Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 2.djvu/537

 io" s. ii. DEC. 3, 1904.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

441

LONDON, SA TiltDA Y, DECEMBER S, 190!,.

CONTENTS. No. 49.

NOTES : The Chiltern Hundreds, 441 Burton's 'Ana- tomy,' 442 The Arbalest or Cross-bow, 443 Steward Monument at Bradford-on-Avon, 414 Going Shopping " Nabob " Oakham Castle Horseshoes " Sarum " Indian Life in Fiction, 445 Henry II. on the Welsh- Johnson on the Letter H-The "Chego" at the Zoo "Oblivious" Folk -medicine in Lincolnshire, 44<5 "Eggler," 447.

QUERIES-. Mozart Concerto Jenny Cameron of Loo.hiel Qalapine "Count Tallard, French Prisoner of War- Benjamin Blak : Norman : Oidmixon, 447 Verse Trans- lations of Moliere-Clock by W. Franklin Woolmen in the Fifteenth Century Mrs. Arkwright's Setting of ' The Pirate's Farewell'-C. Ma. H. V.-Birth at Sea in 1805- Mnglish Burial-ground at Lisbon Statue discovered at Charing Cross Bphis and his Lion Jordangate McDonald of Murroch, 448 -Rev. John Wilson, of King's College, Cambridge Byrt of Shrophouse Pownill Paragraph Mark Barga, Italy Mrs. Carey, 449.

REPLIES :-Richard of Scotland, 449 Spelling Reform, 450 'Assisa de Tolloneis,' 451 "Honest Broker "Corks " Rnvison " : " Scrivelloes " ' Tracts for the Times,' 452 Nine Maidens "Mali" William III. at theBoyne-How to Catalogue Seventeenth-Century Tracts, 453 The Tenth Sheaf Children at Executions, 451 Blood used in Build- ingPublishers' Catalogues Ainsty " Bonnets of Blue," 455 Vaccination and Inoculation Penny Wares Wanted, 456 Shelley Family Holborn, 457.

NOTES ON BOOKS : Barbeau's 'Bath 'in the Eighteenth Century' The "Favourite Classics" Shakespeare 4 Duelling Stories ' Scottish Historical Review ' Edin- burgh Review.'

Notices to Correspondents.

THE CHILTERN HUNDREDS.

THE three hundreds of Stoke, Burnharn, and Desborough are, according to our ency- clopaedias, distinguished by the name Chiltern Hundreds, and the office of steward of these hundreds is one which is usually accepted by a member of Parliament in order to vacate his seat. One or more of our encyclo- paedias and other books give us this addi- tional information : " In former time the beech forests of the Chiltern Hills were infested with robbers, and in order to restrain them it was usual for the Crown to appoint an officer who was called Steward of the 'Chiltern Hundreds." This is interesting, and that is all that can be said concerning this information, except that it is a pity it should be copied from book to book, as apparently it has been.

As the Chiltern Hills are in Buckingham- shire and Oxfordshire, any hundreds in these counties in the Chiltern district might be called Chiltern Hundreds, Stoke, Burnhara, and Desborough in Buckinghamshire among them. The question arises, however, Were these the Chiltern Hundred of antiquity, whose stewardship or custody was an office held under the Crown since the time of the

Xormans ? I think not. Domesday Book, in the part relating to Oxfordshire, tells us that the soke of four and a half hundreds belongs to the Royal Manor of Bensington. There was thus attached to Bensington an extent of country comprised within four and a half hundreds, of which it was the administra- tive centre.

The Hundred Rolls for 1279 tell us that the jury sworn in reference to Bensington made the return that this manor was of the king's demesne with the hamlets of Henley, Nettlebed, Huntercumbe, Wyfaude, Preston- Crowmarsh, Ward burg, Silingford, and Hupholecumbe ; and that the manor with the hamlets, excepting Preston-Crowmarsh and Huntercomb, King Henry gave to his brother with the Chiltern Hundreds.

The Oxfordshire Hundred Rolls also tell us that the jury for the Hundred of Langtre made a return that the Castle of Wallingford, with its honour and what belonged to it, was at one time in the hands of the king, and that he gave it, with the four and a half hundreds of Chiltern viz., Puryton, Bene- felde, Langhetre, Leukenore, and half of that called Ewelme to Richard his brother, Earl of Cornwall ; and that it is now held by Edmund, son of the aforesaid Richard, but they know not by what warrant or by what service.

These entries in the Hundred Rolls show clearly that the four and a half hundreds of Bensington, of Norman time, were by Henry III. attached to the Castle and Honour of Wallingford as part of the lordship of his brother, and were known as the Chiltern Hundreds.

The Parliamentary Writs for 1316 contain the Nomina Villarum, or names of manors, and the hundreds in which they were grouped at that time. The hundreds and their courts were in the hands of the king unless specially granted. The lordship of a hundred, if attached to that of the most important manor in it, carried with it an additional significance, and this lordship frequently went with the manor.

In 1316 we find that the Honour of Walling- ford comprised the four and a half hundreds of Chiltern, of which the king was at one time the lord. These hundreds are named, and are the " Hundred de Benefelde, Hund. de Langtre, Hund. de Piriton, Hund. de Leukenore, and dimid. Hund. de Ewelme." The name Benefelde appears to be the same as Bensington, and so we find that the four and a half hundreds which in 1086 were grouped round Bensington, and were given by Henry III. to his brother Richard, as part of