gad S. N" 73., May 23. *57.] 



NOTES AND QUERIESi 



413 



and I would intimate to him that, had he given 

 their arms*, some assistance might have been af- 

 forded in the search. The name is almost as vari- 

 ously spelt as that of Wickliffe, Braose, Brewose, 

 Bures, with a diphthong, Brsehus, Brouse, Brutes, 

 Brus (not Bruce), Bruyes, Brewis, &c. They 

 possessed much property in Gloucestershire, par- 

 ticularly at Tetbury and the neighbourhood, and 

 had the manor of Tetbury before the Berkeley 

 family. When the old church at that place was 

 pulled down, between seventy and eighty years 

 ago, there was a very dilapidated altar monument 

 belonging to the family standing in the church, 

 probably six centuries old, and which was perhaps 

 in too ruinous a state to be preserved, . but of 

 which an engraving may be found in the library 

 of the British Museum (191. f 3. at p. 101.). 

 Probably your correspondent's object may be pro- 

 moted by referring to the Baronage of England, 

 by William Dugdale, vol. i. p. 414 — 421., Lond. 

 1675, folio ; the History of the Dormant Peer- 

 ages, by Thomas C. Banks, 1826, Supplement, 

 Appendix to vol. i. p. 15., where there is a " Table 

 of the Descent of Braose." 



I would now introduce a similar inquiry I am 

 desirous to make, concerning the family of Belet, 

 Bellot, or Bellet (query, French Belette, a wea- 

 sel ?), which came into England with William the 

 Conqueror, and whose name is inscribed in the 

 Boll of Battel Abbey in 1067. They soon rose 

 to the highest honours in the state, and were for 

 several reigns distinguished for great probity as 

 well as very extensive possessions. In the reign 

 of Henry I. they had the original grant of the 

 Manor of Syenes, or Shene, now Richmond, in 

 Surrey: tliey were also noted in 1140, in the 

 time of Stephen. In 1154, temp. Henry II., Ro- 

 bert Belet was Sheriff of Surrey, and also in the 

 succeeding year ; and in 1165 paid a fine of lOOZ. 

 in that county. Michael Belet was cup-bearer to 

 Henry II.; and this Michael was a iudge about 

 1186. In temp. Richard I. (1190), Robert Belet 

 paid 80^. to have restitution of Combe Park, King- 

 ston, which was of his inheritance, whereof he had 

 been dispossessed by that king. In the reign of 

 John there is much mention of them ; also in that 

 of Henry III,, when in 1236 Master Belet was 

 "pincerna" at Henry's marriage.f Their arms J 

 are, Arg. on a chief gules, two (and sometimes 

 three) cinquefoils or (or arg.). Blomefield, in his 



* Sir George Nayler, the late Garter King of Arms, in 

 Collection of Coats of Armour of Gloucestershire, Lond. 

 1792, has those of Braose or Breose of Tetbury, plate 8. : 

 but I have not the work to refer to. The seal of Wm. de 

 Braose, as affixed in the year 1301 to the letter from the 

 Barons of England to Boniface VIII., will be found in 

 ArchcBologia, vol. xxi. p. 207. 



t Matthaei Paris, Angli Historia Major, edited by Dr. 

 Wm. Wats, Lond. 1640, folio, vol. ii. p. 421. 



X Survey of Dorsetshire, by Rev. John Coker, Lond. 

 1732. 



History of Norfolk, in 11 vols. 8vo., Lond. 1805, 

 has passim notices of the Belets, with a pedigree 

 in vol. viii. pp. 433-4. ; a pedigree is also given by 

 Manning (History of Surrey, vol. i. p. 407.), but 

 he acknowledges it is imperfect. In Hutchins's 

 History of Dorset, vol. ii. p. 126., Frome-Belet, 

 a parish and a manor in the time of Henry II., be- 

 longed to Robert Belet. Bridges and Whalley's 

 Hist, of Noi-thamptonshire, vol. ii. p. 66., says, under 

 Thorp Underwood, formerly Thorp Belet, Hervey 

 Belet possessed lands there in the 5 th of King 

 Stephen ; and it is stated that in course of succes- 

 sion those came to Michael, usually called Master 

 Michael. Not to multiply these extracts, I would 

 refer to Dugdale's Baronage of England, tom. i. 

 p. 614., Lond. 1675; Dormant and Extinct Baron- 

 age, by T. C. Banks, vol. i. pp. 31, 32., 1807, 4to. ; 

 Madox (Thos.), History of the Exchequer, 4to., 

 1769, passim ; Rotuli Litterarum Clausurum, by T. 

 D. Hardy, 1833; Testa de Nevill; Calendarium Ro- 

 tulorum Pdtentium ; Liber Niger Scaccarii, edidit 

 Thorn. Hearnius, Lond. 1771, &c. *. 



The pedigree of the Braose family, showing its 

 extinction in the male line in 1418, on the death 

 of George Brewes, and the descent of the property 

 through his sister Agnes to the St. Pierres, the 

 Cokeseys, and the Grevilles, and then the re- 

 union in 1498 with the other Broase estates in 

 the Howard and Berkeley families, together with 

 the evidence supporting the pedigree, will be 

 found in the 8th vol. of the Sussex Arch. Coll., 

 p. 97. Wm. Dubrant Cooper. 



Br^ItcjS t0 Minav eaucrteS. 



Autographs (2°'^ S. iii. 269. 351.) — Let me re- 

 mind Mr. J. Cyprian Rust that Sir John Fenn's 

 Paston Letters was not, by nearly fifty years, the 

 first publication wherein facsimiles of autographs 

 appeared. Dr. Forbes's Full Vieio of the Public 

 Transactions in the Reign of Q. Elizabeth, 2 vols., 

 folio, 1740-41, exhibits several excellent fac- 

 similes of autographs, at the end of most of 

 the documents and letters printed in that very 

 useful collection ; in his Preface to which the 

 Doctor himself thus speaks of these fac-similes : 

 " the names to all the original Pieces are so cu- 

 riously imitated, as not to be distinguished from 

 the original handwriting." Henry Campkin. 



Reform Club. 



Scott dictating (2"^ S. iii. 366.)— For the sake 

 of the memories (in both senses of the word) of 

 Lockhart and Sir Walter, I beg leave to observe 

 that Laidlaw's " shake of his head'' does not at all 

 impugn, but, in my mind, confirms Lockhart's 

 statement. Laidlaw's own expressions convey 

 the substance of the anecdote, but he was probably 



