Maud of Lancaster, Countess of Ulster

I've written briefly before about Maud of Lancaster, countess of Ulster, and see also here: she was one of the six daughters of Henry, earl of Lancaster, Leicester and Derby (c. 1281-1345), grandson of Henry III, first cousin of Edward II and uncle of Edward's queen Isabella, and Maud Chaworth (1282-1321), older half-sister of Hugh Despenser the Younger. Maud of Lancaster's sisters were Blanche, Lady Wake; Isabella, prioress of Amesbury; Joan, Lady Mowbray; Eleanor, Lady Beaumont and countess of Arundel; and Mary, Lady Percy, mother of the first earl of Northumberland and the earl of Worcester. The only Lancaster brother was the magnificent Henry of Grosmont, first duke of Lancaster, grandfather of Henry IV, king of England and Philippa of Lancaster, queen of Portugal. None of the dates of birth of the seven Lancaster siblings are recorded, but Blanche (born c. 1302/05) was certainly the eldest and Eleanor and Mary the second youngest and youngest respectively. In my opinion, Isabella the prioress of Amesbury was the second eldest, born c. 1305/07 or thereabouts and named after her maternal grandmother Isabella Beauchamp, mother of Maud Chaworth and Hugh Despenser the Younger; she was old enough to go on a pilgrimage to Canterbury with Edward II's sister the nun Mary and niece Elizabeth de Clare in the spring of 1317. This leaves Maud, Joan and Henry, the middle three children, who might have been born any time between about 1308 and 1316 (I estimate Eleanor's birth as about 1318 and Mary's as about 1320), and their order of birth is also unclear. Maud's first husband was born in September 1312, and Joan's husband in November 1310, so possibly Joan was older than Maud, but it's impossible to know for sure. Both Maud and Joan married in 1327. Maybe there was even a set of twins among the seven siblings; I just don't know. Interestingly enough, Blanche, the eldest sibling, was the last to die: she lived until July 1380, when she must have been at least in her mid-seventies. She had married Thomas, Lord Wake, all the way back in 1316, though the couple had no children. Thomas was a first cousin of Roger Mortimer, first earl of March, the brother of Margaret Wake, countess of Kent, and the great-uncle of Richard II.

Maud of Lancaster, the third or fourth daughter of Henry of Lancaster and Maud Chaworth (who died in 1321 when some of her children were still very young) married William Donn de Burgh, only son of Edward II's niece Elizabeth de Clare and her first husband John de Burgh, sometime in 1327. William was fourteen or fifteen at the time, born on 17 September 1312, and Maud probably about the same age. Their only child Elizabeth de Burgh was born on 6 July 1332 and named after her paternal grandmother, and less than a year later William was dead, murdered near Carrickfergus in Ireland. Maud and her baby daughter fled back to England. Elizabeth de Burgh was a great heiress: she inherited the earldom of Ulster from her father and great-grandfather Richard de Burgh, and was also the heiress of her grandmother Elizabeth de Clare and her third of the vast de Clare inheritance. Edward III snapped her up for his second son Lionel of Antwerp, who was born in November 1338 and was six and a half years Elizabeth's junior. Lionel and Elizabeth's only child, Maud of Lancaster's granddaughter, was Philippa of Clarence, born in 1355 and Edward III's eldest grandchild (or legitimate grandchild, anyway; Edward of Woodstock had probably produced one or two of the illegitimate variety by then).

Meanwhile, Maud of Lancaster had married her second husband Ralph Ufford, justiciar of Ireland and brother of Robert Ufford, earl of Suffolk, a close friend and ally of Edward III. Their only child Maud Ufford was born in 1345 or 1346, so was about a dozen years younger than her half-sister Elizabeth de Burgh. Ralph Ufford died on 9 April 1346, leaving his widow Maud of Lancaster either pregnant or with a newborn baby. Once again, she went back to England. and never married again. In 1364, she took the veil as a Minoress or Poor Clare. Her younger daughter Maud Ufford married Thomas de Vere, earl of Oxford, and was the mother of Robert de Vere, earl of Oxford (1362-1392), Richard II's notorious favourite. Maud de Vere née Ufford outlived her son by more than twenty years, and died in 1413; her maternal grandparents Henry of Lancaster and Maud Chaworth had been born all the way back in the early 1280s.

