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CHAPTER III.

THE SAXON AILRIC AND HIS DESCENDANTS,
TENANTS OF CAWTHORNE.

The Ailric of Domesday Book, spoken of in the first chapter, was succeeded by his son Swayne, whose name is probably still perpetuated by the neighbouring village of Hoyland Swein.

Whether Swein himself, as seems probable, was the founder of Silkstone Church or not, it was he who gave that church to the Priory of St. John at Pontefract, which, as we have seen, his own chief lord Robert de Laci had founded in 1090.

The original grant is for the first time given in Hunter's Deanery (Vol.II., p.221) from the Chartulary of Pontefract in Mr. Wentworth's possession at Woolley: "Swanus filius Ailrichi: Volo vos omnes scire qui nunc estis præsentes et futuri, quod ego, in remissione omnium peccatorum meorum, et pro salute animæ meæ, et omnium parentum meorum qui de hoc seculo transierunt, et pro animabus omnium heredum meorum dedi et concessi Deo, &c., ecclesiam de Silkstun et VI bovatas cum omnibus pert. et capellam de Caltorna cum II bovatis et cum II partibus omnium decimarum dominii mei, videlicet de garbis. Testem voco Deum, &c. &c."

He thus gives "the Chapel of Cawthorne, with two oxgangs of land" here "and with two parts of all the tithes of grain in his lordship," as well as "the Church of Silkstone." The Charter of Robert de Laci confirming this grant has already been referred to, and also that of Hugh de La Val, in which what is here called the "Chapel" (capellan) is mentioned as the "Church" (ecclesiam) of Cawthorne.

The successor of Swein was his son, Adam, whom Hunter describes as "one of the most considerable persons of his age." He was the founder of the only religious house which has ever existed in the Wapentake of Staincross, the Priory of St. Mary Magdalene de Lunda, commonly called Burton or Bretton Priory—"Monk-Bretton"— a Monastery of the Cluniac Order of St. Benedict.