Page:English Historical Review Volume 37.djvu/38

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Two more of his reckless errors are here the whole sum of my critic's contributions to our knowledge: the right date is 1080, not '1088', and the number in Mr. Davis's book is, not '22', but 122. As for the charge that I do not mention 'any of the earlier sheriffs', I expressly stated at the outset that I only set myself 'to supplement the information' in Mr. Morris's learned paper on the sheriff 'in the early Norman period', where, for instance, Roger Bigod's shrievalty of East Anglia is fully dealt with. I also explained at the outset that one of the points I desired to illustrate was 'the system of hereditary (or quasi-hereditary) tenure of certain shrievalties', and this I did in the case of Norfolk. 'I do not see', Mr. Rye observes of William, 'why he is called "hereditary sheriff"' by Stapleton. Yet my article (pp. 491–2) makes it clear.

More serious is his treatment of Robert son of Walter, a sheriff