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

21
sons with these Christian names were mesne tenants in War-
wickshire, of Osborn Fitz-Bichard, at the Domesday Survey. 1
The descent of some of the manors held by them is obscure
(and rendered more so by Sir William Dugdale, by confounding,
in common with most topographers, the tenant-in -cbief and the
mesne lord), of others sufficiently distinct, as those of Bereford,
Hillsborough, Bevington, and Ippesley, which were owned by
Hugh. The successors of this Hugh were the families of
Hubald, who bore three leopards' faces, and Bereford, who bore
three fleurs de lis. Hugh Fitz-Norraan, it will be remembered,
was supposed to have died without issue, and his inheritance to
have passed (partly) to his cousin, by marriage. The family of
Hubald, from which sprang that of Bereford, may have obtained
these manors in the same way. An Elias de Bevington is to be
met with at an early period, as also an Elias and Walter de
Stretton, whilst Stretton is one of the manors owned by Matilda
de Cantalupe temp. King John ; and the Raleighs, descendants
of Gilbert le Marshall, had property in Farnborough, which, says
Dugdale, is involved with Molliton, that belonged to William.
Osbern Fitz- Richard, the paramount lord of the aforesaid manors,
was progenitor of the Scropes, who bore a bend, the bearing of
the Fitz-Osborns and their successors, and a near relative of
William Earl of Brettville (son of William Fitz-Osborn, Earl of
Hereford), who, we have seen, was the feudal lord of William
Halis. This therefore would render it probable that the " Wil-
liam," one of the mesne tenants of Osborn Fitz-Bichard, was
William Halis, and therefore, upon the presumption of " Hugh"
being identical with Hugh Fitz-Norman, the same as the William
Fitz-Norman so often mentioned. But a more familiar acquaint-
ance with the family of De la Mare will tend to establish the
identity of William Alis and William de Mara.
The De la Mares, during the twelfth, thirteenth, and four-
teenth centuries, was one of the most widely spread, powerful,
and wealthy families of the kingdom, next to the nobility, and
occupied a distinguished position amongst those of knightly
rank. By tracing upwards some of their possessions to the
Domesday Survey, we are enabled to identify other persons
therein mentioned as owners, with their great ancestor Nor-
maunusj and by deducing the descent of families bearing their
names, we become possessed of a mass of facts and circumstances
that throw an increased light on the subject of our investigations.
Amongst the returns of lands held of the crown, and their mesne
tenants, a.d. 1 166, recorded in the Liber Niger Scaccarii, Peter
de la Mare states that he holds " Lavington," in Wilts, of the
King. At the Domesday Survey, this, with Gare, was held of
1 Dugdale's Warioicksldre, p. 24)4.