A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



wood at Barmer's Hill.' At the close of last century 

 295 acres were woodland. - 



The manor-house, or hall, was pulled down im- 

 mediately after the sale of the estate in 1801, but a 

 drawing of the east front made in 1721^ shows a facade 

 of considerable extent, two stories high, with a return 

 south wing of three stories forming two sides of a court, 

 which appears to have been inclosed on the north by 

 a hedge and trees, and open to the east.* There was 

 already a house in existence when Christopher Yelver- 

 ton purchased the estate, but the drawing of 1721 

 shows a rather widespreading manor-house of the 

 Jacobean period with central porch, subsidiary side 

 porches, stone gables and dormers, and muUioned win- 

 dows, some of which had been replaced by sashes. The 

 general disposition was symmetrical, though the in- 

 dividual features were irregular.' Two doorways with 

 pointed arches may have belonged to an older house, 

 but it would appear that the house was rebuilt about 

 1600. The Rev. W. Cole, who accompanied Horace 

 Walpole when he visited Easton Mauditin 1763, men- 

 tions a 'fine large drawing-room', and notes 'two or 

 three old coats of alliances of the Yelverton family in 

 the staircase windows', as well as a shield of the family 

 arms in the chapel, but the only relics of the house 

 knowTi to have been preserved are two 18th-century 

 carved chimney-pieces and two sets of stone gate 

 piers.* At the time of its demolition the house con- 

 tained seventy rooms.' 



' The Bishop's room ' was the room occupied by the 

 venerable Bishop Morton, who had been successively 

 Bishop of Chester, Lichfield, and Durham. After the 

 abolition of episcopacy in 1646 he fell into extreme 

 poverty and lived for a time with Sir Christopher Yel- 

 verton at Easton Maudit as tutor of the younger mem- 

 bers of the family until his death there in 1659 at the 

 age of 95,* when a floor-slab was placed to his memory 

 in the church. 



The vicarage, considerably remodelled since his day, 

 was the home for twenty-nine years of Dr. Thomas 

 Percy' (1729— 181 1), who was presented to the living 

 in 1753 by the college of Christ Church, Oxford. It 

 was here that his most important work, including the 

 publication of the Relijues of Ancient Poetry, was ac- 

 complished. The church registers contain specimens of 

 his beautifully clear handwriting.'" Among his visitors 

 were Shenstone and Garrick, Goldsmith, and the great 

 Doctor and his friend Miss Williams. Of Dr. Johnson's 

 visit in 1764 Mrs. Percy told Cradock" that 'her hus- 

 band looked out all sorts of books to be ready for his 

 amusement after breakfast, and that Johnson was soatten- 

 tive and polite to her that when her husband mentioned 

 the literature prepared in the study he said: "No, Sir, I 

 shall first wait upon Mrs. Percy to feed the ducks." ' 



Dr. Percy was succeeded in the living by his friend 

 and correspondent, the philologist Robert Nares, pre- 

 sented in 1782 to this living, which he held until 1805. 

 Robert Nares, who was Keeper of Manuscripts at the 



British Museum, assisted in 1790 in completing 

 Bridges's History of Northamptonshire}''- 



The parish lies at a level of about 200 to 300 ft. 

 Its soil is various, but chiefly clayey; its subsoil clay. 

 The crops grown are the ordinary cereals. 



Winemar [the Fleming, otherwise Wine- 

 MANOR mar de Hamslape], who was returned in the 

 Survey as holding of the Countess Judith 

 I virgate of land in Bozeat, was holding in chief at the 

 same time 2 hides and 3 virgates in a place unnamed 

 in the hundred of Higham.'^ This was presumably 

 EASTON, since his successor Michael de Hamslape 

 was entered in the Northampton Survey as holding 

 3 J hides and i great virgate in Easton and Strixton.''' 

 The 2 hides and 3 virgates recorded in 1086 had been 

 held before the Conquest by six freemen, one of whom 

 was called Osgot, and his part of the land had been 

 claimed by the Countess Judith. The lands held in 

 Easton by Michael de Hamslape evidently passed to 

 William Mauduit, the King's Chamberlain, by his 

 marriage with Maud daughter of Michael, as in 1242 

 land in Easton was held in chief of the king by William 

 Mauduit,'5 of whom William de Nowers was holding 

 3 parts of a fee in Easton, while Robert Wolf, or 

 'Lupus', was holding of him half a fee in Esse [Ashby] 

