The Despensers: The Rise and fall of a mediaeval family

Here is another of Kathryn Warner‘s volumes in which the genealogy is central but there is plenty of history about the principal individuals that comprise the structure of the book. These range from Hugh Despenser the Justiciar, who fell at Evesham in 1265 opposing Henry III, to his son and grandson (the latter married to…

The Death and Burial of Constance of York

(Reblogged from The Yorkist Age.) According to the Tewkesbury Chronicle Constance died in 1417 ( recte November 1416) but was not buried until 1420. This is hard to explain, and may simply be an error. However, given that Constance left no will behind her, there is a good possibility that her death was sudden and unexpected. She…

The Touchet/Audley Family in the Fifteenth Century.

James Touchet, Lord Audley, was born about 1398. He was not in the first rank of magnates but nevertheless had significant estates, notably Heighley Castle, near Madeley in Staffordshire, and the Red Castle (Hawkstone) in Shropshire, as well as two small Marcher lordships in Wales. His first marriage was to Margaret Roos, daughter of Lord Roos…

The Ancestry of Sir Richard Pole.

Richard Pole is perhaps most famous for being the husband of Margaret Plantagenet, later Countess of Salisbury. But who was he? His maternal ancestry is relatively straightforward. He was the son of Edith St. John, who was the half-sister of Margaret Beaufort. So that makes him the (half-blood) first cousin of Henry VII. Edith St.…

The Decline of Villeinage

The Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 is well-known, and it is often thought that the decline of serfdom, or villeinage, began at about this time. The truth is more complex. Like most English traditions, villeinage took a long time to pass and outlived its usefulness by many decades. Indeed Queen Elizabeth I still owned serfs –…

Election of MPs. How local ‘democracy’ worked in the late Middle Ages.

In principle, each shire was supposed to elect two knights to represent it in Parliament – hence the expression ‘Knights of the shire.’ The leading men of the county (excluding magnates) would meet at the quarter-sessions or county court and choose suitable candidates, who would then be nominated by the Sheriff, whose job it was…

The many wonders of medieval Caversham

Caversham is just across the Thames from Reading. The present bridge carrying the main road between the two places is modern, but it is more or less on the site of a medieval stone and timber bridge, dating from between 1163 and 1231. Sources vary as to whether it had one, two or three chapels,…