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Wfyt #rtgm of tije SfjtrUgs antr of tfje 



By J. H. Round, M.A. 



O all who are interested in the history of our old 

 " Conquest " houses the names of Shirley and 

 Gresley are, or should be, familiar. For these 

 families, which both derive their names from 

 Derbyshire manors, and the ancestors of which were knightly 

 tenants of Ferrers, Earl of Derby, enjoy the very remarkable 

 distinction of holding at the present day manors which belonged 

 to their Domesday ancestors. I am in a position to show, 

 beyond dispute, that the attacks on their pedigrees contained 

 in the work styled A Feudal History of Derbyshire, are wholly 

 without foundation. That well-known writer on feudal 

 genealogy, the late Mr. Eyton, described the pedigree of the 

 Gresleys as " a. genealogy second to none among the com- 

 moners of England," and the singular attempt to prove that 

 the early Gresleys, of Gresley, were identical with the con- 

 temporary Albinis, of Cainhoe (in Bedfordshire), and not with 

 the later and modern Gresleys, is a mere dream, for which 

 there exists no ground whatever. I propose to prove this 

 in detail in the next volume of this Journal, and shall hope 

 at the same time to throw a little fresh light on the feudal 

 history of the county and the records on which it is based. 

 1 may perhaps be permitted to add, as I am somewhat 

 vehemently assailed in the work referred to, that in not one 

 single instance has my critic succeeded in impugning the 

 accuracy of my statements or the soundness of my conclusions ; 

 this also can be proved. 



