A HISTORY OF DERBYSHIRE 



Matthew de Hathersage, a baron, who had considerably increased his power in the 

 county by marrying the heiress of Musard, was presented for having a buckstall in his great 

 wood at Hathersage, which was distant barely two bowshots from the king's forest. The 

 baron contended that his ancestors had always had a buckstall in their wood, and that formerly 

 it was still nearer the bounds of the Peak forest. The upshot of the matter was that the 

 decision was against Matthew, who had to pay a fine of 20 marks. 1 



The fines imposed for venison trepasses varied at this eyre from ,100 to 131. 4<f. and 

 seem to have been proportioned in accordance with the position of the offender as well as 

 the comparative gravity of the offence. The long intervals between the eyres and the 

 frequent changes of the forest custodian, together with the wildness of the country, seem to 

 have led to the Peak forest being hunted with a certain amount of impunity by not a few 

 of the nobility and gentry of Derbyshire and of the adjacent parts of Yorkshire and Cheshire. 

 The game at this period was entirely red deer, save for the single instance of a presentment 

 against Robert de Wurth for killing a roebuck, for which offence a huge fine of 100 was 

 imposed. The amount of this fine had nothing to do with the nature of the game, but was 

 caused by the non-appearance of the accused, accompanied probably by some aggravating 

 circumstances not recorded on the brief entry on the plea rolls. 



When the justices at the 1251 pleas came to the consideration of vert offences and 

 encroachments various particulars were missing. Matthew de Langesdon and Adam de Stanton, 

 hereditary verderers, were each fined 2os. for not producing their fathers' rolls. There seems 

 to have been much carelessness among the various officials in the keeping of their respective 

 yearly lists of offences. Peter del Hurst, regarder of one section of the Peak forest, was fined 

 ioj. for the non-presentment of assarts and purprestures in his rolls. A considerable number 

 of agisters were at the same time declared in mercy for not producing their agistment rolls 

 according to the custom and assize of the forest. There is, however, a fairly long list of vert 

 offences (about 60) that had accrued within the crown demesnes since 1218, the damage 

 done being in most cases valued at 6d. The majority of the offenders the offences were 

 probably trifling had simply to find pledges for their future observance of the forest assize. 

 Heirs were held responsible for their fathers' offences in two or three cases. Many of these 

 vert trespassers were of good position. The worst case at this eyre was that of Roger 

 Foljambe, who was fined the large sum of twenty marks for many transgressions : his 

 pledges were John Foljambe and Walter Coterell. 



The question of assarts was always an important one at forest pleas, particularly as licences 

 and offences relative thereto yielded a considerable revenue. Assart rolls were presented to the 

 justices at this eyre from the days when William, Earl Ferrers, was bailiff", at the beginning of 

 the reign, down to the current year. The word ' assart ' signifies the reduction of waste or 

 woodland to a condition of cultivation. The punishment for a trespass of this kind was a 

 fine at the next eyre, and a further sum per acre for the crops sown on it. This latter pay- 

 ment was usually is. per acre for every crop of winter corn and 6d. an acre for spring corn. 

 The tenant of an assart was as a rule allowed to retain it, but he had to account for the crops 

 at the next eyre. But there was considerable diversity of practice and custom on this ques- 

 tion. In most forests, as in the Peak, assarts were resumed by the crown whenever the pleas 

 were held, save in those cases where there had been a licence by the bailiff" or keeper, or (in 

 some cases) by a forester of fee. Thus in the first roll of assarts presented at this Peak eyre, 

 on which twenty-two cases are entered, two of these assarts that had been made without 

 warrant many years before were taken into the king's hands ; and in one case, where William 

 the smith (deceased) had made an assart of three acres without warrant in the liberty of the 

 abbot of Basingwerk, in the days of Robert de Lexington (122833), the then abbot was 

 allowed to retain it as tenant. The abbot of Basingwerk, in the time of John de Grey, was 

 reported as having assarted i acres at Whitfield without the demesne, and enclosed it so as 

 to prevent the free roving of the deer and their fawns, and this without warrant ; at the time 

 when the justices were sitting the fence had been removed, and it was declared in the hands 

 of the king. The usual custom in the Peak, at this time, seems to have been for the tenant 



1 A buckstall was an extended trap or toil for deer of which nets usually formed a component 

 part: but the definition generally given 'a net for taking deer' is not sufficient. Earth ramparts 

 and wattled work were also used in its construction : it was a kind of cunning enclosure wherein the 

 deer could be taken alive, as is implied in the term deerhay : a ' buckstalle vel derehay ' is named in 

 presentments of Clarendon forest, Wilts. Under later legislation the maintaining a buckstall anywhere 

 save in a private park was forbidden under a penalty of 40. 



402 



