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A solution to the ancestry of Iseult, wife of Hugh de Audley

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John P. Ravilious

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Sep 24, 2012, 2:35:09 PM9/24/12
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Hello All,

The identity of Iseult or Isolde, wife of Sir Hugh de Audley (d.
before 1 Apr 1325) has been a point of discussion on the newsgroup for
over a decade, and elsewhere for quite a bit longer [1]. In most
instances she is shown in print and online webpages as a daughter or
sister of Edmund de Mortimer of Wigmore, primarily based on aspects of
the tenure of Arley, co. Stafford [2].

The VCH account of Upper Arley states in part that the manor of
Upper Arley passed in 1336 to William de Bohun, earl of Northampton in
connection with his marriage to a Mortimer widow. It is interesting
that this account states that the weirs and other land at Le Boure in
Arley, a separate holding in the parish, passed under the terms of the
will of Iseult to William de Bohun. This is supported by an entry in
the Calendar of the Fine Rolls dated at Berkhampstead, 16 April 1339,
recording the “Ratification of the grant made by letters patent of
Roger ' of the Fold ' of the county of Gloucester, executor of the
will of Iseult Daudele, to the king's kinsman, William de Bohun, earl
of Northampton, and Elizabeth his wife of the keeping of the weirs in
the water of Severn and of the fords.. “ [3].

What connection there may have been between Iseult and William de
Bohun cannot be determined from what little detail is provided
concerning her testament. However, there is another piece of evidence
that indicates there was a familial relationship. Iseult’s younger
son, Hugh de Audley (d. 1347), is perhaps best known for two reasons.
He married Margaret de Clare, one of the sisters and coheirs of
Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester and Hertford (d.s.p. 1314) and
subsequently was created Earl of Gloucester on 16 March 1336/7. The
second reason for widespread interest in Hugh is due to his widespread
progeny, due to his daughter and heir Margaret’s marriage to Ralph de
Stafford, 1st Earl of Stafford. Of immediate interest, however, is
Hugh’s seal which was affixed to a document dated 1344: Birch
describes the crest as follows:

“Crest, on a helmet with grating closed, and mantling
crusilly, out of a ducal coronet a swan’s head and wings erect. “ [4]

The arms of the Audley family are well known, usually described
as “fretty”, or sometimes “fretty, for a fret” [5]. The adoption of
the Clare chevrons by Hugh prior to 1344 is not atypical, given that
his earldom and his wife’s share of the Clare inheritance accounted
for the bulk of his landed wealth and social standing. As to Hugh de
Audley’s adoption of the Swan crest, during the 14th century the
heraldic seals displaying a Swan crest was otherwise limited to two
well-known but related families: the Bohun Earls of Hereford and
Essex, and the Tonys of Flamstead, co. Herts. and their descendants,
the Beauchamp Earls of Warwick [6]. As there was no Clare descent
from these families or any evidence of the use of the Swan in their
heraldry, or that of the Audleys before this generation, the
appearance is that Hugh de Audley adopted the Swan crest in honour of
his maternal ancestry.

The use of the Swan crest would appear to disprove the theory
that Hugh’s mother was a Mortimer. It does leave unanswered serious
questions as to why Edmund de Mortimer would have provided Iseult and
her 1st husband Walter de Balun with the manor of Upper Arley. If
Iseult were the daughter of Humphrey de Bohun and Eleanor de Braose,
she would have been a first cousin of Edmund de Mortimer: this makes
his provision of Arley in support of Iseult’s marriage believable,
although still in need of a detailed explanation.

There is slight indirect evidence in support of this suggestion.
Sir James de Audley, nephew of Earl Hugh, was desperately wounded at
the Battle of Poitiers (1356), and “sent for his brother sir Peter de
Audeley, sir Bartholomew Burghershe, sir Stephen Cosington, the lord
Willoughby, and sir Ralph de Ferrers, who, he says, were of his blood
and lineage” [7]. As shown in the following chart, the relationships
with Sir Peter de Audley and Sir Ralph de Ferrers are uncomplicated;
Sir Bartholomew de Burghersh was either the 2nd cousin 1x removed of
Sir James de Audley as shown (via Bohun), or similarly related through
his Mortimer ancestry if the ‘traditional’ parentage of Iseult is
correct. However, as the Mortimer ancestry assigned to Iseult
provides no known relationship to Sir John de Willoughby, it seems
more likely that Iseult was a Bohun, and not a Mortimer [8].

The seal of Hugh de Audley, Earl of Gloucester discussed above
appears to make Iseult a Bohun. A Tony ancestry would provide a
single additional generation between Iseult and Humphrey de Bohun,
Earl of Hereford and Essex (d. 1275), but would cause consanguinity
between Hugh, 2nd Earl of Stafford and his wife Philippa de Beauchamp
for which no dispensation is known. Should anyone have any further
documentation on the matter, or have comment or criticism regarding
the proposed resolution to Iseult’s ancestry, I would be glad to hear
of it.

