

Present Representative, Edward Heneage, Esq., M.P. for Lincoln.

Originally of Northumberland, where the family were seated at an early period. The first recorded ancestor is Sir Robert de Maners, who obtained a grant of land in Berrington in 1327, and was M.P. for Northumberland in 1340. His son William Maners, of Etal, died before 1324, which estate appears to have been inherited from an heiress of Muschamp. At the end of the fifteenth century, by marriage with the heiress of the baronial family of Roos, the house of Manners came into possession of the Castle of Belvoir. In the succeeding century, a fortunate match with the heiress of Vernon of Haddon still further increased the wealth and importance of this noble family.

The royal title of Rutland, which had belonged to the house of York, was conferred upon Thomas Lord Roos in 1525 as the grandson of the lady Anne of York, sister to King Edward the Fourth.

An extinct branch was from the time of Henry VIII. for a long period of Newmanor House, in the parish of Framlington, in Durham. Another branch of the Etal family was of Cheswick, in the same county, extinct after 1633.

See Raine's North Durham, 211, 230; Nichols's Leicestershire, ii. pt. i. 67; and Brydges's Collins, i. 454.

Arms.—Or, two bars azure; a chief quarterly azure and gules, on the 1st and 4th two fleurs-de-lis, on the 2nd and 3rd a leopard of England of the first; the chief being an augmentation granted by Henry VIII. The ancient arms, no doubt founded on those of the Muschamp family, were, Or, two bars azure, a chief gules. See the Rolls of the reign of Edward II. and Richard III.

Present Representative, Charles Cecil John Manners, sixth Duke of Rutland.

This is a branch of the extinct family of the Lords Alington, of Horseheath, in Cambridgeshire, who were originally of Alington, in the same county, soon after the Conquest. The family descend from a younger son of Sir Giles Alington, and were seated at Swinhope in the reign of Queen Elizabeth.

See Clutterbuck's History of Hertfordshire, ii. 542; and Collectanea Topog. et Genealog. iv. 33-53, and note 2, p. 39. For Horseheath, see Topographer, ii. 374.

Arms.—Sable, a bend engrailed between six billets argent.

Present Representative, George Marmaduke Alington, Esq.

It has been supposed, but without any evidence or authority, that this family is descended from Thorold, Sheriff of Lincolnshire in 1052, and that consequently it may claim Saxon origin. There is however no doubt that this is a family of very great antiquity, and seated at Marston as early as the reign of Henry I.

See Wotton's Baronetage, ii. 338, and iv. 250.

Arms.—Sable, three goats salient argent.

Present Representative, Sir John Charles Thorold, 11th Baronet.

"Langton, Sir," exclaimed Dr. Johnson, alluding to his friend Bennet Langton of Langton, at that time the accomplished head of this very ancient family, "has a grant of free warren from Henry the Second, and Cardinal Stephen Langton in King John's reign was of this family." The name is derived from Langton-by-Spilsby in Lincolnshire, a manor which has remained to the present day the inheritance of this house, who are descended in the female line from the Massingberds of Sutterton in this county.

Younger branch. The Langton-Massingberds of Gunby.

See Allen's History of the County of Lincoln, ii. 175; and Boswell's Life of Johnson, ed. 1836, i. 294.

Arms.—Paly of six argent and sable, a bend or.

Present Representative, Bennet Rothes Langton, Esq.

This very ancient family is descended from Lambert Massyngberd of Soterton, now Sutterton, in this county, who lived in the reign of Edward I. and has ever since remained in Lincolnshire. In the latter part of the fifteenth century, by the marriage of Sir Thomas Massyngberd with the heiress of Braytoft of Braytoft Hall in Gunby, the Massingberds removed to that place, which became the principal seat of their descendants. Ormsby, purchased from the Skipwiths in 1636, and afterwards Gunby Hall, built by Sir William Massingberd, the 2nd Baronet of this family, in 1699, was their principal residence, till it went by an heiress to a younger branch of the Langtons, who have assumed the name. Wrangle is a recent purchase in this county by the present representative of the male line of the family. The Massingberds early embraced the Reformed faith. Thomas Massingberd, the last representative for Calais in 1552, "fled abroad for his religion" under Mary. Nevertheless his descendant, William Burrell Massingberd of Ormsby, joined Prince Charles Edward at Derby: a miniature given to him by the Prince is still in the family. Ormsby belongs at present to a younger branch of the Mundys of Markeaton in Derbyshire, who have assumed the name of Massingberd.

