77 



m)t Host iHanov of ^esUsfovtie. 



By Benjamin Bryan. 





HERE has probably been no more scholarly historians 



of Derbyshire than the Lysons, and none who had 



at disposal more original sources of information, 



and yet when the volume on Derbyshire in the 



" Magna Britannia " was written, on coming tO' deal with 



Mestesforde — now Matlock- — they said the site of it was not 



now certainly known. 



It is superfluous to say that a manor could not be substan- 

 tially lost — the land of which it was composed must remain ; 

 therefore it could only be the title of the manor which had been 

 lost or changed. The parish of Matlock, which stands on the 

 site of Mestesforde, is an interesting piece of territory, not 

 alone because, as the late Mr. William Adam so aptly termed it, 

 it is " The Gem of the Peak," but also because it was in this 

 parish that was settled for generations the interesting family 

 which gave to the county Mr. Adam Wolley, the man who 

 collected and left such a priceless legacy of manuscripts in 

 elucidation of its history as is now deposited in the British 

 Museum. From an antiquarian point of view, the Manor and 

 Parish of Matlock must also be regarded as interesting, because 

 since the time of the Domesday Survey their name has been 

 changed, the old designation .having disappeared so mysteriously, 

 and so far so ine.xplicably, as to create a definite and attractive 

 archaeological problem for solution. 