Cheers,

John



[NB: the following chart is conjectural, and
intended for discussion purposes]




Beatrice = Geoffrey fitz Piers = Aveline de
de Say I Earl of Essex I Clare
I I___________
I I
Henry de Bohun = Maud Sir Reynold = Hawise
E of Essex I de Mohun I
____________I ______________ I
I I I I
Humphrey Eleanor Margaret Isabel
E of Essex &c. de Quincy de Quincy = Edmund
= Maud d’Eu = Alan la = William de Deincourt
I Zouche Ferrers I
I I I I
Humphrey Margery William Margaret
dvp 1265 = Robert of Groby = Robert de
= Eleanor fitz Roger = Anne Willoughby
de Braose I____ Durward I
__I_ _ _ _ _ I I____ I
I I I I I
Margery Iseult John de Sir William John de
= Theobald = Hugh de Clavering de Ferrers Willoughby
de Verdun Audley I______ d. 1325 d. 1349
I ___I_______ I I I
I I I I I I
Theobald Hugh de James ~ Eva Sir Ralph Sir John de
de Verdun Audley I de Ferrers Willoughby
= Maud de E of I <P> <P>
Mortimer Gloucester I
I ___I_______________
I I I
Elizabeth Sir James Sir Peter
= Bartholomew de Audley de Audley
de Burghersh <P> <P>
I
I
Sir Bartholomew
de Burghersh
<P>







Notes

[1] See SGM threads, <Iseult, wife of Hugh de Audley, the elder> (Jan
2002), <Iseult de Mortimer, wife of Walter de Balun and Hugh de
Audley> (Mar 2006) and numerous others in between.

[2] The best example of this, so to speak, is the History of the
County of Worcester (Victoria County History series, 1913). Vol. 3,
pp. 5-10 of this work covers the parish of Upper Arley due to the
transfer of the parish from Staffordshire in 1895: this account calls
Iseult the daughter of Edmund de Mortimer. URL:
http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=43079

[3] Calendar of the Fine Rolls (London: published for His Majesty’s
Stationery Office, 1915), Vol. V, p. 127.

[4] W. de Gray Birch, Catalogue of Seals in the Department of
Manuscripts of the British Museum (London: Longmans and Co., 1892),
Vol. II, p. 445, no. 7022. The full description provided by Birch:

“ Hugh de Audele, or Daudele,
2nd Baron, Earl of Gloucester. A.D. 1337-1347.
7022. [A.D. 1344.] Cast in red composition from fine
impression. 1 ¼ in. [xlii. 79.]
A shield of arms, couche: three chevrons, for CLARE. The
Earl married Margaret de Clare, sister and coheiress of
Gilbert de Clare, 8th and last Earl. Crest, on a helmet
with grating closed, and mantling crusilly, out of a ducal
coronet a swan’s head and wings erect. Within a carved
Gothic panel.
SIGILLVM * HVGONIS * DE * AVDELE * “

[5] Birch, ibid., pp. 444-446.

[6] Early instances of the use of the Swan are provided by Scott-
Ellis, in particular his depiction and description of the counter-seal
of Humphrey, Earl of Hereford and Essex (d. 1322) as “The shield of
Bohun, hung by a loop enclosing the Bohun swan “ [T. E. Scott-Ellis,
Baron Howard de Walden, Some Feudal Lords and their Seals, MCCCI
(London: De Walden Library, 1904), pp. xxvii, 11]. The seal of Robert
de Tony, displaying swans and ‘talbots’ around the arms, is also shown
and described by Scott-Ellis [p. 115]. For some discussion of the
Swan crest and its use by the Bohun, Tony and Beauchamp families, see
Nicholas Harris Nicolas, Esq., The Siege of Carlaverock in the XXVIII
Edward I, A.D. MCCC (London: J. B. Nichols, 1828), pp. 369-370, and
in particular Anthony R. Wagner, The Swan Badge and the Swan Knight,
Archaeologia (1959), vol. XCVII, pp. 127-138.

[7] George Frederick Beltz, Memorials of the Order of the Garter
(London: William Pickering, 1841), p. 80, citing the chronicle of Jean
Froissart. Following is the relevant French text of Froissart as
rendered in Siméon Luce, ed., Chroniques de J. Froissart (Paris: Jules
Renouard, 1874), vol. V, pp. 61-62:

‘ § 396. Quant messires James d’Audelée fu arrière raportés en
littière en son logeis,.. quant il manda monsigneur Piere d’Audelée
son frère, messire Betremieu de Brues, messire Estievene de Gonsenton,
le signeur de Willebi et monsigneur Raoul de Ferrières: cil estoient
de son sanch et de son linage. ‘

[8] The ancestry of Margaret Deincourt, wife of Robert de
Willoughby, was discussed on the newsgroup in 2002 by Cris Nash, Rosie
Bevan, Chris Phillips, and Douglas Richardson, among others
(<Deincourt uncertainties>). Given that Reynold de Mohun’s Ferrers
wife has been shown to have had no surviving descendants beyond 1324,
it appears that she must have been among the issue of Reynold’s wife
Hawise, daughter of Geoffrey fitz Piers, Earl of Essex (a Bohun
ancestor).

Don Stone

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Sep 29, 2012, 5:14:46 PM9/29/12
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John,

This is a very interesting proposal.

