Feudal England: Historical Studies on the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries

by John Horace Round

'Vyllelm king gret Hereman b. & Wulstan b. & Eustace eorl & Eadrich & Bristrich & ealle mine þegenes on Ƿyltoneshyre & on Glouc'shyre fronliche & ic cuþe eoƿ ic habbe geunnan Reinbold mina preost ꝥ land æt Esi & ꝥ land æt Latton & ealle þæra þinge ꝥ þar to lið binnan port & buten mið sace & mið socne sƿa full and sƿa forð sƿa his furmest on hondan stodan Harald kinge on ællan þingan on dæge & æfter to atheonne sƿa sƿa ealra lefest ys & ic nelle nenna men geþafian ꝥ him fram honda teo ænig þære þinga þæs þa ic him geunne habbe bi minan freonshype.'

The relevant entry in Domesday speaks for itself:

Reinbaldus presbyter tenet Latone et Aisi. Duo taini tenuerunt pro II. Maneriis T.R.E. Heraldus comes junxit in unum. Geldabat pro ix. hidis (68b).

If the charter were nothing more than a grant from the Conqueror to a private individual of lands duly entered in Domesday, it would, I believe, as such be unique. Historians have long and vainly sought for any genuine charter of the kind; and here it has been in print for nearly sixty years.

But the document, I hope to show, does far more for us than this: it opens a new chapter in the history of the Norman Conquest.

We first notice that the writ is addressed not to Norman, but to English authorities. The only exception is Count Eustace, who was, of course, not a Norman, and who was known in England before the Conquest as brother-in-law to Edward the Confessor. The obvious inference is that, at the time this writ was issued, Norman government had not yet been set up in the district. Urse d'Abetot, for instance, the dreaded sheriff of Worcestershire, would probably have been addressed in conjunction with Bishop Wulstan had he been then in power. But we know that he came into power soon after the Conquest, for he had time to be guilty of oppression and to be rebuked for it by Ealdred before that Primate's death in 1069. But as our writ is of this early date, it must be previous to the treason of Count Eustace in 1067. It must therefore belong to the beginning of that year, when William had only recently been crowned king.

We see then here, I think, the Conqueror, in his first days as an English king, addressing his subjects, in a part of the realm not yet under Norman sway, and doing so in their own tongue and in the forms to which they were accustomed. As King Edward in his charter to Regenbald had greeted bishops, earls, and sheriffs, so here his successor greets two bishops, 'Eustace Eorl', and two Englishmen representing the power of the sheriff. And so again in his charter to London he began by greeting the Bishop and the Portreeve.[⁴]

The writ, it will be seen, is addressed to the authorities of Gloucestershire and Wilts. The estate lay in the latter county, but the connection of Regenbald de 'Cirencestre' with Glo'stershire may account for the inclusion of that county. Can we identify 'Eadrich' and 'Bristrich' with any local magnates? With some confidence I boldly suggest that the latter was no other than the 'Bristricus' of the Exon Domesday, that famous Brihtric, the son of Ælfgar, who, to quote from the appendix Mr Freeman devotes to him, 'appears distinctly as a great landowner in most of the western shires', one from whose vast domains was carved out later the great Honour of Gloucester. Until now, all we have known of him has been derived from the Domesday entries of his estates T.R.E. and from the legend which associates his name with that of Queen Matilda. But this charter enables us to say that he was living and still holding his great position in the west in the early days of William's reign.[⁵]

From 'Bristric' I turn to 'Eadric', and ask if we may not here recognize 'Eadric the Wild' himself? This can only be matter of conjecture, but it is certain that these two Englishmen are here assigned the place that would be given to a sheriff, and that 'Eadric the Wild'—'quidam præpotens minister', as Florence terms him—was a magnate in the west (Herefordshire and Shropshire) at the time of the Conquest. Mr Freeman terms him 'a man about whom we should gladly know more'. It is stated by Orderic that he was one of those who came in and submitted to William at the outset. But Mr Freeman held it 'far more likely that he did not submit till a much later time', because Florence says of him in William's absence: 'se dedere Regi dedignabatur'. Orderic's statement, however, is not denied, and Florence's words seem to me quite explicable by the hypothesis that Eadric had refused the 'dangerous honour', as Mr Freeman terms it, of following William to Normandy in 1067 among 'his English attendants or hostages'. Harried, in consequence, by his Norman neighbours, he retaliated by ravaging Herefordshire in August of that year; while Count Eustace also threw off his allegiance and made his descent on Dover.