132 NOTES FROM THE PIPE ROLLS OF KING HENRY THE SECOND. 



receivers of each item of account, and the reasons for such pay- 

 ments. The regular income of the year arose principally from 

 payments made by the great landowners, sometimes in respect of 

 annual rents, at others for a kind of payment in lieu of succession 

 duty on acquiring a property by purchase or inheritance. Other 

 payments were made by way of fine or penalty for the infraction 

 of some law, a rebellion perhaps, or for the permission for a 

 widow to marry whom she choose, or alas, only too often, for a 

 license for some mercenary ruffian to marry her. Large sums, 

 too, were frequently paid for the King's good will. These 

 accounts are most beautifully kept, and the earlier they are in 

 point of date the more perfect is the arrangement and the 

 legibility of the handwriting. They are called the Great Rolls, 

 and well worthy are they of the name. They are of a very great 

 antiquity — 750 years or thereabouts is the date of the oldest, and 

 there is a regular and perfect series from the year 1156, a won- 

 derful collection of documents, the like of which no other nation 

 in Europe can show a counterpart. 



The credit of the invention of this system of accounting is 

 generally given to one Nigel, who was afterwards created Bishop 

 of Ely, and who is generally supposed to have been the nephew 

 or son of a greater bishop — Roger of Salisbury, of the time of 

 King Henry I.. 



Only five or six years of this vast period had been published 

 before the Pipe Roll Society came into existence ; they have 

 printed about as many more years, and they only require funds to 

 enable them to start the work in earnest. 



Derbyshire historians have done but little in this direction. The 

 writer, for his own work, has extracted all that relates to Derby- 

 shire for the reigns of Henry II. and of several of his successors, 

 a most laborious compilation ; and it is not too much to say that 

 the information which they produce is far greater than the whole 

 amount of Derbyshire County History that has yet been published. 

 It may be broadly laid down that there is no pedigree of true 

 Derbyshire origin that is not here profusely illustrated. 



Take for example the family of Heathcote, now honoured by 



