Coming to England with the Conqueror, he was granted by William the manor of Pontefract, and 150 other lordships in Yorkshire, 10 in Nottinghamshire, and 4 in Lincolnshire. In several other parishes, {104a} Kirkby being among them, he also held lands, not absolutely “in demesne,” as his own, but under the absentee Bishop of Durham as lord paramount, to whom he paid a small yearly rent, which was exacted from his Saxon dependents. This Ilbert, or Hildebert, built the castle of Pontefract, {104b} and was one of the most powerful nobles in Yorkshire. Another of his family, also Ilbert, was a witness to the Charter of King Stephen, which secured the ecclesiastical liberties of England; and another, John de Lacy, became Earl of Lincoln, by marrying Margaret, daughter of Hawise de Quincy, sister of Ranulph, Earl of Lincoln and Chester (A.D. 1232). Their son, Henry de Lacy, held the same honours in the reigns of Henry III. and Ed. I. {104c} A John de Lacy was among the signatories of the Magna Charta, and we may add that it is not a little remarkable that, in this 20th century, the name of Ilbert is yet to the fore, Sir Courtenay Peregrine Ilbert, K.C.S.I., C.I.E., &c., being now Clerk of the House of Commons, and a distinguished lawyer and scholar. By a curious coincidence, Pontefract was in Saxon times known by the name of Kirkby, and this name continued even in later times; a charter of Ilbert’s son, Robert, conveying lands to the Priory of St. John at Pontefract, mentions them as being “de dominio de Kirkby,” while another charter gives them as “de Pontefract” (Camden’s “Britannia,” p. 729.) Thus Ilbert, Lord of Kirkby-on-Bain, held two lordships in different counties, of the same name. We have yet another landowner named as connected with this parish, of scarcely less note than Ilbert de Lacy.