John de Neville

Notes:

Chief Forester and Justice of the King's Forests throughout England. Notable for having achieved the distinction of being excessively tyrannical and oppressive even by the standards of the early thirteenth century.

Complete Peerage: "On 21 October 1235 he was appointed Chief Forester and justice of the whole of the King's Forest through England. He was one of the English notables who sailed with Richard, Earl of Cornwall, for Palestine from Marseilles in 1240. After his return to England he was so rapacious and oppressive in the execution of his office that, upon evidence obtained by commission, he escaped prison only by a very heavy fine. He retired in disgrace to Wethersfield, where he died soon afterwards."

John married Hawise de Courtenay before 15 Feb 1230. Hawise (daughter of Robert de Courtenay and Mary de Revières) was born in of Okehampton, Devon, England; died before 8 Apr 1269. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

1. Joan de Neville died before 1280.

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Bef 31 Jul 1234

Notes:

Chief Forester and Justice of the King's Forest; Sheriff of Essex and Hertfordshire 1197-1200, 1202-4; Keeper of the Seaports from Cornwall to Hampshire.

Raised at the court of Henry II as an intimate of Richard, whom he accompanied to the Holy Land on the Third Crusade in 1190. Present at the siege of Jaffa. It was Richard who first appointed him forester, an office he retained under John, but his relationship with the latter king was less smooth. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: "As chief forester he was largely free of supervision by the king's exchequer at Westminster; he held his own exchequer of the forest, which is known to have sat at Marlborough and Nottingham, and was directly accountable to the king, who, however, sometimes intervened personally. Neville's position during John's reign was very powerful, since he was one of the king's closest advisers and agents, but his relationship with his royal master was a turbulent one. Several times he had to pay large fines to the king when his actions did not find favour. His wife may have been one of the women who suffered from the amorous attentions of the king, since in 1204 she made a fine of 200 shillings 'to lie one night with her husband' (Rotuli de oblatis et finibus ... tempore Regis Johannis ed. T. D. Hardy, RC, 1835, 275). In 1212 Neville was forced to pay a fine of 6000 marks, ostensibly for allowing the escape of two knights captured at Carrickfergus in 1210, but it seems also to have covered his misdeeds in administering the northern forests and his tenure of the lands of the bishopric of Salisbury during the interdict. Soon afterwards he was dismissed as sheriff of Hampshire, and as keeper of the county and forest of Cumberland, which he had held since 1209; some of the debt was, however, pardoned later. He witnessed Magna Carta in 1215, but before John's death joined the baronial party, to whom he brought the possession of Marlborough Castle." For this he lost his office and some of his estates.

He made peace with Henry III but did not return to office until 1224; his remaining years as forester were caught up in the complex disputes over forest boundaries between the counties and the central government. He was ultimately dismissed on 8 Oct 1229.

Hugh married Joan de Cornhill before 30 Apr 1200. Joan (daughter of Henry de Cornhill and Alice de Courcy) died between 1224 and 1230; was buried in Waltham Abbey, Essex, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Aft Dec 1224
• Alternate death: Aft 9 May 1225

Notes:

"Ralph de Neville, a younger son of Alan aforesaid, is known only as being father of Hugh the Forester." [Complete Peerage]

Ralph married (Unknown) Rafin. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Henry fitz Gervase.

Sheriff of Kent 1189-92; Sheriff of Surrey 1183-91; joint Sheriff of London 1187-9.

Henry married Alice de Courcy. Alice (daughter of William III de Courcy and Gundred de Warenne) was born in of Stogursey, Williton, Somerset, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Judge of the Court of Exchequer, 1165; Justice of the Forest throughout England, 1165-77.

From the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography:

The first mention of pleas, probably forest pleas, held by him occurs in Wiltshire in 1163. Neville supported the king in his quarrel with Archbishop Thomas Becket, and was twice excommunicated by the latter -- in 1166 and 1168. About 1166 he was appointed Henry II's chief forester, and he held forest pleas in many counties in 1166 and 1167. According to Roger of Howden, Neville remained chief forester until his death, when he was succeeded by Thomas son of Bernard. Neville's death took place about 1176.

