General Notes

William Malet, of Granville, Normandy; also held lands in Lincs before1066 (possibly by virtue of his mother's putative status ofEnglishwoman); granted the feudal Barony of Eye, Suffolk, following theConquest, in which he was one of William I's chief lieutenants, beingallegedly given the task by William of burying Harold's body afterHastings; Sheriff of Yorks 1068; married Hesilia Crispin (living 1086),gggdau of Rollo The Dane, Duke of Normandy, and died c1071.  [Burke'sPeerage]

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Note: Malet is a dimunitive of "Mal" meaning evil.

The Peytons, Camden observes, have had a common progenitor with theUffords, who became Earls of Suffolk, the founder of both being WilliamMallet, a Norman baron, who was sheriff of Yorkshire in the 3rd ofWilliam I, and obtained grants of sundry lordships and manors from thecrown, amongst which were Sibton and Peyton Hall, which he possessed atthe time of the survey. "Iselham," says the same author, "formerlybelonged to the Bernards, which came to the family of the Peytons bymarriage, which knightly family of Peyton flowed out of the same malestock whence the Uffords, Earls of Suffolk, descended; albeit theyassumed the surname of Peyton, according to the use of that age, fromtheir manor of Peyton Hall, in Boxford, in the county of Suffolk." [JohnBurke & John Bernard Burke, Extinct and Dormant Baronetcies of England,Ireland, and Scotland, Second Edition, Scott, Webster, & Geary, London,1841, p. 408, Peyton, of Isleham]

Note: Domesday states that Walter de Caen held Sibton (given to him byWilliam's widow) and Swein of Essex held Peyton--Walter having been deadsince 1071.

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William, according to some, was grandson of Lady Godiva & brother ofHarold Godwyn's wife, while not necessarily entirely true, probably therewas some relationship.

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According to Crispin and Macary, "William (Guillaume) Malet de Gravillestands out as one of the most imposing figures at the Conquest. There canbe no doubt about his presence there, which is subscribed to by Williamof Poitiers, Guy of Amiens, Orderic Vital, and all the historians of thisepoch. So much has been placed on record concerning him that just a fewfacts of his life will be recited here. He was probably descended fromGerard, a Scandinavian prince and companion of Duke Rollo, which gave thename of the fief of Gerardville or Graville, near Havre. Robert, theeldest son, occurs in a document of about 990 in Normandy. On hismother's side William Malet was of Anglo-Saxon origin, for she wasprobably the daughter of Leofric, Earl of Mercia, and Godwa or Godgifu,the supposed sister of Thorold the Sheriff in the time of Edward theConfessor, and therefore the aunt of Edwin and Morcar, Earls ofNorthumberland. He was nearly killed in the battle of Hastings but wasrescued by the sire de Montfort and William of Vieuxpont, and wasappointed by William the Conqueror to take charge of the body of Harold,a statement that has been disputed. The consensus of opinion favors it,and it is most logical if William Malet's mother was as stated the sisterof Algar II., 7th Earl of Mercia, who was the father of Alditha, wife ofHarold. He accompanied King William at the reduction of Nottingham andYork in 1068, for which he was rewarded with the shreivalty of land inthat county. Gilbert de Gand and Robert Fitz Richard were also commandersin this expedition. The following year he was besieged in the castle ofYork by Edgar, the Saxon prince, and was only saved from surrender by thetimely arrival of the Conqueror. In the same year he was attacked by theDanes, who captured the city of York with great slaughter and tookWilliam Malet, his wife and children, prisoners, but their lives werespared, as was that of Gilbert de Gand, for the sake of their ransoms.There is evidence that he was slain in this year, but it is uncertain andthe date of his death is unknown. An entry in Domesday that "WilliamMalet was seized of this place (Cidestan, Co. Suffolk), where heproceeded on the King's service where he died," would indicate that hisdeath occurred during the compilation of that book. He was witness to acharter of King William to the church of St. Martin-le-Grand, in London,and is there styled "princeps," which title, however, was honorary andnot hereditary, having ceased with his death."

