280 Broughton Gifford. 
very spot where the standard of Harold had been planted. Wil- 
liam’s vassals followed his example on their several properties all 
over the country; so that within a century and a half no population, 
however small, was without the consolations of religion and the 
ministrations of a resident priest. 
These details may be of little interest, but I must say with Thierry,! 
they are useful in forming our ideas of the varied scenes of the con- 
quest, and invest with their original colours facts of greater import- 
ance. The transactions which took place in Broughton were being 
repeated at the same time all over England. When elsewhere we 
hear of tenants in capite, villains and bordsmen, we may perhaps, 
if we think of Humphrey and his people, perceive some reality in 
these titles and names, which considered abstractedly have only a 
vague and uncertain meaning. Through the distance of ages we 
make our way to the then living men; we realize them dwelling and 
acting on the land, where not even the dust of their bones is now 
to be found. Many merely local facts and names will be introduced 
into this memoir; but, if they help to reproduce the various situ- 
ations, interests, and habits of men, during the past, they will not 
have been mentioned in vain. 
Of antiquities we have not much to show. Ina field called Brad- 
leys, belonging to Monkton and adjoining the railway, there are, 
in a dry season, traces of foundations. Different coins have been 
found in working the ground for agricultural purposes. Five 
within my time: two of Valentinian Giorta Romanorum, the 
Emperor dragging a captive: one of Trajan, Cos. V., in his fifth 
consulship: two of Constantine the Great, one, SoLr INvIcTo CoMITI, 
the sun standing; another, two legionary soldiers standing with 
the Labarum between them, and the inscription GLORIA EXERCITUS. 
I believe none of these are very rare. 
From the state of the Parish at the Domesday survey, I pass to 
the history of the manors of Broughton and Monkton from that 
time to the present. 
Manoriau History. 
First of Broughton and its feudal lords, whom I will divide into 
1 Thierry’s Normans, vol. i. p. 237. 
