By G. Poulett Scrope, Esq., M.P. 9 



himself in open Parliament, wlio declared it (the Earldom) " to be 

 held thenceforward as freely by the sword, as he (the King) 

 held England by the Crown." A detailed account of this ceremony 

 on occasion of the Lord Henry Staiford being created Earl of Wilt- 

 shire by Henry VIII. in 1509, is still extant in a MS. in the 

 Herald's College.' 



The Saxon Chroniclers make mention of but two noblemen 

 holding the dignity of Ealdormen, or Earls of Wiltshire. The 

 earliest of the two is Wulstan or Weoxtan, who, in the year 800, 

 the first of the reign of Egbert, and indeed on the very day of his 

 accession to the throne of Wessex, ■^aliantly resisted an invasion of 

 the Mercians under Ethelmund, at Cj^nesmeresford.^ The Chro- 

 nicle asserts that the slaughter was tremendous, but "the Wilt- 

 shiremen were victorious." Earl Wolstan died shortly after of the 

 wounds received in this battle, and his widow, Elburvey, (or 

 Alburga), who was daughter (or more probably sister) of Egbert, 

 thereon took the veil, and founded the Priory of Wilton, of which 

 she became the first Prioress. The chronicle subsequently makes 

 mention of one Aethelm, " Comes WiUunensis," Ealdorman of 

 Wiltshire, as having been employed to carry to Rome the alms- 

 offerings of Alfred and the West Saxons in the year 888. He is 

 also reported, in company with other leaders, to have gained a 

 victory over the Danes at Buttington in 898, and to have died 

 in the same year.^ 



Edward of Sarisburie is mentioned in Domesday as Sheriff ("Vice- 

 Comes") of Wiltshire; and this ofiice was certainly hereditary in 

 his family together with the Earldom of Salisbury, being enjoyed 

 by his grandson Patrick, and great-grandson William, whose 

 daughter and heiress, Ela, conveyed both by marriage to her 

 husband, William Longespee. But the dignity of Earl of 

 Wiltshire was for the first time after the Conquest created by 

 Richard II, in the 2l8t year of his reign, (1397), when in open 

 Parliament ho conferred it upon his favourite William Le Scrope. 



' It is printed in full by Mr. Courthope in his edition of Nicolas's Peerage. 



2 Qucrc Somerford Keynca on the Isis in tlie extreme north of the county ? 



3 Henry of IluntinyJou states him to have been slain in u baltle with the 

 Danes at Port in lluiiiphhire. 



