[35] See p. 174.
[36] It is certain that Tamworth originally belonged to Robert 'Dispensator', and equally certain that it was held successively by Roger and Robert Marmion under Henry I.
[37] See my Early Life of Anne Boleyn, pp. 25-7.
THE LEICESTERSHIRE SURVEY
(1124-29).
Asserting the importance of the Lindsey Survey, Mr Chester Waters observed that 'this is the sole record of its kind which deals with the interval between the completion of Domesday in 1086, and the compilation of the Pipe-Roll of 1129-30, and that no similar return of the landowners of any other county is known to exist' (p. 2). And, indeed, it would seem that the survey to which I now address myself has hitherto remained unknown. It is found in the form of a late transcript on an unidentified roll in the Public Record Office.[1]
Comprising the whole of Gosecote Wapentake, and in part those of Framland and Gartree, it retains for these divisions the Domesday name of Wapentake—they are now 'Hundreds'—while subdividing them into small 'Hundreds', of which the existence seems to have been hitherto unsuspected. Proceeding, like the I.C.C., 'Hundred' by 'Hundred', and Vill by Vill, it enables us, like that document, to reconstitute the aggregate assessments, and thus affords priceless evidence on 'the six-carucate unit'.[2] But apart from this, it is invested with no small importance from that 'great want of documentary evidence' for the reign of Henry I which Mr Hunter rightly lamented in his elaborate introduction to the first great roll of the Pipe (p. ii). It affords us new and trustworthy evidence on the many vicissitudes of the great fiefs, and enables us, while tracing the fortunes of their owners, to see how the first Henry provided for his novi homines, showering escheats and royal demesne on the trusty officials he had raised 'from the dust', as well as on his favourite nephew, Stephen, Count of Mortain.
The date of this survey is thus determined. The frequent mention of 'Rex D[avid]' places it subsequent to his accession to the throne in April 1124. On the other hand, the name of Ralf Basset (the justiciar) shows it to be anterior to his death; and he was dead before Mich., 1130 (Rot. Pip., 31 Hen. I). Moreover, it speaks more than once of Hugh de Leicester as 'Vicecomes', and Hugh's shrievalty seems from the Pipe-Roll to have terminated at Mich., 1129. We may therefore place this survey between the spring of 1124 and the autumn of 1129, with a likelihood of its having been compiled nearer the latter date.