Page:VCH Leicestershire 1.djvu/417

 LEICESTERSHIRE SURVEY on the Nottinghamshire border. The total of 77 1 carucates which is thus obtained for Gosecote wapentake is suggestively near to the 775 carucates assigned to that of Guthlaxton, and indeed suggests that a symmetrical scheme of distribution may have been applied to the assessments of the four wapentakes in the county. It seems distinctly probable that the assessments of the two northern wapentakes of Gosecote and Framland were intended respectively to equal the assessments of the two southern wapentakes of Guthlaxton and Gartree. If this were the case the total assessment of the county must have been something very near 2,664 carucates ; a sum which would represent 148 of those i8-carucate units which are described as ' hides ' in the present survey and in Domesday. It is impossible to attain certainty in regard to matters of this kind, but the evidence of the document we arc considering, combined with that of Domesday, undoubtedly suggests that some scheme, such as that indicated here, really underlay the distribution of the Leicestershire assessment. The changes in the distribution of land in the county which are revealed by the Leicestershire Survey were worked out in detail by Mr. Round upon his publication of the record in Feudal England. They are indeed suffi- ciently far-reaching. The royal demesne had been granted away wholesale, the chief grantees being the earl of Chester, the count of Mortain, Norman de Verdon, and Richard Basset. The latter, a favourite official of Henry I, had received, probably only a few years before the date of our survey, almost the entire Domesday fief of Robert de Buci, from which he endowed the priory of Launde, the documents relating to this house enabling us to trace his succession to. Robert de Buci in parts of Leicestershire which lie outside the scope of the Leicestershire Survey as we possess it. 13 Probably the largest fief in the county at this time was that of the young earl of Leicester, whose father had become possessed of the lands held in 1086 by Hugh de Grentemaisnil after the manner described in the Domesday Introduction. The bulk of the Countess Judith's lands had passed to her son-in-law, David king of Scots. At least three important Domesday fiefs had been divided by the date of the survey : Robert de Todeni's lands were held by William de Albini 1 * 1 and Robert ' de Insula,' the fief of Robert ' Dispensator' had passed to his heirs Robert Marmion and Walter de Beauchamp, and of Roger de Busli's estate the important vill of Saltby had been given to William Peverel, the remainder apparently being held by the king as part of the forfeited Honour of Blyth. On the other hand the Domesday fief of Henry de Ferrers had more than maintained its integrity in the hands of his son Robert, although certain lands which had been held of the former by Nigel de Stafford were now held in chief of the crown by the latter's son William. 16 Roger de Mowbray appears in possession of the entire fief of Geoffrey de Wirce, upon the most important manor of which he was to confer his surname ; William Meschin, the brother of Earl Randulf of Chester, had received part of the land of William Loveth and had also " feudal England, 210-12. 13 Ralf Basset the justiciar held land in Great Dalby which had formerly belonged to Robert de Buci. 14 Robert, count of Meulan, had died in n 18, leaving two sons, both minors at the time. 14a Cf. Mr. Round's remarks on this succession in his report on the Belvoir charters; Belvoir MSS. (Hist. MSS. Com. Rep.), iv. 15 For Nigel de Stafford, the founder of the Derbyshire family of Gresley, see y.C.H. Derby, i, 306. 343 u