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William Malet, or Guillaume, as he may have been called, "Sire deGraville", came from Graville Sainte Honorine between Le Havre andHarfleur, in what is today the French province of Normandy. He is said tohave had a Norman father and a Saxon (read English) mother, and had somesort of association with King Harold of England before the conquest.William, through his Saxon mother, may actually have been related to KingHarold, and also to the well known Lady Godiva. It is also possible thatWilliam and Harold were both God fathers of Duke William of Normandy'sdaughter, Abela.

The Malet Castle at Graville Sainte Honorine had an important strategiclocation, at the mouth of the Seine. It has now fallen into the sea,though some remnants of it may still be visible. A large section of wallwith large iron rings attached was still there just over 100 years ago.The Abbey church, in which some of the Malets are buried, is now in thetown of Le Havre. Though William Malet had connections to both sides inthe conflict to come, his main allegiance was to Duke William of Normandy.

William fought with distinction at Hastings, as the following Excerptfrom Wace's "Roman de Rou" attests:



William whom they call Mallet,
Boldly throws himself among them;
With his flashing sword
Against the English he makes furious onset;
But his shield they clove,
And his horse beneath him killed,
And himself they would have slain,
When came the Sire de Montfort
And Lord William de Vez-Pont
With the great force which they had,
Him they bravely rescued.
There many of their men they lost;
Mallet they remounted on the field
On a fresh war-horse.


When the battle was over, Duke William entrusted William Malet to attendto the burial of the dead English king. The body was buried under a heapof stones on top of a cliff at Hastings overlooking the shore that Haroldhad so bravely defended. William placed a stone on the grave with theepitaph:


"By command of the Duke, you rest here a King, O Harold, that you may beguardian still of the shore and sea".
This burial of Harold was only temporary and the body was later re-buriedat Harold's Abbey at Waltham.

William and his brother Durand held lands in Lincolnshire, England,during the reign of Edward the Confessor, and through the reign of Haroldright up to the conquest, in addition to those in Normandy. TheseLincolnshire holdings, all in the Danelaw, probably came from William andDurand's mother. After the conquest William's English holdings weregreatly increased, again, principally in the Danelaw, as English landswere taken from their Saxon owners and handed over to Norman Barons. Itis likely that Duke William conferred these estates on William, partlybecause of his loyalty and skill in battle, but also because of his priorconnections with his Danish "cousins" there. Perhaps the Duke felt thatWilliam was the best man to bring these proud, warlike and independentsettlers under the control of their new King.

William was dead at the time of the Domesday survey in 1086, but theholdings at that time of his son Robert, and of his wife, give a goodindication of the extent of his estates. He held large parts of what aretoday Suffolk and Norfolk, with smaller amounts of land in Lincolnshireand Yorkshire. Eye, in Suffolk appears to have been William's stronghold.Here he built a Motte and Bailey castle, after the Norman fashion.Nothing remains of the Norman fortifications, but the outline of thebaileys and "Castle Mound", are still evident. There is even a slightindication of where the Market, founded by William Malet under RoyalLicense would have been held.

William married Hesilia Crispin, by whom he had two sons, Robert andGilbert, and one daughter, Beatrice. Robert and possibly Gilbert, alongwith their uncle Durand, accompanied their father at the battle ofHastings. The arms shown at the top of the page, likely carried by theMalets at Hastings, were used by many generations of the Malet family,both in England and in France, and can be seen on the Bayeux tapestry.

William was made Sheriff of York and granted considerable lands inYorkshire following the building of the first Norman castle there (themound now supports 'Clifford's Tower') in 1068. He and his fellowcaptains, Robert Fitz-Richard and William of Ghent, with 500 pickedknights had to fight off a local revolt, headed by Edgar the Atheling;this in or shortly after January 1069. Robert Fitz-Richard and many ofhis men were killed and it was only by the timely arrival of King Williamthat the City was saved. The natives remained restless and had another,token go, as soon as King William left but were quickly put down. Thetroops were strengthened and another castle built on the other side ofthe river from the original but, notwithstanding, in September 1069,William, his wife and two of his children were captured by a combinedforce of Danes and English under Sweyn of Denmark supported by EarlsWaltheof and Gospatric and the Northumbrians, when York fell to themafter a terrible fight. This led to King William ordering the burning andkilling of everything in the north and Domesday, even 16 years later,records most of northern England as still being waste and uninhabited.

