Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 8.djvu/333

 i2s. viii. APBO, 2, mi.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 271 William Herbert, second Earl of Pembroke, held that Earldom until 1479, in which year, Edward IV., wishing to confer the Pembroke title on his son, Prince Edward, Herbert, at the King's request, surrendered his earl- -dom, and was created instead Earl of Huntingdon. The point, however, to which it is specially wished to call attention is the following: , Sir William Dugdale in his * Baronage,' vol. ii. p. 257 (1676), states that William Herbert, first Earl of Pembroke, died, " leaving William his Son and Heir nine years of age upon the fifth of March the same year," which year Dugdale describes as '9 Edward IV. As. that King's reign began on Mar. 4, 1460/lj and as the birthday of William, the son and heir of the first Earl, was Mar. 5, Dugdale's statement would mean that William, the heir, was born Mar. 5, 1459/60, and that he therefore - completed his 9th year on Mar. 5, 1468 /9, and was, consequently, 9 years old when his father was beheaded, in July, 1469. The 'D.N.B.' gives the date of the heir's birth as Mar. 5, 1460, and as, doubtless, the historical year is meant, it is in agreement with Dugdale. Collins, in his ' Peerage,' repeats Dugdale' s statement as to the heir's age, but G. E. C.'s ' Peerage ' enters the date of the heir's birth as Mar. 5, 1460/1, which would mean that he completed his 8th year on Mar. 5, 1468/9, and was therefore only 8 at his father's death the following July. Doyle says that the second Earl was born Mar. 5, 1461, presumably. meaning the historical year, and so in agreement, as to the heir's age, with G. E. C., who uses the civil reckoning. What Dugdale says, however, as to the age of the heir at the first Earl's death, and the statements of the various authorities above mentioned, on the same point, are not correct. A year ago I examined carefully at the Record Office the original documents there preserved of the inquisitions post mortem, of William Herbert, first Earl of Pembroke, taken shortly after his death in July, 1469. ' These documents are written on parchment, in contracted Latin. Three separate in- quisitions of the Earl's estates were made, at slightly differing dates, and by three different juries, one at Hereford, another at Gloucester, for these two shires and the Marches of Wales adjacent, and a third at London for the deceased's propertv there - situated. In all three inquisitions, William, the first Earl's son and heir, who succeeded as second Earl, is stated to have been 14 years of age in the ninth year of Edward IV. In two of the inquisitions the heir's age is entered in numerals " xiiij.," and in one, viz., that taken in London, the age is in writing " quatuordecim." As this differs considerably from Dugdale' s statement, as well as from what is said on the subject by other authorities, above referred to, I asked one of the experts at the Record Office to examine the documents with me, and this he was good enough to do, and he at once said that there is not the slightest doubt that the age of William, the eldest son and heir of the deceased Earl, is entered in the three inquisitions as being 14 in ninth Edward IV This means that William, second Earl of Pembroke, and afterwards Earl of Hunting- don, was born on Mar. 5, 1454 /5, and not on Mar. 5, 1459/60, or 1460/1. I would suggest the following as a possible explanation of the error in Dugdale' s ' Baronage.' In his account of the first Earl of Pembroke, Dugdale mentions the inquisition as being taken shortly after the Earl's death, and gives a long list of the estates of the deceased, taken from the inquisition. There is some ground for thinking that Dugdale drew his information as to the age, and date of birth of the deceased Earl's son and heir, from one of these inquisitions, viz., from that taken at Hereford, which contains the longest list of the deceased Earl's castles, manors, &c. It is possible that the entries of the heir's age in the two other inquisitions, those made at London and Gloucester, were ex- amined by someone whose investigation Dugdale accepted, and it also seems possible that the first numeral in the heir's age, as entered in the Hereford inquisition, viz., x., which was somewhat unusually formed by the scribe, was mistaken for a v., which might, on a careless inspection have hap- pened, and that the entry of the age was, in consequence, erroneously copied as 9. Such mistake would exactly represent the extent of the error, viz., 5 years, in Dugdale' s ' Baronage,' and in later works, whose authors, doubtless, in most cases took their statements from Dugdale. The Hereford inquisition alone mentions the date of the month (Mar. 5) on which the heir was born The other two inquisitions describe him e- being 14 years old and more, one, at L^ father's death,. and the other, in the ninth year of Edward IV., but do not name his birthday.