Ranulf le Meschin

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Jan 1129
• Alternate death: 17 Jan 1129
• Alternate death: 27 Jan 1129

Notes:

Also called Randle; Ranulf de Briquessart; de Bricasard; Ranulf du Bessin; Ranulf of Chester.

Earl of Chester. Vicomte of Bayeux. Commander of the royal forces in Normandy, 1124.

"Ranulph le Meschin, styled also, 'de Briquessart,' Vicomte de Bayeux in Normandy, s. and h. of Ranulph, Vicomte de Bayeux, by Margaret, sister of Hugh (d'Avranches), Earl of Chester abovenamed, being thus 1st cousin and h. to the last Earl (whom he suc. as Vicomte d'Avranches, &c., in Normandy), obtained, after the Earl's death in 1120, the grant of the county palatine of Chester, becoming thereby Earl of Chester. He appears thereupon to have surrendered the Lordship of the great district of Cumberland, which he had acquired, shortly before, from Henry I. In 1124 he was Commander of the Royal forces in Normandy. He m. Lucy, widow of Roger Fitz-Gerold (by whom she was mother of William de Roumare, afterwards Earl of Lincoln). He d. 17 or 27 Jan. 1129, and was bur. at St. Werburg's, Chester. The Countess Lucy confirmed, as his widow, the grant of the Manor of Spalding to the monks of that place." [Complete Peerage III:166, incorporating corrections from volume XIV.]

Ranulf married Lucy of Bolingbroke about 1098. Lucy was born in of Spalding, Lincolnshire, England; died about 1138. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Adeliza la Meschin. "[Richard fitz Gilbert's] wife was rescued from the Welsh by Miles of Gloucester." [Complete Peerage]

Family/Spouse: Richard fitz Gilbert de Clare. Richard (son of Gilbert fitz Richard de Clare and Alice de Clermont) was born about 1090 in Hertford, Hertfordshire, England; died on 15 Apr 1136 in Abergavenny, Monmouthshire, Wales; was buried in 1136 in Chapter House, Gloucester, Gloucestershire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Robert de Condet. Robert was born in of Thorngate Castle, Lincoln, Lincolnshire, England; died about 1141. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Abt 1100
• Alternate birth: Abt 1105, Guernon Castle, Normandy, France
• Alternate death: 17 Dec 1153, Gresley, Derbyshire, England

Notes:

Also called Ranulf of Chester. Earl of Chester. Vicomte d'Avranches.

Of his death, Complete Peerage says "being supposed to have been poisoned by his wife and William Peverell, of Nottingham", but the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, while noting the claims that he died of poison, says nothing about his wife being involved.

"Most contemporary verdicts upon Ranulf were unfavourable. Although Orderic Vitalis acknowledged his resourcefulness and daring, the Gesta Stephani criticized ‘the cunning devices of his accustomed bad faith’ (Gesta Stephani, 192–3), and Henry of Huntingdon, through a speech supposedly by the royalist spokesman at the battle of Lincoln, called him ‘a man of reckless daring, ready for conspiracy...panting for the impossible’, prone to defeat or, at best, to Pyrrhic victories (Historia Anglorum, 734–5). Clearly, his strategy during the civil war was to take every opportunity to enhance his territorial position, especially in the north midlands, and such commitments as he made, either to the king or to the Angevins, were calculated to that end. Other magnates followed similar policies, but Ranulf (II) was exceptionally ruthless in pursuit of his ambitions, and accordingly he was hated by many and trusted by none." [Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]

Ranulph married Matilda of Gloucester before 1135. Matilda (daughter of Robert of Gloucester and Mabel fitz Robert) died on 29 Jul 1189. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Rohese married Robert fitz Robert before 1163. Robert (son of Robert fitz Fulk and Alice de St. Quintin) was born in of Ilkey, Yorkshire, England; died before 1175. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Aft 1115, of Clare, Herefordshire, England

Notes:

Also called Roger Fitz Richard. 2nd Earl of Hertford, but generally styled Earl of Clare.

Family/Spouse: Maud de St. Hilary. Maud (daughter of James de St. Hilary du Harcourt and Aveline) was born in of Field Dalling, Norfolk, England; died on 24 Dec 1193; was buried in Priory of Great Carbrooke, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Bef 1202

Notes:

Also called de Condy, de Cundi. Steward of Roger de Mowbray in 1174 or 1175. His wife, mother of Agnes de Condet, may have been named Basilia.

