i84 



DEER AND DEER PARKS. 



Ch. VIII. 



came hard by Hexgrave Park on the right 

 hand, and a Httle beyond on the left hand, 

 I saw nere at hand, Mr. Newman's a 

 knighte's parke, and prati manor. It is 

 in KeWington (Kirklington) paroche.' ' 

 This appears to be the park marked in 

 Saxton's Survey at Bellow. 



A little more to the north two more 

 parks are noticed by Saxton at Knesall 

 and Rufford. The latter was, I presume, 

 originally a monastic park ; it is an ex- 

 isting one, belonging to Henry Savile, 

 Esq;, and is said to contain 400 head of 

 deer. 



We now approach the well-known 

 ' Dukeries,' the contiguous domains of 

 Worksop, Welbeck, Clumber, and Tho- 

 resby, to which may be added Houghton, 

 at one time the seat of the Holles's Earls 

 of Clare and Dukes of Newcastle. It is 

 marked as a park in Saxton's Map, to- 

 gether with Worksop and Welbeck, but 

 has been long disparked and the mansion 

 demolished. 



' Worksop^ writes Leland, ' is a parke 

 of a vi. or vii. miles in compass, long- 

 ging to the Erie of Shreusbiry. The 

 stones of the castil were fetched, as sum 

 say, to make the fair lodge in Wyrksoppe 

 Parke not yet finished. This Erie of 

 Shrewsbyri's Father was aboute to have 

 finished hit, as apperith by much hewyd 

 stone lying there." 'Wirsop' is noticed 

 as a park, when it belonged to Thomas 

 de Furnivall, in the twenty-ninth of Ed- 

 ward in.' 



Worksop Manor, purchased in 1838 by 

 the Duke of Newcastle from Bernard 

 twelfth Duke of Norfolk, was at that time 



Leland's Itin. vol. v. p. 104, fol. 93. 

 Itin. vol. V. p. 103, fol. 92. 

 A-bbr. Rot. Orig. 239. 



disparked, and the greater part of the 

 mansion taken down. A mile from 

 Worksop, Leland notices the Park of 

 Newhagge, ' longging to the king.' This 

 appears to be the park laid down in 

 Saxton's Map as north of Worksop 

 Manor. 



Welbeck is an existing and very ex- 

 tensive park belonging to the Duke of 

 Portland. The park of Thomas de Fur- 

 nivall here is noticed ' by the King's 

 Highway ' as early as the twenty-ninth of 

 Edward I.^ In 1654 Welbeck belonged 

 to William Cavendish Duke of New- 

 castle, and was visited ^ by Evelyn, who 

 calls it ' a noble yet melancholy seate.' 

 It was the only one of eight parks be- 

 longing to the Duke which escaped des- 

 truction from the rebels in the Civil Wars. 



Clumber never appears to have had a 

 deer park, and the adjoining park of 

 Thoresby is not found in the ancient maps. 

 It is a very extensive park, said to be thir- 

 teen miles in circumference, with 1,000 

 head of deer. 



To the north of Worksop is Hodsock, 

 ' a park where Master Clifton hath a fair 

 House,' writes Leland. Thoroton calls it 

 ' a fair park,' but it has been long since 

 disparked. Two other ancient parks were, 

 in Henry VIII.'s time, in this vicinity 

 thus noticed by Leland : ' Riding a very 

 little beyond Scroby Manor Place, I 

 passid by a forde over the Ryver : and so 

 betwixt the pales of two parkes longging 

 to Scroby, I came to Bautre.'^ Scroby 

 was a palace of the Archbishops of York, 

 and here Archbishop Savage, one of the' 

 keenest sportsmen of the age, often re- 



■■ Thoroton, p. 451. 



° Leland's Itin. vol, i. p. 36, fol. 37. 