You say below that "the Mortimer ancestry assigned to Iseult provides no
known relationship to Sir John de Willoughby," but exploring on Leo's
Genealogics database, I found the following:

Sir William de Briwere, = Beatrice de Vaux
of Horsley I
_______________I______________
I I
Reginald de = Grace de Sir Reynold = Alice de
Braose I Briwere de Mohun I Briwere
________I ___I
I I
William de = Eve Marshall Sir Reynold = Hawise
Braose I de Mohun I
_________I ______________ I
I I I I
Maud de Eleanor Margaret Isabel
Braose de Quincy de Quincy = Edmund
= Sir Roger = Alan la = William de Deincourt
de Mortimer Zouche Ferrers I
I I I I
Edmund de Margery William Margaret
Mortimer, = Robert of Groby = Robert de
d. 1304 fitz Roger = Anne Willoughby
I I____ Durward I
I_ _ _ _ _ I I____ I
I I I I
Iseult John de Sir William John de
= Hugh de Clavering de Ferrers Willoughby
Audley I______ d. 1325 d. 1349
___I_______ I I I
I I I I I
Hugh de James ~ Eva Sir Ralph Sir John de
Audley I de Ferrers Willoughby
E of I <P> <P>
Gloucester I
___I_______________
I I
Sir James Sir Peter
de Audley de Audley
<P> <P>

The relationship between Sir James de Audley and Sir John de Willoughby
is one more generation removed than in your chart below, but, partially
compensating for that, the women in generation two are full siblings
rather than half siblings.

So your slight indirect evidence based on the relatives named by the
wounded Sir James de Audley may not work.

Nevertheless, the known Mortimer ancestry doesn't include any Bohuns or
Tonys who would enable Hugh de Audley to adopt a Swan crest. So your
basic Swan Badge argument (which has Iseult as a Bohun rather than a
Mortimer) may well be sound.

I read Anthony Wagner's "The Swan Badge and the Swan Knight" many years
ago, as I was getting started in medieval genealogy, and I was blown
away by it. What a marvelous account of the intricate interweaving of
myth, history and heraldry (and Shakespeare, for that matter).

-- Don Stone
> -------------------------------
> To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to GEN-MEDIEV...@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message

Don Stone

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Sep 29, 2012, 5:28:48 PM9/29/12
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Fixing the connecting line between Sir Reynold de Mohun and his son of
the same name:
> Sir William de Briwere, = Beatrice de Vaux
> of Horsley I
> _______________I______________
> I I
> Reginald de = Grace de Sir Reynold = Alice de
> Braose I Briwere de Mohun I Briwere
> _______I ___I
> I I
> William de = Eve Marshall Sir Reynold = Hawise
> Braose I de Mohun I
> _________I ______________ I
> I I I I
> Maud de Eleanor Margaret Isabel
> Braose de Quincy de Quincy = Edmund
> = Sir Roger = Alan la = William de Deincourt
> de Mortimer Zouche Ferrers I
> I I I I
> Edmund de Margery William Margaret
> Mortimer, = Robert of Groby = Robert de
> d. 1304 fitz Roger = Anne Willoughby
> I I____ Durward I
> I_ _ _ _ _ I I____ I
> I I I I
> Iseult John de Sir William John de
> = Hugh de Clavering de Ferrers Willoughby
> Audley I______ d. 1325 d. 1349
> ___I_______ I I I
> I I I I I
> Hugh de James ~ Eva Sir Ralph Sir John de
> Audley I de Ferrers Willoughby
> E of I <P> <P>

John P. Ravilious

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Oct 2, 2012, 11:04:29 AM10/2/12
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<<<<< snip >>>>>>


Good morning Don,

As you show, there is a slightly more distant kinship for
Mortimer and Willoughby. Whether 5th cousin 1x removed is or is not
beyond the 'recognizable pale' for kinship in the 14th century is a
matter for discussion.

It does appear the heraldry is another matter. If another crest
(e.g. griffin) were involved there'd be little to discuss, but the
Swan crest is altogether unique. Beyond the Bohun and Tony/Beauchamp
groups, the only two individuals I see (ca 1350 or before) using a
Swan crest were (1) Sir William fitz Warin, and (2) Hugh de Audley,
Earl of Gloucester. Previous SGM discussion has indicated that Sir
William de Warin was most likely a descendant (via Constance de Tony)
of the 2nd group. I think it quite unlikely that Hugh de Audley would
have displayed the Swan crest without a similar descent (Bohun or
Tony).

Cheers,

John

John P. Ravilious

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Oct 4, 2012, 6:56:33 PM10/4/12
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Thursday, 4 October, 2012


Don,


My view re: Isolde was that she was most likely either (A) the
youngest daughter of Humphrey de Bohun (dvp 1265) and Eleanor de
Braose, or (B) the eldest child (born say 1270 ?) of Humphrey de Bohun
(fl 1248-1298) and Maud de Fiennes. I have as yet found no early
Fiennes seals, but their Boulogne descent is without question.

