PART II.-CHAPTER XVII. 



OF FATALITIES OF FAMILIES AND PLACES. 



[NEARLY the whole of this chapter, with some additions, is included under the head of " Local 

 Fatality " in Aubrey's Miscellanies. 12mo. 1696. J. B.] 



Omnium rerum est vioissitudo. Families, and also places, have their fatalities, 



" Fors sua cuiq' loco est." OVID, FAST. lib. iv. 



This verse putts me in mind of severall places in this countie that are or have been fortunate to their 

 owners, or e contra. 



The Gawens of Norrington, in the parish of Alvideston, continued in this place four hundred fifty 

 and odd yeares. They had also an estate in Broad Chalke, which was, perhaps, of as great 

 antiquity. On the south downe of the farme of Broad Chalke is a little barrow called Gawen's- 

 barrow, which must bee before ecclesiastical lawes were established. [Aubrey quotes a few lines 

 from the " Squire's Tale " in Chaucer, where Gawain, nephew to King Arthur, is alluded to. J. B.] 



The Scropes of Castle-Comb have been there ever since the time of King Richard the Second. 

 The Lord Chancellor Scrope gave this mannour to lu's tliird son ; they have continued there ever 

 since, and enjoy the old land (about 800 1U per annum), and the estate is neither augmented nor 

 diminished all this time, neither doth the family spred. 



The Powers of Stanton St. Quintin had that farme in lease about tliree hundred yeares. It did 

 belong to the abbey of Cyrencester. 



The Lytes had Easton Piers in lease and in inheritance 249 yeares; sc. from Henry 6th. 

 About 1572 Mr. Th. Lyte, my mother's grandfather, purchased the inheritance of the greatest part 

 of this place, a part whereof descended to me by my mother Debora, the daughter and heire of 

 Mr. Isaac Lyte. I sold it in 1669 to Francis Hill, who sold it to Mr. Sherwin, who hath left 

 it to a daughter and heir. Thos. Lyte's father had 800 1 '. per annum in leases : viz. all Easton. 

 except Cromwell's farm (20 U ), and the farmes of Dedmerton and Sopworth. 



The Longs are now the most nourishing and numerous family in this county, and next to them the 

 Ashes ; but the latter are strangers, and came in but about 1642, or since. 



Contrarywise there are severall places unlucky to the possessors. Easton Piers hath had six 

 owners since the reigne of Henry 7th, where I myself had a share to act my part ; and one part 

 of it called Lyte's Kitchin hath been sold four times over since 1630. 



'Tis certain that there are some houses lucky and some that are unlucky; e. g. a handsome 

 brick house on the south side of Clarkenwell churchyard hath been so unlucky for at least these 

 forty yeares that it is seldom tenanted ; nobody at last would adventure to take it. Also a hand- 

 some house in Holbourne that looked into the fields, the tenants of it did not prosper ; about six, 

 one after another. 



