'Lord of the Manor of Silverstone' Title

Please note - there is an important Saleroom Notice on this lot. Please see the bottom of the description for further details.

The title is being sold with all and any rights and privileges as detailed in the accompanying historic vellum-bound Court Rolls, Copyhold and Minute books, Maps, and the Index to Court Rolls dating back to 1427. The purchaser, on becoming the new Lord of the Manor of Silverstone, will receive any memorial rights which are carried with the title. The term 'Incorporeal Hereditaments' means 'property without body'.

The Manor of Silverstone had an active Manorial Court and records exist from the 15th century until the 20th. The new Lord of the Manor will receive a collection of manorial documents as listed, and will be entitled to hold court. Although there are now no tenants, some memorial courts are still held as ceremonial and social events and the new Lord could appoint a Steward, Bailiff or even an ale taster.

The title is registered with the Land Registry under Title number NN238761 which will need to be transferred by a solicitor to the new Lord of the Manor.

Full details.

The Manor of Silverstone is found in the parish of the same name. It is also known as Silston, or Silston Burnham and derives its name from a corruption of the the Saxon, silva ton, meaning wood town In the 10th, Century the area was heavily wooded and formed part of Whittlewood Forest.

At the time of Domesday Book in 1086, Silverstone was divided into three fees, which had been established by the Saxons and before 1066 were held by Leuric, Siward and Angar. These were the Moreton Fee, which was held by a Norman named William, under the Earl of Moreton. Pinkeney Fee was seemingly, and unusually, retained by its Saxon owners since the Domesday owner is noted as Goderin, ancestor of the Pinkeney family who would later give their name to the fee. The third fee was the Mandeville Fee which was, unsurprisingly, held by the Norman Magnate, Geoffrey de Mandeville. Despite there being three ‘fees’ or manors in 1086, by the time of the reign of Henry II (1154-1189) all three had coalesced into a single manor under the ownership of the Crown itself.

In 1173, Silverstone is recorded as being held by the King. He was well acquainted with the manor since he stayed here in 1166 as several letters and papers recorded as being signed by him here, attest. Four-years later, he was again a visitor, likely hunting in Whittlewood, when he signed a charter in favour of Tavistock Abbey. Hunting is likely the reason that Silverstone was obtained by the King, as Henry was known to enjoy his sport, and a suitable lodge was built in the manor as early as 1121, but the site of this has never been determined. The lodge was rebuilt on several occasions before being abandoned in around 1317. However, there are still visible in the landscape, the remains of several fishponds, or stews, North West of the village, and it is likely that these were created for the lodge. Fish was an essential part of the Medieval diet, not only for religious reasons, and most houses and residences associated with royalty and the aristocracy would have had one nearby. The King took an interest in the fish ponds and there are several records connected to them. In 1241, the bailiffs of the Manor of Silverstone were instructed to 'aid William the Kings fisherman, whom he is to send to fish in his stews at Silverstone and to send the fish that he shall catch to the King without delay'. A few years later the King ordered that his servants were to 'search out nets in the town of Oxford with which William the Kings fisherman, whom he is sending to Silverstone, can fish in the Kings stews there and to carry them to Woodstock'. The fish ponds were evidently extremely well stocked since they supplied fish for sale or perhaps to the royal palace in London. In 1257, it is reported that the King allocated the men of Silverstone "4 shillings spent in taking 20 pike in the Kings stews at Silverstone and in salting them and carrying them to London". The ponds fell into decline when the King stopped hunting in Whittlewood Forest in the 14th century, but their remains are still visible in the landscape.

In April 1194, after attending a conference with William, King of Scotland at Northampton, Richard I lodged at Silverstone and issued a number of writs whilst in residence. This was part of Richard’s procession south to be crowned at Winchester. Since Richard was an infrequent visitor to England, this may have been his only visit but his brother and successor, John, was known to have stayed at Silverstone numerous times throughout his reign. Even when he was mired in dispute with the Barons, he still visited his lodge here, and in March 1215 he issued 20 grants of land, land which he had forfeited from his enemies. His successor, Henry III, issued a grant to the University of Oxford which bears date at Silveston 6th February 1235. The last recorded visit of a King to Silverstone was made by Edward I in 1290 when he played an oblation or offering of seven shillings on the alter of the church at nearby Luffield Priory.

No King ever lived at Siverstone so the manor was administered by his officials such as a bailiff and steward. In 1217, however Henry III, newly on the throne, leased Silverstone to Joudowin de Dou for £6 per year. These leases, presumably for the life of the tenant continued throughout the next century. In 1271, the manor was committed to Thomas de Book and Henry Wade for a yearly sum of £14. 11 years later it was then granted to Richard de Holebrok, the King’s steward of his Northamptonshire forests. In 1315, Edward II is recorded as Lord of Silverstone but within a year had granted the manor to Sir Richard Lovell and his wife Muriel. There was some political intrigue involved in this grant, since Muriel was the daughter Sir John Soulis, the Guardian of Scotland who was exiled to France in 1310. Given that this grant followed so closely upon Edward’s catastrophic defeat at Bannockburn the year before, this may have been an attempt to gather support against the 'auld enemy'. However, the grant turned into something of a protracted legal nightmare for Edward III as Lovell, after Muriel’s death in 1318, later claimed a view of frank pledge, control of the assize of bread and beer and various other rights over tenants of the Manor. The King’s attorney reacted to this by claiming that no rights were included in the grant. The action continued for over ten years before Sir Richard died in 1351, without a decision having been reached. On his death the Manor was then granted to Sir John Molins.

