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III. Of the Borstal Horn

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 July 2012

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King Edward the Confessor had a royal palace at Brill, or Brehul, in Bucks, to which he often retired, for the pleasure of hunting in his forest of Bernwood. This forest, it is said, was much infested by a wild boar, which was at last slain by one Nigel, a huntsman, who presented the boar's head to the king; and for a reward the king gave to him one hyde of arable land, called Derehyde, and a wood called Hulewode, with the custody of the forest of Bernwood, to hold to him and his heirs per unum cornu, quod est charta praedictae forestae. Upon this ground Nigel built a lodge or mansion house, called Borestall, in memory of the slain boar. For proof of this, in a large folio vellum book, containing transcripts of charters and evidences relating to this estate (supposed to have been written in or before the reign of Henry the Sixth), is a rude delineation of the site of Borstal house and manor, and under it the figure of a man presenting on his knees to the king the head of a boar on the point of a sword, and the king returning to him a coat of arms, Arg. a fess G. between two crescents, and a horn Vert, as represented in Plate I. No 2.

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Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1775

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References

page 15 note [a] Bishop Kennet says, “though this distinction of arms did not agree with the time of Nigel, yet it is most likely he did receive from the king a horn, as a token and charter of his office of Forrester, and his successors, by the name of Fitz Nigel, did bear those arms,” Par. Antiq. p. 52.

page 16 note [b] Bishop Kennet says, this ring bears the rude impression of a horn; but the bare inspection of the plate is sufficient to shew that it bears the two initials of John Dynham, lord of this manor in the beginning of the last century. See Kennet, ib. p. 678.

page 16 note [c] Kennet, p. 147, 148. ex Reg. de Borstal, f. 1. Dugd. Bar. I. 597.

page 16 note [d] Kennet, p. 265. ex Chart, de Borstal, f. 11.

page 17 note [e] Kennet, p. 148. Dugd. ubi sup.

page 17 note [f] Kennet, p. 148.

page 17 note [g] Id. p. 166.

page 17 note [h] Id. p. 337. She seems to have died before 1315, when Sir John de Hand'o married Maud, daughter of Sir Philip Burnel, and widow of John lord Lovel. Kennet, p. 371.

page 17 note [i] Kennet, p. 349, ex Chart, de Borstal.

page 18 note [j] Kennet, p. 363, ex Dugd. MSS.

page 18 note [l] Kennet, p. 460. Dugd. Bar. II. 61.

page 18 note [m] Kennet, p. 479. Dug. ubi sup.

page 18 note [n] Kennet, p. 523.

page 18 note [o] Id. p. 617.

page 18 note [p] Id. p. 678. The initials of the name of his son or grandson John are on the seal ring before mentioned.