http://boar.org.uk/ariwxo3FNQ338.htm Latest edit 28 Nov 2007.
Interactive version ©2006 R.J.PENHEY
The Bourne Archive
FNQ
Fenland
Notes and Queries.
Edited by Rev. W.D. Sweeting,
Rector of Maxey.
Part 16. January 1893.
This quarterly periodical took the form of a forum in
which people sent in questions about the history, ecology and so on of the
Because of its length, the late fifteenth century document
was spread between two FNQ articles of which this is the first. The second is
FNQ 380. Two print versions are available. These include only the text of the
1500 document, one in the original Latin, the other translated. Each of the
print versions combines the relevant material from FNQ 338 and FNQ 380.
No claim is made as to the authorship of the FNQ articles
but they are almost certainly by Sweeting. The parts of words in the Latin text
which are printed in Italic will be those which Sweeting has reinstated after
they had been omitted by the 1500 legal scribe’s shorthand (or that of the copyist).
I have inserted national
grid references in end notes to facilitate the placing of the names
metioned, on a map. These are unqualified where I estimate the probability of
their accuracy to be greater than 95%. Otherwise an indication of estimated
pobability is given.
R.J.P.
Bookmarks: – Boston : Bridgedike : Collyweston: Gobionbooth : Great Sluice:
Kyme Hall : Maxey Castle : Old Ea (Witham) : Shedingfleet :
Willowbooth : Wragmer Stake
: List of Jurors
Administration
338
– The Limits of Kesteven and
In this year [14 Rich. II.,
1390-91], upon question betwixt the inhabitants of Kesteven and
But this commission did not have
the desired effect of finally settling the dispute. On the following page
Dugdale refers to another commission that was held a little more than a hundred
years later, at the instance of the Countess of Richmond
and Derby.4 He
does not, however, give any details of this commission (except the names of the
jurors), nor describe the boundaries which it prescribed. Among the archives of
the Commissioners
of Sewers at Spalding is a certified copy of what may be called the report of this
commission. It is a paper of singular interest, but as it would be too long to
be inserted in its entirety in one part of Fenland
Notes and Queries, we propose to print it by instalments, together with a
translation.
The document is thus endorsed : –
Ao Henrici septimi 16o
The Limitts of Holland & Kesteven tempore Margaretae
Comitissae
Undr ye hands of Mr
Anderson Maior of Boston5 & Mr Gannoch Justice
ibm. [ibidem - in the same place]
It will be seen that quarrels
between the two provinces had not ceased, and that the Countess, in the
interest of peace, had obtained this new commission from the King, her son. She
resided frequently at Collyweston,6 and had also a residence at Maxey Castle. The latter property had been in the royal
family since the time of Eleanor of Castile.
Both these places are mentioned in the document. The date of the report is 8
Sep. 1500.
Innotescat Omnibus presentibus7 et futuris Quod piissima et nobilissima princeps Margareta Comitissa Richemond
et Darby Mater charissima domini nostri
domini regis Henrici septimi dum magnum
pontem infra villam sancti Botulphi restaurare instituit et sub eodem Cataractam
sive Slusam redintegrare sive edificare et constituere in utilitatem omnium paludum et mariscorum inter aquas de
Welland et Wytham et totius patrie circumiacentis de Kesteven et Holland et
eandem perpetuo manuteneri voluit
imposterum et conservari sumptibus et expensis hominum de Holland Quia illi maxime utilitatem exinde caperent et
precipue villata de sancto Botulpho predicta
ratione profundioris portus per
eandem futuri (ut speratur) Et quia propter discordias ex malitia motas non liquide constat omnibus Ubi limites mete bunde et diuisiones inter partes predictas iaceant vel posite sunt inter aquas predictas Quia homines de Kesteven ex dedita opera ut
metas predictas delerent et
confunderent aliquot Cruces sanctas
dividentes partes predictas nuper subruebant et abstulerunt
ex qua re satis intellecta et cognita prefata nobilissima princeps odio habens
huiusmodi discordias et contentiones et iniurias et cupiens enixe
veritatem revocari et redintegrari per
litteras suas impetravit a domino Rege Commissionem suam sub
sigillo directam Roberto domino
Willowghbie Thome domino Rosse Thome domino
ffitzwater Georgio domino Haystings Johanni domino ffitzwarren Roberto Dymocke militi Georgio Taylboys militi
Edwardo Stanley militi Reginaldo Bray militi et Christoffero Willoughbie militi Ut illi decem novem octo septem vel sex eorum
causam querimonium et lites exinde
ortas cognoscerent audirent et imposterum determinarent quibuscumque
vijs medijs et modis possent et valerent.