Maud of Lancaster died on 5 May 1377, in her mid-sixties or thereabouts, just two months before her second cousin Edward III. She was already a great-grandmother at the time of her death: Elizabeth, Roger and Philippa Mortimer, children of Maud's granddaughter Philippa of Clarence and her husband Edmund Motimer, earl of March, were born in the early to mid-1370s. Maud had outlived her elder daughter Elizabeth de Burgh and her son-in-law Lionel of Antwerp, who died in 1363 and 1368 respectively, and also outlived all her six siblings with the exception of her eldest sister Blanche, Lady Wake, who lived three years into the reign of her husband's great-nephew Richard II. Maud of Lancaster, countess of Ulster, was buried at Campsey Priory in Suffolk, where she had taken the veil and where her second husband Ralph Ufford was also buried.

Edward II and the Necromancer: Death by Magical and Secret Dealings

Something most curious happened in England in 1323/24: a group of people in Coventry plotted to kill Edward II and his 'favourites' Hugh Despenser father and son by necromancy. Here's a post about it.

A man named Robert le Mareschal of Leicester gave evidence before Simon Croyser, coroner of Edward II's household, on Wednesday 31 October 1324, or 'Wednesday the eve of All Saints in the eighteenth year of our lord King Edward's reign' as it appeared on record, and the case was referred to King's Bench a few days later. Mareschal stated that he was lodging in Coventry with a John of Nottingham, a necromancer (nigromauncer in the Anglo-Norman records of King's Bench), when on 30 November 1323 ('Wednesday before Saint Nicholas in the seventeenth year') twenty-seven men came to visit the necromancer. Mareschal named all of them; they included Richard le Latoner, John de Siflet, Richard le Taillour, Robert le Mercer, Philip le Hosier, Robert de Stone, Piers Baroun, Richard de la Grene, Reynauld de Alesleye who was a girdler, and John le Redclerk who was a hosier. Judging by the men's names, they were mostly craftsmen, merchants and traders: a hosier sold hosiery, a girdler made and sold girdles, a latoner worked with a kind of metal called latten, a mercer sold textiles, and the name taillour means tailor.

The men complained to the necromancer John of Nottingham that they could no longer live because of the harshness (duresce) the prior of Coventry was imposing on them every day with the support of the king, Hugh Despenser the Elder and Hugh Despenser the Younger (I have no idea what this 'harshness' involved, or who the prior of Coventry was and how Edward II was supposedly helping him). They therefore asked John of Nottingham if he might undertake to kill Edward II, the earl of Winchester, i.e. Hugh Despenser the Elder, Sir Hugh Despenser the Younger, the prior of Coventry "and others whom they named" by necromancy "and his arts." John of Nottingham, having first promised to keep whatever they told him secret - as did his lodger and assistant Robert le Mareschal, a promise he broke - agreed to do so. The men made a covenant with him promising to pay him the extremely large sum of twenty pounds (the equivalent of a few years' wages for most people in England at the time) and another fifteen pounds to Robert le Mareschal for helping. They also promised the necromancer board and lodging at any religious house he chose in England, presumably because he would have to escape and live in hiding after murdering the king. The twenty-seven men paid eleven marks (a mark was two-thirds of a pound) of the twenty pounds they owed to the necromancer, and four pounds of the fifteen they owed to his assistant Robert le Mareschal, in the house of Richard le Latoner on 7 December 1323, 'the Wednesday after the feast of Saint Nicholas in the seventeenth year'.

John of Nottingham and Robert le Marechal acquired seven pounds of wax (cire) and two ells of canvas (canevace), and formed seven images of seven men: Edward II, for whom they fashioned a crown of wax; Hugh Despenser the Elder, earl of Winchester; Hugh Despenser the Younger; the prior of Coventry; the prior's cellarer and his steward Nichol Crumpe; and 'a Richard de Sowe'. The latter's identity is not explained, but he seems to have been a local inhabitant who would act as a test case for the efficacy of John of Nottingham's powers of necromancy. Robert le Mareschal stated that on Monday 12 December 1323, he and John of Nottingham began performing their tricks over the image representing Richard de Sowe, in an "old house" half a league from the town of Coventry (a une demie luwe de la ville de Coventre) beneath the park of 'Shorteleye' (looking at the map, there's still a Shortley Road in Coventry, a mile or so south of the cathedral). They continued working on the wax and canvas image of the unfortunate Richard de Sowe for many months, until the Saturday after the feast of the Ascension in the following year, 1324; I don't know the exact date of Ascension in 1324, but it falls in May or early June, so approximately six months later. Finally, in the old house on the Friday before the feast of the Exultation of the Holy Cross, around midnight (entour la my nuyt), John of Nottingham and Robert le Mareschal made a pointed spike out of a sharpened feather and drove it two thumbs deep into the forehead of Richard de Sowe's wax/canvas image, to see what might be expected to happen when they did the same thing to the others.

