A HISTORY OF DERBYSHIRE constitute the Derbyshire property which passed to Morcar by Wulfric ' Spot's ' will. For the rest Ralf fitz Hubert, as his English predecessors had done, held a fairly compact estate in mid-Derbyshire round Crich and Ashover with isolated manors in the north and west and south. 1 The next three fiefs, those of Ralf de Burun, Ascuit Musard, and Gilbert de Gand, are not very important. The juxtaposition in the Survey of Ascuit Musard, who was a Breton, and Gilbert de Gand, who was a Fleming, may help us to realise the extent of the area from which William derived his resources for the conquest of England, the former of these two men being a tenant in chief in Gloucestershire and Warwickshire. Gilbert de Gand had only two manors in Derbyshire, Ilkeston, and Shipley. Of these Ilkeston had belonged to a certain Ulf, styled ' fenisc,' who not only had the rights of sac and soc over his land before the Conquest, 2 but in company with the Archbishop of York and Countess Godiva possessed the earl's third penny also. In all but two of his Nottinghamshire manors 8 Gilbert had been preceded by an Ulf, who appears in that county without any further designation, but is doubtless the Ulf ' fenisc ' of Ilkeston. That Ulf ' fenisc ' in Derbyshire at any rate was the recog- nised predecessor of Gilbert de Gand is proved by the statement, evidently as an exceptional fact, that Shipley, which was in his possession, did not belong to Ulf fenisc in King Edward's time, but to two thegns who could dispose of it by gift or sale to anybody they wished. The next fief, that of Nigel de Stafford, has a peculiar interest in that its owner can be proved to be the direct ancestor in the male line of a family which still exists in its original seat. The Gresleys of Drakelow and Gresley continue to hold in these places two of the manors of their Domesday ancestor, and in the whole of England there is probably no case in which the descent of an existing family can be traced from a Domesday tenant in chief with equal precision.* Gresley itself is not mentioned by name in the Survey, but would seem to be represented by the Heathcote which is surveyed together with Drakelow. We have seen already 6 that Nigel de Stafford held part of Linton as a tenant of Henry de Ferrers, and it is from the Ferrers Carta of 1 166 that we are able to ascertain the first steps in the splendid descent of his family. He held as tenant in chief several other manors in south Derbyshire, including land in Oakthorpe and Donisthorpe, which made part of a group of vills until quite recently surrounded by Leicestershire, and Ravenstone, still further separated from the body of the county. Roger ' de Busli,' whose estates occupy the next column to that assigned to Nigel de Stafford, will more fittingly be considered under Nottinghamshire, where he was by far the greatest landholder. The last column of the Derby Survey is devoted to the anomalous class of king's thegns. This class deserves notice, for all its members were Englishmen, and Professor Freeman attached much importance to its 1 For the descent of this fief see 'The Barons of Criche,' Academy, June, 1885. 8 Dam. fol. z8ob. Ibid. fol. zgob.
- Round, feudal England, 213. 8 See page 302 above.
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