William, his wife and two children must have been released some timelater and William retained most of his lands apart from those inYorkshire, which will have come with the office of Sheriff, which hadbeen taken from him. At some point the King awarded William theappellation of "Princep", and in the Chart granted by the King to thechurch of St. Martin le Grand, his signature appears as "Wilielmus MaletPrincep". In the context of the times, Princep would likely have beeninterpreted as "leader, or chief". William is believed to have diedfighting "Hereward the Wake" in the Fens near Ely Cathedral, which liesbetween South Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk (and in the middleof the Malet holdings), in 1071. The Domesday book records that "...Hewent into the marsh", and that "...he went on the King's service, wherehe died".

William is generally accepted to be the progenitor of many of the variousbranches of the Malet family (those that can trace their lines back thatfar), both in England and in France. The descendants of Durand continuedto hold lands in Lincolnshire, and are recorded in Irby on Humber up tothe 16th century.

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NORMAN SHERIFFS
By 1066, when William the Conqueror seized power, he replaced all of theexisting sheriffs with his own loyal comrades in arms. When Williamconveyed the offices of sheriff to his Normans, he also bestowed to themthe title "Vicomte," which added nobility to their positions. He allowedVicomte sheriffs to build castles, a powerful symbol of privilege and afar greater honor than had ever been granted to prior Anglo-Saxonsheriffs. The castles were a sign of aggressive force. This fortificationsymbolism helped identify William as the incomparable authority in thenewly conquered land.

The most famous William the Conqueror sheriff was a man named WilliamMalet, a ferocious warrior. During the Battle of Hasting his horse waskilled from under him. Mounting a fresh horse, he continued leading thecharge, killing the enemy along the way, to a Norman victory. Williamcontinued to use Malet to crush insurgent forces within his reign.. . .As a reward, William named Malet the sheriff of Yorkshire.

King William sought aggressive types for the office of sheriff whoseambitions were consistent with his. Those willing to squeeze the peasantsto their maximum were the best qualified in William's eyes. He institutedthe practice of selling the office to the highest bidder. This broughtforth evil men willing to pay exorbitant prices for the office and thenwilling to do whatever it took to recoup their investment. . . No onespoke out for the peasantry because their only representative to the kingwas the very sheriffs embezzling them. The most notorious was Picot,Sheriff of Cambridgeshire. . . . Monks describe him as:

a hungry lion, a prowling wolf, a crafty fox, a filthy swine, a dogwithout shame, who stuffed his belly like an insatiable beast as thoughthe whole country were a single corpse.

If events reduced production within the shires and thereby reduced theprosperity of King William, the sheriff was then forced to press thepeasants even more to make up for the deficiency. In 1083, William leviedthe highest tax assessment of his reign to make up for the previousyear's famine and low production. . . . To enhance their income, sheriffscommonly pillaged Church properties. . . .

The only coin in circulation in twelfth century England was the silverpenny. It was the responsibility of the sheriff to police the silvercontent in the coinage. If the sheriff failed to see that the tender didnot meet quality assurance in the amount of silver content versus thealloy percentage, he was held personally liable for the shortage. Becausethis burden was placed on the sheriffs in the area that effected them themost, their pocketbooks. . . .Enforcement of the matter was particularlyunkind under the reign of King Henry II to punish offenders thatcirculated "bastard" coins. The first offense routinely resulted in thesevering of a hand or castration. . . .

The coming of King John in 1199 brought about one of the most stirringperiods in the history of the medieval sheriff. . . . As King John wagedwar against the Welsh, the French, and the Irish, he placed the emphasisupon the sheriffs to finance his wars. . . . Because of the sheriff'sauthority and ability to raise funds, the 13th century saw the sheriff asthe most powerful administrative force in medieval England. . . .

King John personally knew every one of the 100 or so sheriffs that heappointed between 1199 and 1216. Some were his intimate friends and mosttrusted advisors. In contrast to the prior practice of King Richard, heappointed only two members of the Church to the post. He instead chose toselect intense, secular men, with strong military backgrounds. . . . Hisdeliberate selection of men of harsh demeanor . . . was considered bypeople of his time as a substantive answer for the difficult issues ofthe day . . . tough men for tough times. . . .