Alan de Neville was widely hated for the vigour with which he enforced the forest laws. The chronicler of Battle Abbey said that he used the power the king had given him to enrich his master by harrying various counties of England with numerous and unaccustomed inquiries; since he feared neither God nor man, he spared no man of rank, whether churchman or layman. Confirmation that great men feared him comes from an official source; the treasurer, Richard fitz Nigel, reported that the justiciar Robert, earl of Leicester, obtained a special writ from the king in order more easily to avoid the pressing demands of Neville's men (Alaniorum). When Neville was dying, a monastic community asked the king for Neville's body for burial; the king replied 'I will have his wealth, you shall have his corpse, and the demons of Hell shall have his soul' (Chronicle of Battle Abbey, 223).

Regarding his possible wife:

In a post to SGM dated 14 Oct 2001, Rosie Bevan quotes an early pedigree from "a series of articles in the later volumes of The Genealogist (IIRC vols 26-30ish) about the various branches of the Neville families by Edmund R. Nevill" which states that this Alan de Neville married "Juliana da of Robert Canu."

The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in its article about Alan de Neville, states that he "is first recorded in 1138, in the retinue of Count Waleran of Meulan, whose butler he became with an annual fee of 100s. About this time he married a daughter of a baron of the honour of Pont Audemar."

Dictionnaire historique, géographique, statistique de toutes les communes de l'Eure by M. Charpillon, 1868, p. 39, describes "Julienne, fille de Robert Canu" of Pont Audemer, as the wife of Alain de Beuzeville.

Notes:

Also known as Gervaise de Cornhill.

Joint Sheriff of London 1155-6; Sheriff of Surrey 1163-82; Sheriff of Kent 1168-74.

Gervaise married Agnes de Cornhill before 1136. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Or de Curcy.

William married Gundred de Warenne. Gundred (daughter of Reynold de Warenne and Alice de Wormegay) died before 9 May 1225. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Complete Peerage describes him as "probably" the father of Gilbert and Alan. "Geoffrey de Neville in or before 1146 was lord of the fee in which the church of Scothern lay, and held Walcut 'cum appendiciis suis.'"

Notes:

Alive in the time of Henry I.

Notes:

"Nepos Huberti." [J. Horace Round, citation details below.] Sheriff of London in 1125. Died on pilgrimage to Jerusalem.

Roger married Ingenolda. Ingenolda (daughter of Herlwin) died after 1129. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Edward married Godeleve. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

William married Avice de Rumilly about 1125. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Avice de Meschin. Lady of Harewood.

Notes:

Sheriff of Sussex 1170-76. Administered the estates of his older brother William, Earl of Surrey, both before and after William left on crusade in 1147. Died as a monk.

Reynold married Alice de Wormegay in 1167. Alice (daughter of William de Wormegay) was born in of Wormegay, Norfolk, England; died about 29 Sep 1179. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Called in Domesday People Gislebert De Noua Uilla.

Possibly, but far from certainly, the father of Geoffrey who d. abt. 1146.

"Gilbert, identified as Gilbert de Neville, in 1086 held in Lincs a carucate, &c., at Walcot near Folkingham, and another at Yawthorpe, of the Abbot of Peterborough. Presumably the same Gilbert, about 1115-18, held of Peterborough in Lincs 2 carucates for 2 hides, and found one knight; of the Bishop of Lincoln land in Scothern, Reepham, &c.; and in Middle Rasen and elsewhere of Manasser Arsic." [Complete Peerage. The identification of this Gilbert as a Neville is footnoted to Feudal England by John Horace Round.]

"Gilbert I de Neville; held in the year 1086 carucates (a carucate was an area of land that could be cultivated by an eight-ox plough team throughout a single year) at Waltcot, Lincolnshire and Yawthorpe, together with others in that part of England by 1115-18; kinship is plausible but has not been proven with [son Geoffrey]." [Burke's Peerage]

The idea that he was William the Conqueror's "admiral", persistent in many sources, is almost certainly fanciful.

Notes:

Domesday sub-tenant of three hides in Warnham, Sussex.

Notes:

A Norman.

Notes:

Steward to Henry I.

