PREFACE.

The five western counties, Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Dorset, and Wiltshire, were visited by St. George and Lennard, as deputies to Camden, the two first in 1620, and the others in 1623. The original Visitations, signed for the most part by the gentry whose pedigrees were entered, are now part of the Harleian Collection of MSS. in the British Museum, Nos. 1162, 1163, 1164, 1165, 1166, and 1141. These books form the most valuable part of the Heralds' Visitations in our National Library, being without question original documents, which, either from carelessness or dishonesty, have escaped from their proper custodians, the Officers of ^Vnns. They appear to be in the handwritings of St George and Lennard, with some few additions by Henry Parker, an arms-painter, in whose possession they at one time were ; the catalogue of the Harleian MSS. states that the Somersetshire Visitation was at one time in the hands of Richard Mundy. On the death of Mr. Lennard these MSS. came into the possession of Mr. Parker, and then passed by purchase to Mr. Robert Fisher, and subsequently to the Earl of Oxford's library. Those who are curious as to their history may consult the able Preface to the Cornwall Visitation, edited for the Harleian Society by Col. Vivian and Dr. Drake, and the accounts of them given in the Catalogue of tlie Harleian MSS.

The Arms of those whose pedigrees are recorded in this Visitation are not entered in the MS., except in the case of Seals of Corporate towns, and a fcAv appended to abstracts of ancient deeds. These have been reproduced from tlie ;MS. by photo-lithography, on two plates, each figure being numbered and a note referring to it inserted as a foot note to the text, so that it can easily be identified by the reader.

Harleian MS. 1443, which is an amalgamation of the Wiltshire Visitations of 1565 and 1623, supplies tricks of the Arms belonging to many of the families whose pedigrees are entered here.