ward the Third, by his Letters Patent, dated at Shene, in the fiftyfirst of his reign, granted Anstie, with its Castle, and the Castle of Fotheringay, to his fifth son, Edward of Langley. Edward, Duke of York, his son and successor, who was slain in the battle of Agincourt, obtained license from Henry the Fifth, to make over this, and other manors, to Henry, Bishop of Winchester, and others, in trust, for the completion of the collegiate Church of Fotheringay; towards the building and endowment of which, he had expended large sums. His descendant, Edward the Fourth, granted Anstie to Cecily, Duchess of York, his mother; after whose death it reverted to, and continued in, the Crown, till Henry the Eighth granted it to his Queen, Jane Seymour, for life. After her death, he again granted it, in the thirty-sixth of his reign, to John Cock, Esq. of Broxbourn, in consideration of the payment, into the Exchequer, of 2881. 12s. 10d. to hold by the fortieth part of a Knight's fee, and the yearly rent of 20s. From his heirs it passed through various families; and lastly, by purchase, to Sir Rowland Lytton, of Knebworth; and it is still in possession of the representative of his family. The artificial mount, on which stood the Keep, or more ancient part of the Castle, still remains surrounded by a moat; together with a deep ditch and rampart, that inclosed the additions made in the time of King John. The Church is built in the form of a cross, with a low tower rising from the intersection of the nave and chancel in the latter are some ancient stalls. In the south aisle is an ancient monument, with the effigies, as traditionally reported, of Richard de Anstie, the builder of the Church. BRENT PELHAM, FURNEUX PELHAM, and STOCKING PELHAM, are now three distinct parishes; but at the period of making the Domesday Survey, they were all included in one, under the general name of Pelham; and though divided into seven parcels, were all held of the Bishop of London. How they were alienated from his See is unknown; but in the time of Henry the Third, Simon de Furneuse was Lord of the whole, as appears by his pleading a grant of liberty of free-warren from that King, when summoned to show his right by a Quo Warranto in the reign of Edward the First. The Manor of Stocking Pelham, however, he is recorded to have held of the Bishop of London, as of his Castle at Stortford, by homage, and the payment of 10s. annually, for the defence of the Castle. The name of Furneux Pelham was derived from his family: that of Brent Pelham was obtained from a fire in the reign of Henry the First, which nearly destroyed the whole place, together with the Church: and that of Stocking or Stockin Pelham, was, according to Salmon, so given from its being situated adjacent to some wood, that had been grubbed or stock ed up. The descent of the Manors of Furneux Pelham, and Brent Pelham, was the same for several centuries. From the family of Furneux they passed by an heiress to Sir John de la Lee, or At Lee, who represented this county in a Parliament held at Westminster in the twenty-ninth of Edward the Third. Sir Walter, his son and heir, was also a representative for this county in the fiftyfirst of the same King; and in the time of his successor, Richard the Second, he was Knight of the shire in no fewer than ten of the numerous Parliaments held during that troublesome reign. He was also Sheriff of Hertford and Essex, in the thirteenth of the same Sovereign. He dying without issue in the nineteenth of Richard, was succeeded in these manors by Robert Newport, Esq. who had married Margery, his eldest sister and co-heiress. This Robert was Knight of the shire in the second, and again in the twelfth, of Henry the Fourth; and in his descendants these estates continued till the time of Henry the Eighth, when they passed in marriage with an heiress to the family of the Parkers, Lords Morley; William, Lord Monteagle, sold Furneux Pelham to Edward Newport, Esq. about the year 1616; and in 1619, he also disposed of Brent Pelham to the same gentleman, who was descended from the family of his name that had before held these manors. The Manor-House, called Pelham Hall, with the demesne and parks connected with it, had been previously sold, by the Lord Monteagle, to Richard Mead, Esq. of Bearden, who pulled down a considerable part of the buildings: it afterwards passed through different families to the Calverts, who became owners by purchase about the year 1677: they also became pos sessed sessed of the Manor of Stocking Pelham, of which the history is Brent Pelham was sold to the very obscure, in the same manner. Floyers in the time of Charles the First. The Church at BRENT PELHAM is a small structure, consisting only of a single pace, with a tower at the west end; the chancel is of brick-work. In the north wall of the nave is the curious monument of O PIERS SHONKES, who is said to have been owner of a subordinate manor in this parish very soon after the Conquest; and the site of his mansion is still pointed out, surrounded by a moat. The lower part of the tomb is of modern brickwork; but the top is covered with an ancient slab of Petworth marble, sculptured in very high relief, with the figure of an