See the Genealogy of this House, a MS. by Robert Dale, Suffolk Herald, compiled about the year 1718, and still at Ormsby; and Allen's History of the County, under Ormsby and Gunby.

Arms.—Azure, three quatrefoils (two and one,) and in chief a boar passant or, charged on the shoulder with a cross patée gules, with which the following coat is generally quartered, said to be the arms assumed by Sir Thomas Massingberd, Knight of St. John, in the reign of Henry VIII. Quarterly or and argent, on a cross humetté gules, between four lions rampant sable, two escallops of the first.

Present Representative, The Rev. Francis Charles Massingberd.

"In the Isle" of Axholme "be now there 4 gentilmen of name, Sheffild, Candisch, Evers, and Mounsun. The lands of one Bellewodde became by marriage to this Mounson, a younger son to old Mounson of Lincolnshire. This old Mounson is in a maner the first avauncer of his family." Thus wrote Leland in his Itinerary. The Monsons however are clearly traced to the year 1378, as resident at East-Reson, in this county. They were afterwards seated at South Carlton, a village adjacent to Burton.

See Leland's Itin., i. fol. 42; Allen's Lincolnshire, ii. 57; and Brydges's Collins, vii. 228.

Arms.—Or, two chevronels gules.

Present Representative, William John Monson, 7th Baron Monson.

This is an ancient Shropshire house descended from William de Whichcote, of Whichcote, in that county, in 1255. In the reign of Edward IV., by marriage with the heiress of Tyrwhitt, the family became possessed of Harpswell in this county, which for a long time continued the residence of the Whichcotes.

See Wotton's Baronetage, iii. 13; and Allen's History of Lincolnshire, i. 38.

Arms.—Ermine, two boars passant in pale gules.

Present Representative, Sir Thomas Whichcote, 7th Baronet.

Roger Anderson of Wrawby, in this county, Esquire, living in the latter part of the fourteenth century, and who came from Northumberland, stands at the head of the pedigree. His great-grandson Henry, also of Wrawby, was grandfather of Sir Edmund Anderson of Flixborough, Knight, Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, who died in 1605. He was the ancestor of the present family, and of Sir Charles Anderson of Broughton in Lincolnshire, Baronet 1660, and of the Andersons of Eyworth in Bedfordshire, Baronets 1664, extinct in 1773. Brocklesby came from an heiress of Pelham, a younger branch of the Pelhams Earls of Chichester.

See Wotton's English Baronetage, vol. iii. p. 191, vol. iv. p. 427, and "The History of Lea," printed in 1841.

Arms.—Argent, a chevron between three crosses flory sable.

Present Representative, Charles Anderson Pelham, 3rd Earl of Yarborough.

The ancient extraction of the Berties from Berstead in the county of Kent is proved by the Thurnham charters in the possession of Sir Edward Dering, and by various public records of undoubted authority; and, although the exact line of pedigree is by no means clear, there appears no reason to doubt the descent of this "undefamed house" from John or Bartholomew de Bereteghe, who were living in the 35th of Edward I. The marriage of Richard Bertie son of Robert, who died in 1500, with Katherine daughter of William Willoughby, last Lord Willoughby of Eresby, and widow of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, was, as is well known, the origin of the consequence of this right loyal family, five generations of whose history have been so agreeably illustrated by Lady Georgiana Bertie. Grimsthorpe, inherited from the Duchess of Suffolk from her paternal Willoughby ancestors, became the principal seat of the Berties, Barons Willoughby of Eresby and Lords Great Chamberlains of England, advanced in the person of Robert second Lord Willoughby to the Earldom of Lindsey by King Charles I. His great-grandson was created Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven in 1715, which titles became extinct on the decease of the fifth Duke in 1809. The Earldom of Lindsey and representation of the family thereupon devolved on the father of the present Earl, descended from the fifth son of the second Earl of Lindsey by his first wife.

