TITCHFIELD HUNDRED 



TITCHFIELD 



across the nave, while the central tower was taken 

 down to the roof level and the south transept 

 destroyed, for the sake of symmetry. The remaining 

 parts of the church lost their vaults and were divided 

 into two stories, the porter's lodge being on the 

 ground floor to the west of the gateway, its door, 

 window, and fireplace being still to be seen. The 

 thirteenth-century windows were blocked up and 

 square-headed mullioned windows cut through the 

 wall, while large brick arched fireplaces were set in 

 the west wall of the nave, the south wall near the 

 crossing, the gatehouse walls, and elsewhere, some of 

 the cut brick chimney shafts still remaining. Wriothes- 

 ley's work, where not made of the old material 

 reused, is of Caen stone, and of excellent workman- 

 ship, without a trace of Renaissance feeling. His 

 kitchen occupied the site of the monastic kitchen, and 

 parts of walls of his date stand here, with two win- 

 dows on the west, and part of a lamp niche in the 

 north-west angle of the cloister. Till the latter part 

 of the eighteenth century the whole house stood with 

 little alteration, but it was then dismantled, part of 

 its materials going to Cams Hall near Fareham, and 

 has since then gradually decayed under the influences 

 of weather, ivy, and general neglect. A still inhabited 

 cottage on the north, adjoining the north-west angle 

 of the monastic dorter, is probably in part of 



a copy published in the Hants Field Club Proceed- 

 ing!, by permission of the Rev. G. W. Minns. A 

 projecting chimney breast on the north of the frater 

 is doubtless an addition of Wriothesley's time, and a 

 rectangular block of masonry still existing on the 

 south side of the frater seems to be the substructure 

 of the bay window of the hall. A doorway with the 

 arms of Southampton in the head, masking the western 

 entrance to the inner parlour, may also have had a 

 projecting window over it, lighting a stair which 

 Wriothesley seems to have put here to lead to the 

 first-floor rooms in the north transept and dorter 

 range. The whole of Wriothesley's alterations were 

 probably completed by 1542, in which year he 

 received pardon for having fortified his manor house 

 of Titchfield without licence, and in the same year, 

 or a little earlier, Leland visited the house, and re- 

 marked on the fine conduit-house or fountain in the 

 middle of the cloister, of which no trace now remains. 

 Old place-names are : Byttenfeld, 4 Newe Court, 

 Parva Mirabyll, Warishassefield, 43 and Chilling. 6 The 

 parish was inclosed in 1859. The subsoil is gravel 

 and clay and the surface loam. 



In Domesday Book, TITCHFIELD is 



MANORS described as a berewick belonging to 



Meonstoke, and held by the king as it 



had been held by Edward the Confessor. 5 * It is possi- 



NORTH ASPECT OF TITCHFIELD HOUSE 



From a drawing by Grose, 1782, in tht possession of J. R. Fielder, Esq. 



Wriothesley's time, and has a good four-centred stone 

 fireplace in one of the ground-story rooms. A large 

 walled garden incloses the church and monastic 

 buildings, extending beyond them to east and west, 

 and at some distance further to the west are the 

 remains of a sixteenth-century building of Wriothes- 

 ley's date, whose original use cannot be determined. 

 On the north-west are the banks of large fish-ponds, 

 and on them till lately stood a very large oak tree, 

 now fallen. In a letter to Wriothesley reference is 

 made to these ponds. The writer reports that he 

 has viewed the fish-ponds, four of them being a mile 

 in length and that the bailiff will give Wriothesley 

 500 carp to stock them, so that in three or four years' 

 time he may sell 20 or 30 worth of fish every 

 year.* 1 A general view by Grose of the buildings 

 from the north-west, showing the north side of 

 the frater and the west side of the dorter range, is 

 preserved in Titchfield, and is here reproduced from 



ble that part of the manor was in the hundred of 

 Meonstoke and part in that of Titchfield, as it is cer- 

 tain that the hundred of Titchfield was in existence at 

 the time of the Domesday Survey.' An account of 

 the descent of the manor given by the abbot of Titch- 

 field, in a dispute in the reign of Henry III, shows 

 that William I held it by conquest, that it was given 

 by his son William Rufus to Payn, ancestor of John 

 de Gisors/ and that the latter forfeited it by his ad- 

 herence to the king of France. 8 King John then 

 granted from it ^15 of rent to his supporter Robert 

 de Vipont, and 5 worth to Oliver de Beauchamp, 8 * 

 but Robert died in 1227. Henry III in 1228 

 granted the manor to Hubert de Burgh, earl of Kent 

 and justiciar, ' to hold as freely as John de Gisors held 

 it until the king shall restore it to the heirs of John of 

 his free will or by a peace.' * However, during the 

 next year, Hubert de Burgh gave back Titchfield to 

 Henry in exchange for the manors of Eylesham 



L. and P. Hen. VIII, xiii (i), 19. 

 4 Chan. Inq. p.m. (Ser. 2), No 7. 

 Pat. 29 Hen. VIII, pt. i, m. 4. 

 * W. & L. Inq. p.m. 4 Edw. VI (Ser. 

 2), No. 103. 



> V.C.H. Hants, i, 456*. 

 Add. MS. 33284, fol. I. 

 7 John dc Gisors was holding before 

 1195, in which year the sheriff accounted 



22 3 



for /1 4 from Titchfield 'which had be- 

 longed to John de Gisory.' 



* Add. MS. 33284, fol. 4. 



&> Testa de Nevill (Rec. Com.), 237. 



Cal, of Chart. R. i, 71. 



