Manor of Shirwell

The Courtenay family, later Earls of Devon, were from 1219 the successors to the feudal barony of Okehampton[2] and thus continued as overlords of Shirwell into the 13th century, as recorded in the Book of Fees,[3] and beyond.

In the Domesday Book of 1086 Ascerewelle (Shirwell) was one of at least four manors held in Devon, but merely as a mesne lord from Baldwin de Meulles, by the Norman magnate Robert de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Leicester, Count of Meulan[4] (c. 1040/50 – 1118), to whom had been granted by William the Conqueror about 91 English manors in several counties for his service in the Norman Conquest of England.

These four manors stayed for many generations within a line of the Beaumont family, seated at Youlston within the parish of Shirwell.

A.D. 850–1850, hazarded a guess that the Devon family descended from Robert's third son Hugh de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Bedford (born 1106).

[5] A confusion arises as to the early tenure of Shirwell as another manor named Sirewelle is listed in Domesday Book as held in demesne by William of Poilley, as one of his 21 Devon holdings, but all held as a tenant-in-chief of the king, not from Baldwin the Sheriff.