Page:History of Norfolk 1.djvu/504

 coffin was ploughed up in a close in this town about 1715. There are divers saints painted on the screens, as St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, &c. In 1615, John Dowffyld, Gent. gave 10l. by will to the minister and church-wardens, to be employed for ever as town stock, to set the poor on work.

WEST, or NORTH WROTHAM
Belonged to Ralph de Toni at the Conquest, who was son of Roger de Toni, Standard-bearer of Normandy, and founder of the abbey of Conchis in that dukedom; this Ralph was Standard-bearer to the Conqueror in that memorable battle against King Harold, and by his eminent service in it, became a sharer in those large possessions which were after that signal conquest disposed of to his friends and followers, and among others, had 19 lordships in Norfolk, these three being part of them, the biggest of which he gave (as is before observed) to Bec abbey, and left the other two to Ralph, his son and heir, who left them at his death, to Roger his son and heir, who gave this manor and advowson, with the mill and moors, and whatever he held else in the township, to the monks of Conchis,  who held them of his gift at his death, as belonging to their cell at WottonWawen in Warwickshire, which was in 1162. In 1267, Robert le Taylur and Aveline his wife, granted to Walter abbot of the church of St. Peter of Cunches, 70 acres of land here; in 1279, Ralph, son of the said Roger, granted liberty of free-warren, and free fishing, to the abbot of St. Peter of Conches Castellon, in all his demeans and waters in his manor of Wrotham,  viz. in Wrotham-Thorp manor. In 1285, the abbot of Conches had view of frankpledge, assize of bread and ale allowed him, and thus it continued in the abbot (except when the King held it on account of the French wars, when the temporalities of the alien priories were generally seized, that the revenues might not go to support the King's enemies) till 1414, the 2d of King Henry V. and then the parliament at Leicester dissolved all the alien priories, and so it came to the Crown, and was granted for life to Sir Rowland Lenthall, Knt. and at his death it went with the Priory of Wotton Wawen, and all its revenues, to King Henry VI. who gave them to the provost and scholars of his college of St. Mary and St. Nicholas in Cambridge, commonly called King's college, who are