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THE WARRENNES. 283
to it.
twenty-eight Vills which, either in whole or in part, were appended
Possibly it was given to William de Warrenne by the Conqueror, not so
much as a reward for his bravery as for his consanguinity, for he had
certainly married Gundred, the daughter of Matilda, William's wife.
There is no doubt of that, for in the Charter (dated 1085) of the Priory of
Lewes, which William de Warrenne founded, 1078, he states
his donations
to be for the salvation of the souls, amongst others, of Queen Matilda,
mother of his wife (matris uxoris meae) ;
but antiquaries, as M. Planche"
shews in his Conqueror and his Companions, are at issue as to her father ;
and it seems doubtful as to whether she was the daughter of William or
the child of a previous marriage, and thus sister to Gherbod the Fleming,
to whom William gave the earldom of Chester : an unaccountable act of
generosity on any other hypothesis. Or was she the child of Matilda
before her marriage
? That age was not an epoch of refined morality,
and William, an illegitimate son himself, would probably not allow such a
consideration to prevent his forming an advantageous alliance with the
daughter of the powerful Count of Flanders. We have no record of
Matilda's frailties, though she certainly meted out strong measure to one
who did not return her advances ;
for Brihtric, the son of Algar, surnamed
Meaw (snow) from the extreme fairness of his complexion, an Anglo-Saxon
Thegn, having come to her father's Court, she fell desperately in love with
him, and offered herself in ;
marriage but, receiving a cold rebuff from
one whose heart was, perhaps, already pre-occupied, she took the first
opportunity after becoming Queen of England to persuade her husband to
confiscate the lands of the unfortunate Thegn, and drag him to Winchester,
where he died in a dungeon. However, Gualterius was her grandson, and
the Lord of Conisborough.
What a grand position ! Standing high above the bank of " the
" gentle Don," about half-a-mile below its reception of the Dearne,
in the midst of a fine sylvan amphitheatre fitting seat, as its name
" Conings-burgh
"
implies, of Saxon royalty. An isolated knoll of rock
or gravel, rising, at about 400 feet from the river, to the height of 170
feet. Here he built the curtain wall of the enciente, and much of the
lower gate-house, together with a hall, kitchen, and lodgings within the
area of the old Saxon earthworks. It was probably not until a century
later that the keep was added. What a glorious building still, as it fears
its lofty form above the ruins around, a vast cylinder of stone, supported
by six massive buttresses, sixty feet in diameter. The walls fourteen feet
thick at the first floor level, twenty feet from the ground (where the only
entrance is to be found a narrow door at the top of a long straight
flight of narrow steps), decreasing to twelve feet at the summit. Who,
without interest and emotion has examined or climbed up this stately