With regard to 'option B' above, I show that Humphrey de Bohun
and Maud de Fiennes were married before 20 July 1275 [CPR 3 Edw I, p.
99, mem. 16], but nothing can be inferred from the grant (as described
in CPR) as to how long the couple had been married at that point.
However, the wording of the agreements dated 1275 between Humphrey de
Bohun the Earl, Humphrey his grandson, Queen Eleanor and William de
Fiennes [CCR 3 Edw I, p. 191] make it obvious that was the year of the
marriage. If Isolde were the daughter of this marriage, she could
only have been born as early as 1276, and would have been 11 at most
when Walter de Ballon died (1287). Perhaps not impossible, but
deserving further consideration.


Cheers,



John

Don Stone

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Oct 4, 2012, 9:08:12 PM10/4/12
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On 10/4/2012 4:56 PM, John P. Ravilious wrote:
> My view re: Isolde was that she was most likely either (A) the
> youngest daughter of Humphrey de Bohun (dvp 1265) and Eleanor de
> Braose, or (B) the eldest child (born say 1270 ?) of Humphrey de Bohun
> (fl 1248-1298) and Maud de Fiennes. I have as yet found no early
> Fiennes seals, but their Boulogne descent is without question.
>
> With regard to 'option B' above, I show that Humphrey de Bohun
> and Maud de Fiennes were married before 20 July 1275 [CPR 3 Edw I, p.
> 99, mem. 16], but nothing can be inferred from the grant (as described
> in CPR) as to how long the couple had been married at that point.
> However, the wording of the agreements dated 1275 between Humphrey de
> Bohun the Earl, Humphrey his grandson, Queen Eleanor and William de
> Fiennes [CCR 3 Edw I, p. 191] make it obvious that was the year of the
> marriage. If Isolde were the daughter of this marriage, she could
> only have been born as early as 1276, and would have been 11 at most
> when Walter de Ballon died (1287). Perhaps not impossible, but
> deserving further consideration.
>
> Cheers,
>
> John

I've done some investigation/classification of the bearers of the swan
badge itemized by Anthony Wagner in his "The Swan Badge and the Swan
Knight." I started by choosing three people in the fourth generation of
the Summary Pedigree (Plate XL). I then looked at those who later bore
swan badges from the point of view of which of these three people they
descended from. The three people are
(1) Eustace II, Count of Boulogne, d. 1080;
(2) his brother, Lambert, Count of Lens, d. 1054; and
(3) Henry II, Count of Louvain, d. 1029.

All the later people in the chart descend from one or more of the above
three. However, no person in the chart who bore a swan badge descended
from only one of these three, if we include the line (not in Wagner's
chart but sent to me by John R.) from (3) Henry II of Louvain via
Godfrey and then Adeliza down to Maud de Lusignan (or d'Eu) who married
Humphrey de Bohun.

If some bearer of a swan badge had been descended from only one of these
three, then we could say definitively that that one ancestor could
confer the ability to wear a swan badge. But since that's not the case,
saying which descent or descents enabled a particular swan badge is tricky.

For example, it's possible that only (1) and (2) above confer the
ability to wear a swan badge and (3) doesn't, and that all descendants
of (3) who bore a swan badge did so because of their descent from (1) or
(2).

Alternatively, it's possible that only (1) and (3) confer this ability
and (2) doesn't. There are later stories connecting the swan knight to
(1) and to a great-grandson of (3) who is not descended from (1) or (2),
assuming that Konrad von Wurzburg's "Godfrey, duke of Brabant" (Wagner,
p. 132) is Godfrey III, Duke of Lower Lorraine, who was also Landgrave
of Brabant.

Or maybe any of (1), (2) or (3) confer this ability.

Let's compare two bearers of a swan badge or crest, Robert de Tony (b.
1276) and Hugh de Audley, Earl of Gloucester (at least 12 years younger
than Robert):

(A) Robert de Tony is descended from (2) Lambert, Count of Lens,
via Lambert's daughter Judith's daughter Alice, who married Ralph IV
de Tony. Roger, son of the latter couple and ancestor of Robert,
married Ida, a descendant of (3) Henry II, Count of Louvain.
Further, Robert's paternal grandmother (not in Wagner's chart) was
Alice de Bohun, who is also a descendant of both (2) and (3); Alice
descends from (2) Lambert, Count of Lens, via Lambert's daughter
Judith's daughter Maud, who married David I, King of Scotland and
became grandmother of Humphrey de Bohun, Constable of England, and
Alice descends from (3) Henry II, Count of Louvain, via Henry's son
Godfrey's daughter Adeliza, who (as widow of King Henry I of
England) married William d'Aubigny and became an ancestor of Maud de
Lusignan (or d'Eu) who married Humphrey de Bohun.

(B) Hugh de Audley's mother Iseult is presumed to be the source
of his swan knight lineage. If Iseult was the daughter of Humphrey
de Bohun (dvp 1265) and Eleanor de Braose, then she would have
through her father the same descents from (2) and (3) that her aunt
Alice de Bohun has; she would not have the double descents from (2)
and (3) that Robert de Tony has, but duplicate descents probably
make no difference as far as conferring eligibility to bear the swan
badge. If Iseult was one generation later in the Bohun family and
was the daughter of Humphrey de Bohun and Maud de Fiennes, then she
would also have a descent from (1) via Maud. If Iseult was a
daughter of Roger de Tony and Alice de Bohun, in spite of the
consanguinity problem mentioned in John's original post, then she
would have the same double descents from (2) and (3) that Robert de
Tony has.