The following day, John of Nottingham sent Robert le Mareschal to Richard de Sowe's house to see what kind of condition he was in. Robert found the poor man howling and crying out Harrou!, an expression of distress in Middle English. He had lost his memory and was unable to recognise anyone. He remained alive and in this distressed state until John of Nottingham removed the sharpened feather from the forehead of his image some days later and plunged it instead into the heart (of the image), whereupon Richard de Sowe died soon afterwards. Before they could try out the wax figures of Edward II and the Despensers, however, Robert le Mareschal was seized with an attack of conscience and gave the game away to the authorities.

Hugh Despenser the Younger wrote to Pope John XXII to complain about the "magical and secret dealings" threatening him, and received the notably unsympathetic response on 1 September 1324 that he should "turn to God with his whole heart and make a good confession" and that no other remedy was necessary. [1] The royal clerk who wrote the Vita Edwardi Secundi came to hear of the story, and says of Edward that his "meanness is laid at Hugh's door, like the other evils that afflict the court. Hence, many conspired to kill him [Despenser], but the plot was discovered, some were captured and the others fled." [2] John of Nottingham died in prison; the others either fled and could not be found, or were acquitted (at least as far as I can tell; I admit that my ability to read several paragraphs of Latin legalese is not the greatest).

Sources
The case is cited in full in the Latin and Anglo-Norman original (no translation) in Thomas Wright, A Contemporary Narrative of the Proceedings against Dame Alice Kyteler (1843), pp. xxiii-xxix. A summary of the case appears in Natalie Fryde, The Tyranny And Fall of Edward II 1321-1326, pp. 162-4 (which I only read after I'd translated it myself).

1) Calendar of Papal Letters 1305-1341, p. 461.

2) Vita Edwardi Secundi, ed. N. Denholm-Young, p. 136.

14 April 1322: Execution of Bartholomew, Lord Badlesmere

Today marks the 694th anniversary of Edward II's execution of his former household steward, Bartholomew, Lord Badlesmere, who had joined the Contrariant rebellion against the king and the Despensers.

Badlesmere was appointed as the steward of Edward II's household in October 1318, and in December that year was one of the four men (one of the others was Edward's chamberlain Hugh Despenser the Younger, whose wife Eleanor de Clare was the first cousin of Badlesmere's wife Margaret de Clare) who devised a Household Ordinance for the king. In late June 1321, the Marcher lords who had recently destroyed the lands of the two Hugh Despensers throughout Wales and England met Edward II's cousin and enemy Thomas, earl of Lancaster at Sherburn in Yorkshire. Edward sent Badlesmere to the meeting, presumably as a spy; Badlesmere switched sides and joined the Marchers. His motives are uncertain, but most probably he was angry at the rise of Hugh Despenser, his former ally who had deprived him of influence with the king, and he had a family connection to two Marchers: his daughter Elizabeth was married to Roger Mortimer's son and heir Edmund, and his wife Margaret was the aunt of Roger, Lord Clifford (son of Maud Clifford née de Clare). This proved to be as astonishingly unwise move on Badlesmere's part. Edward thereafter detested him for his treachery, and the earl of Lancaster loathed him already (I have no idea why; Lancaster loathed a lot of people): a letter of 27 February 1321 had informed Edward that "great ambushes are set for Bartholomew de Badlesmere in the south and in the north against his coming," and these ambushes were most likely Lancaster’s.  [J. Goronwy Edwards, Calendar of Ancient Correspondence Concerning Wales, pp. 180-81; J. R. Maddicott, Thomas of Lancaster, p. 264.] Edward and Hugh Despenser the Younger's plan in the autumn of 1321 to bring the Despensers back to England and defeat the Marchers, or Contrariants, centred around Badlesmere in Kent.

Edward II ordered Bartholomew Badlesmere's arrest on 7 December 1321. [Patent Rolls 1321-24, p. 40] During the king's winter campaign of 1321/22 against the Contrariants, he sometimes offered some of them safe-conducts to come and meet him but always pointedly excluded Badlesmere by name. [Patent Rolls, pp. 47-8, 51, 70, 71] The battle of Boroughbridge on 16 March 1322 marked a decisive turning point; Edward II's ally Sir Andrew Harclay, sheriff of Cumberland and soon to become earl of Carlisle, defeated the Contrariant army. Thomas, earl of Lancaster was executed on 22 March, with Lords Clifford and Mowbray following on 23 March. Twenty or twenty-two noblemen and knights were executed in March/April 1322 (don't believe the inaccurate figures and hysterically over-emotive accounts you often read in modern literature: here is a reliable count of the executions).