Younger branch, the Earl of Abingdon 1682, Baron Norreys of Rycote 1572, descended from the second marriage of the second Earl of Lindsey and the heiress of Wray, whose mother was the sole heir of Francis Norreys, Earl of Berkshire, and Lord Norreys of Rycote.

See Lady G. Bertie's "Five Generations of a Loyal House," 4to. 1845, and Brydges's Collins, vol. ii. p. 1, vol. iii. 628.

Arms.—Argent, three battering rams barways in pale azure, armed and garnished or. The "docquet or grant" in the fourth of Edward VI. gives the arms, Quarterly, 1 and 4, Argent, a battering ram azure, garnished or; 2 and 3, Sable a tower argent.

Present Representative, George Augustus Frederick Albemarle Bertie, 10th Earl of Lindsey.

"This family is very ancient, for they were gentlemen of good ranke in the time of King John, as it appeareth by many ancient grants and evidences of theirs which I have seen," wrote Peacham in his "Compleate Gentleman," in 1634. (p. 191.) The name is local, being derived from Wodehouse in Silfield, in this county; but as early as the reign of Henry III. the family had property in Kimberley, and in that of Henry IV. the manor was also inherited from the heiress of Fastolff.

See Blomefield's Norfolk, ed. 1739, vol. i. p. 751, for long extracts from the curious old pedigree in verse; Wotton's Baronetage, i. 164; and Brydges's Collins's Peerage, viii. 562.

Arms.—Sable, a chevron or, guttée de sang, between three cinquefoils ermine. This coat is said to have been augmented as now borne, by Henry V. in honour of John Wodehouse's valour at the Battle of Agincourt, the guttée de sang, not at present considered very good heraldry, being then added. The supporters, two wode or wild men, were also, it has been said, then first used.

Present Representative, John Wodehouse, 3rd Baron Wodehouse, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

Walpole, in Mershland, in this county, gave name to this historical family, and here Joceline de Walpole was living in the reign of Stephen. Reginald de Walpole, in the time of Henry I. seems to have been lineal ancestor of the house. He was father of Richard, who married Emma, daughter of Walter de Hawton, or Houghton, which at a very early period became the family seat, and which, after the death of the third Earl of the first creation, passed to the issue of his aunt Mary, Viscountess Malpas, daughter of Sir Robert Walpole; whose descendant, the Marquess of Cholmondeley, is the present possessor.

See Blomefield, iii. 796, and iv. 708; also Brydges's Collins, v. 631.

Arms.—Or, on a fess between two chevrons sable three cross-crosslets of the first.

Present Representative, Horatio William Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford.

Berney, in the hundred of North Greenhow in this county, doubtless gave name to this ancient family, who are traced pretty nearly to the Conquest. Park Hall, the former seat, is in the parish of Reedham, and was acquired by the marriage of Sir Thomas de Berney with Margaret daughter and heir of Sir William de Reedham in the reign of Edward III.

Younger branch, Berney of Morton Hall in this county, descended from a younger brother of the first Baronet.

See Parkins's continuation of Blomefield's Norfolk, v. 1482; and Wotton's Baronetage, i. 378.

Arms.—Party per pale gules and azure, a cross engrailed ermine.

Present Representative, Sir Henry Hanson Berney, 9th Baronet.

Descended from the noble house of Astley Castle in Warwickshire, and traced to Philip de Estlega in the 12th of Henry II., and in the female line from the Constables of Melton-Constable, which estate came into the family by the second marriage of Thomas Lord Astley with Edith, third sister and coheir of Geffrey de Constable, in the time of Henry III. Astley Castle, the original seat, descended by an heiress to the Greys of Ruthin, afterwards Marquesses of Dorset, and Dukes of Suffolk. Hill-Morton in Warwickshire was also the seat of this family from the reign of Henry III.

The Astleys formerly of Patishull in Staffordshire were the elder branch, sprung from the first marriage of Thomas Lord Astley, who was killed in the Barons' Wars at Evesham, (the 49th of Henry III.,) extinct 1771. The Astleys, now of Everley, in Wiltshire, Baronets 1821, descend from the second son of Walter Astley of Patishull, the father of the first Baronet of that line (1662).

