Page:Archaeologia Volume 13.djvu/158

112 in that prince's reign." But the citation is so loose that it cannot be deduced from it, where the person named discharged this office of a juror, or where he resided. The anecdote is related by Philipott in his account of Bayhall Manor in Pembury, and by Hasted under the manor of Preston and Allington.

To Thomas Colepeper, by whose direction the numerals 1102 were affixed to the barn and oasthouse, supposing them to specify a year (and they can hardly be otherwise construed) they must have marked what he deemed an important era in his family; for before my late excellent friend Dr. Joseph Milner improved this seat, and took down a high wall that was in the front of it, there were two more inscriptions bearing the same date. One of them, as mentioned by Mr. Hasted, was on a chimney, the other, as noticed by Dr. Harris, on an old stone-portal on the left hand of the gate. And if the family had really inhabited this mansion five hundred years, it is not in the least surprising that a descendant should be solicitous to thus perpetuate so memorable an event. And should it have been his intention to apprise the many Colepeper plants which had long flourished in different parts of Kent that they were scyons from the Preston Hall stem, it was a, spice of vanity that was excusable.

As the name of Colepeper does not occur in Domesday book, it ought not to be inferred that any of the family held lands in Ayles- ford