THE DOMESDAY SURVEY 



and the Honour of Haughley, or of the constableship, of which the lord 

 was Hugh de Montfort at the time of the Domesday. The head of 

 each was its lord's castle of which, in both cases, the moated mound 

 remains but as that of Haughley is in Suffolk it concerns us less 

 immediately here. 



Suain * * of Essex ' was a personage of quite exceptional interest 

 among the local barons. I am strongly of opinion that the use by him- 

 self, his son, and his grandson of the name of the county as a surname 

 arose from the tenure of its shrievalty by him and by his father before 

 him.* Mr. Freeman, who gave his attention to both of them, 3 had 

 observed that Suain's father, Robert, had been sheriff of Essex under 

 Edward as well as under William, and that Domesday alludes to the tenure 

 of the office by him and by his son, and to acts of theirs while holding 

 it. Robert himself is always spoken of as ' the son of Wimarc,' and we 

 only learn, Mr. Freeman wrote, from William of Poitiers that Wimarc 

 was a woman. The Essex Domesday however always mentions her as 

 such (' Robertus filius Wimarc^ '). Her name, I may add, was Breton. 

 Robert is found, under Edward, holding the post of staller, and he 

 further received from that king, to hold ' sicut canonicus,' a prebend at 

 St. Mary's, Shrewsbury, which he made over to his son-in-law.* When, 

 in 1052, on Godwine's triumphant return, Norman favourites of Edward 

 had fled for their lives, some, we read, escaped ' north to Rodbertes 

 castele.' Mr. Freeman held that ' Robert's castle must be some castle 

 belonging to Robert the son of Wymarc, as distinctly the most notable 

 man of his name in the country after Robert the Archbishop,' but he 

 sought in vain to identify it. It appears. to me that, with much proba- 

 bility, we might assign it to Clavering, where the earthworks of a castle 

 of the time are still to be seen, and which was the greatest manor held 

 by him in Essex. Domesday shows us his son in possession of the 

 Hundred itself 8 that is, of the Hundred court and there can be little 

 doubt that Robert had held it before him. 



It was observed by Mr. Freeman that Robert's fief was subjected 

 to much change before the Domesday Survey. He appears to have 

 obtained fresh manors from the Conqueror, if not from Harold ; but, on 

 the other hand, lands which he had held, especially in counties other 

 than Essex and Suffolk, are not found in his son's hands in 1086. I 

 cannot find however that in Essex itself any of his land failed to pass, 

 as alleged by Mr. Freeman, to Suain. A great change in the balance 

 of the fief was effected by the large additions it received in the south- 

 east of the county after the death of Edward. To this I attribute Suain's 

 choice of Rayleigh as the site of his castle. The Domesday entry 



1 Mr. Freeman rendered his name as ' Swegen,' but the Domesday forms, Suain, Suanus, Suenus, 

 represent it phonetically better. 



* See Feudal England, p. 1 68, for the adoption by sheriffs of the name of their county town as a 

 surname. In the case of Essex there was then no such county town, and the sheriff would therefore adopt 

 the name of the county itself. 



8 See Appendix on ' Robert and Swegen of Essex* in Norman Conquest (1871), iv. 736-8. 



* Domesday, i. 252^. Compare Eyton's Shropshire, v. 207-9, where the hazardous suggestion is 

 made that Robert Fitz Wimarc was identical with Robert the Deacon. 6 See p. 489 below. 



i 345 44 



