Robert Disard de Hotoft, holding in Lindesey in Lincolnshire, occurs in the Rotuli Hundredorum of the time of Edward I. The name is not on the Roll of Landowners in those parts in the time of Henry I. (1114-1116) found in the Cottonian Library in the British Museum: nor have I found any subsequent notice of it. Robson gives the arms of Disert, Dissert, or Dysert, as Gules three dexter hands Argent.

As Izzard or Izard, the name is still occasionally found in the Southern counties, but whence it is derived is a question that it would be difficult to determine. I think we may safely dismiss from consideration “Dysart, on the coast of Fife, which marks the wilderness—desertum—where St. Serf scooped out of the rocks a cave for his abode.” - Isaac Taylor. Nor need we trouble ourselves with the Welsh “Thisarte, or Disarte, a Castelle yn Flyntshire, by the Name yn Walsche thus expounded. Thi is privata particula, as not. Sarte is stepe up. Not stepe, or dining up, that is to say, playne.”— Leland.

Anselme mentions a Seigneurie des Issars, held by Louis de Gallien in 1665: and the Forêt de Londes in Normandy anciently bore the name of Forêt des Essarts. Philip and William de Deserte occur in the Norman Exchequer Rolls of 1198. In England Robert de Essartis (so styled in the confirmation charter of Henry II.) was a benefactor of Fountains Abbey: but his name “derived, perhaps, from a district or place that had been essarted or cleared of brushwood,” is also given as Sartis or Sarz. Hugh de Essartis witnesses a grant of King Stephen to Sawley Abbey, at York (Mon. Angl.). William de Deserte held at Thornton, Yorkshire, in the time of Henry III. (Archbishop Grey’s Register). Roger de Desarte had been Viscount of London in the preceding reign (2 John). Was this the Roger de Assarto, mentioned in the Testa de Neville who held at Fishwick in Lancashire? Another of the name, Ralph de Assartis, occurs in the same record as a tenant of the Honour of Essex.

A Norman name: Izards; a local name