The Sheriff of Cambridge
There is one celebrated case involving Picot, the infamous sheriff of Cambridge. When a king's thegn called Ulfkell seized the manor of Isleham Priory from the Bishop of Rochester at the instigation of Picot himself, the sheriff bullied the shire court into finding against the bishop in the subsequent court case. The bishop took his grievance to Odo of Bayeux (his local lord as well as the regent of England), who settled the matter by getting six of the court members to swear on oath that they had made the decision freely. However, one of them accused the others of perjury, and the case was taken to London. There in front of an assembly of 'most of the better barons of all England' they were found guilty and fined £300. The bishop of Rochester got his land back, and Picot got off scot free.
'...rapacious sheriffs were not uncommon...'
It has to be said that Picot was a particularly nasty example of his kind: he was characterised as: 'A hungry lion, a ravening wolf, a cunning fox, a dirty pig and an impudent dog' by the Abbot of Ely, with whom he had more than one run-in. Many sheriffs under William must have been good and fair men, but we don't hear about them because they don't make good television programmes. We are told about the corrupt new men, like Picot and Robert d'Oilly, who have come up from obscurity and are making the most of their new and highly unusual position while they can. Nevertheless, rapacious sheriffs were not uncommon. By the reign of William's third son, Henry I, we hear of a whole group of them being thrown out for exceeding their authority.
Published: 2001-05-01
Bookmark with:
What are these?