See Parkins's Blomefield's Norfolk, v. 940; Thomas's Dugdale's Warwickshire, i. 19, 107; and Wotton's Baronetage, iii. 63; for Astleys of Patishull, Shaw's Staffordshire, ii. 287; and Wotton's Baronetage, iii. 368.

Arms.—Azure, a cinquefoil ermine within a border engrailed or. The Patishull and Everley family omit the border, and it was thus borne by the head of the house in the reign of Richard II. Thomas de Astley, at the same period, differenced his coat by a label of three points or, charged with two bars gules. (Rolls.)

Present Representative, Jacob Henry Delaval Astley, 3rd Baron Hastings.

Traditionally a Norman family seated at Bedingfeld, in Suffolk, soon after the Conquest. Oxburgh, or Oxborough, has been the residence of this eminently knightly house from the reign of Edward IV., when it came by the marriage of Edmund Bedingfeld with Margaret, daughter of Robert Tudenham, and to whom licence was granted to build the walls and towers of Oxburgh in the year 1482. The baronetcy was conferred by Charles II. as a mark of his favour and in consideration of the eminent loyalty and consequent sufferings of the family during the usurpation. The Bedingfelds of Ditchingham, in this county, are a younger branch parted from the parent stem as early as the middle of the fourteenth century.

See Blomefield, iii. 482; Wotton's Baronetage, iii. 212; and the Rev. G. H. M'Gill's account of Oxburgh Hall in the Proceedings of the Norfolk Archeological Society.

Arms.—Ermine, an eagle displayed gules, armed or.

Present Representative, Sir Henry George Paston Bedingfeld, 7th Baronet.

The great historical house of Howard in point of antiquity must yield precedence to many other English families: it can only be traced with certainty to Sir William Howard, Judge of the Common Pleas in 1297. Norfolk appears to be the county where this great family should be noticed, the Duke of Norfolk still possessing property in the county of his dukedom derived from his ancestors of the house of Bigod. In the fourteenth century, by the match with the heiress of Mowbray, the foundation of the honors and consequence of the Howards was laid, the first Duke being the son of Margaret, daughter and coheir of Thomas de Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk. The Sussex estates came from the heiress of Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel, in the reign of Edward VI.; Worksop from the Talbots; Greystoke and Morpeth from the Dacres.

All the English Peers of the house of Howard are traced to a common ancestor in Thomas, the second Duke of Norfolk, who died in 1524. The Duke of Norfolk, the Earls of Suffolk and Carlisle, descend from his first wife, and the Earl of Effingham from the second. The Howards of Greystoke, in Cumberland, are a younger branch of the present ducal house. The Howards of Corby Castle, in the same county, descend from the second son of "Belted Will," the ancestor of the house of Carlisle.

Extinct branches. The Viscount Bindon; the Earls of Northampton, Nottingham, and Stafford; and Lord Howard of Escrick.

See Brydges's Collins, i. 50, for the Duke of Norfolk; iii. 147, for the Earl of Suffolk; iii. 501, for the Earl of Carlisle; and iv. 264, for the Earl of Effingham. See also Cartwright's Rape of Bramber, p. 185; and Dallaway's Rape of Arundel; Hunter's South Yorkshire, ii. 10. For the Howard Monuments at East-Winch, see Weever's Funeral Monuments, p. 842-9; for their state in the 18th century Parkins's Blomefield's Norfolk, iv. 746; and Topographer and Genealogist, ii. 90. For the Earl of Carlisle, see Hodgson's History of Northumberland, ii. pt. 2, p. 381; for Howard of Corby, the same vol. p. 477. See also "Historical Anecdotes of some of the Howard Family," 12mo. 1769; Tierney's Castle and Town of Arundel, 8vo. 1834; and Mr. Howard's "Indication of Memorials, &c. of the Howard Family," fol. 1834.

