Mysterious Entries on Roll C 61/32: A Reconsideration (C 61/32 (11 Edward II), entries 101 & 102 (29 January 1318); and entries 103 & 104 (4 February 1318))
These four entries are inserted together in a blank space on m.12 of C 61/32 (11 Edward II). They are written in a darker ink and in a hand which differs from the preceding and following entries on the roll; all four have been crossed through, with possible signs of an attempt to erase them (even using an ultraviolet lamp, it is very difficult to read everything in the entries); the word ‘vacat’ is written in the left margin of the roll, implying that the entries do not belong and are to be recorded elsewhere. As the editors observe, there is no obvious reason for the initial inclusion of the four entries, none of which has any connection with the usual business of a Gascon Roll, except that items 103 and 104 refer to possible payments to be made from the revenues of Gascony. The editors are also of the opinion that the entries are in a much later hand, perhaps later fifteenth- or even sixteenth-century.
The original roll, C 61/32, was examined in TNA and, for the purpose of comparing the script, so also was C 61/137 (28 Henry VI, 1449-50). C 76/9 (Rotuli Franciae et Pontivi, 3-17 Edward II) was checked in case the entries appeared there. The file of Chancery Warrants, C 81/103, including the relevant dates in late January and early February 1318, was also examined. C 62/94 (Liberate Roll, 11 Edward II) was later consulted online through the website of the Anglo-American Legal Tradition, Quinn Law Library, University of Houston. The results of this research were inconclusive, but there are a few clues and it is possible to make some tentative suggestions.
File of Chancery Warrants, TNA, C 81/103: There is no direct mention of the subjects of entries 101-104 in C 81/103, but the following privy seal writs are interesting:
a. C 81/103, 4537A (29 Jan. 1318, Westminster) corresponds with item 105 on the Gascon Roll;
b. C 81/103, 4537B (30 Jan., Westminster) refers to a former treasurer of the Agenais, John de Husthweyt. See CPR, 1317-21, p.76.
c. C 81/103, 4537C (30 Jan. 1318, Westminster) refers to John de la Marche, yeoman of the pantry, appointed to custody of the gate of Guernsey castle. The writ was added from unsorted miscellanea on 4 Nov. 1924. See CPR, 1317-21, p.75.
d. C 81/103, 4537D (30 Jan. 1318, Westminster): exemption to Thomas de Grey from being put on assizes, juries, etc. Also added from unsorted miscellanea on 4 Nov. 1924. See CPR, 1317-21, p.75.
e. C 81/103, 4538A (31 Jan. 1318, Westminster). Re appointment of John Hathewy as forester of Forest of Dean. See CPR, 1317-21, p.102.
f. C 81/103, 4538B (31 Jan. 1318, Westminster). Re an assize of novel disseisin. Also added from unsorted miscellanea on 4 Nov. 1924. No corresponding entry in CPR, or in CFR, CCR.
g. C 81/103, 4539 (1 Feb. 1318, Windsor). Re presentation of Robert Hillary to church of Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire. See CPR, 1317-21, p.104.
h. C 81/103, 4540 (4 Feb. 1318, Windsor). Re the bridge at Kingston-on-Thames. No corresponding entry in CPR, or in CFR, CCR.
i. C 81/103, 4541 (6 Feb. 1318, Windsor). Re appointment of John de Fenwyk to custody of Bamburgh castle. See CPR, 1317-21, p.76.
One of the writs relates directly to Gascony and appears on the Gascon Roll (item 105); one mentions the Agenais; one refers to something vaguely French (Guernsey). Three writs, in poor condition, were added from unsorted miscellanea in November 1924. This indicates a damaged file of C 81 privy seal writs, which might, if better preserved, have thrown some light on entries 101-104.
TNA, C 76/9 (Rotuli Franciae et Pontivi, 3-17 Edward II). Nothing relevant found.
TNA, C 62/94 (Liberate Roll, 11 Edward II). Consulted online through the website of the Anglo-American Legal Tradition, Quinn Law Library, University of Houston. Nothing relevant found.
TNA, C 61/32, entries 101-104:
Entry 101: Garin de Glapion, seneschal of Normandy, who is the subject of entry 101, can be found in the Norman Rolls for 2 John, TNA, C 64/1-4. He also appears in a fragmentary payment roll, TNA, E 373/5; most of the rest of the account is in TNA, E 101/349/1A, printed in S R Packard, Miscellaneous Records of the Norman Exchequer, 1199-1204, Smith College Studies in History, vol XII (1926-27). It may be relevant that entries 93-96 (28 January and 4 February 1318) relate to the disputes between the men of Normandy and Bayonne. Normandy was at least in the official mind at the same time as entries 101 and 102.
