(Maulovel in Leland’s copy) Humbert, Seigneur de Montluel, and Alix de la Tour his wife, founded the church of Montluel in 1289. Jean de Montluel (probably in default of heirs male) granted the Seigneurie to Henry de la Tour in 1325. (Anselme, vol. ii. 17, 20.) In England we first meet with the family in Yorkshire. According to the Testa de Neville "Robert de Maulovel was among those who held of the King as of the Honour of Tickhill in the reign of Henry I.”—Hunter's South Yorkshire. They bore Vert, three wolves passant Or, in allusion to their name.Wolves must have been plentiful in Normandy, judging from the names given in connection with them. Besides the above, we find Trancheloup, Heurteloup, Gratteloup, Cul de Loup, Piedeloup, &c. It was either this Robert, or his son of the same name, that married the heiress of Rampton in Nottinghamshire, Pavia, daughter of Nigel de Rampton, and left (according to Thoroton) four sons, Stephen, Robert, Roger, and Richard. Stephen died early, and the custody of his son Robert was given to Roger, " who took care of him in his infirmity, when all his other friends left him,” and obtained from him a “chartel” or grant of some land at Rampton. When, however, Robert came of age, in King John’s time, he declared that “he was not in his own power when he made that chart, nor knew his own sense,” and claimed back the property. This was dealing hard measure to his uncle, for I find, from entries both in the Rotuli Cancellarii and Rotuli Curiæ Regis of that reign, that he held land in four different counties, Leicester, Lincoln, Notts, and Derby. Roger recouped himself with an heiress, for in 1209 he “gave account of a swift running palfrey and two leis of greyhounds, for having the King’s letters deprecatory to Maud de Muschans, that she should take him for her husband.”

Robert’s grandson married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Thomas de Longvilers, and eventually the heiress of her family, as the children of her brother Sir John both died s. p. Her son Stephen proved the last heir male of the Maulovels, and through his daughter—another Elizabeth—Rampton passed to John Stanhope, whose son Sir Richard further succeeded to the great longvilers inheritance in 1398. It was this marriage that first brought the Stanhopes from Durham into Nottinghamshire, and Rampton continued to be their seat for six successive generations, till Saunchia Stanhope conveyed it to the Babingtons in the time of Henry VIII.

MAULOVEL: An Anglo-Norman name, meaning, according to its latinization, (Malus Lupellus) "the bad little wolf."

Mauclerk: are all nick-names—the bad clerk, the bad covenant, bad faith, the bad young wolf, the evil eye, bad talent, bad neighbour—not likely to be passed on as surnames. De Mauney is, however, not bad nose, but a place-name; more of this presently.