THE DOMESDAY BOOK 
Ranulf was created earl of Cumberland,’ but he afterwards withdrew it 
in favour of an earldom of Carlisle. Even a palatinate has been received 
with some favour.” The ‘Testa de Nevill’ warrants none of these dignities. 
The inquisition calls him lord (dominus) of Cumberland, a phrase of some 
ambiguity on the lips of jurors in the reign of king John, when applied 
to the district as it existed in the early years of the twelfth century. We 
shall presently hear something of the formation of the modern county of 
Cumberland out of the district of Carlisle, by the severance of the barony 
of Appleby and the addition of the barony of Coupland. But it was 
usual to apply the name of Cumberland to Ranulf’s fief before its forma- 
tion into an English shire.’ In that case the territorial designation of the 
‘Testa de Nevill’ is historically correct, and of course so was Freeman’s 
first conjecture, if the second stands good. When we turn to the authentic 
acts of the so-called earl of Carlisle, we get little inducement from his 
own language to accept him as such. Ranulf’s feudal dignity must be 
estimated at his own valuation. Though there was a sheriff of Carlisle’ 
while Ranulf ruled the land, it cannot be admitted that the presence of 
a sheriff assumes the existence of an earl. In whatever aspect we view it, 
no matter how abnormal the condition of the district, we must infer that 
the fief of Carlisle, if not an earldom, was either a palatine state like the 
great ecclesiastical franchise of Durham, in which the sheriff was not the 
king’s officer, or that it was of the nature of a Crown colony in which 
Ranulf acted as vice-gerent with unlimited powers. But Ranulf Meschin 
has not yet been found as claiming or using the title of earl while he 
was lord of Cumberland. In the foundation charter of the priory of 
Wetheral, it was as Ranulf Meschin, not as Ranulf Comes, nor with any 
other title, that he addressed the ‘ French and English’ who lived in the 
Power (Porestas) of Carlisle. In after years when Henry I. confirmed the 
privileges granted by Ranulf to that foundation, the nature of the fief is 
described as an Honor, the monks having been permitted to exercise all 
the rights to which they were entitled ‘ while Ranulf earl of Chester had 
the Honor’ of Carlisle.’ In every instance, as far as we have noticed, 
where he witnessed a deed before he became earl of Chester, Ranulf 
Meschin was the invariable signature or designation that he used.° 
Throughout the Lindsey survey, which was made (1115-8)’ while he 
was in possession of Carlisle, he is known by no other name.° 
The wreck of the White Ship, in which Richard, the young earl 
1 Norman Conquest, v. 118 ; William Rufus, ii. 547-8. Freeman joins Lappenberg (Norman Kings, 
pp. 234, 235) in pointing out the error of Sir Francis Palgrave (English Commonwealth, i. 449) that the 
Conqueror had created Ranulf Meschin earl of Cumberland. The manifest confusion of ‘Matthew of 
Westminster’ (in ann. 1072) about Ranulf and the earldom has been often noticed by historians. 
2 R. S. Ferguson, History of Cumberland, p. 144, Popular County Histories. 
8 British Museum, Cotton Charters, xviii. 45; Pipe Rolls, 4 Hen. Il. p. 146, ed. J. Hunter ; 
(Cumberland), 16 Hen. II. 
4 Register of Wetherhal, p. 1, ed. J. E. Prescott. 5 Register of Wetherbal, pp. 1, 2, 25. 
6 Calendar of Documents preserved in France, No. 96 ; Rymer, Fadera, i. 6, new edition ; Liber Niger, 
i. 16, 23, ed. T. Hearne ; Dugdale, Monasticon, ii. 387. 
7 J. H. Round, Feudal England, p. 181. See also his note under ‘ Carlisle’ in Complete Peerage, it 
150, and his life of Randulf Meschin in Dict. Nat. Biography, xlvii. 284-6. 
8 Liber Niger Scaccarii, ii. 399-423, ed. T. Hearne. 
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