Family/Spouse: Unknown. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Hugh Bardolf. Hugh was born about 1120 in of Waddington, Lincolnshire, England; died about 1176. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 1147, Merionethshire, Wales

Notes:

Earl of Chester. Also known as Hugh le Meschin; Hugh de Meschines; Hugh of Kevelioc; Hugh de Cyveiliog.

1908 DNB entry on Hugh of Kevelioc:

[By Thomas Frederick Tout.]

HUGH (D. 1181) called HUGH of CYVEILIOG, palatine Earl of Chester, was the son of Ranulf II, Earl of Chester, and of his wife Matilda, daughter of Earl Robert of Gloucester, the illegitimate son of Henry I. He is sometimes called Hugh of Cyveiliog, because, according to a late writer, he was born in that district of Wales (Powel, Hist. of Cambria, p. 295). His father died on 16 Dec. 1153, whereupon, being probably still under age, he succeeded to his possessions on both sides of the Channel. These included the hereditary viscounties of Avranches and Bayeux. Hugh was present at the council of Clarendon in January 1164 which drew up the assize of Clarendon (Stubbs, Select Charters, p. 138). In 1171 he was in Normandy (Eyton, Itinerary of Henry II, p. 158).

Hugh joined the great feudal revolt against Henry II in 1173. Aided by Ralph of Fougeres, he utilised his great influence on the north-eastern marches of Brittany to excite the Bretons to revolt. Henry II despatched an army of Brabant mercenaries against them. The rebels were defeated in a battle, and on 20 Aug. were shut up in the castle of Dol, which they had captured by fraud not long before. On 23 Aug. Henry II arrived to conduct the siege in person (Hoveden, ii. 51). Hugh and his comrades had no provisions (Jordan Fantosme in Howlett, Chron. of Stephen, Henry II, and Richard I, iii. 221). They were therefore forced to surrender on 26 Aug. on a promise that their lives and limbs would be saved (W. Newburgh in Howlett, i. 176). Fourscore knights surrendered with them (Diceto, i. 378). Hugh was treated very leniently by Henry, and was confined at Falaise, whither the Earl and Countess of Leicester were also soon brought as prisoners. When Henry II returned to England, he took the two earls with him. They were conveyed from Barfleur to Southampton on 8 July 1174. Hugh was probably afterwards imprisoned at Devizes (Eyton, p. 180). On 8 Aug., however, he was taken back from Portsmouth to Barfleur, when Henry II went back to Normandy. He was now imprisoned at Caen, whence he was removed to Falaise. He was admitted to terms with Henry before the general peace, and witnessed the peace of Falaise on 11 Oct. (Fœdera, i. 31).

Hugh seems to have remained some time longer without complete restoration. At last, at the council of Northampton on 13 Jan. 1177, he received grant of the lands on both sides of the sea which he had held fifteen days before the war broke out (Benedictus, i. 135; Hoveden, ii. 118). In March he witnessed the Spanish award. In May, at the council at Windsor, Henry II restored him his castles, and required him to go to Ireland, along with William Fitzaldhelm and others, to prepare the way for the king's son John (Benedictus, i. 161). But no great grants of Irish land were conferred on him, and he took no prominent part, in the Irish campaigns. He died at Leek in Staffordshire on 30 June 1181 (ib. i. 277; Monasticon, iii. 218; Ormerod, Cheshire, i. 29). He was buried next his father on the south side of the chapter-house of St. Werburgh's, Chester, now the cathedral.

Hugh's liberality to the church was not so great as that of his predecessors. He granted some lands in Wirral to St. Werburgh's, and four charters of his, to Stanlaw, St. Mary's, Coventry, the nuns of Bullington and Greenfield, are printed by Ormerod (i. 27). He also confirmed his mother's grants to her foundation of Austin Canons at Calke, Derbyshire, and those of his father to his convent of the Benedictine nuns of St. Mary's, Chester (Monasticon, vi. 598, iv. 314). In 1171 he had confirmed the grants of Ranulf to the abbey of St. Stephen's in the diocese of Bayeux (Eyton, p. 158). More substantial were his grants of Bettesford Church to Trentham Priory, and of Combe in Gloucestershire to the abbey of Bordesley, Warwickshire (Monasticon, vi. 397, v. 407).

