Mistress of the Monarchy (68 page)

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Authors: Alison Weir

Tags: #Biography, #Historical, #Europe, #Social Science, #General, #Great Britain, #To 1500, #Biography & Autobiography, #History, #Women's Studies, #Nobility, #Women

BOOK: Mistress of the Monarchy
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10 ‘The King’s Mother’

1
Complete Peerage
; Chancery Records: C.81; Special Collections: S.C.8

2
Rotuli Parliamentorum
; Somerville; McKisack

3
Froissart; Rose; Goodman:
John of Gaunt

4
Calendar of Close Rolls
. I have found no other record of the lands Katherine held in Leicester, Northamptonshire and Norfolk prior to her marriage to John of Gaunt.

5
Calendar of Patent Rolls

6
A Collection of All the Wills …

7
Now No. 2, Minster Yard. Lincoln Cathedral Dean and Chapter Muniments, Dean and Chapter Acts, Liber VI (i), ff.2, 3; Major; Jones, Major, Varley and Johnson

8
These measurements cannot have been taken very accurately as the remains of the mediaeval hall measure 44’ by 26’.

9
For the Priory, see Jones, Major, Varley and Johnson; Major; Silva-Vigier; Pevsner and Harris; Jones:
Four Minster Houses; Calendar of Patent Rolls.

10
Early Lincoln Wills.
His name is also given as Peter Dalton.

11
Goodman:
Katherine Swynford

12
Special Collections: S.C.8; Exchequer Records: E.403;
Calendar of Patent Rolls

13
Chronicque de la traïson et mort de Richart Deux

14
Trokelowe

15
Goodman:
Katherine Swynford

16
Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Chute; Lucraft:
Katherine Swynford

17
Calendar of Patent Rolls

18
Crow and Olsen

19
He was also required to surrender the Warwick lands to the King.
Rotuli Parliamentorum

20
Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Exchequer Records: E.28

21
Calendar of Patent Rolls

22
Lucraft:
Katherine Swynford

23
The site is now occupied by the Henry VII Chapel.

24
The date usually given for Chaucer’s death, 25 October 1400, was inscribed on the Tudor tomb, and may well have been copied from the original epitaph plate that was displayed in the Abbey. Chaucer’s bones were uncovered in 1889 when Robert Browning was buried in Poet’s Corner, and the coroner then estimated that he had been about 5′6″ tall. There are no grounds for accepting recent assertions that he was murdered on the orders of Henry IV (Jones:
Who Murdered Chaucer
).

25
Goodman:
Honourable Lady; Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Exchequer Records: E.28

26
Goodman:
Katherine Swynford
. Perry suggests that the reference was to Sir Norman Swynford, but this is unlikely in view of evidence from the Exchequer Records that will shortly be cited in the text.

27
Bruce; Wylie; Beltz

28
Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Given-Wilson:
Royal Household

29
Duchy of Lancaster Records: DL.42

30
Duchy of Lancaster Records: DL.29

31
Blomefield and Parkin; Lucraft:
Katherine Swynford
; Perry

32
Norris

33
Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan;
Historiae Dunelmensis Scriptores Tres

34
Duchy of Lancaster Records: DL.42, DL.49

35
Exchequer Records: E.101;
Calendar of Close Rolls

36
Calendar of Patent Rolls; Calendar of Close Rolls

37
Ibid.

38
Archaeological Journal
, XXXI, London, 1874

39
Foedera

40
In 1406, Isabella married Charles of Valois, Duke of Orléans. She died in childbirth in 1409.

41
Calendar of Patent Rolls

42
Harriss; McGrath

43
Calendar of Close Rolls

44
Walsingham

45
Duchy of Lancaster Records: DL.28

46
Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Harriss

47
Rotuli Parliamentorum
; Trokelowe; Walsingham

48
Exchequer Records: E.404, E.101; Goodman:
Marriage of Henry IV

49
Calendar of Patent Rolls

50
Ibid.;
Calendar of Close Rolls

51
Complete Peerage; Desiderata Curiosa
; Lincoln Cathedral Dean and Chapter Muniments, Chapter Acts A.ii.29, ff.2, 3

52
Harvey: ‘Catherine Swynford’s Chantry’

53
Duffy

54
Duchy of Lancaster Records: DL.29, DL.42

55
Lucraft: ‘Missing From History’;
Katherine Swynford
; Goodman:
Katherine Swynford
. The Prerogative Court of Canterbury records are in the National Archives.

56
Lincoln Cathedral Dean and Chapter Muniments, Bj.2.10

57
Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan;
Historiae Dunelmensis Scriptores Tres

58
Lincoln Cathedral Dean and Chapter Muniments; Jones, Major, Varley and Johnson; Weir: English Aristocratic Pedigrees

59
Wickenden

60
Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Goodman:
Katherine Swynford

61
Calendar of Patent Rolls; Excerpta Historica

62
Lucraft: ‘Missing From History’;
Katherine Swynford; A Collection of All the Wills …
; Jamieson. The hospital was demolished in 1825.

63
Leese; Lambeth Palace MS. 20, f.173v;
A Collection of All the Wills …

64
Hicks

65
Duffy;
A Collection of All the Wills …

66
Harriss, for example.

67
Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers; Cartae et Munimenta de Glamorgan
;
www.rootsweb.com
; Verity: ‘A Non-Affair to Remember’. Joan married Sir Edward Stradling of St Donat’s, Glamorganshire (1389–1453), by whom she had a son, Henry.

