A HISTORY OF DERBYSHIRE ordered, the bailiwick that he had in the forest at the king's pleasure, to be held as before. In the following year there is another case of crown interference with hereditary forestership. On 12 July, 1285, the sheriff of Derbyshire was ordered to cause a regard to be taken of the Peak forest before Michaelmas, preparatory to the holding of the forest pleas ; and on i August he was further instructed to issue summons of an eyre for forest pleas to be held at Derby to all concerned, save Brother William de Henley, prior of the Hospitallers, and Edmund the king's brother, who were excused attendance. 1 Thirty-four years had passed by since the last eyre. The pleas of the forest were held at Derby on 30 September, 1285, before Roger Lestrange, Peter de Leach, and John FitzNigel, justices of the forest. The full rolls of this eyre are also extant at the Public Record Office.* From the rolls then produced the list of bailiffs from the time of the last eyre can be continued: William de Horsenden, 1251 ; Ralph Bugg, 1252 ; Ivo de Elynton, 1253 5 Richard de Vernon, 1254 ; Gervase de Bernake, 1255 ; Thomas de Orreby, 1256 ; Richard le Ragged, 1257 ; William de Findern, 1258 ; Thomas de Furnival, 1264 ; Roger Lestrange, 1274; Thomas Foljambe, 1277; Thomas de Normanville, 1277; Thomas de Furnival, 1279; Thomas le Ragged, 1280; Thomas Foljambe, 1281 ; 8 and Robert Bovon, 1283. The jurors of 1285 confirmed the privileges of the foresters of fee as accepted in 1251. The Campana foresters of fee of that date were John Daniel ; Thomas le Archer ; Thomas, son of Thomas Foljambe, a minor in the custody of Thomas de Gretton ; Nicholas Foljambe, who had been a minor in the custody of Henry de Medue, but was then of full age ; and Adam Gomfrey ; and of these foresters Adam Gomfrey and Thomas Foljambe held jointly the same bovate, which had formerly been divided between two brothers. Also Thomas Foljambe and John le Wolfhunte held another bovate in the same way, John holding his half by hereditary descent, whilst Thomas Foljambe, sen., had acquired his half by marriage with Katherine, daughter of Hugh de Mirhaud. This subdivision of serjeanties became burdensome to the district, as each forester of fee endeavoured to have a servant maintained at the expense of the tenants ; but the jurors confirmed a decision of the hundred court of 1275 to the effect that there could be only four such servants or officers, according to ancient custom, for the Campana bailiwick. The bovate of land held by Wolfhunte and Foljambe was a serjeanty assigned for taking of wolves in the forest. On the jurors being asked what were the duties pertaining to that service, the following was the highly interesting reply : ' Each year, in March and September, they ought to go through the midst of the forest to set traps to take the wolves in the places where they had been found by the hounds ; and if the scent was not good because of the upturned earth, then they should go at other times in the summer (as on St. Barnabas' day, 1 1 June), when the wolves had whelps (catulos), to take and destroy them, but at no other times ; and they might take with them a sworn servant to carry the traps (ingenia) ; they were to carry a bill-hook and spear, and hunting-knife at their belt, but neither bows nor arrows ; and they were to have with them an unlawed mastiff trained to the work. All this they were to do at their own charges, but they had no other duties to discharge in the forest.' * The names of the foresters of the two other wards are also set forth. 1 Close, 1 3 Edw. I. m. 5d. 3 Duchy of Lane. For. Proc. , , ^-, a good abstract of part of this eyre was given by Rev. C. Kerry, in vol. xv. of Derb. Arch. Journ. (1893). 8 The total receipts of Thomas Foljambe for this year as bailiff or steward of the High Peak and constable of the castle amounted to 260. Duchy of Lane. Mins. Accts. 1 ff 9 .
- There are two slightly different versions of this interesting account of the trapping of wolves to
be found on Nos. 3 and 1 1 of Forest Proceedings, Duchy of Lane, bundle i. Nos. 3, 5, and 1 1 of this bundle all relate to the pleas of 1251, the two last being transcripts, apparently by the pleas clerk, from the rolls supplied by the different officials. In T ^- the expression is ' ad ponendam peditas ad lupos capiendos,' but in -J ' peyas ' takes the place of ' peditas.' It has been thought that peyas means pitch, and that the wolves were to be caught on the same principle as fowling with bird-lime. But wolves, with their keen smell, could not be thus taken, and ' peyas ' is probably only a wrong rendering of ' peditas ' or gins. The sentence is not grammatical in either roll, and the meaning of the ' terram fossam ' interfering with the scent at the more usual time for this wolf hunting can scarcely refer to new ploughed or dug land, of which there was scarcely any in the forest ; but the more probable meaning is that the wolves themselves might detect the soil disturbed for setting the traps. The abundance of wolves throughout England in pre-Norman days is borne witness to by the Saxon name for January, namely, the Wolf- month. There was probably no part of England where the wolves had surer or more prolonged retreats than amid the wilds of the Peak forest and its borders. The last places in this country where 404