Hugh married before 1171 Bertrada, the daughter of Simon III, surnamed the Bald, count of Evreux and Montfort. He was therefore brother-in-law to Simon of Montfort., the conqueror of the Albigenses, and uncle of the Earl of Leicester. His only legitimate son, Ranulf III, succeeded him as Earl of Chester [see Blundevill, Randulf de]. He also left four daughters by his wife, who became, on their brother's death, co-heiresses of the Chester earldom. They were: (1) Maud, who married David, earl of Huntingdon, and became the mother of John the Scot, earl of Chester from 1232 to 1237, on whose death the line of Hugh of Avranches became extinct; (2) Mabel, who married William of Albini, earl of Arundel (d. 1221); (3) Agnes, the wife of William, earl Ferrers of Derby; and (4) Hawise, who married Robert de Quincy, son of Saer de Quincy, earl of Winchester. Hugh was also the father of several bastards, including Pagan, lord of Milton; Roger; Amice, who married Ralph Mainwaring, justice of Chester; and another daughter who married R. Bacon, the founder of Roucester (Ormerod, i. 28). A great controversy was carried on between Sir Peter Leycester and Sir Thomas Mainwaring, Amice's reputed descendant, as to whether that lady was legitimate or not. Fifteen pamphlets and small treatises on the subject, published between 1673 and 1679, were reprinted in the publications of the Chetham Society, vols. lxxiii. lxxix. and lxxx. Mainwaring was the champion of her legitimacy, which Leycester had denied in his 'Historical Antiquities.' Dugdale believed that Amice was the daughter of a former wife of Hugh, of whose existence, however, there is no record. A fine seal of Earl Hugh's is engraved in Ormerod's 'Cheshire,' i. 32.

[Benedictus Abbas and Roger de Hoveden (both ed. Stubbs in Rolls Ser.); Howlett's Chronicles of Stephen, Henry II, and Richard I (Rolls Ser.); Eyton's Itinerary of Hen. II; Ormerod's Cheshire, i. 26-32; Dugdale's Baronage, i. 40-1; Dugdale's Monasticon, ed. Ellis, Caley, and Bandinel; Doyle's Official Baronage, i. 364; Beamont's introduction to the Amicia Tracts, Chetham Soc.]

[DNB, Editor, Sidney Lee, Macmillan Co., London & Smith, Elder & Co., NY, 1908, vol. x, pp. 164-5]

Family/Spouse: (Unknown first wife of Hugh of Chester). [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: (Unknown mistress of Hugh of Chester). [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Hugh married Bertrade de Montfort in 1169. Bertrade (daughter of Simon de Montfort and Maud) was born about 1155; died after 31 Mar 1227. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Rohese (or Rose) Fitz Robert.

Rohese married Simon III de Kyme before 1176. Simon (son of Philip I de Kyme and Hawise) was born in of Sotby, Lincolnshire, England; died before 11 Feb 1219. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Abt 1155
• Alternate death: Nov 1217
• Alternate death: 28 Nov 1217

Notes:

Earl of Hertford and of Gloucester. Also styled Earl of Clare.

Along with his son Gilbert, he was one of the 25 Magna Carta sureties.

Richard married Amice of Gloucester about 1180. Amice (daughter of William fitz Robert and Hawise of Leicester) died on 1 Jan 1225. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Between 22 Nov 1220 and 4 Jun 1225
• Alternate death: Bef 1225

Aveline married William de Munchensy before 1186. William (son of Warin de Munchensy and Agnes Fitzjohn) was born in of Winfarthing, Norfolk, England; died before 7 May 1204 in Swanscombe, Dartford, Kent, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Aveline married Geoffrey fitz Peter before 29 May 1205. Geoffrey (son of Peter de Ludgershall and Maud) was born in of Pleshy, Essex, England; died on 14 Oct 1213; was buried in Shouldham Priory, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Alice; also called de Condy, de Cundi.

Agnes married Walter II de Clifford about 1185. Walter (son of Walter de Clifford and Margaret) was born about 1150 in Clifford's Castle, Herefordshire, England; died before Mar 1208. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Cecily Bardolf.

Family/Spouse: Richard Foliot. Richard (son of William Foliot) was born in of Norton, Yorkshire, England; died before 25 Jul 1206. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Unknown. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Nicholas Poyntz. Nicholas (son of Pons Fitz Simon) was born before 1173 in of Tockington, Gloucestershire, England; died between 4 Apr 1222 and 2 Nov 1223. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Amice of Chester. Her legitimacy was the subject of a lengthy seventeenth-century controversy which can be read, in all its magnificently florid language, here.

