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is little doubt. In the British Museum are three undated charters of this family,1 viz., of Robert, son of Jocelin; Alice, wife of Jocelin; and Thomas, son of Nicolas. This family bore three leopards' faces, or three leopards' faces jessant de lis. Elias occurs as a Christian name more than once in the Amundeville family; and the other Christian names of the Fitz-Normans and Alises, are frequent-John, Robert, Walter, and William. In the pedigree mentioned, John and Robert are given as sons of Roger de Amundeville, temp. William I.; if this affiliation be correct, the John is probably the John de Amundeville of the Pipe Roll 31 Henry I., and Robert (upon the assumption of Roger de Amundeville and Roger de Auberville being the same person), the father of Robert Doisnell mentioned in the Pipe Roll. The Disneys, who eveutually represented the chief branch of the Amundevilles, bore fleurs de lis in various ways, and are said to have derived their name from Isigny, near Bayeux, though there is another Isigny in Normandy. The names of Adam and Nigel occur in this family as well as in that of Amundeville; and, as they probably both bore fleurs de lis, it is very likely that they were of common origin. The name is not found in Domesday, and the earliest authentic mention of it is of the time of Hen. II., when we find "Garnero de Iseni" witness to a charter of Richard de Lucy, chief justice to that monarch,3 and a William d'Iseny, father of Adam, which latter lived temp. John. In the Gallia Christiana (vol. ii. p. 107), there appear as witnesses to a deed, dated 1082, the names of Normanno filio Garneri 5 and Willielmo Testardo, scemingly of the families herein treated of.

We have now presented a vast mass of evidence, tending to show, from their use of fleurs de lis and leopards' faces, the occurrence of the name of Elias, and other circumstances, that a great number of families so characterised, had a common origin. with that of the Ellises; and by so assembling a great number of families of the same lineage into one clan or race, we have multiplied the channels through which can be pursued the search for the ancestry of William Alis, or rather of his father, Robert Fitz-Walter. Before, however, entering on this field of inquiry,

1 49 G. 33, 34, 35. Robertus filius Jocelini is witness to the latter's deed; and the date of this and the first is fixed in the reign of Henry II., if, as is possible, the Robert Fitz-Jocelin holding one knight's fee in Herts, A.D. 1166 (Liber Niger), be the same as the above.

2 Vide Sussex Archeological Collections, vol. ix. Appendix.

3 Madox's Formulare Anglicanum.

4 Abbreviatio Placitorum.

5 It is not improbable that this name is synonymous with that of Jenour, or Jenner, an ancient family in Essex, who bore five fleurs de lis on a cross. "Gunner," who occurs in Domesday, in that county, as an under-tenant, may have been their progenitor.

it will be desirable to present a few facts which appear to afford connecting links to the foregoing chain of presumptive reasoning, and to cement the main argument and its corollary, viz., that the Ellises bearing the cross and crescents, and sprung from Sir Archibald Ellys the Crusader, were descended from the Alises of Allington, in Hampshire. The manor of Send, in Surrey, was held, at the Domesday Survey, by Rainald (" son of Erchenbald," as appears by the prefaced list of Tenants for the county, though not so described in the text). Beatrix de Sende, apparently his descendant and a heiress, with Ruald de Calne, her husband, towards the end of the twelfth century, founded the priory of Newark, in the parish of Send. This Ruald was of the family of Croc, of whom "Croc Venator" and Rainald, his son, at the Domesday Survey, were landowners in Hants and Wilts. And several of them are mentioned in the Pipe Roll of 31 Henry I. There is little doubt that the Rainald of Send was the same as the last-mentioned Rainald, and that consequently his family name was Croc. Elias Croc occurs subsequently more than once, and a coat of arms of the family was a fess between six fleurs de lis. They were also allied by marriage to the family of Broc, in which too is found the name of Elias, and who also bore fleurs de lis. "Erchenbald " occurs as a witness with "Elias, son of Robert" (before mentioned, and supposed to be a son of Robert de Venuz), to the charter of John, son of Gilbert (the Marshal). So does "William de Mara," who also occurs in the Pipe Roll of 1131, for Yorkshire, as does "Erchenbaldus filius Reginaldi" for Surrey. Assuming then, De Mare and Alis to be identical, the connection of the family with that of Croc, seems to account for the Christian name of Sir Archibald Ellys the Crusader, and at the same time strongly to confirm the connection of the Yorkshire Ellises with the Alises of Hants. Again, Robert de Broc, marshal of the king, who married Margaret, daughter and heiress of Walter Crok, gave to Roger Helias, alias de Bentley, his lands in Nether Shugborough, co. Warwick.1 One of the coats of Bentley was azure a mermaid or; another, three bends, as borne by Sir William Bentley, temp. Edward II.,3 at the battle of Boroughbridge. This mermaid, from its use as arms by the Prestwyks and the Ellises, of Prestwych and Preston, in Lancashire, would seem to be another form of the crest of Sir Archibald Ellys, the naked female; its use by a Bentley, originally Ellis, would indicate the source of the family, and the name Roger, prevalent with the Alises of Allington, and the connection with the Brocs, further indicate that source, viz., the family of

