Blakenham Priory

His father, also Walter Giffard, Lord of Longueville in Normandy had fought with William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and been given 107 English lordships, of these 48 were in Buckinghamshire.

Founded in 1034, it became through the magnetic presence of the erudite Lanfranc of Pavia a focus of 11th century intellectual life, which developed further under its second abbot, Anselm.

[5] Many of the companions in arms and followers of William the Conqueror supported the abbey, enriching it with extensive properties in England, where Bec possessed in the 15th century several priories, namely, St Neots, Stoke-by-Clare, Wilsford, Steventon, Cowick, Ogbourne, and at some point also Blakenham and Povington Priory.

An estate of this size would have required supervision, probably of one or two monks, who would have their chapel and offices at the manor house in early days.

[8] As an alien priory (i.e., the dependency of a French mother-house) Blakenham would have had a certain instability of status before the English crown, especially whenever there were hostilities between France and England, and particularly during the Hundred Years' War.