Page:Surrey Archaeological Collections Volume 7.djvu/118

 Harow was the property of the Windsors and the Braunches, except in the church, the northern doorway of which, now blocked up, exhibits a Norman arch, while other features of the interior, if not a roodloft and porch now destroyed, must have been added at a somewhat later date. The inquisition taken on the death of Henry de Guldeford in 1313 proves the existence of a manorhouse (messuage), with a dovecot, at that period, and another inquisition taken forty-one years later specifies a manor-house, garden, and two dovecots, then valuable adjuncts of a family residence. The water-mill entered in the first inquisition is stated in the second inquisition to have become dilapidated. Whether the farm of Ryhill was then included in the parish of Peper Harow, and whether the manor was on this side coextensive with the parish, are points on which I cannot speak with certainty. What is known is that Ryhill, under the name of Rie-hull, was granted to the Abbey of Waverley by one Ralph, probably the same who was Sheriff of Surrey in 1157-9; that his grant was confirmed by a bull of Pope Eugenius III., in 1147; and that Waverley Abbey appears, from entries preserved in Dugdale's "Monasticon," and elsewhere, to have derived revenues from lands in the manor, as well as in the parish, of Peper Harow. Hence we may fairly infer that Ryhill formed part of Peper Harow manor when it was granted to Sir William Fitzwilliams with the other Waverley estates in the 28th year of Henry VIII.'s reign; and in a deed of 1602, lands called "Ryalls" are expressly described both as lying in the parish of Peper Harow and as parcel of the Manor of Peper Harow.

In the year 1369, Peper Harow was in the hands of Sir Bernard Brocas, who afterwards became Master of the Buckhounds to Richard II. and was honoured by a tombstone in Westminster Abbey. From this date we hear no more of the Braunche family, but the superior lordship of Peper Harow was apparently vested in the Windsors, at least up to the 30th year of Henry VI., when it is mentioned in the inquisitio post mortem on the death of "Milo Wyndesore." This inquisition seems to