It seems to us entirely plausible that Amicia was Hugh's legitimate daughter by an unknown earlier wife. The Earl's behavior toward Amicia, and the attitude shown by all their contemporaries -- to say nothing of the illustrious guests recorded as having attended Amicia's wedding to Ralph Mainwairing -- are all consistent with Amicia being legitimate. It's far from impossible that history should have lost track of the identity of a twelfth-century magnate's short-lived first wife. We don't even have firm knowledge of the birth dates of some post-Conquest English kings.

A summary of the issues, from Burke's Dormant and Extinct Peerages:

The earl had another dau., whose legitimacy is questionable, namely Amicia,* m. to Ralph de Mesnilwarin, justice of Chester, "a person," says Dugdale, "of very ancient family," from which union the Mainwarings, of Over Peover, in the co. Chester, derive. Dugdale considers Amicia to be a dau. of the earl by a former wife. But Sir Peter Leicester, in his Antiquities of Chester, totally denies her legitimacy. "I cannot but mislike," says he, "the boldness and ignorance of that herald who gave to Mainwaring (late of Peover), the elder, the quartering of the Earl of Chester's arms; for if he ought of right to quarter that coat, then must he be descended from a co-heir to the Earl of Chester; but he was not; for the co-heirs of Earl Hugh married four of the greatest peers in the kingdom."

(*) Upon the question of this lady's legitimacy there was a long paper war between Sir Peter Leicester and Sir Thomas Mainwaring -- and eventually the matter was referred to the judges, of whose decision Wood says, "at an assize held at Chester, 1675, the controversy was decided by the justices itinerant, who, as I have heard, adjudged the right of the matter to Mainwaring."

The passage from Dugdale that evidently occasioned Sir Peter Leycester's astonishment and disbelief, from his Baronage of England, 1675, reprinted by Georg Olms Verlag, Hildesheim & New York, 1977; Earls of Chester, pp. 40-41:

[I]t is certain that [Sir Hugh] had another Daughter called Amicia, married to Raphe de Mesnilwarin (a person of a very ancient Family, and Justice of Chester, in those days) whose Legitimacy is doubted by some; the cheif reason they give for it, being, that they find no Memorial, that Earl Hugh her Father had a former Wife.

That she was his Daughter, sufficiently appeareth, not only from his Grant of two Knight Fees with her in Frank-marriage, unto Raphe de Mesnilwarin before mentioned, where he so termeth her. But by another Deed of Roger de Mesnilwarin her Son, wherein he calls Ranulph, Earl of Chester, (Son to this Earl) his Uncle.

As to her Legitimacy, therefore I do not well understand how there can be any question, it being known Maxim in Law, that nothing can be given in Frank-marriage to a Bastard.

The Point being then thus briefly cleared, I shall not need to raise further Arguments from Probabilities to back it, then to desire it may be observed, that Bertra (whom I conclude to have been his second Wife) was married to him, when he was in years, and she, herself, very young, as is evident from what I have before instanced. So that he having been Earl no less then twenty eight years, it must necessarily follow, that this Bertra was not born, till four years after he came to the Earldom. Nor is it any marvel he should then take such a young Wife, having at that time no Issue-male to succeed him in this he great Inheritance."

From Palatine Anthology: A Collection of Ancient Poems and Ballads Relating to Lancashire and Chester ed. James Orchard Halliwell (London: 1850):

The following old ballad relates to a famous dispute between two Cheshire knights, Sir Peter Leycester and Sir Thomas Mainwaring, about the legitimacy of Amicia, daughter of Hugh Lupus. The worthy knights were related by marriage, and the controversy agitated the county for many years, and was hardly settled by the death of one of the principal controversialists. Communicated to me by Mr. W. H. BLACK.

A new Ballad, made of a high and mighty Controversy between two Cheshire Knights, 1673.

(From the ASHMOLEAN MSS. No. 860, iii, art. 1, and No. 836, art. 183.)

Two famous wights, both Cheshire Knights,
Thomas yclep'd and Petre,
A quarrel had, which was too bad
As bad as is my metre.

Neere kinsmen were they, yet had a great fray,
Concerning things done quondam;
I think as long since as Will Rufus was Prince,
E'en about their Great-great-grandame.

Sir Peter (good man) this quarell began:
Whilst he tumbles ore ancient deedes,
Old women can't have quiet rest in their graves,
So loud he proclaims what he reades.