1 Shaw's Staffordshire, ii. 93.

2 Dugdale's Warwickshire, p. 351.

3 Roll of Arms in Parliamentary Writs.

the Crusader and that of the descendants of William Alis to be identical. The mermaid is the crest of the Byrons; their arms are three bends; in the time of King John there was an Elias de Buron: the foregoing circumstances therefore suggest a derivation of this crest from the Bentleys alias Ellises.

PART II.2

M. D'Anisy, we have seen, connects the family of the Sir William Alis of Domesday with the parish of Alisay, formerly Alis, he says, near Pontdelarche, in Normandy. Though no evidence to this effect is given, yet it is extremely probable, and, from circumstances, may be considered certain. To trace the ownership, then, of this place, would be to make us in some measure acquainted with the ancestry of the Alises. M. D'Anisy speaks of Alisay as a place where councils were held in the ninth century. Alberic Comte de Dammartin, about the year 1200, made a donation to the abbey of Fontaine-Guérard, which was dated "at Alisi, in the monastery of St. Germain."3 Little is known of this religious house, but it had probably been long in existence; it is supposed to have been transferred to the priory of Les Deux-Amants, which was situated where the Seine and Andelle unite, near Amfreville, and was not suppressed till the Revolution. In the Red Book of the Exchequer of Normandy,5 A.D. 1184, Conan de Pierrefonds is said to hold the fief of Alisay

1 Abbreviatio Placitorum, p. 117.

2 The works consulted for this part are, generally speaking, mentioned in the Notes. Of course an examination of the libraries of France, and the public archives of that country, more particularly of the archæological and genealogical publications which have appeared there during the last quarter of a century, would very considerably elucidate the inquiries of these pages, and doubtless settle many conjectural points.

3 In 1202, Alberic Comte de Dammartin, Mathilda his wife, and Renaud their son, united to the living a chapel, which they had built and endowed, in the manor of Rouville, and to which they gave the tithes of all newly assarted or cleared land in the manor of Alisay. In November, 1258, Mathilda Countess of Bologne gave the patronage to the Archbishop of Rouen. In 1351, the lord of Rouville presented; and, according to the Père Anselme's Hist. Gen. de la France, vol. viii. p. 709, in 1324, John, seigneur of Rouville, was also lord of the fief of Alisay.

An interesting account of the origin of this establishment is given in Jules Janin's Normandy, p. 546. Neither the Neustria Pia nor the Gallia Christiana contains any notice of Les Deux Amants or St. Germain.

5 Published in the volume for 1834 of the Transactions of the Society of Antiquaries of Normandy, and in Mr. Stapleton's Rotuli Magnæ Scaccarii Normannia.