angel, surrounded by the symbols of the Evangelists, and sustaining a festoon of drapery, out of which rises a small human figure, with his hands raised in the attitude of prayer: below this, in the centre of the slab, is a cross fleury, with a kind of branched stem, the lower end of which is entering the mouth of a dragon or serpent. This symbolical representation of the triumph of Christianity, was most probably the origin of a traditional tale concerning the person buried here, and which represents him as having so offended the Devil, by killing a serpent, that his Highness threatened to secure him, whether buried within or without the walls of a Church; to avoid which, he was deposited in the wall itself. Over the tomb is this inscription, which, as it differs from the copies given both by Chauncy and Salmon, has most probably been renewed since their times. O PIERS SHONKES Tantum Fama manet Cadmi, Sanctiq. Georgi Nothing of Cadmus, nor St. George, those names Whatever Whatever might have given rise to the tradition, it would seem that O'Shonkes was a character much venerated, as the buttresses on the outside of the Church, which bound the place of his sepulture, are marked with Crosses. The Exchequer rolls mention a Gilbert Sank, of Brent Pelham, upon whom Simon de Furneuse made a distress in the sixteenth of Edward the First, for his homage and service, and 40s. and sixpence, annual rent.* The Church at FURNEUX PELHAM consists of a nave, chancel, and side aisles, with a small tower, in the centre of the struc ture, at the west end: the chancel appears the most ancient, and has a cross fleury at the summit of the east end. It is somewhat remarkable, that there was originally no entrance from the west; but a door-way has been opened through the lower part of a large ramified pointed arched window. The windows of the aisles have obtuse arches, and are each divided by mullions into three trefoil-headed lights, with crockets and smaller lights above. In the north aisle remains a very curious piece of Gothic Screen-work; the ancient seat of the Newports, Lords of the Manor, covered with an elegant canopy of light tracery, carved in wood. Over the door are the ancient arms of the Newports, parte per fess, a lion rampant; the more modern arms of the family, Or, a fess between three crescents sable; and another shield, bearing gules, on a cross azure, five tygers heads, Or: each of these shields had deer for its supporters. In a Burial-Chapel appropriated to the interment of the families of the Lords of the Manor, and connected with the south aisle, and in the south aisle itself, are the mutilated remains of several monuments for the Newports, and their predecessors, the At Lees; but all without inscriptions: several of these, however, have been preserved by Weever and Chauncy. On a slab in the pavement, is also this inscription in Saxon characters: Symon: Defvrnevr filius. This is thought to be of the time of Edward the First, and to be intended for the son of the Simon de Furneuse who pleaded to the Quo Warranto in that reign. On one of the tombs are Brasses of a male and female under rich cano pies: Salmon's Herts, p. 289. pies: the former has a small sword, or dagger, at his left side, and is standing upon a shepherd's dog; his beard is forked in the fashion of the times of Richard the Second. His Lady is in the dress of the same age. The inscription and arms are gone; but the whole costume of the figures evinces this to be the monument which Weever mentions as fouly defaced,' in his days, and as then having the following imperfect epitaph: Sir Waltar At Lea, alias Sir Walter At Clay GREAT HORMEAD, or Hormede Magna, was given by the Conqueror to Edgar Atheling; but it afterwards reverted to the Crown in the person of Henry the Second, who claimed his right of inheritance by virtue of his descent from Margaret, wife of Malcolm, King of Scots, and sister to Edgar. In the latter end of the reign of King John, it was held by John de Sandford, by service in the Queen's Chamber; and his descendant, Gilbert, Lord Sandford, was Chamberlain to Eleanor, Queen of Henry the Third: an office that was also executed by his wife Lora, after his decease. Their daughter Alice, being left heiress, was married to Robert, son and successor to Hugh de Vere, Earl of Oxford, who had purchased the wardship of the heiress for that purpose. In this family it continued till Henry, the spendthrift Earl, conveyed it to Anthony Cage, Citizen of London, in the twenty-first of Elizabeth; he gave it to Daniel, his youngest son, who claimed the office of Chamberlain to Anne of Denmark, at the time of her coronation with James the First; but the Commissioners of Claims declined to give judgment. LAYSTON, called Ichetone in the Domesday Book, and Lefstanchirche in a grant of the manor made to the Church of the Holy Trinity, in London, in the time of King Stephen, had the grant of a weekly market, and an eight days' annual fair, from Henry the Third. These, however, have been long disused. After the Dissolution, the manor was granted to the Lord Chancellor Audley: but it has since been possessed by several different families. In the Church are many ancient slabs, now mostly deprived of . their 2 |