NEWMARKET 117 



may search the ancient records almost in vain. 

 Apparently the few race meetings organised were, 

 to say the best we can of them, not of great im- 

 portance, not excepting those in which the king 

 and his nobles were directly interested. To afford 

 opportunities for wagering was, so far as one can 

 gather, their principal raison detre, and such rules 

 of racing as did exist most likely were almost 

 wholly disregarded. 



In this respect the king would seem not to 

 have been much more particular than his sub- 

 jects, though, as already said, information obtain- 

 able upon the subject is of the scantiest, and is 

 at best unreliable. 



In the history of Henry III.'s reign there 

 occurs what we may take to be the first direct 

 reference to "a village named Newmarket," in 

 Cambridgeshire. As I have already pointed 

 out, the tribe that dwelt on Newmarket Heath in 

 very early times and was known as the Iceni 

 apparently was interested in horses and to some 

 extent bred horses, so it is not astonishing to 

 learn that in the thirteenth century the people 

 then living in Newmarket and the neighbourhood 

 still carried on the traditions of the Iceni, even to 

 boasting openly that steeds bred upon the Heath 

 could not be rivalled for speed " the world over." 



