For Bavent, with which it corresponds in Leland’s list. The name is so spelt in the Liber Niger, where Picot de Bavet is entered as holding one knight’s fee in Norfolk of William de Albini. It was derived from Bavent, lying on the Dive, a little south of Varaville, in Normandy. “De Baudre de Bavent” was represented at the great Assembly of Norman nobles in 1789; and belonged to the Bailifry of Bayeux.

Another Norfolk mesne-lord appears in the Liber Niger, Hubert de Baduent, an undertenant of the Honour of Rie. From him descended Adam de Bavent, who in the following century obtained through his wife a share of the estate of William de Wiston in Sussex, and was the father of another Adam, married to Alice de Scudamore. The latter had died before 1292, when the wardship of his son Roger was in dispute between the King and William de Say; and the contest was revived fourteen years afterwards by William’s son Geoffrey; the young heir being then still under age.

Roger de Bavent came from Sussex to the coronation of Edward II. (Palgrave’s Parl. Writs): and was afterwards summoned to Parliament with tolerable regu­larity from 1313 till 1321, when, as an adherent of the Earl of Lancaster, the whole of his possessions were seized by the Crown. He recovered them at the general restoration of forfeitures on the accession of Edward III., and added to them an estate in Wiltshire; for in 1327 “he was found to be one of the heirs of John Lord Gifford of Brimsfield, viz: son of Alice (wife of Adam de Bavent), daughter of Peter Scudamore, son of Maud (wife of Godfrey Scudamore), one of the aunts of John the last Lord Gifford of Brimsfield.” Two of these manors, Norton-Bavent, and Fifield-Bavent, still bear his name. He had the privilege of a weekly market and yearly fair at Marom in Lincolnshire, and Shipborne in Kent (the latter granted to his father in 1283), where Wrotham was held of him by the Colepepers.—v. Hasted's Kent. His successor, Roger II., made over to the King, in 1344, the whole of his estates in Wales, Dorset, Wilts, Surrey, Kent, and Sussex, with the reversion of a manor in Suffolk, and “all the other lands and tenements in England and Wales, which he then held in demesne, or which might come to him by right of inheritance, with the exception only of the manors of Chiltington and Sloghtree in the county of Sussex.” This was merely to constitute the King his heir; for he soon after received a fresh grant of the lands for life. He died in 1355, leaving a son John, who (according to Dallaway) only survived him three years, and having no posterity, Eleanor his daughter, the wife of William de Braose, was her brother’s heir. “From this Eleanor descended Beatrix de Braose (daughter of Peter, son of John, son of the said Eleanor) who, by death of her brother Sir John Braose, without issue, became heir of this line. She married Sir Hugh Shirley, who was Master of the Hounds to King Henry IV., and was slain, fighting on his part, at the battle of Shrewsbury.

“The present Marquess Townshend (1808) is her heir and representative.”— Townsend's Additions to Dugdale' s Baronage.

This is one account, given by Banks, and followed by Dallaway in his History of Sussex; but Dugdale substitutes for Roger II. Thomas de Bavent, who, in 1330, obtained a licence for a weekly market at Eston-Bavent, in Suffolk. He was succeeded by his son Peter, who died in 1370, leaving Eleanor and Cecily his daughters and heirs.

Banks adds yet another pedigree, which apparently belongs to a different line altogether, commencing with William Bavent of Bilsby (one of the Lincolnshire manors in which Roger I. had free warren), obt 1252. Of him, in the fourth generation, came Peter Bavent, the last heir male, and the father of two daughters; Alianor, married to Marmaduke Lumley; and Elizabeth, married to William Chamberlain of Edlington.

“The several pedigrees of this family are so variant from each other, that to endeavour to reconcile them with the records would be an almost indefinite task, unless for any one who, in the character of heir-general, may conceive a baronial claim to be derivable under, and by virtue of the writs of summons before cited.”—Banks.

It is clear the name did not expire with the barony, for we find two Bavents —Roger and John—among the esquires who were present at Agincourt in Lord Maltravers’ train.