The legal judgement on Bartholomew Badlesmere was issued on 30 March 1322: "Forasmuch as you, Bartholomew de Badelesmere, liege of our lord the king, contrary to your fealty, homage and allegiance, falsely and treacherously took his town and castle of Gloucestre, and burned his town of Bruggenorth, and then killed his men, robbed his lieges, and took the peace in the land where you went to make war until you came to his castle of Tikhull, and then you besieged the castle with banner displayed as an enemy of the king and realm, and wrecked and killed the king's lieges, and thence went in the company of the attainted traitors, Thomas, late earl of Lancaster, and Humphrey, late earl of Hereford, to Burton-upon-Trent, and took the peace where you went, with banner displayed contrary to your fealty, homage and allegiance, as a traitor, felon and enemy of the realm, as is known to great and small of the realm, and the king hath recorded, this court awards that you be for the treason drawn, for the robberies and homicides hanged, and for the flight beheaded, and forasmuch as you were the king's steward, it is his will that your head be put over the gate of the town of Canterbury for an example to others.'" [Patent Rolls 1338-40, p. 209]

The Brut chronicle says that Badlesmere was captured at Stowe Park, a manor of his nephew Henry Burghersh, bishop of Lincoln. [Brut, ed. Brie, p. 221] The Livere de Reis of Sempringham, Lincolnshire, has a different story: it says that Edward II's close friend  Donald of Mar, a nephew of Robert Bruce, captured Badlesmere in "a small wood near Brickden" and took him to Canterbury. [Livere de Reis, ed. Glover, pp. 341-3] There the poor man suffered the terrible fate ordained for him by Edward: he was dragged three miles to the crossroads at Blean, hanged and then beheaded, and his head set on a spike over the gate into Canterbury at Edward's own command as an example to those who would betray the king. Bartholomew Badlesmere is one of only four men I know of who certainly suffered the traitor's death during Edward II's reign, the others being Andrew Harclay, earl of Carlisle (linked above), Sir Gilbert Middleton, who attacked and robbed two cardinals visiting England in 1317, and Hugh Despenser the Younger (and the latter was not done at Edward's order, of course). Poor Bartholomew; no-one deserves to die like that. Edward II could be remarkably vindictive towards people he felt had betrayed him, and Bartholomew Badlesmere is a prime example.

History Essay Prize; Book Reviews

I'd like to draw an exciting new history prize to your attention: The Mortimer History Society Essay Prize. To quote from the website: "Essays will be accepted on: any aspect of the medieval Mortimer family of Wigmore (and its cadet branches, eg Chirk, Chelmarsh) and its impact on the history and culture of the British Isles, and / or any aspect relating to the history, economy, society and culture of the medieval Marches of Wales, between 1066 and 1500." For more info, see here and here. If you read this and know anyone who might be interested, please do pass on the information to them! Entries must be submitted by 16 December 2016, and the competition is open to amateur historians, not just PhD candidates or more established academics.

It's great to see your own work reviewed by experts in the field in academic history journals, so I'm delighted to see that a few weeks ago my Edward II biography, along with Sara Cockerill's The Shadow Queen about Edward's mother Eleanor of Castile, was reviewed by Andrew Spencer in the English Historical Review. And even more excitingly, this month it's reviewed in Speculum by none other than Professor Seymour Phillips, who knows more about Edward and his reign than anyone on the planet. Fantastic! A few months ago, it was also reviewed by Professor J. S. Hamilton, Piers Gaveston's biographer, in The Medieval Review. 

Sir Richard Damory

I wrote a post a while ago about a plot to free some Contrariants from prison in 1323, and mentioned Edward II's then household steward, Sir Richard Damory. Rather curiously, there's no page on the English Wikipedia about Richard, but there is on the German one. Here's a post about him.

