132 THE BURTON CHARTULARY. 
All which injuries the lord the Abbot is prepared to prove if necessary by the 
oath of his bailiffs and foresters, and other men worthy of credit. 
FOLIO 73. 
Contains the complaint of Robert de Tok against the Abbot. It states that 
the Abbot and his Convent denied to him and his tenants the use of the Abbot’s 
wood and the common of the same as they used to have, and taking his cattle, 
forced him into expensive litigation. 
That the Abbot had forced him into the said litigation for three days in one 
week in his Court at Burton, which had necessitated his coming to Ansedeleg 
with all his household (¢ot@ familia sua), and to make a stay there, relinquish- 
ing other business, by which he had been greatly injured. 
That the Abbot had defamed him openly before his Court, calling him a 
traitor to his lord, working maliciously against him; and that one of the 
monks, viz., Henry de Alrewas, had specially defamed him in this way. 
That in consequence of this litigation he had been forced to give up the 
pasturing of goats, and enclosures in the wood of Ansedelega, which he and all 
his predecessors had formerly enjoyed. 
And that owing to the absurd (/atfwam) method of cutting timber adopted 
by the Abbot in the said wood, a cow belonging to one of his men had been 
killed, and an ox had been killed in the same wood it is believed by the Abbot’s 
men. 
That a certain monk, Robert de Lega, with a servant of the Abbot’s, had 
beaten one of his men of Ansedelega, named Meriet, and taken from him his 
“« densaxe.””* 
That the Abbot had erected a mill at Finderne, when he was precluded from 
doing so by the charters of his predecessors, and by which trespass he had been 
put to expensive litigation in the County of Nottingham. 
That a certain servant of the Abbot, named Alan, had withdrawn from his 
suit of mill at Potlac all the men of Finderne, against the tenor of the charters 
of the Abbot’s predecessors, and to his damage. 
The Abbot replies seriatim to all these complaints, denying that Robert or 
his predecessors had ever had any right of depasturing goats in the wood of 
Ansedeleg, etc. And that as to the Abbot defaming him by calling hima 
traitor in his Court, it was true, inasmuch as Robert had sworn fealty to him, 
and done homage to him, and had afterwards insidiously worked injury to his 
lord ; and that he had carried on the contest against the supplication of the 
whole county, ‘‘ ipsum dominum suum ad legem in pleno comitatu ponendo et 
ipsam capiendo contra maximam supplicationem totius Comitatfis pro ipso 
attentius deputantis ut personze suze deferet et ab aliis eam caperet qui tantum 
* << Tyensaxe,” that is a toothed axe or saw. —ED. 