68
Vale. The portrait is in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna.

69
Calendar of Patent Rolls; Calendar of Close Rolls

70
Calendar of Patent Rolls

71
Worcestre

72
Dictionary of National Biography

73
Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan; Perry

74
Chronicles and Memorials of St Edmund’s Abbey
; Leese;
Antiquarian Repertory

75
Lucraft:
Katherine Swynford
; Armitage-Smith;
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
; Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan. The book that Thomas Hoccleve dedicated to Joan is Cosin MS. V.iii.9 at Durham University.

76
Historiae Dunelmensis Scriptores Tres

77
Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Harvey: ‘Catherine Swynford’s Chantry’; ‘Inventories of Plate’; Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan; Given-Wilson;
Collections Relative to … the Diocese of York

78
Harvey: ‘Catherine Swynford’s Chantry’; Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan

79
Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan

80
Duffy; Sandford; Harvey: ‘Catherine Swynford’s Chantry’;
A Collection of All the Wills
…; Goodman:
Katherine Swynford
. Her arms were noted around 1600 by Francis Thynne, Lancaster Herald.

81
The Neville Book of Hours is in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris.

82
Goodman: Redoubtable Countess Joan

83
www.english.upenn

84
English Historical Documents

85
Griffiths and Thomas

86
Perry; Goodall

87
Foedera

88
Perry

89
Calendar of Patent Rolls
; Manly:
Some New Light on Chaucer; Excerpta Historica

90
Hunter

91
Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem

92
Cole. Thomas Beaufort left him 50 marks (£7, 076) in his will.

93
Campling

94
Elder

95
Calendar of Patent Rolls

96
Excerpta Historica

97
Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem

98
Cole

99
Ibid.

100
For Kettlethorpe, see
www.kettlethorpe.com
; Leese; Perry; Goodman:
John of Gaunt; Katherine Swynford
; Cole;

101
Silva-Vigier; Lucraft: ‘Missing From History’

102
The epitaph was recorded by Weever. The Latin inscription was recorded by Anthony Munday in 1618, in his extended edition of Stow’s
Survey of London
.

103
Exchequer Records: E.301; Dugdale:
History of St Paul’s

104
Holland

105
B.L. Lansdowne MS. 874, f.115

106
Benham

107
Dugdale:
History of St Paul’s

108
Sandford

109
Ibid.; Duffy

110
Arnold

111
Leland:
Itinerary

112
Dugdale: Book of Monuments

113
Harvey: ‘Catherine Swynford’s Chantry’; Duffy; Goodman:
Katherine Swynford

114
Duchy of Lancaster Records: DL.43

115
John Evelyn, the seventeenth-century diarist, noted that ‘the soldiers had lately knocked off most of the brasses from the gravestones’.

116
Kendrick:
Cathedral Church of Lincoln

117
Dugdale:
Monasticon
. A drawing of the repositioned tombs was made in 1809
by John Buckler (B.L. Additional MS. 36369, f.87), which is reproduced in Harvey: ‘Catherine Swynford’s Chantry’.

118
Lincoln Cathedral Dean and Chapter Muniments, AIV 15; Jones, Major, Varley and Johnson

119
Payn Roët’s epitaph in St Paul’s Cathedral, cited by Silva-Vigier

Appendix: Anya Seton’s
Katherine

1
The Austin Chronicle

2
Goodman:
John of Gaunt

3
Cantor

4
The date is sometimes incorrectly given as 1904 or 1916.

5
Anya Seton’s personal papers are held in the archives of the Historical Society of the Town of Greenwich, and biographical details of her appear on many internet sites; of these, I am indebted chiefly to ‘The Setons: The Setons at Home’, by Lucinda H. MacKethan of North Carolina State University (
www.nhc.rtp.nc.us:8080
).

6
BBC: The Big Read

7
‘National Review Online’ (
www.nationalreview.com
)

Alison Weir
is one of the world’s foremost popular historians. Her books include
Britain’s Royal Families;
The Six Wives of Henry VIII
;
Children of England
;
Henry VIII: King and Court
;
Mary Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley
;
Isabella: She-Wolf of France, Queen of England
; and most recently the novel
Innocent Traitor
. She lives and works in Surrey, England.

Text copyright © 2007 Alison Weir

Cloth edition first published as
Katherine Swynford: The Story of John of Gaunt and his Scandalous Duchess.
Published in the U.K. in 2007 by Jonathan Cape, The Random House Group Limited and in Canada in 2008 by McClelland & Stewart Ltd.

Emblem edition published 2009

Emblem is an imprint of McClelland & Stewart Ltd.
Emblem and colophon are registered trademarks of McClelland & Stewart Ltd.

All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher — or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency — is an infringement of the copyright law.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Weir, Alison
Mistress of the monarchy : the life of Katherine Swynford, Duchess of
Lancaster / Alison Weir.

Originally published under title: Katherine Swynford : the story of John of Gaunt and his scandalous duchess. London : Jonathan Cape, 2008.

eISBN: 978-1-55199-320-1

I. Katherine, Duchess of Lancaster, 1350?-1403. 2. John, of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, 1340-1399. 3. Nobility-Great Britain-Biography 4. Nobility-Great Britain-History— To 1500. 5. Great Britain—Court and courtiers—History—To 1500 6. Great Britain-History-Edward III, 1327-1377. 7. Great Britain-History-Richard II, 1377-1399.
I. Weir, Alison. Katherine Swynford. II. Title.

DA247.K38W45 2009
A
     942.03’8092     C2009-901627-3

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and that of the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Media Development Corporation’s Ontario Book Initiative. We further acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program.

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