Page:The histories of Launceston and Dunheved, in the county of Cornwall.djvu/88

 70 DUNHEVED. had prevailed under the Saxon government. The prudent Conqueror avoided all violent disruption of popular habits, and amalgamated with the Norman system what- ever was excellent in the Saxon polity and legislation. Even the language of the subjugated race was welded into all public documents. We continually find Latinized Saxon words, not only in Domesday, but in the muniments of later centuries. The Earl Moriton, or Earl of Mortaigne, held his Court at Dunhevet. Before even the compilation of Domesday he had taken from his neighbours at St. Stephen the then important in- stitution, a market, and had transferred it to his favoured place (see page 3). He had apparently surrounded his Castle by a wall, within or contiguous to which a new Town was rapidly rising. Here dwelt the Burgesses, and here were often concentrated the Earl's feudal retainers. His chaplain resided in this Castle. The Burgess was known before the Conquest. He was a freeman occupying a house in a town as tenant of the King or of some inferior lord. In later years the term burgesses evidently extended to females, and to the repre- sentatives of deceased persons who had enjoyed privileges in Dunheved Burgh. We believe there is no record of an actual Charter by Earl Robert to his Burgesses of Dun- hevet, although we have lately found in the Lambeth Library a copy of a grant from him concerning the founda- tion of the Church of Secular Canons at St. Stephen. It is probable that the Burgesses of Dunheved enjoyed under the Earl's personal protection all the known advantages of a free Borough. We shall hereafter specify some of their privileges. The exact time of Robert's death is uncertain. It occurred between the years 1089 and 1097. He was suc- ceeded as Earl of Cornwall by his only son, William, of