So, I think that in any case Hugh de Audley's swan badge tells us that
his mother Iseult was a Bohun or a Tony, and all of the alternatives
mentioned under (B) above give him as much hereditary right to the swan
badge as Robert de Tony had.

In addition, I think that the slight indirect evidence that John
presented in his original post is still somewhat supportive. The
Mortimer ancestry which has been assigned to Iseult provides a
relationship to Sir John de Willoughby via Sir William de Briwere of
Horsley as their common ancestor, whereas the Bohun ancestry provides a
relationship to Sir John via Geoffrey fitz Piers, Earl of Essex,
certainly a better-known individual. (Though Wikipedia says "Under King
John, William [William Brewer (justice)] was one of the most active
figures in government, next to Henry Marshal and Geoffrey fitz Peter in
terms of the number of royal charters he witnessed.[3].")

I'll have some further comments in the near future.

-- Don Stone

Don Stone

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Oct 5, 2012, 1:52:26 AM10/5/12
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Here are some thoughts about the motivation for adopting the swan badge.

First, a quotation from Susan Crane's /The Performance of Self: Ritual,
Clothing, and Identity during the Hundred Years War/, 2002, p. 112
(http://books.google.com/books?id=2st-PkahafIC&pg=PA112&lpg=PA112):

Most persistent in all formulations of totemism is its conception
that certain groups of humans have a connection to certain animals
or other natural entities. The connection is one of "mystical
descent," .... Claude Lévi-Strauss's /Totemism/ disagreed sharply
with earlier anthropologists who were intrigued by the quality,
particularly the religious valence, of the relation between human
and mystical ancestor. That relation, in Lévi-Strauss's view, was
insignificant in comparison to the differentiating function of
totemism within human society: totemism asserts not so much "we are
descended from a swan" as it asserts "we are different from people
who are not descended from a swan."

.... the ordinary ancestor-descendant relation, in medieval Europe,
is understood to be metonymic: ancestors are not reincarnated in
descendants, but they do have a significant association with them,
both biologically as cause and effect, and socially as holders down
through time of identical positions in the devolving lineage. Where
ordinary human descent is already metonymic, such that ancestors are
at a remove from descendants but can confer prestige on them by
association, the conceptual ground is prepared for mystical
ancestry. In the case of the Swan Knight, the mystical ancestor
fits neatly into an otherwise historical lineage, as the grandfather
of Godfrey of Bouillon.

Wagner ("The Swan Badge and the Swan Knight," p. 135) tells how a book
at Faversham Abbey written probably soon after 1200 apparently narrated
the story of the Swan Knight and said that this knight and the widow of
Godfrey of Bouillon had a daughter Ida who married Eustace, Count of
Boulogne, and became mother of Godfrey and Baldwin of Jerusalem and
Eustace of Boulogne, father of Maud, the queen of Stephen, king of
England (and founder of Faversham Abbey). Wagner: "It is thus clear
that the story of the Swan Knight was known in England and linked with
the house of Boulogne from the twelfth century..."

One of the early persons to bear the swan badge was Sir Humphrey de
Bohun, Earl of Hereford and Essex, d. 1321. He employed a swan to
support his shield of arms on the seal he used in 1301 on the letter of
the barons to the pope. This seal, as tricked by the Lancaster Herald
in 1611, can be seen as the bottom illustration on p. xxvii of Howard de
Walden's /Some Feudal Lords and Their Seals, MCCCJ/, at
http://www30.us.archive.org/stream/somefeudallordst00howauoft#page/n36/mode/1up.
Humphrey de Bohun married Elizabeth, daughter of King Edward I of
England, in Nov. 1302. Their dispensation was dated August 1302. The
application for the dispensation would have been earlier and the
negotiations for marriage still earlier than that. Elizabeth was the
widow of Johann (or Jan) I, Count of Holland and Zeeland, who had died
in Nov. 1299, and no doubt people began very soon after this death to
wonder who the widow's next husband would be or perhaps to plan
strategies to influence the selection process.

I can think of three scenarios for Humphrey's initiating use of the swan
badge:

1. Earlier family members had used the swan badge and it was
available to Humphrey as one who shared the relevant descent.

2. Humphrey adopted the swan badge as part of a strategy for making
himself a more appealing candidate husband for Elizabeth. (His
father had died around the end of 1298, so it's not clear who would
have been planning for or conducting the marriage negotiations.) OR

3. Humphrey, now engaged to Elizabeth, may have begun to worry
whether his identity would become more the king's son-in-law and
less Humphrey de Bohun. Adoption of the swan badge would be a way
to call attention to a distinctive descent which he had and which,
incidentally, the king of England did not possess. "I am different
from people who are not descended from the swan knight," as per
Lévi-Strauss.

Note that Humphrey's second cousin, Robert de Tony, was also a signer of
this letter of the barons to the pope. He, too, used a swan theme in
his seal, having swans alternate with lions around the border of the
shield (at the right of the middle row of
http://www30.us.archive.org/stream/somefeudallordst00howauoft#page/n41/mode/1up
-- click several times on the "+" to enlarge the page image to see the
swans better).

