Joseph Hunter

“ The inhabitants of the town of Sheffield at this period were probably for the most part small artificers, or persons who had certain services to perform at the castle. In the surrounding country, such parts of the old inclosures as were not retained in the lord's own hand were held by small copyholders, none of whom rose above the rank of the mere farmer. It is not till the De Lovetots have passed off the stage, that we find families within the parish aspiring to imitate, if not rival, the chief at his castle of Sheffield. ”

“ Like all our old surnames the name of Lovetot is found with great variety of orthography: Lovetoft, Luvetoft, Lovetot, &c. Arms the same in figure, but difffering in tincture, appear in ancient authorities purporting to be the insignia of this family. In one of the windows of the parish-church of Sheffield, in the time of Dodsworth, they appeared a lion rampant parti per fess guled and sable on a silver field. The same lion on a field of gold was used as the insignia of the house of Worksop, till another was adopted formed out of the arms of a later patron Thomas Nevil lord Furnival. ”

“ Of all the places in the immediate vicinity of Sheffield which formed the terra of their ancestor, Kimberworth is the only manor in which I have found the family of De Busli exercising acts of ownership. About the year 1160, Richard de Busli, with the consent of Emma his wife and his heirs, granted to the monks of Kirkstead in Lincolnshire sufficient land in that manor for the erection of four iron-works, forgias, two for smelting the ore, and two ad fabricandum, for forming it into bars, with liberty to dig the ore in any part of the manor [4] . ”

“ It seems to have been little more than a nominal possession which De Busli enjoyed at Sheffield. We find not the slightest trace of his connexion with the place except that it is enumerated under the general head of Terra Rogerii de Busli, in the Domesday survey. Nor do we find, as in the case of many other places which were parts of the same fee, that in later times a dependence on the castle of Tickhill and its lords was confessed by any small annual payment. Sheffield was never reckoned among the towns in the liberty of Tickhill ”

“ In that retired part of the parish of Ecclesfield where it adjoins the manor of Kimberworth, a religious solitary took up his abode. His example seems to have been followed by others, till at length a hermitage became established in this place, which was dedicated to Saint John the Baptist, for obvious reasons the patron of the desert-religionist. The first William de Lovetot settled certain lands upon the hermitage and its inhabitant, and to this gift his son Richard made a small addition. ”

“ But when we find districts exceeding many counties in extent belonging to one person, it is obvious that his ownership is not regarded by us in the same light with the proprietorship of a modern land-owner. ”

“ The last of the male line of the Lovetots, lords of Hallamshire, died between the 22d and 27th years of the reign of Henry II. He left an only daughter, named Matilda, or Maud, then of very tender age. This lady was heir to his large possessions, and through her mother nearly allied to the great house of Clare.
The right of the chief lords to dispose in marriage the heiress of those who held lands of them is one of the most indefensible points of the feudal system. ”

“ MS. 1808, f. 18 b. is a very old draft of arms which are said to be'Arma Adæ de Stavelay.' They are like those on the seal, barry of eight gules and argent, a fleur de lis sable.—The witnesses to this charter seem to have been persons contemporary with the second rather than the first William de Lovetot.↑ Deed of Robert de Ecclesall, in Dodsworth's Extracts from the Rockley Evidences. MSS. in Bibl. Bodl. vol. cxxxix.↑ Dods. MSS. vol. cxvii. f. 74.↑ Mon. Ang. vol. i. p. 808.↑ Thoroton, 4to edit. vol. iii. p. 387.↑ Id.↑ Dods. Extracts from Fines 7 Joh. Harl. 801. Ecclesfield. ”