Page:The Complete Peerage Ed 2 Vol 4.djvu/722

 yoo APPENDIX H the inheritance of the family of Say(») descended to coheirs, whereupon William de Clinton, C") the senior coheir, assumed the style of Lord Say.(") In 1446/7, when William was dead. Sir James Fiennes, his kinsman, was summoned to Parliament by writ directed Jacoho de Fenys Militi Domino de Say et de Sele. On i Nov. 1448, John Clinton, son of William, surrendered and confirmed to James Fiennes the name and style of Lord Say to him and his heirs and assigns for ever.('') Two years after this writ to James Fiennes, an extraordinary writ of summons issued. On 24 Jan. (1448/9) 27 Hen. VI, twenty-two days after the list of summonses was sent out for the Parliament which was to meet on 12 Feb., Henry de Bromflete received the first and only(') writ of summons importing the bestowal of a peerage barony containing words of inheritance: Rex dilecto et fideli suo Henrico Bromflet militi, baroni de Vessy, salutem i^c. . . . Volumus enim vos et heredes vestros masculos de corpore vestro legitime exeuntes Barones de Vessy existere.(*) To summarise events so far, we have had the first creation of a barony by patent in tail male (Beauchamp of Kidderminster), two assumptions of baronies (Hastings and Say), the creation of the second barony by patent (Fanhope, without limitation), a successful though fraudulent claim to an earldom by tenure (Arundel), a fraudulent claim to tenure in the creation of a barony (Lisle), and the surrender of an assumed barony purporting to confirm it to the grantee and his heirs and assigns. The Dacre case takes us a step further. No explanation was offered of how Thomas Dacre came to inherit the Barony of Dacre " to him and his heirs," but this and the other "fact " that Richard Fiennes was Lord Dacre in right of Joan his wife, tsfc, were introduced successfully into the patent and award respectively, as we have seen. It cannot be doubted, when all the evidence which is forthcoming during this reign is examined, that the heralds were busy preparing precedents. It is to this time that we must look for the seeds of that monstrous growth, the barony by writ. (^) Three generations of this family had been summoned from I3I3-I375. The fourth died an infant, leaving his sister as sole heir. On her death s.p., in 1399, the coheirs were the representatives of her aunts, from the youngest of whom was descended Sir James Fiennes. C*) He was the fourth member of his family to be summoned, and fourth in descent from John Clinton, summoned in 1299 (only). (') The descendants of William Clinton disregarded the renunciation of the style of Say, and continued the assumption so successfully that it eventually was recog- nised officially. The same happened in the case of Reynold de Grey, already mentioned. C) Compare this with the Lisle patent ut supra. (') The three creative writs issued by James II in 1689, after his deposition as King of England, may be disregarded. Dugdale, Summonses, p. 439.