146 "Early Heraldry in Boyton ChurcJi, Wilts" 



being the younger house, compared with the Giffards of Brimsfield, 

 Gloucestershire. Although this sculptured coat certainly belong! 

 to the Giffard family, for many generations lords of Boyton, there 

 has been much difficulty in ascertaining who of that family is the 

 particular individual commemorated by this effigy. Sir R. C. Hoare 

 timidly and tentatively suggests that it may be Sir Alexander 

 Giffard, 1 fourth son of Hugh Giffard, Constable of the Tower of 

 London, brother of Walter Giffard, Archbishop of York, who died 

 lord of Boyton in 1279, and also brother of Godfrey Giffard, Bishop 

 of Worcester, who died lord of Boyton in 1301, holding it of John 

 Giffard, then a minor. 



Mr. Fane has most persuasively elaborated the aforesaid suggestion 

 with references to contemporary documents, shewing that, " accor- 

 ding to the strict laws of feudal tenancy, Sir Alexander Giffard left 

 his native home at Boyton, and followed his liege lord, the gallant 

 Longespee, to the war." This was the crusade under St. Louis, of 

 France, A.D. 1250, and the chief scene of the exploits of lord and 

 vassal was the assault of Massoura, in Egypt. 



When Longespee, hardly bested by the Saracens, scorned to fly, 

 and resolved to die fighting, he thus laid his commands as liege 

 lord upon Sir Alexander Giffard : " If you can escape, you, who 

 have the care of my goods, and are my knight, distribute my goods 

 among my people in this manner," etc. " Giffard instantly obeyed 

 his lord's command, and dashing with his unwounded war-horse 

 against the host of Saracens, he passed through, as Paris asserts, 

 graviter vulneratus, he swam the river, reached the coast, and re- 

 turning to England, probably died at Boyton in early manhood." 2 



The arms still preserved in a lancet window on the north side of 

 the chancel are certainly not the coat of Giffard, but of Thomas 

 Plantagenet, Earl of Lancaster, Derby, Leicester, Lincoln, and 

 Salisbury, who, from his consanguinity with the royal families of 



1 Sir R. C. Hoare, Hundred of Heytesbury, Boyton, p. 198. In plate xi., ibid, 

 the label is not well shown, and the name is thus given at the bottom of the 

 engraving : — " Effigy of Elias Giffard in Boyton Church." 



2 Of" Wilts Mag., No. iv., April, 1855, vol. ii., pp. 105-6. 