Arms.—Gules, a bend between six cross-crosslets fitcheé argent, on an escucheon a demi-lion pierced through the mouth with an arrow, within a double tressure flory counter-flory gules, granted by patent 5 Henry VIII. to Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, in remembrance of the victory gained over the Scots at Flodden. The present coat was borne by Sir John Howard in the reign of Edward II., and by Mr. Howard in those of Edward II. and Richard III.: it has been conjectured, from the similarity of this coat with that of the Botilers, Barons of Wem, (Gules, a fess cheeky argent and sable between six crosses pateé fitchée argent,) that Sir William Howard the Judge was descended from the Hords, stewards to these Barons: it is observable that none of the Howards ever prefixed the de to their name, a fact which opposes their derivation from Hawarden in Flintshire. (Blakeway's Sheriffs of Shropshire, pp. 53 note.)

Present Representative, Henry Fitzalan Howard, 15th Duke of Norfolk.

This is a younger branch of the Gurneys of West Barsham in this county, whose principal male line became extinct in 1661, West Barsham came from the heiress of Waunci about the reign of Edward III. Previous to that time the Gurneys appear to have been seated at Harpley, also in Norfolk, as early as 1206, and are traced for two descents beyond that period, being (as there appears no reason to doubt) descended from the great Norman baronial house of the name. The present family may be said to have been refounded by John Gurney, an eminent silk-merchant at Norwich, about 1670. Keswick was purchased in 1747. The Gournays of Somersetshire, represented by the Earls of Egmont, may have been a distinct family; their arms were, Paly of six or and azure. Dugdale, however, gives them a common ancestor with the former house. (Baronage, i. 429.)

See the "Records of the House of Gournay," privately printed, 4to., 1848, and particularly, for the Norman origin of the family page 293 of that work. For the Gournays of Somersetshire, see the History of the House of Ivery. London, 1742, vol. ii. p. 473,

Arms.—Argent, a cross engrailed gules, in the first quarter a cinquefoil azure.

Present Representative, Hudson Gurney, Esq.

This ancient family is supposed to have the same origin as the noble Norman house of Grey, now represented by the Earl of Stamford; it is traced to William de Grey, of Cavendish, in Suffolk; whose grandson Sir Thomas was seated about 1306 at Cornerth in that county, by his marriage with the heiress of the same name; their son and heir married the coheiress of Baynard, and thus became possessed of Merton, the long-continued seat of this family.

See Blomefield, i. 576; and Brydges's Collins, vii. 510.

Arms.—Barry of six argent and azure, in chief three annulets gules. The ancient coat of Cornerth, Azure, a fess between two chevronels or, (which was doubtless derived from their superior lords the Baynards,) was borne for many generations by the ancestors of this family.

Present Representative, Thomas de Grey, 5th Baron Walsingham.

This family is said to have been established at a period shortly subsequent to the Conquest at Letheringsett, in Norfolk, but is better known as a Suffolk family, having been seated at Monks' Bradfield, in that county, in the reign of Richard I. Redgrave was granted by Henry VIII. in the 36th year of his reign, to the great Sir Nicholas Bacon, who with Francis his son, Viscount St. Alban's, were the principal ornaments of this family. Raveningham descended to the Bacons from the heiress of the ancient family of Castell, or de Castello, about the middle of the 18th century.

See Parkins's Continuation of Blomefield's Norfolk, iv. 262 Wotton's Baronetage, i. 1, and ii. 72.

Arms.—Gules, on a chief argent two mullets pierced sable. This coat was borne by Sir Edmund Bacon, in the reign of Edward II., and by M. Bacon in that of Edward III. (Rolls.) A brass circa A.D. 1320, at Gorleston church, Suffolk, supposed to represent one of this family, bears five lozenges in bend on the field, besides the mullets in chief: see Boutell's Brasses, p. 36.

Present Representative, Sir Henry Hickman Bacon, 11th Baronet.

The ancestors of this ancient house were seated at Horham in Suffolk in the 13th century, "knights of high esteem in those parts," saith Camden, and traced to Sir Hubert Jernegan of that place. Somerleyton, in the same county, derived from the heiress of Fitzosbert, afterwards became the family seat, and so continued until the extinction of the elder line. Cossey was granted to Sir Henry Jerningham, (son of Sir Edward Jerningham, by his second wife,) in 1547, by Queen Mary, "being the first that appeared openly for her after the death of Edward VI." He was the ancestor of Lord Stafford.

