VOL. XIV.] CONTRIBUTION TO SWAN HISTORY. 177 



under colour of the same and of Surveying and Search for Swans 

 and Cygnets for their Lords and Masters, have stolen Cygnets and 

 put upon them their own Mark, by which unlawful means the 

 substance of Swans be in the hands and posssesion of Yeomen and 

 Husbandmen, and other persons of little Reputation ; (2) Wherefore 

 it is ordained," etc. etc. 



Most Swan-marks hitherto pubHshed appear to have been 

 taken from Swan-rolls and other records belonging to the 

 sixteenth century or later, which is to be expected, since 

 it was not till after the Act of 1483 came into force that it 

 became necessary for permanent records to be compiled 

 and kept. I can only find two references to the subject 

 of an earlier date than this. One is a quotation in the Birds 

 of Norfolk (III., p. 102) which describes just such a poaching 

 event, as the statute was designed to prevent, that occurred 

 in 1451 ; the other is the mention of the King's Swanherd 

 in the Parliamentary Rolls of 1393 (" Swan Law," by Sergeant 

 Manning, Penny Cyclopcsdia, XXIII., p. 372). The practice 

 of keeping Swans by " persons of little reputation " is, 

 however, well illustrated by certain entries in the Chamberlains 

 Accounts of Lydd and New Romney. In the first half of the 

 fifteenth century, and in the case of New Romney in the latter 

 part of the fourteenth also (as far back as the records in either 

 case extend), it was customary for both these corporations 

 to make presents to people in high office, such as the Lord 

 Warden of the Cinque Ports, his Lieutenant, the Archbishop 

 of Canterbury, etc., whom it was to their interest to placate. 

 Very frequently these gifts took the form of one or more 

 Swans or Cygnets. These were invariably purchased, as the 

 records state, from different people, inhabitants of the marsh 

 or commoners of the town, who pretty certainly could not 

 have been lawful keepers of Swans as afterwards defined 

 by the Act. 



From a perusal of some of the Corporation records of the 

 Port of Sandwich, then one of the chief channels of communica- 

 tion with the Continent, it is clear that prior to 1483 measures 

 were already being taken to restrict the ownership of Swans. 

 The Customal of this town was transcribed at the beginning 

 of Edward the Fourth's reign, probably between 1461 and 

 1465, by John Series, then town clerk, from a more ancient 

 manuscript (now lost) written by Adam Champneys in 1301. 

 The transcriber, however, embodied with the older work many 

 observations and customs of his own time, and others have 

 been added since, so that we cannot certainly assign anything 

 contained in it to an earlier date than 1461-5. In the para- 

 graph dealing with the appointment and duties of the King's 



