348 On the Succession of the Abbesses of Wilton^ ^c. 



friend and follower of Rufus, was lord of the honour of Gloucester, 

 and conqueror of the land of Glamorgan, he re-founded the Abbey 

 of Tewkesbury and died there in 1107. His eldest daughter, Mabel, 

 was regarded as his sole heiress ; owing to her enormous possessions 

 the husband selected for her was E-obert, eldest natural son of 

 Henry I. 



During the war between Stephen and the Empress Matilda, Earl 

 Robert of Gloucester attacked Stephen at Wilton, on July 1st, 1143, 

 and drove him out. At this time Hawise, sister-in-law of Robert, 

 was probably Abbess of Wilton. The date of her appointment is 

 not known. Her age can be inferred from the fact that her elder 

 sister, Mabel, was born about 1100, and was married to Robert 

 about 1116 or 1117, certainly before 1119.' Hawise, the Abbess 

 of Wilton, was the third daughter of Fitz-Hamon, who, as before 

 mentioned, died in 1107. The statement that Cecilia was made 

 Abbess of Shaftesbury by Henry I., in 1107, can hardly be correct, 

 she must have been an infant at that time As Hutchins, in his 

 County History of Dorset, gives the name of an Abbess Emma in 

 1125, and Cecilia Fitz-Hamon in 1135, there can be little doubt 

 that the first date of 1107 is an error. 



Alice occurs in a Pem. charter of the third Richard I. — 1191-1192, 

 between Alice, Abbess of Wilton, and the Bishop of Winchester, 

 relating to a grant to Robert, son of Siward, of land at Chilhampton. 

 This abbess is No. 1 of Hoare's list, who, however, gives the ap- 

 proximate date of " the beginning of the reign of Henry II." 



Maria, Abbess of Wilton, is found in a Pem. charter in con- 

 nection with the name of Roger de Vernon relating to lands at 

 Cliilmark, in the fifth, and again in the 6th, of Richard I. — 1194- 

 1195. Her name also occurs in the eighth of Richard I., 1197. This 

 abbess Maria is No. 2 of Hoare^s list, with the date 1189. 



AscELiNA, Abbess of Wilton, is found in a Pem. charter of a 

 grant to one Thomas, in Ugford, early in the thirteenth century. 



* The Land of Morgan, the chief Lord, by G. T. Clark, Esq. Journal of 

 the Archseological Institute, vol. 35, p. 4. In this and the preceding volume will 

 be found many particulars of the life of Fitz-Hamon. 



