By John WaUon-Tai/hr. 79 



ill the first was John le Somemxr, chaplain, and in the second one 

 of the sureties was John de Uptone, clerk. ^ 



In 1286, when Matthew Fitz-John made the manor over to the 

 King, it remained for a year and a half under the management of 

 llalpli de Sandwich, the King's Escheator, and his account of the 

 income and expenditure during that period, which is found included 

 in a pipe roll of the year 1305,^ and contains interesting details of 

 the internal economy of the manor at this period, is translated 

 from the latin and set oiit below in the form of an account current."^ 



It is seen that the escheator rendered his accounts to the 

 Exchequer in skeleton form only, while the details of each item 

 were entered separately on certain rolls of particulars referred to 

 in the postscript and in several places throughout the record. 

 These rolls are unfortunately no longer in existence and the 

 amount of information to be gathered from the accounts is thus 

 materially reduced so that many questions of importance can only 

 be solved by surmise. In previous documemts frequent reference 

 to the free-tenants of the manor has been found, and now for the 

 first time the villeins or customary tenants are mentioned by 

 name, and the interesting fact is disclosed that they were allowed 

 to redeem at least a part of the services they owed to the lord by 

 a money payment, while the bailiff employed others to work the 

 private lands. The tallage which the villeins paid at Michaelmas 

 in the first year seems to be represented in 1309 by a gift made 

 to the lord at the feast of St. Dionysius (October 9th), which later 

 still became Lardarmvi, a word interpreted by Cowell as " a com- 

 mutation for some customary service of carrying salt or meat to 

 the lord's larder." 



' It may be suggested that the meaning of le Somenur is, the apparitor, 

 and that this is an early form of the old Wiltshire name of Sumner. 



= No. 150, 33Edw. I., Ro. 48. 



•■ Fi(/e p. 80. The postcript to the account is as follows: — "For corn 

 bought and for live and dead stock (instauro) he accounts accurately because 

 the whole is in the sales, sowings and support of the servants, and the crops 

 with all utensils, Ac, have been sold, as is shown above and in the aforesaid 

 rolls of pariiculars." 