Unde predicti Commissionarij mandatum suum mittunt virtute Commissionis predicte Vice Comiti Lincolniensi ut ad certum diem et locum coram
ipsis venire faceret xxiiijor probos
et legales homines de Balliva sua per
quos rei veritas melius cognosci poterit ad inquirendum de controuersia predicta
Ad quem diem scilicet quarto die Septembris Anno xvjto regni domini domini regis Henrici vij: predictus Vice Comes Lincolniensis retornavit breve predictum et Commissionarij predicti humiliter obtemperantes domine
nobilissime comitisse que apud Collyweston illos convocavit et in mandatis
dedit et oravit ut causam hanc diligenter caute et accurate agerent et
tractarent secundum veritatem et post crebras et longas perambulaciones unacum Juratoribus
habitas et Postquam his cum Juratoribus
limites et bundas partium predictarum
lustrassent nunc equites nunc pedites nunc Cimbis vecti primo ab aqua de
Welland ad Wytham et deinde e contra procedendo interea multis evidentijs et
rotulis et Recordis coram Commissionarijs
et Juratoribus hinc et illinc ostensis apud Sessiones suas inceptas apud Kime in domo mansionali predicti Georgij Taylboys militis dicto quarto die Septembris anno xvjto dicti
domini regis henrici septimi (ut prefertur) et finitas apud Maxey Castle in
presentia prefate nobilissime Comitisse quarto die post videlicet octavo die
Septembris predicte receperunt
veredictum Juratorum in hec verba
Viz: Inquisitio indentata capta apud Maxey Castle in Comitatu Northampton viijo die Septembris Anno regni regis
Henrici septimi xvjto in presentia
nobilissime Comitisse Margarete Comitisse
Richemond et Darby coram Roberto domino Willoughbie Thoma domino Rosse Thoma domino ffitzWater Georgio domino
Haystings Roberto Dymocke milite Georgio Taylboys milite Edvardo Stanley milite
et Cristoffero Willoughbie milite per sacramentum Roberti Husse militis et sociorum suorum qui in mandatis
precipue habent ut omni qua possent diligentia querant ubi antique rate et vere
bunde mete diuisiones et limites inter Kesteven et Holland sint vel esse debent
inter aquas de Wytham et Welland et addita exinde quacumque cura labore et inquisicione Juratores predicti dicunt
super sacramentum Suum Quod
antique rate et vere bunde mete et limites dividentes partes predictas sunt que
sequuntur Viz eundo ab aqua de Wytham et tendendo ad aquam de Welland dicte mete bunde et limites incipiunt in
loco ubi aqua de Wytham et Kyme Water simul cadunt et coniunguntur et ab eodem
loco ascendendo occidentaliter sicut Cursus aque predicte vocate Kyme Water currit et tendit usque ad locum ubi le ould Ea cadit in aquam de Kyme et ab eodem loco vertendo australiter et ascendendo per cursum dicte ould Ea alias
Holland dike alias Kime dike Quia diuidet partes predictas usque ab Willobothe et tunc ascendendo directe per fossam predictam vocatam le Ould Ea usque ad South Ea et deinde sicut le South Ea venit a quadam Syka
vocata le Shedingflete et ab eodem
loco directe recta fere linia ad Wragmerstake alias Blackestake habita levi et parva
declinacione ad sinistram videlicet orientem. Et Juratores
predicti dicunt super sacramentum suum Quod tunc procedendum sit versus austrum per
Gobyonbothe alias Molbothe usque ad Gristhirn alias Grist declinando paululum
inter Gobyonbothe et Grist versus occidentem
et tunc ascendendo versus Australiter per
quandam sykam que ducit directe inter
litle folinge Worthill et greate folinge Worthill quorum prius dictm est in Holland et posterius dictum in Kesteven et tunc
ascendendo versus austrum per dictam sykam directe ad crucem lapideam
super brigedike que posita fuit in honorem dei beate marie virginis ut semper
sit meta et bunda inter partes predictas.
