A HISTORY OF DORSET 



the refusal of his miUtary tenants to accompany him on the French expedi- 

 tion.' This he repeated in 1213, again landing at Studland.' 



After the Interdict (1208) and the excommunication of the king (1209), 

 Peter of Pontefract or Wakefield, a seer, prophesied that John would reign 

 fourteen years and no more. John imprisoned him in Corfe Castle till the 

 time for fulfilment of the prophecy should have expired.^ The surrender to 

 the papacy took place in 121 3 (23 May), the fourteen years were up, count- 

 ing from Ascension Day, 1 199 (from which John's regnal years were dated), 

 on 27 May. The prophecy therefore came true, in a sense, and the king had 

 the prophet executed in Corfe Castle.* 



On the landing of the Dauphin in 12 16, John at first entrenched himself 

 in the castle, but Louis, instead of advancing upon him, stayed to harry 

 Hampshire. Nevertheless John, who had been at Corfe and Wareham till 

 17 July ^ (the Dauphin landed 20 May), withdrew to Bristol. 



One of the barons who had helped to call in Louis was William 

 Longespee, the natural son of Henry II. He had married Ela, daughter and 

 heiress of William earl of Salisbury [ob. 1196), grandson of Edward of 

 Salisbury, and successor to his Domesday fief. This had included the manors 

 of Canford and Kingston, and the manor of Great Kingston had been added 

 to the Salisbury inheritance by the marriage of the son of Edward of 

 Salisbury with the daughter and coheiress of Ernulf of Hesding, successor 

 to many of the lands of Ulward the White. Another of the rebellious 

 barons was William of Montacute, sheriff of Dorset and Somerset from 

 1206 to 1208, grandson of Drogo of Montacute, who at the date of 

 Domesday had been in Dorset a tenant of the count of Mortain." 



On the death of John the castle of Corfe was handed over to the regent, 

 William Marshall (whose nephew John had already held Dorchester Castle^), 

 by Peter de Mauley, one of John's Poitevin favourites,' and formerly sheriff 

 of Dorset and Somerset, and constable of Corfe. In 1221 he was again 

 sheriff", and in 1222 was made governor of Sherborne Castle, presaging the 

 downfall of Hubert de Burgh, who had himself up to 1206 held the manors 

 of Corfe Mullen and Milborne, with lands in Winfrith.' Queen Eleanor 

 of Provence, wife of Henry III, held lands at Warmwell, in the hundred of 

 Winfrith.^" The connexion with Dorset of another foreigner, the great Earl 

 Simon, arose through his mother. The elder Earl Simon, ' the scourge of 

 the Albigenses,' had married Amicia, sister and heiress of Robert de 

 Beaumont earl of Leicester, sometimes also called ' Fitz Pernell ' from his 

 mother Petronilla, daughter of Hugh of Grantmesnil. Earl Robert had 

 mortgaged at one time the manor of Blandford Forum to Aaron, a Jew of 

 Lincoln," but became repossessed of it on the seizure of the latter's 

 property. The inheritance of the earls of Leicester came originally from 

 Roger de Beaumont, who as a very old man was holding at the time of the 



' Ralph of Coggeshall, Chron. (Rolls Ser. 66), 152-4 ; Rog. Wend. Chrm. (Rolls Ser. 84), iii. 

 ' Walt. Covent. Chron. (Rolls Ser. 58), ii, 212 ; R. Cogg. op. cit. 167 ; Rog. Wend. op. cit. iii, 261, 262. 

 ' Walt. Covent. op. cit. ii, 209 ; Rog. Wend. op. cit. 240. 



'Walt. Covent. op. cit. 212 ; Rog. Wend. op. cit. 255 ; Ann. Men. 278; Chron. Th. Wyka (^oVi» 

 Ser. 36), iv, 58. ' llin. ' Dom. Bk. i, 79. 



' Dugdale, Baronage, i, 599. ' Ibid, i, 733-4 ; Ralph of Coggeshall, op. cit. 66, 190. 



' Liber Niger, i, 102 ; Ejton, op. cit. 120. 



'" HunJ. R. (Rec. Com.), 103. Plac. de Quo Warranto (Rec. Com.), 181. 



" Pipe R. 5 Ric. I, m. 8. 



136 