Sir John’s tenure was brief, he died in 1338, but not before obtaining a licence from Edward III to gift the Manor to the Abbess and nuns of Burham Abbey, in Buckinghamshire. This Austinian Abbey, a few miles from Silverstone, was founded in 1266 by Richard, King of the Romans and second son of King John. It was a relatively small house, with just 20 nuns at its peak, but it was given a good deal of independence by Richard’s son, Edmund, Earl of Cornwall when he allowed the Abbess to be freely elected. Given its small size, it is no surprise that Burnham Abbey often suffered financially and it was likely in an effort to alleviate these problems that St John Molins gifted them the manor in 1338. Even so, it continued to struggle, and its record as Lord of Silverstone is rather obscure. There is just a single manorial court roll which survives from this period, dating from the mid-15th century. After the dissolution of Burnham Abbey in 1539, the Manor of Silverstone or Silston Burnham, as it sometimes become known, was seized by to the Crown. In 1551 it was granted to Sir Nicholas Throckmorton of Paulersbury. Throckmorton was a Member of Parliament in the 1540s and a gentleman of the Privy Chamber of Edward VI. He made a fortune when appointed as Treasurer of the Mint. After Edward’s death in 1553, he publicly supported the cause of Lady Jane Grey but also hedged his bets by sending word to Mary of Edward’s death and was one of the gentlemen appointed to accompany the new Queen to London in the Autumn of 1553. His objection to Mary’s marriage to Philip of Spain landed him in the Tower of London and almost led to the loss of his head in 1554. On the accession of Elizabeth I in 1558, he failed to regain the positions he had held under Edward VI but was used by Elizabeth as a diplomat and England’s Ambassador in France until 1564. He died in 1571.

Silverstone remained with this family until 1636 when Mary, daughter and co-heiress of Sir Arthur Throckmorton, died and left it to her youngest daughter, Anne who was married to Sir Edward Hales. In around 1687, their son, Edward, sold the manor to Sir Benjamin Bathurst. Henry, third Earl Bathurst, then sold it to Henry, third Duke of Grafton in 1800 and it remained in this family until 1886 when it was sold to Sir Robert Loder. Under an Act of Enclosure in 1824, over 1,000 acres of Silverstone, including much of the remaining woodland, was enclosed under the auspices of the then Lord of the Manor, the Duke of Grafton. Loder's tenure as Lord of Silverstone lasted a mere two-years before it passed to his son, Sir Edmund. In 1901 it was purchased by William Cooper before passing to James Lewis in 1912. In 1922 it came to Margaret Roche and hence to Geraldine Hobson. The present Lord of the Manor inherited the title in 2002.

Manorial Rights which come with the Title of Lord of the Manor.

On becoming the new Lord of the Manor of Silverstone, the purchaser will also receive any manorial rights which are carried with the title.

Under the laws of real property in England, Wales, Northern Ireland, and the Irish Republic, Lordships of the manor are known as ‘estates in land’ and in Courts, where they may crop up in cases to do with real property, they are often simply called ‘land’. They are ‘incorporeal hereditaments’ (literally, property without body) and are well glossed from the English and Welsh point of view in Halsbury’s Laws of England, Vol VIII, title Copyholds, which is available in most solicitors’ offices or central reference library.

There are three major categories of manorial rights: (a) franchise and administrative rights which had been granted by the Crown to the Lord of the Manor, such as the right to have a market or to hold manorial courts; (b) rights relating to the former existence of copyhold land such as the potential ownership of mines and minerals; and (c) rights to any residual areas of non-freehold land in the manor, generally known as manorial waste. As already noted, although the history and administration of manors are broadly similar across England and Wales, each manor has its own individual history, descent, tradition and topography which means that general observations can only serve as a guideline. Each manor must be re-searched individually, and those general historical characteristics are only a framework.

Manorial waste. The majority of land in England is freehold, and at some point has been bought and sold, or alternatively it might be registered common land. However, there are often small parcels of land, such as village greens and roadside verges, which historically belonged to the Lord of the manor as part of the manorial extent, but which have never been sold off or converted into freehold. These areas are known as manorial waste. These, too, can be investigated but nothing can be done unless the legal extent of the manor, and its boundary, is first established—which is often a considerable challenge. However, Silverstone is already registered as a manor at the Land Registry with an established boundary. The buyer would be able to carry out, or commission research into identifying any manorial waste based on the plan of the manor and its registered status.

The Manor of Silverstone had an active Manorial Court which is recorded from the 15th century until the 20th. The new Lord of the Manor will received a collection of manorial documentation which is listed below. The new Lord of the Manor would be entitled to hold a court. Although there are now no tenants, some manorial courts are still held as ceremonial and social events. The new Lord could appoint a steward, bailiff or even an ale taster.

Documents Associated with the Manor in the Public Domain 1427-1450: court roll (mutilated) Northamptonshire Archives Service 1558-1599: court roll 1642-1644: court roll 1650-1650: court roll 1657-1657: court roll 1659-1659: court roll 1660-1667: court roll 1660-1660: particulars 1664-1841: surrenders and admissions 1687-1690: court roll 1691-1699: court roll 1700-1700: court roll 1705-1711: court rolls 1724-1729: court roll 1737-1745: court roll 1750-1756: court roll 1752-1752: rent roll 1757-1762: court roll 1827-1857: quit rentals of copyholds 1831-1843: quit rental of copyholds.

Saleroom Notice

Please note, the Title can be purchased by anyone in the world, or a business. However, the physical documents will not be allowed to leave the country as they are of historical importance. We have engaged the Manorial Society to ensure the Title is transferred to the purchaser and that the documents are stored correctly post sale to adhere to the laws governing such items.