Vol 1: The Bluets - Lackham Countryside Centre

The Bluets 94
Wakeman‘s translation of this agreement). He notes that
The Martells were lords of Llanviagel, Rogeat ,and
LLanwanches, in the same neighbourhood of the Manor of
Langston, which was held by the Bluets from the lordship
of Caerleon by the service of one knight‘s fee 401
Denholm-Young has argued 402 , convincingly, that by this time the
station of esquire didn‘t necessarily involve personal service, although
in this case it sounds as if it did. However this may be because Martel
wasn‘t a squire. Coss has suggested that in the original French the
word most commonly used for a sub-knightly retainer is not esquire,
403
the expected vernacular equivalent of armiger, but valet . “John
Bluet retained William Martel seon valet and the valet has both
household and military connotations”. Coss points out 404 that Valet
was undoubtedly a term employed by the magnates to denote retinue
membership. It is noted that John Martel, not a knight, witnessed an
[undated 405 ] charter of Bartholomew de Mora, along with Sir William
Bluet, but whether John Martel was related to William Martel is
unknown, it seems very likely.
Sir John is known to have borne the device that is now familiar for the
Bluets of Wiltshire (Fig. 1b). This is different from the two wings seen
before (Figs 1a and 15), the Bluets arms had changed sometime between
c1285 (the date of William‘s arms in St. George‘s Roll) and 1297. One
translation also appear in Morgan, O & Wakeman, T (1864) Notices of Pencoyd
Castle and Langeston Monmouth and Caerleon Antiquarian Ass.
401
Wakeman T (1847) ibid p143. This whole section is a good example of how two
researchers can complement one another – Tony located the record of the original
document in the British Library and then, completely independently and many
months later, Karen Repko found the article by Wakeman. It was only when we
compared the information that we realised they dealt with the same document!
402
Denholm-Young, N (1969) The County Gentry in the Fourteenth Century with
Special references to the Heraldic Rolls of Arms Clarendon press
403
Coss, P (2003) The Origins of the English Gentry CUP p225
404
Coss, P (2003) ibid p226
405
Calendar Charter Rolls vol 3 Edw1 Ewd II 1300-1326 p98, this record was for a
re-inspection of the original charter. Internal evidence from the witnesses of the
original would suggest a date around 1260-1270. This charter was seen above