THE DOMESDAY SURVEY 



not only because his name is preserved in that of an Essex parish, but 

 also on account of the interesting position held by himself and his de- 

 scendants as hereditary masters of the mint. His only manor was that 

 of Gestingthorpe, which had been held by Earl j^Elfgar, with whose 

 former estates he was associated as farming them for the Crown. In 

 Essex he so farmed them at Shalford and Finchingfield, and in Suffolk 

 he was associated with Godric the ' dapifer ' in farming them at Sudbury 

 and Cornard. These estates, as an entry under Colchester reminds us, 

 had been held by ./Elfgar's widow, jElfgifu, and afterwards by William's 

 queen. It is an interesting fact that the lord of Gestingthorpe was 

 entrusted by William Rufus with the monument of gold and silver, 

 encrusted with gems, erected over the Conqueror's tomb at Caen. 1 



In studying the holders of land before and after the Conquest we 

 have to keep our eyes on more counties than one. We can often thus 

 trace the identity of those Englishmen .to whose estates the newcomers 

 had succeeded, although at first sight their names may suggest nothing. 

 One of the most interesting cases of such succession in Essex is that of 

 Walter the Deacon. Wix, where his son and namesake founded a 

 priory for nuns, had been given him by Queen Edith since the coming 

 of King William, and she had also been his predecessor at (Little) 

 Bromley and (Little) Chesterford ; but his predecessor at ' Colne ' was 

 named Leofwine, and his two manors in Purleigh had been held by 

 Leofwine and Leofwine ' Cilt.' Now his ' Colne ' manor is ignored by 

 Morant, but on working through the manors in the Colnes we learn 

 from his own account that the manor of Overhall in Colne Engaine ' is 

 ancient and an entire lordship, not holding of any of the adjoining 

 manors of Colne-Engaine, Wakes, or Earls ; but of the manor of 

 Witnesham ... in Suffolk' (ii. 219). Following up the clue thus 

 obtained we find Witnesham in Domesday held by Walter the Deacon, 

 who had there succeeded ' Leofwine, a free man.' We thus at once 

 locate Walter's manor in the Colnes, and identify its English holder 

 with the lord of Witnesham, Suffolk. But we do more than this. In 

 Suffolk as in Essex we find that Walter has succeeded a Leofwine in 

 some of his manors and Queen Edith in others (fos. 426-7). But while 

 at Bacton his predecessor is styled ' Leofwine a free man of Harold,' at 

 another he is ' Leofwine of Bacton (de Bagatona), a thegn of King 

 Edward,' so these were certainly the same man. We can see him also 

 in ' Leofwine, a free man,' holder, as above, of Witnesham, and even, I 

 think, in ' Leofwine cilt a free man' (fo. 376^), who occurs at Ulve- 

 stone in Debenham. Therefore, to return to Essex, we can doubtless 

 see him also in the ' Leofwine ' and ' Leofwine cilt ' whom Walter the 

 Deacon had succeeded in two manors at Purleigh. This conclusion is 

 of more than personal or local interest ; for it illustrates the looseness of 

 the Domesday scribe, especially in dealing with the names of English- 



1 ' auri et argenti gemmarumque copiam Othoni aurifabro erogavit, et super patris sui mausoleum 

 fieri mirifkum memoriale przcepit. Ille vero, regiis jussis parens, insigne opus condidit, quod ex auro et 

 argento et gemmis usque hodie competenter splendescit ' (Ordericui Vitahs). 



351 