Translation
[Kesteven and
Be it known to all present and
future that whereas the most pious and most noble princess Margaret Countess of
Richmond and Derby the most dear mother of our sovereign lord King Henry the
seventh decided to restore the great bridge within the town of Boston and to renew
or build a flood-gate or sluice beneath the same8 and to construct it for the use of
all the fens and marshes between the waters of Welland and Wytham and all the country
round about of Kesteven and Holland and wished the same to be perpetually
maintained and kept in repair at the costs and expenses of the men of Holland
because they would derive most advantage from it and especially the township of
Boston by reason of the deeper harbour that would be created (as is hoped) And
because through quarrels moved by malice it is not clearly agreed by all where
the limits metes bounds and divisions between the parts aforesaid lie or are
placed between the waters aforesaid Because the men of Kesteven with deliberate
intention of destroying and putting into confusion the metes aforesaid lately
overthrew and carried off some consecrated Crosses that divided the parts
aforesaid and when this matter was sufficiently understood and known the
aforesaid most noble princess holding the detestation quarrels and contentions
and wrongs of this sort and desiring earnestly that the truth should be
regained and restored by her letters obtained from our sovereign the King his
Commission directed under his seal to Robert Lord Willoughbie9 Thomas Lord Ross10
Thomas Lord Fitzwater11 George Lord Haystings12 John Lord Fitz warren13 Sir Robert Dymocke14 Sir George Taylboys15 Sir Edward Stanley16 Sir Reginald Bray17
and Sir Christopher Willoughbie18
That they ten nine eight seven or six of them19 enquire into and hear the cause of
complaints and the strifes that have arisen on the subject and finally
determine them by whatever ways means and manners the possibly could. Whereupon the aforesaid Commissioners send
their mandate by virtue of the Commission aforesaid to the Sheriff of Lincoln20 that he would cause to appear before
them at a certain day and place twenty four good and lawful men of his
bailiwick by whom the truth of the matter might be better ascertained for
enquiring into the controversy aforesaid
On which day that is to say the fourth day of September in the sixteenth
year of the reign of our sovereign lord King Henry the seventh the aforesaid
Sheriff of Lincoln returned the writ aforesaid and the Commissioners aforesaid
humbly obedient to the most noble lady countess who summoned them to
Collyweston and charged them and entreated them to deal with this cause
diligently cautiously and accurately and discuss it according to the truth and
after frequent and lengthy perambulations had with the Jurors and after they
had with these Jurors examined the limits and bounds of the parts aforesaid sometimes
on horseback sometimes on foot and sometimes in boats going first from the
water of Welland to Wytham and then going the reverse way many evidences rolls
and records having meantime been exhibited here and there before the
Commissioners and Jurors at their Sessions commenced at Kime in the mansion
house of the aforesaid Sir George Taylboys on the said fourth day of September
in the sixteenth year of the lord King Henry the seventh (as said before) and
finished at Maxey Castle in the presence of the aforesaid most noble Countess
on the fourth day after namely the eighth day of September aforesaid received
the verdict of the Jurors in these words viz : Inquisition held at Maxey Castle
in the county of Northampton the eighth day of September in the sixteenth year
of the reign of King Henry the seventh in the presence of the most noble
Countess Margaret Countess of Richmond and Derby before Robert Lord Willoughbie
Thomas Lord Rosse Thomas Lord FitzWater George Lord Haystings Sir Robert
Dymocke Sir George Taylboys Sir Edward Stanley and Sir Christopher Willoughbie
by the oath of Sir Robert Husse21 and his fellows who were specially charged with all
possible diligence to enquire where the ancient settled and true bounds metes divisions
and limits between Kesteven and Holland are or ought to be between the waters
of Wytham and Welland and after using in the matter every kind of care labour
and enquiry the Jurors aforesaid say on their oath That the ancient settled and true bounds
metes and limits dividing the parts aforesaid are as follows Viz: In going from the water of Wytham and
proceeding to the water of Welland the said bounds and limits begin in a place
where the water of Wytham and Kyme water fall together22
and are joined and from the same place going up westward as the course of the
water aforesaid called Kyme Water runs and goes up to the place where the Old Ea23
falls into the water of Kyme and from the same place turning to the south and
going up by the course of the Old Ea otherwise Holland dike otherwise Kime
dike Because it will divide the parts
aforesaid up to Willobothe24 and
then going directly up to the ditch aforesaid called Old Ea up to the South
Ea And then as the South Ea comes from a
certain Syke called the Shedingflete25
and from the same place directly by an almost straight line26
taken to Wragmerstake otherwise Blakestake by a gentle and slight
turn to the left that is to say to the east27 And the Jurors aforesaid say upon their oath
that then one must proceed towards the south by Gobyonbothe otherwise
Molbothe27 up to Gristhirn otherwise Grist turning a little
between Gobyonbothe and Grist towards the west and then going up towards the
south by a certain syke which leads directly between Little Folinge Worthill
and Great Folinge Worthill whereof the former is said to be in Holland and the
latter in Kesteven and then going up towards the south through the said syke
directly to a stone cross on Bridgedike which was erected to the honour of
God and the Blessed Virgin Mary to be always a mete and bound between the parts
aforesaid.
