The English ancestry of Reinold and Matthew Marvin of Hartford, Ct ...

Reinold and Matthew Marvin 107
annual payment to the widow (Reinold's mother). Robert,
another son, took his father's free lands in Frating, a Parish
west of Little Bentley, and Matthew, his youngest son, was
given the "mentchon house" that "I now dwelle in," in
Great Bentley, "called Edons alles (? alias) Dreybrockes, and
the crofts of land called Hartles and Brocken Heddes," sub-
ject to a similar annuity. No effort has been made to dis-
cover the exact location of these estates in Great Bentley,
but I have been informed it is probable that the task would
not be very difficult.
Wix adjoins Wrabness on the south-west, and is two and a
half miles from the railroad station, and seven miles from
Dovercourt. The name of this Parish, which is called Wica
in Domesday, comes, as Morant remarks, "from the Saxon
word J>ic, which means a village, farm, or dairy." In the
time of Henry I there was a famous Benedictine Abbey here,
called St. Mary's, founded by Walter, Alexander and Editha
Mascherell, children of "Walter the Deacon." Newcourt *
says it was originally " of the order of St. Austin, the sisters
whereof, during their time, took care to have the cure [of the
Parish Church, St. Mary's] supplied by such Clerks as them-
selves provided."
This Priory was surrendered to Wolsey by the Abbess
Mary in 1527, and part of its property was applied toward
* As cited, II : p. 656. St. Austin, better known as St. Augustine of Canterbury, is
believed to have introduced the Benedictine rule into England by the order of the
Pontiff Gregory the Great, about the close of the sixth century, so that the statements
are not necessarily inconsistent; but if the Nunnery ever bore his name, it was early
dedicated to the Virgin.