A HISTORY OF SUFFOLK 



and Robert Malet's mother' have a section to themselves at the end of the 

 Suffolk. Survey."- Robert Malet's fief wras of great extent, though some of 

 his father's possessions had passed into other hands, and he was not the 

 sole successor of Edric of Laxfield."* He had estates in seventeen and a half 

 hundreds, and held the boroughs of Eye and Dunwich,"* with the lands of 

 many an English thegn and freeman. Among the under-tenants to whom 

 Robert had granted out these estates were Walter Fitz Aubrey, himself a 

 tenant-in-chief of the Crown, Robert de Glanville, William Gulafra, and 

 Walter of Caen.=« 



A Norman under-tenant might, like Robert de Glanville, hold lands in 

 various parts of the county, as the representative of many free English land- 

 holders,^'* or the lands of a wealthy Englishman might be divided up among 

 several Normans, as with the estates of Godwin Alfer's son, a tenant of the 

 king in Babergh Hundred and of the queen in Carlford Hundred, who 

 was succeeded by Hubert, Walter Fitz Aubrey, and Humphrey son of Robert.-" 

 Sometimes the change of lords made for simplification, as at Wyverstone, 

 where Hubert took the place of a freeman commended to Edric of Lax- 

 field, with a wife commended to the Abbot of St. Edmunds, and of a group 

 of three freemen and their mother, also commended to two overlords.'" 

 But in the majority of cases a fresh link was inserted in the feudal chain, 

 and the English freeman, if he remained on his holding at all, remained as 

 the tenant of a Norman under-tenant. Where Godwin ' Alsies sone,' Queen 

 Edith's thegn, had held, presumably of the Crown, before the Conquest, 

 Hubert now held of Robert Malet, who held of the king, and where Cus, 

 a freeman commended to Edric of Laxfield, held 90 acres as a manor, Walter 

 held of Malet and two freemen with 14 acres had been added to the estate."' 

 The succession to Edric of Laxfield, who had been outlawed by the Confessor 

 and then pardoned and restored to his lands, led to disputes which are inter- 

 esting from the light which they throw on the position of English freemen 

 before the Conquest and on post-Conquest judicial procedure,^"" and before 

 leaving Robert Malet it may be noted that among his under-tenants was 

 Walter son of ' Grip,' a name which recurs frequently in Domesday 

 Book.'" 



The fief of Roger Bigot, the founder of the second house of East 

 Anglian earls, is surveyed immediately after the lands of Robert Malet."" 

 Its distinctive characteristic in Suffolk, as in Norfolk, is the large number of 

 freemen who held under the earl. They have a special section of the Survey 

 to themselves,'*" and it is possible that, as many of them had previously been 

 under William and Robert Malet, or commended to the sheriffs Toll and 



»• Dom. Bk. 450. 



*" Ibid. 349*, 432*, 433, 435, 437i, 438, 439, 440*, 441, ^li, 442*, 443, 443^, 444. 



"* Below, p. 410, 411. 



"'Dom. Bk. 304, 3043, 305, 306, 3063, 310, 311, 312*, 313, 313*, 314, 317, 318, 319, 319*, 320, 

 324*, 325*, 327, 329*. William de Arcis, the Crown tenant-in-chief, was also a tenant of R. Malet. For 

 Walter of Caen and his connexion with the Stuarts and the Chesneys, cf. F.C.H. Nor/, ii, 21, n. II. 



** Dom. Bk. 304, 304*, 308*, 309, 315*, 317*, 319, 327, 329. 



"'Ibid. 304, 314*. "* Ibid. 309. 



*" Ibid. 306, 3073, 308. 



*" Ibid. 3io3, 313, 332, 342* ; cf. 179*. Freeman, Norm. Coiij. v (ist ed.), 799. 



"' Dom. Bk. 329, 329* ; i, 78, 83* ; cf. ' Wilgrip,' i, 249*, 254, 258* ; ii, 404*, and ' Guillegrip ' one 

 of Henry I's ' Novi Homines ' ; Ord. Vit. Ecd. Hist, xi, chap. 2. 



*" Dom. Bk. 3303 ; KC.H. Nor,, ii, 19. «» Dom. Bk. 333*, 344. 



