THERE is here presented to the view of the Reader , a Genealogical Description of certain Ancient and Noble Houses ; of which , though I have seen several Pedigrees deduc'd , yet they , being old , wanted those necessary and real Ornaments , the Curiosity and Learning of these latter times have afforded Compositions of this Nature , there having been omitted in them , an insertion of proofs ; the material Circumstance , which has only power to make considerable any effect of the Heroick Science . Wherefore these being Families in reality and truth , so rich in Records and Evidence , the Proofs of whose own Antiquity , with the Greatness and Splendor of their Alliances being so numerous , and so unquestionable , I have thought it a Debt to Truth and History , having come , through my Curiosity in matters of this kind , to a Sight and Knowledge of them , to be a means they should be expos'd unto the World , for the Entertainment and Instruction of such as may delight in things of this Nature , and the Honor of those Families that are descended from them .

But to prevent a Suspicion of any such affectation of Greatness , or Antiquity , as in others may have caus'd a Deduction of Genealogies , by corrupt and prostituted Art , from before the Conquest , before the Danes , before the Saxons , from some British or other Potentates , I desire it should be known , that I am an Antiquary by Inclination , not Profession ; that although I have purchased verity out of Ancient and Authentick Records , I sell no Fables from my own Brain , and less from the Phancies of others ; that I esteem nothing but Truths , and those so much , as if any have lost their Proofs , though there I pity them , I use them not , but consider them as unhappy Orphans out of the Guard of their Parents , in a possibility at least to have been corrupted .

And truly the endeavours of many Artists to give specious beginnings unto Pedigrees , whose heads by just Proofs they could not attain unto , has not only among the knowing brought the Science under much Scandal , but even prejudiced the Esteem and Opinion of those Families ; the streams of whose Story , from the Impurity of the Head , have been judged to be corrupted all along .

So as certainly , it is not the business of any Genealogy to be put to the hazard of blushing for a false Original , since those have been esteemed the Noblest Families , unto which a beginning could not be found at all ; but that , as far as Truths could possibly be trac'd , have always continued in their Countries under a Noble Name , and Signalized in the Provinces where they lived ; and that , when as by a Succession , lawfully proved , of between four and five hundred Years , they give to the top of a Pedigree a Gentleman of Name and Arms. It is enough not to have Him denied , that thence shall be so descended , through a Succession of Great and Illustrious Alliances , to be within the Highest Rank of Honour and Nobility . Therefore such as have so much truth for the Ornament of their Houses , and because some few have more , will have recourse to Fable for its assistance to a vain and unjust Ambition , deserve the inseparable reward of their Folly , which will be ( the abuse being discover'd ) to have , together with the Impostures , even the veritable part involved in Contempt and Disesteem .

For these reasons , there is not here pretended any primary Extractions from such suppos'd Originals , whence , like others , I should have been forc'd to bring them down by Invention , and not by Proof , introducing an Unfortunate Wanderer , Younger Brother , or Nephew unto some Unhappy Prince , that for a disastrous reason , fled his Country and chang'd his Name , because I can prove no such thing any more than many that notwithstanding their probabilities were less than those , which the large Rewards they received for their Services , the Noble kind of stile they used in their Donations , the Dignity that appeared in their Seals , and the Marks of their own great Bounties , would have afforded to the Concluders of an Extraordinary Greatness , in the Persons of whom I am to treat , have yet taken pretence with much Ceremony and Ornament to abuse Tradition with such Romances .

But you shall be here presented with several Great and Famous Knights ; most of which were Country-men , or Companions of the Conqueror , but all of them , Men notable for Valour , and Vertue , in the Reigns of those Princes under whom they flourished .

And now as concerning their Names , to manifest , they need not yield to the Antiquity of any , Cambden's Remains in his Treatise of Sirnames , pag. 131 , 135 , 136 , 137. You shall see what the Learned Cambden affirms ; He says , That Sirnames , given for difference in Families , and continued as Hereditary in them , were used in no Nation anciently , but among the Romans , and were taken up in France and England only about the Conquest , or a little before , under King Edward the Confessor ; and in Scotland not before that time , unto which the Learned of that Nation do refer the Antiquity of their Sirnames , although Buchanan doth suppose they were not in use in that Kingdom many years after : likewise he saith , That the better sort , even from the Conquest , by little and little , took Sirnames , so as they were not setled among the common people fully , till about the time of Edward the Second , but still varied according to the Father's Name , as Richardson , if the Father were Richard ; Hodgson , if the Father were Roger , or in some other respect : And from thenceforth began to be established upon their Posterity .