About 15 years later, Hugh de Audley found himself in a less intense
version of the situation Humphrey de Bohun had been in. Hugh was married
to King Edward I's widowed granddaughter Margaret in 1317. He would no
doubt know that Humphrey de Bohun, husband of his bride's aunt
Elizabeth, used a swan badge, and he may have been inspired to follow
that example, especially if Humphrey was his first cousin because Hugh's
mother Iseult was a Bohun and was Humphrey's aunt.

-- Don Stone

Alex Maxwell Findlater

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Oct 5, 2012, 5:53:11 AM10/5/12
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It is interesting to note that the Scottish Lindsays are shown with a swan crest in the Toison d'Or (late C14), and indeed it is still used. I read Wagner's book many years ago, but never put this particular 2 with another 2. Would that suggest that we should look for a Boulogne descent for them?

John P. Ravilious

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Oct 5, 2012, 7:33:11 AM10/5/12
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On Oct 5, 5:53 am, Alex Maxwell Findlater
<maxwellfindla...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> It is interesting to note that the Scottish Lindsays are shown with a swan crest in the Toison d'Or (late C14), and indeed it is still used.  I read Wagner's book many years ago, but never put this particular 2 with another 2.  Would that suggest that we should look for a Boulogne descent for them?
>
>


Alex,

I think it is most likely that the Lindsays of Crawford had such
a descent. The earliest evidence I have found to date is the seal of
Sir James de Lindsay of Crawford affixed to a document dated 26 Sept
1357 [MacDonald, SAS p. 206, no. 1633]. Sir James and his brother Sir
Alexander of Glenesk [cf MacDonald, ibid., no. 1635] were the sons of
Sir David Lindsay and his wife Mary de Abernethy; I would suggest that
their 'Swan' link was likely through Sir David's mother, the unknown
wife of Sir Alexander de Lindsay (d. aft Jul 1306).

Cheers,

John

Don Stone

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Oct 5, 2012, 2:07:05 PM10/5/12
to gen-me...@rootsweb.com
On 10/4/2012 7:08 PM, Don Stone wrote:
> (A) Robert de Tony is descended from (2) Lambert, Count of Lens,
> via Lambert's daughter Judith's daughter Alice, who married Ralph IV
> de Tony. Roger, son of the latter couple and ancestor of Robert,
> married Ida, a descendant of (3) Henry II, Count of Louvain.
> Further, Robert's paternal grandmother (not in Wagner's chart) was
> Alice de Bohun, who is also a descendant of both (2) and (3); Alice
> descends from (2) Lambert, Count of Lens, via Lambert's daughter
> Judith's daughter Maud, who married David I, King of Scotland and
> became grandmother of Humphrey de Bohun, Constable of England
The bottom line above should be

became grandmother of the wife of Humphrey de Bohun, Constable of England


-- Don

John P. Ravilious

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Oct 6, 2012, 4:40:30 PM10/6/12
to
Don,

Many thanks for your observations, and suggestions regarding Hugh
de Audley and his adoption of the Swan crest.

With regard to the book at Faversham, it is quite possible the
legend of the Swan knight and its connection to Godfrey of Bouillon
and the counts of Boulogne was known before the end of the 12th
century. William of Tyre (d. 1186) made mention of the legend of a
Swan as an ancestor of Godfrey in his Historia rerum gestarum in
partibus transmarinis (Book IX:6) - it is quite possible such a story
made its way across the Channel prior to the Third Crusade.

Cheers,

John

Matt A

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Feb 1, 2013, 8:32:57 AM2/1/13
to
Implicitly, this speaks to the controversy of Reynold de Mohun's wife Hawise.

"A History of Dunster & the Families of Mohun and Luttrell" (1909) makes an excellent case that Reynold de Mohun's wife Hawise was a Fleming. Thus:

"Sir Reynold de Mohun married two wives, the first of whom was unquestionably named Hawis. Several of his benefactions already noticed were made for the benefit of her soul. As far back as the year 1350, John Osberne, the untrustworthy chronicler of the Mohun family, described her as a sister of William Mandeville, Earl of Essex. ^ Dugdale, perceiving perhaps that this nobleman was contemporary with Sir Reynold's father, makes her a sister
of Humphrey de Bohun, Earl of Essex, although he professes to get his information from the very book which calls Humphrey her cousin. Others have
chosen to describe her a daughter of John Fitz Geoffrey. On the other hand, two quarterly shields of the later Mohuns give the arms of Fleming immediately after those of Briwere, thus suggesting that a Mohun married a Fleming heiress in the thirteenth century. Such evidence is not of much intrinsic value, but it acquires force when found to be consistent with definite facts. Sir William Pole has preserved copies of two deeds by which William son of William Fleming conveyed to Reynold de Mohun the manors of Ottery and Stoke, and a third deed by which Geoffrey de Mandeville, the overlord, approved William Fleming's grants to Reynold de Mohun of the manors of Stoke, Ottery, Olditch and Pinford. Although the original conveyances are not extant, it further appears that the manors of Luppit and Farway, also in Devonshire, passed from the
Flemings to the Mohuns. In support of his own story, John Osberne states that William de Mandeville. Earl of Essex, granted the manors of Streatley, in Berkshire, to Reynold de Mohun, to be held by him by service of a quarter of a fee. If Reynold married before the Earl's death in 1227, this is likely enough. He certainly had a house at Streatley in 1233, and there is no reason to suppose that he bought this property in a distant county. The nature of the transaction becomes clearer when we find that the Earls of Essex were merely the overlords of Streatley, and that William Fleming held three quarters of a fee there in the middle of the thirteenth century. Lastly, attention may be drawn to the fact that, in 1283, one of the buildings at Dunster Castle was known as the 'Fleming Tower,' doubtless that which was afterwards called ' Dame Hawis's Tower.' In defiance therefore of the older genealogists, we may fairly hold that Sir Reynold de Mohun married firstly Hawis daughter and heiress of
William Fleming."

