Notices of the Ellises of England, Scotland, and Ireland, from the conquest to the present time

says, speaking of an engagement that took place near Ivery,
in 1091, supported by William Alis and other barons, made
a brave resistance to the enemy. 1 A charter of William de
Brettville, son of William Fitz-Osborn (Earl of Hereford), con-
firms the donations of his mesne tenants, William Halis and
others, to the monastery of St. Evroult. 3 William Halis also
occurs as a witness to a charter of confirmation of William de
Brettvill. 3
It will be desirable now to produce the facts and reasons
in support of the belief that William Alis and his family bore
fleurs de lis for their arms. 4 We first find a pedigree of Fitz-
family gave its name to two mills, one at Breteuil, the other at Carentonne,
near Bernai, an estate which it had held for a long period. But he erro-
neously infers that William Alis had a father of the same name, " who was
witness," he says, " of the confirmation, by William Fitz-Osborne, of the
grant of Guernanville to St. Evroult." This confirmation was by William
Fitz-Osborne's son, William de Brettville, the feudal superior of William
Alis, and to which he was witness (ii. 187). He also states, that William
Alis was donor of lands to the Canons of the Priory of St. Denis, near
Southampton, which was confirmed, a long time after, by Geoffry Lucy,
Bishop of Winchester.
1 Ordericus Vitalis, translated by Mr. Forrester. Ed. Bohn, 1854.
4 vols. iii. 344.
2 Ibid., ii. 191.
3 Ibid., ii. 187.
4 The prevalent opinion amongst writers on the subject is, that here-
ditary arms were not in use before the period of the Crusades ; but it will
be seen, throughout this essay, it is assumed that they were of a very
much earlier origin (which opinion the author has given at large, in a
pamphlet on the subject, published by Mr. J. Russell Smith) ; indeed the
genealogical deductions herein advanced, are based on such an assumption,
and could for the most part never otherwise have been made : the belief
in the existence for centuries before the Norman Conquest of hereditary
heraldic symbols, has been throughout the guide and clue to the hypotheses
and conclusions here made, and which they, in their turn, amply warrant.
It is quite true that, at an early period, before quartering of arms was in-
troduced, from the frequent changes of arms by families on marrying
heiresses, it appears that they were not hereditary, but such were excep-
tional cases, though, from the scantiness of records, such changes are pro-
minently recorded, whilst the quiet descent of property is little noticed.
Younger sons will be often found to have transmitted, for several descents,
the original arms of the family, whilst the chief line has changed them in
each generation. But sometimes the converse happens, and a cadet re-
linquishes the paternal arms, and adopts those of a family whose estate
was acquired by marriage.
The tinctures of coats of arms in these pages are very often omitted, as
not essential to the validity of the reasoning employed.
The armorial bearings quoted are taken from the heraldic dictionaries,
which do not profess to give sources of information. A dictionary, how-