See Weever's Ancient Funerall Monuments, p. 769; Blomefield's Norfolk, i. p. 660; Wotton's Baronetage, i. 450; and Suckling's History of Suffolk, ii. p. 46.

Arms.—Argent, three buckles gules.

Present Representative, Henry Valentine Stafford Jerningham, 9th Baron Stafford.

In 1377, the ancestor of this family was of Snoring Magna in this county. In 1398, John Townshend settled at Rainham, which according to some accounts accrued to them by the heiress of Havile, but the pedigree as given by Collins cannot be relied on, neither can the defamatory account of Leland, who says—"the grandfather of Townsende now living was a meane man of substance." The truth seems to be that the family is old, but not of great account before the time of Sir Walter de Townsend, who married Maud Scogan, and flourished about the year 1400.

See Blomefield, iii. 815; Brydges's Collins, ii. 454; and Leland's Itinerary, iv. p. 13.

Arms.—Azure, a chevron ermine between three escallops argent.

Present Representative, John Villiers Stuart Townshend, 5th Marquess Townshend.

This is a younger branch of the very ancient baronial house of Wake, who were Lincolnshire Barons in the reign of Henry I. Sir Hugh Wake was lord of Deeping in the county of Lincoln, and of Blisworth in this county, by gift of his father, Baldwin fourth Lord Wake. He died in 1315, and was the direct ancestor of the present Baronet. See memoir of the family of Wake privately printed in 1833, but written by Archbishop Wake; and Wotton's Baronetage, i. 465.

Arms.—Or, two bars gules, in chief three torteauxes. This coat was borne by Hugh Wake in the reign of Henry III., and again by Sir John Wake in that of Edward II. Sir Hugh Wake at the latter period differenced his arms by a canton azure. His uncle reversed the colours gules and argent, the field being gules. M. Thomas Wake de Blisworth in the reign of Edward III. bore the same arms, with a border engrailed sable. (Rolls of the dates.)

Present Representative, Sir William Wake, 11th Baronet.

William de Bredenhill, seated at Dodington in Oxfordshire, in the reign of Edward I., and the owner of lands at Aynho in this county at the same period, is the first ascertained ancestor of the Brudenells, whose principal consequence however must be traced to Sir Robert Brudenell, Chief Justice of the King's Bench in the reign of Henry VII., who married a coheiress of Entwisell, and thus became possessed of Dene and of Stanton Wyvill in the county of Leicester.

See the pedigree of this family in Nichols's History of Leicestershire, vol. ii. pt. ii. p. 807; see also Brydges's Collins, iii. 487.

Younger branch. The Marquess of Ailesbury (1821), descended from Thomas, fourth son of George fourth Earl of Cardigan, and the Lady Elizabeth Bruce, eldest daughter of Thomas second Earl of Ailesbury.

Arms.—Argent, a chevron gules between three morions azure.

Present Representative, James Thomas Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan, K.C.B.

The first recorded ancestor of this ancient family is Rainald, mesne lord of Knightley, in the county of Stafford, under Earl Roger, in the time of William the Conqueror, as appears by Domesday Book. That estate went out of the family by an heiress who married Robert de Peshall, about the reign of Edward III., and the Knightleys removed to Gnowsall, in the same county, in the 17th of Richard II. (1394). Fawsley was purchased in the 3rd of Henry V. (1415-16). It is thus mentioned by Leland: "Mr. Knightley, a man of great lands, hath his principal house at Foullesle, but it is no very sumptuous thing." (Itin. i. fol. 11.)

See Baker's Northamptonshire, i. 381. Blakeway (Sheriffs of Salop, p. 103) asserts that "the Knightleys appear to have been a branch of the Shirleys," an assumption without any foundation except the similarity of their arms.

Arms.—Quarterly ermine, and paly of six or and gules. This coat was borne as early as 1301-2 (30th Ed. I.) by Sir Robert de Knyteley: it is also borne by Cotes of Cotes, co. Stafford, probably from family connection.

Present Representative, Sir Rainald Knightley, 3rd Baronet, M. P. for South Northamptonshire.