 and Easton. Another account 

 gives a fee in Easton to William 

 de Nowers, and half a fee in 

 Ashby to Robert Wolf* This fee 

 was held of the Mauduits until 

 at the death of William Mauduit, 

 s.p., in 1267, it passed with 

 the earldom to William de 

 Beauchamp, the younger, son of 

 William Mauduit's sister Isabel, 

 deceased, the wife of William de 

 Beauchamp, the elder." It was 

 held by the Beauchamps, Earls of Warwick, until early 

 in the 15th century, as of their manor of Hanslope. 



John Mauduit in 1206-7 granted land in Easton to 

 Gilbert son of Richard de Easton and Christiane his 

 mother;'* and it was probably the same John Mauduit 

 who, as lord of Easton next Bozeat, made a grant to 

 the canons of St. James near Northampton of the wood 

 called Stonpvay in Bozeat and of lands in Easton." A 

 lawsuit in 1306 about the advowson^" (held with the 

 manor) gives a very complete record of the early descent 

 of this manor of Easton, of which John Mauduit died 

 seised after having made the presentation in the reign 

 of King John. John Mauduit left three daughters as 

 his heirs, named Agnes, Flandrina, and Amice. The 

 manor and advowson of Easton were assigned to Agnes 

 and Flandrina as their purparty, and another tenement 

 to Amice. Agnes Mauduit had four daughters: Isabel, 

 Sibyl, Eleanor, and Loretta; of these Isabel married 

 William de Nowers.^' After the death of William de 

 Nowers, Isabel granted to William de Fauconberg 10 

 acres of wood and her share of the advowson.^- This 



Mauduit. Gules three 

 piles 'wa'vy or. 



' Bridges, Hist, of Northanls, ii, 163, 



^ Whellan, Hist, of Northants. 



3 B.M. Add. MS. 5726, reproduced in 

 Assoc. Arch. Sac. Reports^ xxxvi, 95 : the 

 drawing is 'taken in the coach yard'. 



* Pennant describes it, c. 1 780, as 'a long 

 but low old house with a quadrangle in the 

 middle' ; yourney from Chester to London 

 (1782 ed.), 316. 



s J. A. Gotch, Assoc. Arch. Soc. Reports, 

 xxxvi, 95. 



' The two carved stone chimney-pieces 



are at Castle .\shby, as are both sets of gate 

 piers ; ibid. 78—98, where all are figured. 



' Sale Catalogue; ibid. lOO. The 

 numerous portraits in the house about 1780 

 are described by Pennant, op. cit. 317-19. 



8 Diet. Nat. Biog. « Ibid. 



'" N. &■ Q. (Scr. 3), i, 483. " Ibid. 



■2 Diet. Nat. Biog. 



" V.C.H. Norihanis. i, 34.2, and n. 



■* Ibid. 376*. 



'5 Bk. of Fees, 934. 



■» Ibid. 945. 



^7 Cal. Inq. p.m. i, no. 679. 



'8 Feet of F. 8 John, file 12, no. 209. 



" Harl. Chart. 53 C. 39. 



2° De Banco R. Hil. 34 Edw. I, m. 13. 



^^ It was probably her son John who, in 

 1292, quitclaimed to Ralf, Abbot of St. 

 James without Northampton, a rent of zs. 

 or one sparrow-hawk for the wood in 

 Stoneway by a deed to which Robert Wolf 

 of Easton was a witness: Harl. Chart. 

 54 D. 13. 



" De Banco R. Hil. 34 Edw. I, m. 13. 



12 