William married Emma de Falaise. Emma (daughter of William de Falaise and Geva de Burci) was born between 1078 and 1093; died about 1130. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Abt 1135

Notes:

"The most important member of a tightly knit family group was Ranulf's younger brother William le Meschin (d. 1129x35). William went on the first crusade, where he is mentioned, as 'William son of Ranulf le vicomte' at the siege of Nicaea in 1097 (Ordericus Vitalis, Eccl. hist., 5.59). In Cumbria William le Meschin was first given charge of Gilsland, which he failed to hold against the Scots, and then Egremont (the barony of Copeland). He built the castle at Egremont, and close by on the coast he founded the priory of St Bees, a further daughter house of St Mary's, York. William le Meschin married Cecily de Rumilly, the daughter of Robert de Rumilly and heir to the barony of Skipton in Craven, west Yorkshire, thus creating a substantial cross-Pennine estate. William and Cecily were the founders of the priory of Embsay, which later removed to Bolton in Wharfedale. In addition to the two baronies of Egremont and Skipton, William le Meschin acquired tenancies in several counties, the more significant held of his brother in Lincolnshire (where the Lindsey survey of 1115 - 18 provides detailed record) and in Cheshire. William remained closely linked with Ranulf, whom he survived by just a few years, dying before 1135. An elder son, Matthew, having predeceased him, William's heirs were successively his younger son, also called Ranulf le Meschin, and three sisters, Amice, Alice, and Matilda, who in the course of a total of seven marriages comprehensively dismembered the estate." [Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]

"William le Meschin, Lord of Copeland, br. of Ranulph, 1st Earl of Chester, yr. s. of Rannulf, Vicomte of the Bessin, m. Cicely de Rumilly, Lady of Skipton, da. and h. of Robert de Rumelli, of Harewood and Skipton, co. York (see ped. of Lisle in vol. viii, between pp. 48 and 49), and had 3 daughters and coheirs. (1) Alice, Lady of Skipton, who m., 1stly, William fitz Duncan, s. of Duncan II, King of Scots. See Clay, Early Yorks Charters, vol. vii, pp. 9—10. They had one s., William, 'the Boy of Egremont', who d. in the King’s ward after 1155, leaving his 3 sisters his coheirs: (i) Cicely, as in the text; (ii) Amabel, Lady of Copeland (called in the Pipe Rolls and elsewhere, Comitissa de Couplanda, who m. Reynold de Lucy (see vol. iii, pp. 247-8, sub Lucy); (iii) Alice de Rumilly, Lady of Allerdale, who m., 1stly, Gilbert Pipard, Sheriff of cos. Gloucester and Hereford, and 2ndly, Robert de Courtenay, Sheriff of Cumberland and d. s.p. (see vol. ix, pp. 527-8, sub Pipard). Alice, Lady of Skipton, m. 2ndly, Alexander FitzGerold. (2) Avice, Lady of Harewood, who m., 1stly, William de Courcy III, 2ndly, William Paynell, of Drax, co. York, and 3rdly, William de Percy of Rougemont, in Harewood, co. York (see vol. x, p. 319, sub Paynel, and p. 439, sub Percy). (3) Maud, m. 1stly, Philip de Belmeis, of Tong, Salop., and 2ndly, Hugh de Mortimer, of Wigmore, co. Hereford (see vol. ix, p. 271, note sub Mortimer (of Wigmore), and vol. xii, part 2, pp. 930—1, sub Zouche.)" [Complete Peerage I:353, footnote (d), as thoroughly corrected in Volume XIV.]

William married Cecily de Rumilly. Cecily (daughter of Robert de Rumilly) was born in of Skipton, Yorkshire, England. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Earl of Surrey; usually styled Earl of Warenne. Advisor to King John at Runnymede.

William married Isabel de Vermandois after 5 Jun 1118. Isabel (daughter of Hugues le Grand and Adèle de Vermandois) died before Jun 1147. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Bef Jul 1147

Notes:

Countess of Leicester. Also called Elizabeth de Vermandois.

Royal Ancestry says she was living c. 1138 and that she died "13 (or 17) February, sometime before June 1147, when her son, William de Warenne, 3rd Earl of Surrey, left on crusade." Several sources say she died in the priory of Lewes, Sussex.

Via her two husbands and thirteen children, descent from her is so common among modern people with traceable medieval ancestry that Douglas Richardson once jokingly asserted the existence of an exclusive lineage organization called the Society of Non-Descendants of Isabel de Vermandois. Of the 19 root people in this database with demonstrable descent from any monarch, only three would be eligible for membership in such a group.