When in reading he found (as he thought) good ground
To judge his Grannam a bastard;
Though he blemisht her name, yet it to proclaim
He resolv'd hee'd be no dastard.

But boldly durst say, that AMICIA
Daughter of Hugh Earle of Chester
For certaine was bore to him . . . .
As sure as his name was Leycester.

To this good intent he us'd much argument
The which all such as are willing
Fully to know, let them quickly bestow
Upon his Booke sixteene shilling.

His Grannam's his friend; yet truth hee'l defend
And little dirt he throws on her,
For as now, so then, among your great men,
A bastard is small dishonour.

Another grandchild, hearing this was stark wild,
The affront he could not digest;
But takes pen in hand, the same to withstand,
As scorning to fowl his own nest.

His Grannam hee'l right, against the erring Knight,
That slander'd her without warrant:
Who does not his best, to free ladies opprest,
Is not a true Knight Errant.

Hist'ry and lawes he cites for his cause,
With Judges and Heraldes; what more?
With these hee'l defy the scandalous lye
That made him . . . . .

They us'd not their swords, but their pens and fowl words,
Which noyse with other folks laughter,
Could not chuse to awake (to clere this mistake)
The jolly old Earl and his daughter.

Then up start[s] Earl Hughe, and sayes "Is it true--
That I, brave Chester's Earle,
Am summon'd to appear before Justices here,
As charg'd with a by-blow girle?"

Not another word, but clapt hand on his sword;
While she (gentle AMICIA)
For feare of some slaughter that might come after,
Besought him in patience to stay.

But she told her Grandson, "'Twas uncivilly done
Such a hideous pudder to keep:
Whilst he dreams that folks soules do snort in dark holes
To awake us out of our sleep.

"Should it have been true, that's suspected by you,
Its father was able to nourish
The barne he had got, and sure I should not
Have been any charge to the parish.

"But you, dear Sir Thomas, (much honor to your domus)
That my cause you have so well defended;
Henceforth leave AMICIA, both keepe Amicitia;
And so let the quarell be ended."

All this said, the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography also notes that "[t]he feud, however, was not merely a dispute over genealogical and legal niceties, but reflected the division on the Cheshire bench between those like Leycester who sought a rigorous enforcement of the Act of Uniformity and the Conventicle Acts and those such as Mainwaring who opposed this policy."

Amicia married Ralph Mainwaring about 1179. Ralph (son of Roger le Mesnilwarin) died after 1189. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Tanglust of Chester. Ormerod says that William Belward married a Beatrix who was a daughter of Hugh de Bohun, alias Kevelioc, 5th Earl of Chester. And Burke's Peerage (2003) gives her as an illegitimate daughter of Hugh. But she may have been a natural daughter of Ranulph of Chester ("le Gernons") rather than of Ranulph's son.

Family/Spouse: William le Belward. William (son of William le Belward and Mabel Fitz Hugh) was born in of Malpas, Cheshire, England; died after 1154. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

According to CP XIV, she may actually have been called Alice. The Ancestry of Dorothea Poyntz calls her "Agnes (?Alice) de Blundeville".

Agnes married William de Ferrers in 1192. William (son of William de Ferrers and (Unknown wife of William de Ferrers)) died on 22 Sep 1247. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Mabel le Meschin.

Family/Spouse: William d'Aubigny. William (son of William d'Aubigny and Maud de St. Hilary) died on 1 Feb 1221 in Cainell, near Rome; was buried in Wymondham Priory, Norfolk, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Matilda de Blondeville; Maud of Chester; Maud or Matilda de Meschines; Maud or Matilda de Kevelioc.

Maud married David of Scotland on 26 Aug 1190. David (son of Henry of Scotland and Ada de Warenne) was born in 1152; died on 17 Jun 1219 in Jerdelay, Yardley, Northamptonshire, England; was buried in Sawtrey Abbey, Huntingdonshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Between 1174 and 1181
• Alternate death: Between 1241 and 1243
• Alternate death: 6 Jun 1241
• Alternate death: Bef 3 Mar 1243
• Alternate death: 6 Jun 1243

Notes:

Suo jure Countess of Lincoln.

Hawise married Robert de Quincy between 1197 and 1200. Robert (son of Saher de Quincy and Margaret of Leicester) died after 20 May 1217 in London, England; was buried in Church of the Hospitallers, Clerkenwell, London, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]