[684] Patent Rolls, 22 Edward iii., cited by Mazzinghi, p. 80.
[685] Salt Arch. Soc. Trans., viii., 122. It was undoubtedly at this time that the oblong stone keep on the motte, which is described in an escheat of Henry VIII.’s reign, was built.
[686] Salt Arch. Coll., viii., 14.
[687] Speed’s Theatre of Britain; Leland, Itin., vii., 26.
[688] The Stafford escheat of Henry VIII.’s reign, which describes the town, also makes no mention of any castle in the town. Mazzinghi, p. 105.
[689] Salt Arch. Trans., viii., 231. The mistake may possibly have arisen from the fact that a fine castellated gateway, shown in W. Smith’s map (Description of England), stood on the south-west wall of the town, close to the spot where Speed’s map marks a Castle Hill.
[690] There must be some error in the first statement of the Stafford revenue in Domesday, which says that the king and earl have 7l. between them, as it is contradicted by the later statement. D. B., i., 246a and 247b, 2.
[691] There were 141 mansiones, T. R. E., “et modo totidem sunt præter 5 quæ propter operationem castelli sunt wastæ.” From a passage in the Domesday of Nottingham it would seem that a mansio was a group of houses.
[692] Gervase of Canterbury, i., 156, R. S.
[693] Peck’s Antiquarian Annals of Stamford; he gives the charter, p. 17.