THE DOMESDAY SURVEY 



Our record however states definitely that in King Edward's time ' the 

 third penny of the pleas of the shire ' was held with Earl Eadwine's manor 

 of 'Cotes' 1 (near Warwick). And this Warwickshire evidence is con- 

 firmed by that for Dorset, where the earldom had been held by Harold, to 

 whose manor of ' Piretone ' (Puddletown) there was similarly annexed the 

 third penny of the pleas of the shire. 1 These two entries are sufficient to 

 establish the fact that the institution of the earl's ' third penny ' of the 

 shire was older than the Norman Conquest. 



The rights of Earl Eadwine in the borough of Warwick, which had 

 similarly passed to William, will be dealt with under Warwick itself, but 

 one may here note that of his manors the Conqueror kept in his hands 

 Brailes, Coton and Sutton (Coldfield) , while scattering ' Ulverlei,' Budbrooke, 

 Erdington, Aston, Myton and Bedworth among half a dozen tenants-in- 

 chief. Considerable as had been the earl's estates those of his house had 

 been larger still ; manors at Ipsley and Aston Cantlow had been held by 

 his father ./Elfgar, while his grandfather Leofric had denuded himself of 

 sundry rich lordships in favour of his great foundation at Coventry. 

 Domesday again records as the land of the Countess Godiva (Leofric's 

 widow) manors at Alspath, Atherstone, Coventry itself and other places. 

 The curious statement found under Oxfordshire that ' from the land of 

 Earl Eadwine in Oxfordshire and Warwickshire the king has >C IO 5>' 3 

 appears to be irreconcilable with the detailed valuations of his manors in 

 those two counties. 



To the revenue derived from the lands entered under Terra Re<ris 



o 



we must add, at the time of the Survey, the ' farm ' of the manors which 

 Earl Aubrey and Countess 'Godiva' had held, and which had now escheated 

 to the Crown. 4 The first manor, also, entered under Hugh de Grentmesnil 

 is described as held by him ' de rege in custodia,' just as the manors of 

 Earl Aubrey were held by Geoffrey ' de Wirce.' It is well worthy of 

 notice that Domesday thus pointedly distinguishes escheated fiefs from 

 those forfeited manors of the local earl which had passed into the perma- 

 nent possession of the Crown. For it may have been even then, as it was 

 later, recognized that escheats should not be retained, but be granted 

 out anew. 



Of ecclesiastical tenants-in-chief two bishops held lands within the 

 borders of the county in their official capacity. These were a Norman 

 prelate, Peter, Bishop of Chester, who had removed his episcopal seat 

 thither from Lichfield, and who held, in right of the latter church, 

 Bishop's Tachbrook in this county, and Wulfstan, the native Bishop of 

 Worcester, the great possessions of whose see extended from Worcester- 

 shire into Warwickshire. 6 His rival also, the abbot of Evesham, held 



1 Hoc terra cum burgo de Warwic et tercio denario placitorum sirae reddebat T.R.E. xvii. libras." 

 ' Huic etiam manerio Piretone adjacet tercius denarius de tola scira Dorsete. Redd' cum 

 omnibus appendiciis Ixxiii libras' (fo. 75). 



' De terra Edwini comitis in Oxenef et in Warwicscire habet rex c lib. et c solid' ' (fo. 154). 



See p. 276 below. 



Bishop Wulfstan's manor of Alveston is dealt with on p. 287 below. 



i 273 35 



