O Osbern witdeniers, ki l'retint demaneis.
Puis fu ses escriveins, ne sais dous ans, u treis."
Another biographer writes:—
"Rursus vero Osbernus, Octonummi cognomine, vir insignis in civitate et multarum possessionum cui carne propinquus erat detentum circa se Thomam fere per triennium in breviandis sumptibus redditibusque suis jugiter occupabat."[1088]
The influential position of this wealthy Londoner is dwelt on by yet another biographer:—
"Ad quendam Lundrensem, cognatum suum, qui non solum inter concives, verum etiam apud curiales, grandis erat nominis et honoris se contulit."[1089]
In one of the appendices we shall detect him under the strange form "Ottdevers"[1090] (= "Ottdeuers," a misreading for "Ottdeners") witnessing a treaty arrangement between the Earls of Hereford and Gloucester. This he did in his capacity of feudal tenant to the latter, for in the Earl of Gloucester's Carta (1166) of his tenants in Kent we read: "Feodum Osberti oitdeniers i mil[item]," from which we learn that he had held one knight's fee.[1091]
This singular cognomen, though savouring of the nickname period, may have become hereditary, for we meet with a Philip Utdeners in 1223, and with Alice and Agnes his daughters in 1233.[1092]
As I have here alluded to Becket it may be permissible to mention that as the statements of his biographers in the matter of Osbert are confirmed by this extraneous evidence, so have we also evidence in charters of his residence, as "Thomas of London," in the primate's household. To two charters of Theobald to Earls Colne Priory the first witness is "Thoma Lond' Capellano nostro,"[1093] while an even more interesting charter of the primate brings before us those three names, which, says William of Canterbury, were those of his three intimates, the first witness being Roger of Bishopsbridge, while the fourth and fifth are John of Canterbury and Thomas of London, "clerks."[1094] Here is abundant evidence that Becket was then known as "Thomas of London," as indeed Gervase of Canterbury himself implies.[1095]
[1087] Vie de St. Thomas (ed. Hippeau, 1859).