readers with a detailed pedigree, collected from the most approved authorities, and continued through the latter descents to the present period, as having reference, and properly belonging to this subject.

This family is one of the very few of the ancient race of English gentry now remaining, whose origin may be satisfactorily traced to a period anterior to the Norman conquest. The name itself is itself is a derivation from the Celtic, and occurs as such in the annals of French Brittany, by Lobmeau; but Camden and Weever suppose the family to be of Danish extraction. The latter, at page 769 of his work on ancient funeral monuments, describing Somerleyton, says, it was "the habitation in ancient times of Fitz Osbert, from whom it is come lineally to the worshipful ancient family of the Jernegans, knights, of high esteem in these parts," adding that "the name hath been of exemplarie note before the conquest," and quotes the following passage, extracted from a pedigree of the Jerninghams, Anno MXXX.: "Canute, King of Denmarke and of England, after his return from Rome, brought divers captains and souldiers from Denmark, whereof the greatest part where christened here in England, and began to settle themselves here, of whom, Jernegan or Jerningham, and Jernihingo, now Jennings, were of the most esteeme with Canute, who gave unto the said Jerningham certain royalties, and at a parliament held at Oxford, the said King Canute

did give unto the said Jerningham, certain manors in Norfolk, and to Jennings, certain manors lying upon the sea side, near Harwiche, in Suffolke, in regard of their former services done to his father Swenus, King of Denmarke."

The difference of opinion, however, as to extraction, can be but of little importance, where all authorities agree in their remote antiquity.

Horham manor, in the hundred of Hoxne, in this county, is their earliest seat upon record, and was from them styled Horham-Jernegan. The last resident at Horham, was Hubert Jernegan, who died in 1239; and his son, Sir Hugh, made Stonham, in the same county, the chief residence of the family, which then received the name of Stonham-Jernegan.

Sir Peter Jernegan, in the reign of Edward III. again removed, making Somerleyton his principal seat, which he had inherited through his mother, who was the heiress of the Baron Fitz-Osbert. Somerleyton continued to be the chief seat, until Queen Mary granted to Sir Henry Jerningham, knt. (the gallant assertor of her title to the crown of this kingdom, when opposed to the usurpation of the Lady Jane Gray) the manor and park of Costessey, or Cossey, in Norfolk, to which he removed; and upon failure of the Somerleyton branch in heirs male, Cossey Park became, and has ever since continued to be, the uninterrupted residence of the family. Few private families, as Playfair, in

his Baronetage, has very justly observed, can prove such a lengthened succession of knights and baronets, who have all matched with ladies of an equal or superior degree; and it is no less deserving of remark, that they should have subsisted for so many centuries, by a lineal male descent, in nearly one original stock, without spreading into several branches, or settling in other parts of the kingdom; and have inviolably adhered to the ancient faith of England, to which their ancestors were originally converted.

The first upon record is Jernegan, who was settled at Horham-Jernegan, in Suffolk, in the reign of King Stephen and Henry II., and is mentioned in the Castle Acre Register, (fo. 63. b.) as witness to a deed without date, by which Bryan, son of Scolland, confirmed the church of Melsombi to the monks of Castle Acre, and died about the year 1182, leaving by Sibilla his widow, who in 1183, paid £100 of her gift into the Exchequer, (Rot. pip. 30 Hen. 2) a son who was called

2. Sir Hugh, or Hubert Fitz Jernegan, of Horham-Jernegan, kat., who paid a considerable sum of money into the Exchequer, in 1182, as a gift to King Henry II., and was witness to a deed in 1195, by which divers lands were granted to Byland Abbey, in Yorkshire. His wife was Maud, the daughter and coheiress of Thorpine, son of Robert De Watheby. By this lady, the manor of Wathe, in North Cove, in Suffolk, came into the family. He died in 1203, and the King granted the wardship of all his large possessions, and the marriage ofhis wife and children, to Robert De Veteri Pont, or Vipount, so that he married them without disparagement to their fortunes. He was succeeded by his son

3. Sir Hubert Jernegan, of Horham, knt., who aided the barons against King John, in their magnanimous struggles for the great charter, by which he forfeited a considerable part of his estates. On the accession of Henry III., in 1216, he submitted himself, and obtained his pardon; but in 1219, he had not, it apppears, recovered