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by the tenure of four knights' fees, one of the king, and three of the superior lord; and temp. Richard I. or John, the Earl of Boulogne paid £5 for his fee of Alisay. Conan de Nesle, Comte de Soissons, acquired the name and heritage of Pierrefonds with his wife Agatha, sister and heir of Nevelon de Pierrefonds, and, dying without issue, 1181, his wife's inheritance went to her representatives. These were Gaucher de Chastillon, grandson of another Gaucher, who married Ada, sister of Drew, father of Nevelon de Pierrefonds; and (apparently) Matilda, wife of Alberic, Comte de Dammartin, whose son and heir, Renaud, became jure uxoris Earl of Boulogne, the owner of Alisay above mentioned. Margaret, the other sister, and coheiress of Drew, married - De Chambly, whose descendants (not named) are styled cousins by Gaucher de Chastillon, in 1195. Matilda, the wife of Alberic, whose parentage is not known, was doubtless a heiress or coheiress of De Chambly, and brought Alisay to her husband; for he did not inherit it, but acquired this and other fiefs in addition to his patrimony But the inquiry is of greater interest, to ascertain the acquisition of Alisay by the Pierrefonds, and their ancestors. Dreux, the father of Ada and Margaret, married Beatrix, sister and coheiress of Hugh Comte de Crecy-en-Brie, who, there is little doubt, brought Alisay, along with her other possessions, to her husband. This lady was daughter of Guy de Rochefort, seneschal of France, and a celebrated Crusader, one of those who went to the Holy Land with Robert Duke of Normandy, in 1096. He was son of Guy, lord of Montlery, who married Hodierna, daughter and heiress of William de Gommeth, seneschal of France, and lord of Gommeth and Ferté-Alais. This William de Gommeth is named in two charters, dated 1043 and 1067, and he also occurs as a witness along with Elias, the son of Richard, and Guy de Montlery, his son-in-law, to an act of King Philippe, in 1071. A Sir Geoffrey de Gomet, Knight, occurs in 1065 (probably his brother), a charter of whose, of that date, is abstracted in De Brequigny's Receuil des Chartes (vol. ii. p. 98). These are the only persons of the name to be met with. But a family of the name of Gomez, of Lille, are said to have borne for arms, argent on an escocheon vert two fleurs de lis in pale within an orle of eight fleurs de lis gules. This, there is little doubt, was originally the same family, as we shall soon have reason to see. Ferté-Alais is situated on the Essone, in the Hurepoix, or district of Beauce, near Etampes, and is erroneously said to have derived its distinctive appellation of Alais

5

1 Stapleton, ii. pp. cclv. vi.

2 Du Chesne, Hist. de la Maison de Chastillon.

4

3 L'Art de Vérifier les Dates, art. Comtes de Dammartin.

4 Dict. Gen. 5 Art. Ales, Dict. de la Noblesse, par Desbois.

from Adelaide or Adeline, daughter of Hugh D'Ales or Alais, who married Guy, surnamed Trussell, lord of Montlery, and nephew of Guy de Rochefort the Crusader, and to have formerly had the appellation of Ferté-Baudoin; whereas it never appears to have belonged to Guy Trussell or his wife, but was evidently named Alais, by an owner of that name, to distinguish it from Ferté-Baudoin, which belonged to Adèle, second wife of Guy the Crusader (whom he repudiated), both Fertés being probably originally one, and divided on becoming the inheritance of two families. This distinctive title of Alais, and mention of a family so called, of course opens up the view at once of the original ownership of Alisay, and the lineage of its lords. But for the present we must postpone this investigation, and endeavour to trace the name and family of Gommeth. In the list1 of those who accompanied Robert Curthose to the Holy Land (from a roll in the Cathedral Library of Bayeux) occur the names of Abaciers du Hommett (who bore argent three fleurs de lis gules), and immediately after, that of William de Rocheford (who bore the same arms, with the addition of a label azure). The distinguished family of Hommett, or Humet, or Humez, are known to have borne three fleurs de lis for their arms, from other testimony than this roll, and sprung from Robert de Humet, who, before 1025, founded the priory of St. Fromond, and whose grandson and heir, William de Humet, was contemporary with. William the Conqueror. They took their name from, or gave it to, their castle of Hommet, in the arrondissement of St. Lo and diocese of Coutances. Guy de Rochefort, the Crusader, had a brother William, who was lord of Gommeth; but, as Gommeth passed to the descendants of Guy, there is little doubt that Guy inherited that estate from his (elder) brother, who died s. p., as, upon the supposition about to be made, viz., that the latter was the William de Rocheford, the Crusader, the label on his arms. would indicate. This being so, can there be a doubt that Abaciers du Hommett was his brother? For Gommett, or Ghomett, becomes Hommett, as easily as Gherlotta or Gerlotta does Harlotta, or Ghersendis or Gersende, Hirsende, of whose identity there are numerous examples. And there are no circumstances which militate against the synonymous meaning of Hommett and Gommett. We have the same favourite Christian name of William in both families; and there is identity of arms, for Gomez, as we have seen, bore fleurs de lis; and three fleurs de lis are always given as one of the coats of Rochefort. Having then pretty clearly ascertained that the arms borne by the family of

1 Tide Dansey's Crusaders.

3

2 See further particulars of this family in Mr. Stapleton's work. 3 Du Chesne, Hist. de la Maison de Montmorenci.

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