g2 DATE OK MELUOURNK PARISH CHURCH. 



in that old house, when pulled down, articles supposed to have 

 been " nun's caps," and also on the supposed existence ot an un- 

 derground passage from those buildings to the Castle, distant about 

 two hundred yards to the north-eastward. As regards the passage, 

 a few years ago a deep trench for a new sewer was dug across its 

 supposed course without any trace of the passage being found ; 

 and as regards the " Nunnery," it is shown by existing deeds that 

 the ground on which it is supposed to have stood belonged to one 

 of the Chantries in Melbourne Church, and became in the reign 

 of Elizabeth the property of the Beaulie family, who built upon it 

 the old house in which the articles called "nuns' caps" were 

 found. 



Resuming seriousness, it remains to consider the relations 

 between the Church of Melbourne and the temporal seigniory of 

 the district during the building of the Church. 



The Domesday Record states that (in a.d. 1054-6) the Manor 

 of Melbourne was in the demesne of King William, and that it had 

 belonged to King Edward (the Confessor) ; at the earlier period it 

 was worth ^^ro (per annum), but then only ^6, though it 

 rendered ^10. And that the Manor had annexed to it a 

 " berewick," consisting of the neighbouring places, " Barrow-on- 

 Trent, Chellaston, Normanton and Osmaston. For a long period 

 suits arising in those places were prosecuted in the Manor Court 

 of Melbourne, as appears by existing Court Rolls. 



Whether there was at Melbourne in the eleventh or twelfth cen- 

 turies a mansion fitted to be a royal abode is uncertain. There is 

 no mention in the Public Records of a Castle of Melbourne until 

 A.D. 1327, when the " Castrum " is specified as part of the posses- 

 sions of Thomas Earl of Lancaster and Leicester, in " Inquisitiones 

 Post Mortem" (Vol. 2, page 8). We find in Calendar Rot. Pat. 

 (folio 72, 4), that in the year 1311 Robert de Holland had a 

 license from King Edward IL " Kernellare mansum suum apud 

 Melburn." This was doubtless the origin of Melbourne Castle. 

 A nobleman's mansion, perhaps previously a royal residence, or 

 place of " gisting," was converted into a place of strength, and 

 was ever afterwards called Melbourne Castle — " castrum de 



