122 EPONYMOUS FAMILIES OF DORSET. 



ancestors of each of us, living at the date of the Norman invasion 

 would amount to over fifty-two millions ; and, if we deduct two- 

 thirds for the frequent meeting of the lines in common ancestry, 

 there yet remain seventeen millions of departed sires, and to re- 

 embody this spectral host requires the absorption of the entire 

 civil population and the occupants of both hostile camps. 



Hence we see that the pretension which any person may put 

 forward to Norman, or even to Saxon or British ancestry, may, 

 with some modifications, be readily admitted ; assuming the 

 validity of succession on the distaff side ; while, on the other 

 hand, continuous male descent from so remote a period may in 

 some instances be assumed, but only in very exceptional cases 

 can be substantiated. 



It was during this first and most perfect period of the Baronial 

 system, that the Dorset families, De Aquila, Aumarle, Baieux, 

 Bardolf, Mandeville, and some others made their first appear- 

 ance in England. 



All schemes, of whatever nature, that aim at centralisation 

 require of necessity a strong central force, and so, as long as the 

 autocracy of the Norman kings was undisputed, the Baronial 

 system held co-ordinate sway ; but it soon became apparent in 

 this, as it has in other systems, that, when the human element is 

 overlooked in the theory, it is apt to become uncomfortably 

 prominent in the practice, and thus, under a weak and divided 

 administration, the essential chain of subordination became a 

 tangle of insubordination between those who claimed authority 

 and those who owed obedience. 



Thus it happened that, during the troublous period of the first 

 Plantagenet Kings, the frequent rebellions, and unsettled state of 

 affairs, so reduced the power of the great tenants of the Crown, 

 that many were brought to poverty ; others alienated large portions 

 of their possessions, while others, suffering from the misfortune of 

 reputed wealth, were so amerced with fines, for real or pretended 

 offences, with aids, reliefs, and other feudal exactions, that it is 

 not surprising that the great baronial tenures began to be broken 

 up. Henceforward licences for alienation of Crown tenures 