This , he says , will seem strange to some of the English , and of the Scotish Nations , who , like the Arcadians , think their Sirnames as Ancient as the Moon , or at least to reach many an Age before the Conquest . But they that think it most strange , he says , will hardly find any Sirnames that descended to their Posterity before that time ; neither have they seen , he fears , any Deed or Donation before the Conquest , but subsigned with Crosses and single Names in this manner , ✚ Ego Eadredus confirmavi , ✚ Ego Edmundus consolidavi : likewise for Scotland , in an old Book of Duresm , in the Charter whereby Edgar , Son of King Malcome , gave Lands near Coldingham to that Church , in the Year One thousand ninety seven , the Scotish Nobility , witnesses thereunto , had no other Sirnames than the Christian Names of their Fathers ; for they Signed , ✚ Gulphi filii Memani , ✚ Culverti filii Donecani , ✚ Olavi filii Oghe . As for himself , he says , he never found any Hereditary Names before the Conquest , neither any that he knew ; and yet both he , and divers of his acquaintance had pored and pusled over many an old Record and Evidence , to satisfy themselves therein . But he says , about the time of the Conquest he observed the very Beginning , as it were , of many Sirnames , which are thought very Ancient ; whereas it may be proved , That their lineal Progenitors bore other Names within these Six Hundred Years . Warren and Mortimer , he says , are accounted Names of Great Antiquity , yet the Father of them ( for they were Brethren ) which first bore those Names , was Walter de Sancto Martino . He that first bore the Name of Clifford , from his Habitation , was the Son of Richard the Son of Puntz , a Noble Norman , who had no other Name ; and so having instanced in many , he concludes , he could exemplify in sundry more , which shortly after the Conquest took these Sirnames , when their Fathers had none at all , or else most different , whatsoever their Posterity do overwene of the Antiquity of their Names , as if in the continual Mutability of the World , Conversion of States , and fatal Periods of Families , Five Hundred Years were not a sufficient continuance for a Name , when but very few have reached thereunto .

These are the words of the Famous Cambden , that Oracle of Antiquity , in his Treatise of Sirnames , amongst others of his Remains , which I have thought fit to set down , that the peruser of these my ensuing Genealogies , being prepossessed with a of what length of time can by Proof be afforded to any such pretence , there having been , assuredly , no Sirnames before the Conquest , may upon comparison be fit to make a Difference between what shall be here exposed , without other Ornaments than the unquestionable Truths their extant Evidences shall impose upon them , and those other specious Fables , which Fast and Flattery have produc'd to the Prejudice of ancient Probity , undervaluing of true Nobleness , and Scandal of the Heroick Science .

So there remains to speak but of the Etymologies or Derivations of these Names , which their great Age , and Continuance , has left very uncertain , having been taken up ( as will be proved ) among the first of Sirnames . I shall only offer , as grounds of a probable conjecture thereupon , That as Names were usually taken from Places , from Offices , from Actions , from Conditions of the Mind , Complexions of the Body , and sundry other means , as you will find in this rare Antiquary's Treatise thereof , and as Noble of the one , as of the other : So the marks between them seem to have been but the words of De and Le preceding ; the first intimating the Derivation from a place either of the persons Possession , or of his Birth ; the latter of an Office or occasional Sobriquet upon some incidence or action , which was in that beginning of Names amongst the greatest very usual ; as for Example , whereas Jeffrey de Mandeville , Bertran de Verdun , William de Warren , and Roger de Mortimer , were so named from Places ; William Le Marshall , Walter Le Steward , William Le Latimer , and Robert Le Despencer , with other great Families , were of Offices ; Hugh Le Bigot , Robert Le Manduit , Hamon Le Strange , and Robert Le Blond , upon incidents of the Mind , the Manners of the fortune and of the Person , received livewise the Appellations which afterward remained to their Posterity .

And thus , although a positive Derivation I shall not undertake to give unto the words , it may be supposed upon some like occasion to these latter , the Names of which we treat , did first arise , since they had in the Assumers of them the Additions of Le , or De , and all of them we find under these Appellations to have received from their Princes , their Parents , or their Relations , the Lands and Lordships of which they were first possessed , as shall , with the Succession of their Posterities , and their Inherited Houses , be herein demonstrated , and from them an uninterrupted Succession , by which their Arms and Lands were engrafted into the House of Mordaunt . There shall be set forth the Arms that are ascribed to them , and which were born by their Descendants , the Actions they atchieved , the Dignities with which they were honoured , and the Lands and Lordships they did acquire , with divers of their Seals , Tombs , and Images .

I shall begin with the first Alliance , from whose Heir General there descended Arms and Land , the Description whereof I shall set forth to the Conjunction with the Paternal House ; after which shall be expos'd , in a Genealogical Line , the Arms of the Descent and its Alliances , whereunto shall succeed all the Proofs of the first House , and in the same Method , what concerns the rest of the Inherited Houses in their Order .

In the Ornaments of Arms and Distinctions in Heraldry , there may be in this Treatise a difference from what in some kinds is generally practised in this Country . But they being according to the use of those Nations , that at present in things of this Nature are very curious and refined , and altogether concordant with reason , and the proportion of things and qualities ; I hope that difference will give occasion for no exception .

After all , in this Method I suppose that Men may find a certain way to perserve the Memory and Esteem of Ancient Families ; as also that for any Advantage , or Prerogative , the House of Mordaunt is oblig'd but only to Vertue , to Antiquity , and to Truth .