Richard was the elder brother of Edward II's favourite Sir Roger Damory, who came to prominence in the middle years of Edward's reign. The men were the sons - apparently the only two - of Sir Robert Damory of Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire, himself the son of Roger Damory the elder, who was still alive on 27 May 1281 when Edward I gave him a gift of four bucks from the forest of Whittlewood. (CCR 1279-88, p. 86) The Damory family was associated with Henry III's brother Richard, earl of Cornwall (died 1272) and his son Edmund (d. 1300): Roger the elder and his son and heir Robert witnessed the men's charters, and Robert travelled overseas with Edmund in 1280. Robert died shortly after 12 July 1285, leaving his elder son Richard as his heir, his younger son Roger, a widow Juliana, who held a third of the Buckinghamshire manor of Thornborough as part of her dower, and a daughter Katherine, who married Sir Walter le Poer or Poure of Oxfordshire. The dates of birth of the Damory brothers are not known; if I had to guess, I'd say Richard was born around the mid to late 1270s (he was summoned for military service for the first time in 1297), and Roger perhaps in the early to mid 1280s, not too long before their father Robert died in 1285. The Damorys came from a long line of Damorys, knights of Oxfordshire. As far as I can tell, the line goes like this (going backwards in time from son to father): Richard and Roger - Robert, d. 1285 - Roger, d. c. 1281 - Robert, sheriff of Oxfordshire and constable of Oxford Castle, d. c. 1236 - Robert, d. c. 1205 (he had brothers called Richard and Roger) - Ralph, d. c. 1187 - Roger, active in the 1130s and 1140s - Robert, d. c. 1139. We can see from this that the Damory men were extremely fond of names beginning with R. They were a solid knightly family who held the manors of Bucknell and Bletchingdon (both in Oxfordshire) for many generations, were not of the highest nobility or particularly rich, but had a good name stretching back centuries: the Robert who died in or around 1139 may have been the son or grandson of Gilbert, who held the manor of Bucknell in 1086, according to the Domesday Book. (But as Gilbert wasn't called Roger, Richard, Robert or Ralph, he probably wasn't allowed to be a Damory, haha.)

In the last years of Edward I's reign and at the beginning of Edward II's, the elder brother Richard Damory was far more prominent than his brother Roger, being appointed keeper of the peace in Oxfordshire in 1300 and forester for life of the forest of Whittlewood in 1310, and most significantly, constable of the castle of Oxford in April 1308 at a time when Edward II was transferring the custody of key royal castles to men he trusted; the threat of civil war was then imminent thanks to the king's excessive favour towards Piers Gaveston. Edward also re-appointed Richard as keeper of the peace in Oxfordshire at this time, and Richard witnessed Piers' grant of two of his Oxfordshire manors to the king. In the aftermath of Piers Gaveston's death in the summer of 1312, Edward appointed Richard as commissioner of array in Oxfordshire when the possibility of civil war once more loomed. He was also sheriff of Berkshire. (For Oxford Castle, see CFR 1307-1319, p. 21; keeper of the peace, CPR 1292-1301, p. 516, CPR 1307-1313, p. 54, CCR 1307-1313, p. 205, Chancery Warrants 1244-1326, p. 111; forester of Whittlewood, CPR 1307-1313, pp. 223, 449, 571, Chancery Warrants 1244-1326, p. 312; Piers Gaveston's grant, CCR 1307-1313, p. 65; commissioner of array, CPR 1307-1313, p. 486; Berkshire, Chancery Warrants 1244- 1326, p. 366.)

The overall picture of Sir Richard Damory is of a dependable and highly competent knight, soldier and administrator, loyal to the king, a man whom Edward II trusted. And the rise of Sir Roger Damory in Edward II's affections in and after 1315, and particularly his marriage to the king's widowed niece Elizabeth de Clare in 1317 - the greatest gift Edward had in his possession - also led to an increase of royal favours towards his elder brother Sir Richard Damory. At New Year 1318, Richard was one of twenty-five knights who received a silver goblet, valued at seven pounds, from the king. (Stapleton, 'Brief Summary', p. 344) Sometime before 11 April 1318, Richard was appointed 'keeper of the body of my lord Sir Edward, earl of Chester'; that is, he became the guardian of Edward II and Isabella of France's elder son the future Edward III. (Chancery Warrants 1244-1326, p. 485) On the same day as this appointment is mentioned, Richard and three other men were appointed to enquire into negligence and extortions committed by officials in Cheshire and North Wales. (CPR 1317-21, p. 134) In 1300, Richard had been a member of the household of Humphrey de Bohun, earl of Hereford, who became Edward of Caernarfon's brother-in-law in 1302 when he married Edward's sister Elizabeth. (Ibid., p. 111) After the death of Guy Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, in August 1315, Edward appointed Richard keeper of his castles of Warwick and Elmley. (Ibid., pp. 425, 432) Richard also owned the manor of Ubley in Somerset, which in 1313 was attacked and robbed by a group of men, and some of Richard's goods and his trees stolen. (Patent Rolls 1307-13, p. 601; Ibid. 1313-17, pp. 64, 67, 246) The legal process relating to this attack dragged on and on, and in December 1314 some of the thieves were said to be Ralph Gorges (a knight of the Despensers) and a parson.

