The meaning of this entry is that the earl demanded the "third penny," not only of the old composition for the "pleas," but also of the increased sum now paid for them. The passage, of course, is puzzling in its statement that the earl's predecessors had received "the third penny," for, so far as the printed Rolls take us, they never did so. A similar difficulty is caused, in the case of Oxfordshire, by the charter of Henry II. (see p. 239) granting to Aubrey de Vere its "third penny" "ut sit inde Comes;" for there is no trace in the printed Rolls of such payment being made, and in 7 John the then earl actually owes "cc marcas pro habendo tercio denario Comitatus Oxoniæ de placitis, et ut sit Comes Oxoniæ."[870]
Passing from these perplexing cases, on which we need fuller knowledge, we have a simple example in 12 Hen. III., when, on the death of the Earl of Essex (February 15, 1228), his annual third penny, as £40 10s. 10d., was allowed to count, for his heirs, towards the payment of his debts to the Crown.[871] A much later and most important instance is that of Devon, where Hugh de Courtenay, as the heir of the Earls of Devon, is found receiving their "third penny" in 8 Edw. III., though not an earl, a state of things which provoked a protest, a decision against him, and, eventually, his elevation to comital rank.
[848] Constitutional History, i. 139.
[849] Ibid., i. 363.
[850] This insured him his participation pro rata in any future increase ("crementum") of the render.
[851] Const. Hist., i. 361.
[852] Ibid., p. 113.
[853] We must, further, observe that, of these six, Lewes, of which we are not told if, or how, its redditus was divided before the Conquest, and Shrewsbury, of which we are told that the "third penny" of its redditus went, not to the earl, but to the sheriff ("Tempore Regis E ... duas partes habebat rex et vicecomes tertiam") are not in point for the earl's share.
[854] Exeter, p. 43 (cf. p. 55).
[855] This passage appears to imply that Dr. Stubbs, who sees in the "third penny" of the county the perquisite of the earl, would look on that of the borough as the perquisite of the sheriff. But the latter, as we have seen, was held, as a rule, by the earl, though occasionally by the sheriff.