Page:VCH Essex 1.djvu/461

 THE DOMESDAY SURVEY Gernon's in Domesday and which had nothing to do with Ardleigh. A similar case is that of Burnham, where Morant believed the Hodeng family to have held a considerable estate (i. 364 ; ii. 379). The place however with which they had to do was not the Essex, but the Bucking- hamshire Burnham, famous for its beeches. In these instances of course it might be urged that the history of other counties was not so accessible to Morant as it is to ourselves. But this explanation will not account for the cases in which he gave as history a manorial descent which was merely an erroneous guess of his own. The descent of Thorrington was traced by him through three generations of the house of Anestie till it passed by marriage to Montchensy (i. 450). But the house of Anestie had never had anything to do with Thorrington, which was one of those Essex manors which the great house of Montchensy obtained as successors to its Domesday tenant, Ralf the son of Turold. Morant, knowing that they had obtained some Anestie manors by marriage, merely guessed that Thorrington was among them. 1 Even more extraordinary was his treatment of Blunts Hall, which he asserted to have been held by the great Blund family, and to have passed with their heiress to the house of Valognes (ii. 108), although both statements are altogether imaginary and are even disproved by his own evidence.* The case of Great and Little Birch is a further instance. An In- quisition of May 9, 1275, taken after the death of Aveline, Countess of Lancaster, and cited in two places by Morant himself, 3 proves that Little Birch was one of a group of manors held of her, as one of the heirs of Robert Gernon's barony, by Robert de Verley. Among these manors were those of Salcot (Verley) and Gernons in Tolleshunt (Darcy), both of which are entered in Domesday as held of Robert Gernon by Robert de ' VerhY This group was held as four knights' fees, and was one of those which are found as so held in the Montfichet carta of 1166.* From this evidence we learn that the * Bricia ' entered in Domesday as held by Robert Gernon was Little Birch, and that ' Robert,' its under- tenant, was Robert de Verli. Yet Morant identified it as Great Birch in the teeth of the evidence printed by himself. Moreover his own history of the manor of ' William a Birches ' in Great Birch proves clearly that it was held of the Montfort ' Honour of Haughley ' and must therefore be identified with Hugh de Montfort's Domesday manor of Layer (' Legra '), to which it adjoins. And yet he makes that ' Legra ' to be identical with two manors in Layer de la Hay, which he could not connect in any way with Hugh de Montfort (i. 41 1-2). The connection of Hugh de Montfort's fief with the constableship of Dover is often of great assistance in helping us to trace his manors. Domesday assigns to him one manor situate in Chelmsford Hundred, makes it the subject of a long entry, and names it * Bedenesteda.' As 1 Sec my paper on 'The Descent of Thorrington ' in Essex Arch, Trans, [n.s.] viii. 373-4. 1 See my paper on ' Trcgoz of Tolleshunt Tregoz' in Essex Arch. Trans, [n.s.] viii. 331-2. 1 Vol. i. 423 ; ii. 184. This particular portion of the return appears to be now lost. 389
 * ReJ Book of the Exchequer, p. 349. It was probably the first on the list.