I wonder if anyone can manage to find a clarification of the Fleming/Dame Hawise architectural point. On the one hand, the attestation of kinship you have provided speaks to the FitzPiers connection, but as Foissart was speaking of events in 1356, and John Osborne was apparently "As far back as the year 1350" reporting her to be a FitzPiers, is it possible that Foissart was following Osborne? It seems a bit of a stretch, however, to suggest Foissart could really have accessed Osborne.

-Matt Ahlgren

Matt A

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Feb 1, 2013, 10:22:25 AM2/1/13
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Osborne's "old booke", giving Hawise as a FitzPiers, seems to be a curious document, apparently created at the request of the Mohun family. It is noted as in the possession of the Earl of Egmont in 1907. I wonder if it can be found through Access to Archives or whether it is still in private hands.

(Note that the following article was written by Maxwell-Lyte, the author of "A History of Dunster & the Families of Mohun and Luttrell." If indeed Maxwell-Lyte was given full access to the manuscript, but still reached the conclusion that it included some deception re:FitzPiers, I am highly curious to know more about it)

On the other hand, whilst a document internal to the family is more easily manipulated, the conclusion that Froissart had access to it seems almost completely untenable. Clearly, it was not a standard historical source of the period.

-Matt Ahlgren

Matt A

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Feb 1, 2013, 10:25:02 AM2/1/13
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Derek Howard

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Feb 1, 2013, 10:46:56 AM2/1/13
to
Sir H C Maxwell Lyte: "A history of Dunster and of the families of Mohun and Luttrell", part 2, 1909, p 353, refers to an extent of Dunster of 1266, in which the Lower Ward "comprised three towers, of which that known as "the Fleming Tower" was a prison" - the source footnoted as "Mohun Cartulary". The same page also refers to an enquiry in 1284 when the heir was under age which mentions "another Tower called the Fleming Tower" and we are referred for this on p 354, fn 1, to Miscellanea (Chancery) Bundle 3, No 21 (5-7). rhttp://archive.org/stream/historyofdunster02lyte#page/352/

I find no presentation of either of these documents of 1266 and 1284, nor is there is no indexed reference to the Fleming family in his volume of evidences - Sir H C Maxwell-Lyte, “Documents and extracts illustrating the history of the Honour of Dunster”, Somerset Record Society vol 33, 1917 and 1918.
http://archive.org/stream/documentsextract00dunsrich

I note though that Otery Flemyng and Stoke Flemyng in Devon are listed, in 1282-4, as fees of the Honour of Dunster, confirming the acquisition by Reynold de Mohun of the manors of Ottery and Stoke, the deeds of which were said in 1909 to be lost, see "Documents ...", p 56.

Moreover, Hawise wife of Reynold de Mohun is named in his grant, doc 50, pp 31-32 (BL Add Charter 11161) but though this reference leads to a footnote Maxwell-Lyte does not draw attention to any Fleming connection.

As to the Cartulary, he mentions, in his preface to vol I, that
In June 1908, when the earlier part of the present book had been already printed, there was offered for sale by auction in London, a folio volume of 170 leaves of parchment catalogued as "Cartularium et jeodarium Dominorum de Mohun'". On inspection, this proved to be a fragment of the important compilation made, in 1350, by John Osberne, Constable of Dunster Castle, .... The originals of many of the documents transcribed into it had disappeared before Prynne's time, but it is interesting to note that such of them as still remain in Mr. Luttrell's muniment-room are endorsed "irrotulatur" in evidence that they had been duly entered in the cartulary. I was not so fortunate as to secure this manuscript at the sale, and I have not been able to obtain direct access to it since". (The sale is footnoted as that at Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge's Catalogue of the Phillipps Collection, Lot 545).
"The present owner, however, who wishes to remain anonymous, has very kindly supplied me with full transcripts of some of its contents,". So we may presume the statements from it have some basis in fact.

The de Mohun Cartulary is now in the British Library as Egerton MS 3724 and may justify further examination.

