That the curious relic of brass found at Lewes (alluded to at p. [39][336]), was the sword-pommel of Prince Richard, King of the Romans, was an easy and natural inference from its rounded form, so similar to that observed on ancient swords, and from its being found where that Prince is known to have been engaged in the great battle of 1264. Further examination, however, proves this supposition to be erroneous, and by reference to page 589, in vol. xxv of ‘Archæologia,’ it will be seen so closely to resemble, in form, material, workmanship, and heraldic bearings, the two ancient steelyard weights found in Norfolk, and there represented, that its identity with their former use must be at once recognized. The Lewes relic is smaller than the two other weights, and is deficient in the upper part, through which the suspending hook was passed, but, as it now weighs 18½ oz., it was probably, when perfect, a 2 lbs. weight. It is remarkable that all these weights, thus found at distant localities, and all evidently of the same era, the thirteenth century, should bear the arms of the King of the Romans,[337] though in each instance intentionally varied, in order, probably, to signify more readily to the eye the intended amount of each weight when in use. Sandford (Geneal. Hist., p. 95) says that the King of the Romans did not bear the arms of his father, King John, but on the larger Norfolk specimen the three royal lions are exhibited passant, sinisterwise, a remarkable difference, of which only one other similar example is known, on the ancient stamped tiles of Horsted-Keynes Church, co. Sussex, where the Prince’s arms, as earl of Cornwall, are also extant. This Prince had a grant of the stanneries and mines of Cornwall, held by service of five knights’ fees, (vide Dugdale’s Baronage,) and Sandford says that “he got much money by farming the mint,” but he would not appear to derive from these sources any peculiar right to stamp with his own arms all the weights of the kingdom. He is also mentioned (Madox, Hist. Exch.) as sitting with others of the king’s council in the Court of Exchequer in 14o and 54o of Henry III: there was an ancient officer of that court, called a Pesour, Ponderator, or Weigher, but the family of Windesore held this office for four generations by hereditary serjeantry, during the reigns of kings John and Henry III. It would seem more probable, therefore, that these weights were stamped with his arms,[338] by the king of the Romans, in the ordinary exercise of his baronial rights, for the common use of his own officers in his widely extended domains, and especially for those of his own personal household, in order efficiently to check the entries and deliveries of the stores of food and forage necessary for the supply of his numerous retinue. The contemporary accounts of his sister, the Princess Eleanor, wife of the great Simon, earl of Leicester, in 1265 (recently published by the Roxburghe Club), show with what minute detail and accuracy such expenses in a large household were regulated, and superintended by the steward of a great personage. The steward of the king of the Romans may have been thus busily employed at Lewes in measuring out with this identical weight their scanty rations to his Cornish troops, until surprised by the hurry of the fatal battle, in which—for human bones were found with the weight near the Castle gateway—he may have continued to clutch it faithfully, even in death. Prince Richard embarked at Yarmouth in 1253, on his way to his coronation as king, at Aix-la-Chapelle, and he went to Cologne in 1267, to marry his German bride, Beatrice. On one of these occasions, when he would have been accompanied by a large suite, or on some other passage through Norfolk, which was a customary route to Germany, the two interesting weights found there may have been accidentally dropped.
C. AND J. ADLARD, PRINTERS, BARTHOLOMEW CLOSE.
Footnotes:
[1] Yorke’s ‘Union of Honour.’
[2] The general ignorance of Heraldry even among the well-educated may be illustrated by the fact that not many months since the Commissioners of Assessed Taxes decided that a person who sealed his letters with a Thistle surrounded by the words ‘Dinna Forget,’ was liable to the charge for armorial bearings, albeit the device contained neither shield, helmet, wreath, nor any other necessary element of heraldric insignia!