29th May, 1612, leaves to his daughter Judith, all his copyhold in
Harebie, to his brother, Sir Vincent Skynner, Knight, lands in Hareby and
other places, with the advowson of the Benefice. Sir Vincent Skynner was
Lord of the Manor of Thornton Curtis; he was in 1604 appointed by the
crown Keeper of East Kirkby Park, as part of the Royal manor, or
"Honour," of Bolingbroke. His son William married a daughter of Sir
Edward Coke, Knight, and was buried at Thornton Curtis, August 17th, A.D.
1626.

We find mention of another owner of land in Thimbleby, in the 15th
century, whose apparent love of pelf would seem to have tempted him to
defraud the king of his dues. A certain Thomas Knyght, of the City of
Lincoln, Esquire, died in the 10th year of the reign of Henry VII. (A D
1495), seized of lands and tenements "in Thembleby," and other places.
At the Inquisition then held, the jurors found that he had alienated
certain parts of the property, "the Royal license therefor not being
obtained, to the prejudice and deception of the lord the King," and the
property passed to his son and heir William, who took possession, with "a
like evasion of dues, to the King's prejudice." What penalty was imposed
is not stated; but it was a somewhat remarkable coincidence, that, as
shewn in another Inquisition made the following year (A.D. 1496), certain
witnesses deposed that on the 20th day of June, A.D. 1476 (_i.e._ 19
years before his decease), the said Thomas Knyght, and his servants,
about the middle of the night "broke and dug the soil of the parlour of
his house, and found 1,000 pounds, and more, of the coinage of the
Treasury . . . there placed and hidden," which as "tresour-trove, by
reason of the prerogative of the lord the King, ought to come to his use,
&c." This has all a very suspicious look, Knyght would not have ordered
this search for the money if he had not himself known of its being there.
It looks like a previous attempt at concealment, in some way to defraud
the revenue, which Knyght himself afterwards felt was a failure, and that
it was safer to exhume the hoard himself, rather than that public
officials should do it. Altogether it would seem that "Thomas Knyght, of
the City of Lincoln, Esquire," was somewhat of a sordid character, and
not a proprietor for Thimbleby to be proud of.

We now proceed to records more ecclesiastical. We have already noted
that, with the consent of the Bishop of Carlisle, William de Folet