Even though Normandy had been lost by the English crown in 1204, business concerning Normandy was still appearing in English records even during the reigns of Edward I and Edward II. There are several examples of petitions sent to the English Crown by religious houses in Normandy, usually relating to lands held in England or in the Channel Islands, the so-called ‘alien priories’. Such cases may be analogous to entries 101 and 102, in that they may sometimes have required a search of much earlier English government records. Like the three examples cited below, entries 101 and 102 also include references to ecclesiastical matters, the churches of Cocherel and Augelville.
Entry 102: It is not clear who Guillaume de Augelville was, other than also being in Normandy in early John.
Entry103: The man whose name was transcribed by the editors as 'Haaiz Notit', lord of Molendino, is a real mystery. An initial reading of the name was 'Isaatz Nebit', but it is more likely that his first name was ‘Isaacz’ or ‘Isaacus’ (with an abbreviation of ‘us’ written as a superscript) or ‘Isaac’: but an apparently Jewish name raises other problems of identity. His second name is even more problematic. ‘Nebit’ seems less and less likely. The first letter may be ‘N’ but is nothing like the capital N in Normandy in entry 101 and may be ‘r’ (although it is not like the definite ‘R’ in ‘Raynaldus’ in the next entry. The second letter is ‘a’; the third letter is ‘t’ (see ‘quadraginta’ two lines below); and the fourth letter is ‘i’. The name may be ‘Natit’ or ‘Ratit’ or indeed the editors’ suggestion ‘Notit’. It is baffling. Perhaps it is a Jewish name. The location of 'Molendino' is another problem. There are plenty of placenames, in various countries, deriving from the Latin for ‘mill’. This entry is particularly hard to decipher. Seeing the original helped a little, but even ultraviolet light did not resolve the problem.
One possible clue is in the first line of the entry which appears to refer to a ‘domino Everardo’. This could be the French name Erard. Edward II had a brother-in-law named Erard de Bar (Bar-le-Duc in the Meuse valley) whose brother Count Henry of Bar had married Edward’s sister Eleanor in 1293. Erard had visited England for the marriage in 1293, was again in England in 1301, and once more in 1305 to arrange the marriage of his niece Joan de Bar and the earl of Surrey. Various dependents of the county of Bar also served the English crown in Scotland. It is possible that one of the men who accompanied Erard to England or who served in Scotland is the man referred to, although none of the known followers of Erard de Bar matches the name in entry 103. However in 1317-18 the county of Bar was very much in the minds of Edward II and his officials. The capture and ransoming of the earl of Pembroke in 1317 was connected with a Bar dependent, Jean de Lamouilly, who had a grievance against the English crown over unpaid wages for service in Scotland. There was also a great row going on over the breakdown of the earl of Surrey’s marriage with Joan of Bar. One consequence was a lot of correspondence with members of the French nobility, including Erard de Bar. There is some information in Seymour Phillips, Edward II (New Haven & London, 2010), pp.288-90, and more detail in J.R.S. Phillips, Aymer de Valence (Oxford, 1972), pp, 111-117. The answer to the mystery may lie somewhere in the area of the Meuse and in a connection with Erard de Bar, but it is no more than a possibility.
Entry 104, referring to Raynaldus de Bello Loco, is also a puzzle.
Like entries 101-2, entries 103-4 may have nothing at all to do with Gascony (except that in the latter two cases Gascon revenues were to be a source of payment). It is likely that each of the four entries was the consequence of a recent, but no longer extant, petition to the crown (TNA, Ancient Petitions, SC 8, was checked without success); that the resulting orders were initially enrolled on the Gascon Roll for want of anywhere better to put them, and then removed after second thoughts. If they were enrolled anywhere else, there is no trace.
Although entries 101-104 are clearly written by a different clerk than the rest of C 61/32, and appear to have been written with less care, the hand seems to be consistent with the dates of the entries in early 1318. If the entries had been inserted in, for example, the fifteenth century, it raises the even more puzzling questions of why anyone should want to insert entries relating to early 1318 at a much later date, in a space on the roll of 1317-18 which just happened to be vacant, and then had a change of mind and cancelled the entries.
Seymour Phillips (2015).
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