Derek Howard

Matt Tompkins

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Feb 1, 2013, 11:40:54 AM2/1/13
to
> On Friday, February 1, 2013 2:32:57 PM UTC+1, Matt A wrote:
> > quarters of a fee there in the middle of the thirteenth century. Lastly,
> > attention may be drawn to the fact that, in 1283, one of the buildings at
> > Dunster Castle was known as the 'Fleming Tower,' doubtless that which was
> > afterwards called ' Dame Hawis's Tower.' In defiance therefore of the older
> > genealogists, we may fairly hold that Sir Reynold de Mohun married firstly
> > Hawis daughter and heiress of William Fleming."
>
> > I wonder if anyone can manage to find a clarification of the Fleming/Dame
> > Hawise architectural point.
>
On Feb 1, 3:46 pm, Derek Howard <dhow...@skynet.be> wrote:
> Sir H C Maxwell Lyte: "A history of Dunster and of the families of Mohun and Luttrell", part 2, 1909, p 353, refers to an extent of Dunster of 1266, in which the Lower Ward "comprised three towers, of which that known as "the Fleming Tower" was a prison" - the source footnoted as "Mohun Cartulary". The same page also refers to an enquiry in 1284 when the heir was under age which mentions "another Tower called the Fleming Tower" and we are referred for this on p 354, fn 1, to Miscellanea (Chancery) Bundle 3, No 21 (5-7). rhttp://archive.org/stream/historyofdunster02lyte#page/352/
>
> I find no presentation of either of these documents of 1266 and 1284, nor is there is no indexed reference to the Fleming family in his volume of evidences - Sir H C Maxwell-Lyte, “Documents and extracts illustrating the history of the Honour of Dunster”, Somerset Record Society vol 33, 1917 and 1918.http://archive.org/stream/documentsextract00dunsrich
>

The 1284 enquiry's modern TNA reference is C 47/3/21/5-7. All three
documents are identically described in the Catalogue as "Writ to, and
report by, Ralph de Sandwych, touching repairs done to Dunster castle
by John de Vescy, warden of the castle, 3mm, 11 Edw I Oct 5", ie 1283.

Matt Tompkins







C 47/3/21/6

Writ to, and report by, Ralph de Sandwych, touching repairs done to
Dunster castle by John de Vescy, warden of the castle 3mm

11 Edw I Oct 5







C 47/3/21/7

Writ to, and report by, Ralph de Sandwych, touching repairs done to
Dunster castle by John de Vescy, warden of the castle 3mm

11 Edw I Oct 5

Matt A

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Feb 1, 2013, 12:37:35 PM2/1/13
to
According to a 'work in progress' of VCH (http://www.victoriacountyhistory.ac.uk/sites/default/files/work-in-progress/dunster_landownership_edited_dec_09.pdf), William II de Mohun (d. by 1155) founded Bourton Prioty. The volume "Two cartularies of the Augustinian priory of Bruton and the Cluniac priory of Montacute in the county of Somerset" (Somerset Record Society Volume 8; http://books.google.com/books?id=Nuj3FKBDcw4C&source=gbs_navlinks_s) contains many Mohun references but only two FitzPiers and only three Fleming references, none of which shed light on any kinship.

As to BL Add Charter 11161, something's afoot. According to the Monastic Database Browser (http://www.monasticarchives.org.uk/databrowse/monarc/archive/objects/3219/) it was printed in 'On the charters and other archives of Cleeve Abbey' (Proc. Som. Archaeol. & Nat. Hist. Soc., vi)(http://archive.org/stream/onchartersothera00hugouoft#page/28/mode/2up) (incidentally, this article mentions that the charters will soon be placed among the "Additional Charters" collection), on page 52. But there is no Mohun referenced on page 52. Perhaps Additional Charters were renumbered?

At any rate, 'On the charters...' provides English translations for the two charters (Add Charters 11161-2). In the first, Hawise/Avis is living; in the second, she is not. Anyway, the charters are dated [1233x58] and [1238x1258, so they don't really help.

On p. 37 of the same, Charter roll 14 Edw I, n.30 is printed. It might be noted that Humphrey de Bohun witnessed this inspeximus charter.

On p. 58-9, several references are made to public records (IPMs, Rolls, etc.) concerning Cleeve Abbey, which I do not have time at the moment to follow up on.

-Matt Ahlgren

Derek Howard

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Feb 1, 2013, 2:12:13 PM2/1/13
to
The marriages of Reginald de Mohun are discussed in an earlier article by Maxwell Lyte where he refers to the charters by Reginald "to Cleeve Abbey and again in the Register of Newenham Abbey where his first wife is simply Styled Avice of Hawys de Mohun" however, he says that it is "probable that she was the heiress of the Flemyngs of Ottery" (and discusses the circumstantial evidence in fn 4 there).

His reference for the mention of "Damhawys toure" is Dunster Castle Muniments, Box xi, No. 3: "In 1 magna clave empta de Hugone Lokyer et in emendatione 1 sera pro damhawys toure 4s. In Johanne Bolkinam conducto per 1 diem ad purgandum damhawys toure ad cibum domini 2d."
H C Maxwell Lyte, "Dunster and its Lords", The Archaeological Journal, vol 37 (1880), pp 69-70
http://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/catalogue/adsdata/arch-1132-1/dissemination/pdf/037/037_057-093_155-179_271-293_395-405.pdf
(Pt 2 of the article which concerns the Luttrells is in the following edition of the AJ in 1881
http://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/catalogue/adsdata/arch-1132-1/dissemination/pdf/038/038_062_079-207_228.pdf )

Derek Howard
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