Footnotes
1 ^
Kesteven and Holland are two
of the three Parts into which the
2 ^
By about 500 (a little earlier rather than later), Kesteven was only partially
settled by the English but Holland people were beginning to move past the
southern end of the mud flats, into southern Kesteven as at Baston, for example. But this
was the time when the British
began fighting
back so the Baston settlement appears to have been withdrawn (Mayes & Dean). By
putting together snippets of information left by Nennius and Gildas, we
get the picture that the expansion of the English area of settlement was
inhibited for a couple of generations. Archaeological finds in Kesteven seem
consistent with this. In Kesteven, the settlement later progressed again but in
the fens at the southern end of
the present document’s terms of reference, Crowland, the delay seems to
have lasted nearer two hundred years. The locals were speaking Brythonic
when Guthlac arrived
in 699. By the time they faced each other, the men of Kesteven and of Holland
were strangers by at least two generations and in the cases of both Holland and
Kesteven vis à vis Crowland, of quite
different cultures. There was friction which became a tradition. This was
particularly so between Deeping, in Kesteven and Crowland. But there was also a
tradition of trouble between
Spalding and Crowland; as well as the boundary disputes between Crowland and
3 ^ Robert
Willoughby, 4th Baron Willoughby de Eresby (1349-1396).
4 ^ Lady Margaret on the Tudor History
site.
5 ^
6 ^
Tudor History site footnotes.
7 ^ The letters in Italic
type will be those which Sweeting has reinstated after they had been dropped by
the 1500 legal scribe (or the copyist) as part of his
shorthand.
8 ^ This is clearly not the same sluice as that erected by Alan
de Croun and another Margaret, Countess of Richmond (1142) during Stephen’s reign (Wheeler, p26). This was
called the ‘Great Sluice’ and was a precursor of the modern Grand Sluice but in
a place described as ‘where the hundreds of Skirbeck and Kirton divide’. In the
mid-nineteenth century, this description would place it at TF342417, (now Slippery
Gowt Farm) (PBC). Allowing
for earlier wandering of the main channel of the Haven would extend the range
between TF342417 and TF352413 (PBC
viewed in the light of SS).
The configuration of the boundary between Skirbeck and Skirbeck Quarter makes
TF348415 the most likely spot (PBC
compared with SS and O1S37).
1. Part of the
1831 Parliamentary Boundary Commission map. The southern boundary separates the
Kirton and Skirbeck Wapentakes.
2. Part of
Hondius’ 1610 map of
1
2
The sluice mentioned in the present document,
incorporating the bridge, was on the site (after at least two rebuilds of the
bridge part - in 1631 and 1741) of the precursor of Rennie’s
9 ^ It is difficult to place him. He is listed as a lord both
explicitly and by his position in the list, so he was not Sir Robert Willoughby
of Parham. However, There was no Robert in the appropriate generations of the Willoughby de
Eresby line. It looks as though someone has confused him with the earlier,
Robert, 4th Baron Willoughby de Eresby.
10 ^ Again, he is difficult to place. See Baron Ros
11 ^ This
link is the best I can find.
12 ^ George
Hastings, de jure 12th Baron Hastings (1474-1512)
13 ^ He will have been one of this family.
15 ^ This will be an
indication of the family connections.
16 ^ He will have been one of this Stanley family
therefore a relative by marriage of Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Derby.
17 ^ See Reginald Bray. As a ‘new
man’ he is low in the list.
18 ^ He was a brother of William
Willoughby, 11th Baron. Each was a son of Christopher
Willoughby, 10th. Baron Willoughby de Eresby.
21 ^ Hussey, another family name prominent in
22 ^ This is the point at which the course of the modern
Witham diverges from that of the pre-eleventh century Witham. The point
referred to in the text lies between Dogdyke and
23 ^ The name ‘Old Ea’, that is ‘old river’, derives
from its having been the old course of the Witham. (RJP3) The junction between this
and Kyme Eau is at TF194506. It is better-known as Holland Dyke and marks the
eastern boundary of South Kyme Fen in Kesteven and the western boundary of Mary
Land in Holland Fen.
24 ^ This appears to have been at the
junction between the Old Ea and the South Ea, TF215659, where the Old Witham
flowed on to Swineshead and Drayton, via
the line of the Skerth and the South Ea entered it from the middle of the south
Kesteven/west Holland fens.
25 ^ The Sheddingfleet
appears to have been the drain which connected the
26 ^ The first
Ordnance Survey shows this as being on one line with the Midfendyke. (RJP3) It runs from TF216458 to be
cut by the South Forty Foot Drain at TF200419.
27 ^ This bend seems to be in Horbling Fen at
about TF170353, close to where Phillips shows a possible Roman road across the
fen. This road is usually taken as having served to carry salt and other
products away from the coast.
28 ^ This was by Billingborough Lode at TF162326,
just to the north-west of Neslam Bridge Farm.
Second
part (FNQ 380) Third part (FNQ 425) Fourth part (FNQ468) Printable version (English) Printable version (Latin) FNQ Home page