DOMESDAY SURVEY 



It seems improbable to the writer that, as the younger Ralf did not marry 

 till 1075, he could have been exiled before the Conquest or have held a 

 command at the battle of Hastings, but the question is full of difficulty. 

 As Mr. Freeman justly observes, it seems impossible to reject the definite 

 statement of the English chronicle that the elder Ralf w^as an Englishman, 

 born in Norfolk,^ though the name is almost out of the question for a man of 

 English birth. The same authority makes the younger Ralf a Breton on his 

 mother's side only,'' but William of Malmesbury terms him ' Brito ex patre.' 



What is certain is that the elder of the tw^o Ralfs, the Ralf ' Stalra ' of 

 Domesday, w^as ' staller ' in Edward's days, and, under Norfolk, Domesday 

 shows him receiving from that sovereign great crown or comital manors such 

 as Sporle and Swaffham.^ He is found attesting charters before the Conquest, 

 and he was addressed by William shortly after that event as earl in East 

 Anglia, in conjunction with the bishop of Elmham.* As such he was the 

 ' comes R. vetus ' of the Norfolk Domesday,' from the pages of which also 

 we learn the interesting fact that, as Ralf ' Stalra,' he gave land to the local 

 monastery of St. Benet of Holme, with his wife [cum uxore sua),^ in King 

 William's time, with his permission. It is very difficult to understand what 

 this can mean, for the formula is used in Domesday of lands given with a 

 woman when she entered a nunnery. St. Benet was a house of monks, not of 

 nuns ; nor does one see how or why Ralfs wife should enter a monastery 

 except after his death. If on the other hand the meaning is that his wife 

 joined with him in the gift, one does not see how a Breton heiress came to 

 have land in Norfolk.^ 



A further complication is introduced by the mention in the Norfolk 

 Domesday of a ' Godwine uncle {avunculus) of Earl Ralf.' Godwine, as 

 Mr. Freeman observed, is a name distinctively English, and as it does not, he 

 rightly contended, exclude a father's brother, he decided that Godwine and 

 the earlier Ralf were brothers ; for if Ralfs wife was a Breton, Godwine 

 could not be her brother. This Godwine is mentioned three times at least 

 (fols. 1271^, 131, 262), and he is charged with robbing another Englishman 

 of his lands at Quidenham so late as 1069. He certainly held land at Sail and 

 Wood Dalling, and probably, in the writer's opinion, was also that Godwine 

 who held at Saxthorpe and Mannington, North Wootton, Lessingham, and 

 Palling, his lands passing to his nephew, the younger Ralf, by whom, shortly 

 after, they were forfeited. 



The date at which the elder Ralf was succeeded by his son as earl is of 

 some importance to determine, but the vagueness of Domesday in its use of 

 styles, a vagueness to which Orderic also was prone, leaves it in some doubt. 

 Perhaps the most important passage is one relating to Eccles, which was 

 twice cited by Mr. Freeman * and which he rendered ' Hanc terram habuit 



' ' Rawulf his facder wass Englisc, and waes geboren on Northfolce.' 



* ' Se ylca Raulf was Brittisc on his modor healfe.' 



' He is spoken of as earl {comes) in the record of each grant, but this does not prove that he held that 

 title at the time of these grants. 



* ' William Kyng gret iEgelmasr Bischop and Raulf Earl and Nordman and ealle myne thegnass on 

 Sudfolke frendliche' (Feud. Engl. p. 427). 



' Dom. Bk. ff. 128^, 129. * Ibid. fF. 158, ii^U, zi-jb, 218. 



' According to John of Oxenedes (pp. 291, 292) Ralf ' Stalre ' gave South Walsham to the house, and 

 Earl Ralf gave ' Hovetone,' both before 1046. But the two Ralfs must here be the same. 

 ' Vol. iii (2nd ed.), p. 775 ; vol. iv (ist ed.), p. 727. 



II 



