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LIFE OF GEORGE WASHINGTON
BY WASHINGTON IRVING
IN FIVE VOLS.
VOL. I.
CHAPTER I.
GENEALOGY OF THE WASHINGTON FAMILY.
The Washington family is of an ancient English stock, the genealogy of
which has been traced up to the century immediately succeeding the
Conquest. At that time it was in possession of landed estates and manorial
privileges in the county of Durham, such as were enjoyed only by those, or
their descendants, who had come over from Normandy with the Conqueror, or
fought under his standard. When William the Conqueror laid waste the whole
country north of the Humber, in punishment of the insurrection of the
Northumbrians, he apportioned the estates among his followers, and advanced
Normans and other foreigners to the principal ecclesiastical dignities. One
of the most wealthy and important sees was that of Durham. Hither had been
transported the bones of St. Cuthbert from their original shrine at
Lindisfarne, when it was ravaged by the Danes. That saint, says Camden, was
esteemed by princes and gentry a titular saint against the Scots.
[Footnote: Camden, Brit. iv., 349.] His shrine, therefore, had been held in
peculiar reverence by the Saxons, and the see of Durham endowed with
extraordinary privileges.
William continued and increased those privileges. He needed a powerful
adherent on this frontier to keep the restless Northumbrians in order, and
check Scottish invasion; and no doubt considered an enlightened
ecclesiastic, appointed by the crown, a safer depositary of such power than
an hereditary noble.
Having placed a noble and learned native of Loraine in the diocese,
therefore, he erected it into a palatinate, over which the bishop, as Count
Palatine, had temporal, as well as spiritual jurisdiction. He built a
strong castle for his protection, and to serve as a barrier against the
Northern foe. He made him lord high-admiral of the sea and waters adjoining
his palatinate,--lord warden of the marches, and conservator of the league
between England and Scotland. Thenceforth, we are told, the prelates of
Durham owned no earthly superior within their diocese, but continued for
centuries to exercise every right attached to an independent sovereign.
[Footnote: Annals of Roger de Hovedon. Hutchinson's Durham, vol. ii.
Collectanea Curiosa, vol. ii., p. 83.]
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