1. Hereford, granted to William Fitz Osbern before January, 1067.
2. Shrewsbury, granted to Roger de Montgomery circ. 1070.
3. Chester, granted to Hugh d’Avranches, before January, 1071.
4. Kent, granted to Odo, bishop of Bayeux, possibly before January, 1067.
The exact extent of the earldom of Hereford is doubtful, for there exists a certain amount of evidence which makes it probable that William Fitz Osbern possessed the rights of an earl over Gloucestershire and Worcestershire in addition to the county from which he took his title. We have already discussed the general significance of the early writ which the king addressed to Earl William and the magnates of Gloucestershire and Worcestershire, and the evidence of this document is supported by the fact that the earl appears as dealing in a very arbitrary fashion with land and property in both shires.[306] It is probable on other grounds that Gloucestershire lay within the Fitz Osbern earldom, for William’s possessions extended far south of the Herefordshire border to the lands between Wye and Usk in the modern county of Monmouth, and the addition of Gloucestershire to Herefordshire is required to complete the line of earldoms which lay along the Welsh border. On the other hand it seems probable that Worcestershire never belonged to Roger, William Fitz Osbern’s son, for in 1075 it was the main object of the royal captains in the west to prevent him from crossing the Severn to the assistance of his friends in the midlands. In any case the early date at which the earldom of Hereford was created deserves notice, for it shows that within four months of the battle of Hastings William was strong enough to place a foreign earl in command of a remote and turbulent border shire. Short as was his tenure of his earldom William Fitz Osbern was able to leave his mark there; fifty years after his death there still remained in force an ordinance which he had decreed to the effect that no knight should be condemned to pay more than seven shillings for any offence.[307] Lastly, it should be noted that in a document of 1067[308] William Fitz Osbern is styled “consul palatinus,” a title which should not be construed “palatine earl,” but which rather means that William, though raised to comital rank, still retained the position of “dapifer” or steward of the court, which he inherited from his father, the unlucky Osbern of the Conqueror’s minority, and in virtue of which the earl of Hereford continued to be the titular head of the royal household.