Richard Damory's years of favour seemed to come to an end when his brother Roger, edged out of the king's affections by Hugh Despenser the Younger, joined the Contrariant rebellion against Edward in 1321/22. Roger died on 12 March 1322 of wounds sustained while fighting against Edward's army, leaving his widow, the king's niece Elizabeth de Clare, and his only legitimate child and heir Elizabeth Damory. Edward II, who could be remarkably vindictive and spiteful, and despite Richard Damory's many years of service and loyalty to him and his son, ordered the sheriff of Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire and the sheriff of Oxfordshire and Berkshire on 16 February 1322 to arrest him. This was done apparently for no other reason than Edward suspected Richard of joining his brother's rebellion, which he had not. The sheriff of Oxfordshire soon found Richard and arrested him; on 26 February 1322, only ten days after the order, Richard was sent to Banbury Castle to be imprisoned, and granted 'reasonable maintenance' for as long as he should remain there. (CCR 1318-23, pp. 421, 425) On 19 February 1322, the sheriffs of Oxfordshire and Berkshire, Somerset and Dorset and Bedfordshire and Buckinghamshire, and the mayor and bailiffs of Bristol, were ordered to seize all his lands, goods and chattels. (CFR 1319-27, p. 99) Richard was, however, soon released and his lands and goods restored to him, on 16 March 1322 (the day of the battle of Boroughbridge). (CCR 1323-27, p. 51) Presumably he had successfully protested his innocence and lack of involvement in his brother's treason. In July 1322, Edward II even appointed Richard as steward of his household, a position he held until May 1325; there were no hard feelings on Edward's side, at least, though I'm not sure about Richard's. He was appointed justice of Chester and North Wales by Edward II sometime before 2 March 1326, and confirmed in the position on 12 December 1326, which was after Queen Isabella's invasion and when Edward II was in captivity; this suggests that Richard Damory had supported Isabella, or at least had nothing done anything to hinder her. (CCR 1323-7, pp. 450, 626; CPR 1324-7, p. 338) Richard still held this position in the summer of 1327, when he was ordered to arrest the Dunheved brothers Thomas and Stephen and their allies, who were causing mayhem in Chester and who shortly afterwards temporarily freed Edward from Berkeley Castle.

Sir Richard Damory was married to a woman called Margaret or Margery, whose identity I don't know (if anyone does, please do tell me!). He died shortly before 1 September 1330, probably in his early fifties or so, leaving his son Richard (of course) as his heir. Richard the elder didn't live quite long enough to see Edward III, whose guardian he had once been, overthrow his mother and Roger Mortimer on 19 October 1330. The younger Richard was said in his father's IPM of 1330 to be 'aged sixteen years and more', so was born in about 1314. (CIPM 1327-36, pp. 202-3; see also CFR 1327-37. pp. 192, 203) Richard the younger was granted possession of his lands after coming of age (twenty-one) and swearing homage to the king in January 1337; his mother Margaret was still alive then, and Richard himself lived until 1375. (CCR 1333-7, p. 640)

A knight of later in the fourteenth century, who was very high in Edward III's favour, was Sir Nicholas Damory. He also served for many years in the household of Roger Damory's widow Elizabeth de Clare, Edward III's first cousin. Elizabeth's biographer France Underhill (For Her Good Estate, p. 186 note 67) suggests that Nicholas was a first cousin of Richard Damory (d. 1330)'s son Richard (d. 1375), which would make him either the son of another Damory brother who does not appear on record at all, which seems unlikely, or Roger Damory's illegitimate son (he can't have been legitimate if he was Roger's son, as Roger's heir was his daughter Elizabeth, Lady Bardolf, his only surviving legitimate child). Another member of Elizabeth de Clare's household in the 1330s was a young Roger Damory, perhaps Nicholas's brother, perhaps another illegitimate son of Roger (d. 1322), perhaps even an illegitimate son of Roger's brother Richard. It would be great if I could work out the correct family tree of the Damorys; they're a family who interest me a lot.