by Alison Weir
7 Crow and Olsen
8 Goodman, John of Gaunt; Howard; Pearsall
9 Goodman, Honourable Lady
10 Silva-Vigier
11 Ibid.
12 Goodman, Honourable Lady
13 “Liber Benefactorum”
14 Westminster Chronicle
15 Walsingham
16 Knighton; Higden; Westminster Chronicle; “Liber Benefactorum”
17 Higden calls her viropotens, which means, literally, “mighty.”
18 Higden. Armitage- Smith judged this story too scandalous to bear repetition in En glish, so he quoted it in Latin.
19 Wells
20 Complete Peerage; Special Collections, S.C. 8; Walsingham. He had taken, as his second wife, Philippa Mortimer, Elizabeth’s cousin.
21 Higden
22 Knighton; Eulogium; Froissart
23 Chronique du Religieux de Saint- Denys; Goodman, John of Gaunt
24 Jones, Major, Varley and Johnson
25 Bishop Buckingham’s Register
26 Amcotts mss. (VI/A/22/2)
27 Ackroyd
28 Lopes; Russell; Goodman, John of Gaunt; Honourable Lady; Dictionary of National Biography
29 Bevan
30 The year is sometimes—probably incorrectly—given as 1386, but this does not take account of the medieval calendar. In England, until 1752, the New Year officially started on Lady Day, March 25—thus February 16, 1386 should probably read February 16, 1387. To confuse matters, the Roman year began on January 1, which was celebrated in England as New Year’s Day. Effectively there were two new years in England, January 1 and March 25.
31 Foljambe of Osberton mss. (Osberton Deeds, IX, I, 787)
32 Nicolas, Controversy
33 Froissart
34 Fernão Lopes wrote a Portuguese chronicle that was commissioned by Duarte I, John of Gaunt’s grandson. Lopes wrote discreetly and admiringly of John, basing his account on the recollections of people who had known him, and his work reflects the respect in which the House of Lancaster was held in Portugal.
35 Gillespie; Begent; McDonald
36 Beltz; Silva- Vigier
37 McDonald; McHardy
38 Calendar of Patent Rolls
39 Walsingham; Lopes; Froissart
40 Froissart
41 Lopes
42 Exchequer Records, E. 403; Honoré- Duvergé
43 Pearsall; Crow and Olsen; Brewer
44 Sometimes the dress in tomb sculptures is old- fashioned for its period, but Philippa was married to a prominent man with links to the court, and she was an honored servant of the Duchess of Lancaster: Hers would have been no rustic burial, and if any effigy were made for her, it would surely have sported the mode of its own period. Some Internet Web sites (see, for example, www.johnowensmith.co.uk) claim that Thomas Chaucer, Philippa’s son, was lord of the manor of East Worldham from 1418 to 1434, but that is incorrect. This manor was granted to the Crown in 1374, and nearly a century later was still in the hands of Edward IV when Thomas’s daughter, Alice Chaucer, petitioned him for the restoration of lands there that she claimed had been granted to her by Henry VI. There is no evidence that the Chaucers had any earlier interests there. It is far more likely that the effigy represents a lady of the Venuz family, who held the manor of East Worldham from the eleventh to the fourteenth century. See www.british-history.ac.uk; www.astoft.co.uk; Hampshire Record Office, Accession No. 52M70; Norris; Victoria County History: Hampshire
45 Jones, Four Minster Houses
46 Lopes
47 Goodman, Honourable Lady; Walsingham
48 Westminster Chronicle
49 Lopes
50 Foedera
51 Ibid.; Lopes; John of Gaunt’s Register
52 Goodman, John of Gaunt
53 Foedera
54 Crow and Olsen
55 Hicks
56 Froissart; Guzmán; Armitage- Smith; Goodman, John of Gaunt
57 Foedera; Russell; Palmer and Powell; Goodman, John of Gaunt; Ayala; Westminster Chronicle; Perroy
58 Goodman, John of Gaunt. Lewis Recouchez was later Master of St. James’s Hospital, Westminster, the leper hospital that originally stood on the site of St. James’s Palace.
59 Ayala; Froissart; Armitage- Smith; Russell
60 Armitage- Smith; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
61 Goodman, Honourable Lady
62 Ibid.
63 Calendar of Patent Rolls
64 Froissart; Hardyng
65 Froissart
66 Goodman, Honourable Lady; Given- Wilson and Curteis; Wylie; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
67 Given- Wilson and Curteis. His only known bastard son, Edmund Labourde (who died young), was born probably in 1401, when Henry had been a widower for seven years.
68 Goodman, Honourable Lady; John of Gaunt; McFarlane; Wylie; Bevan; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
69 Goodman, “Redoubtable Countess”
70 Foedera
71 Exchequer Records, E. 403; Nicolas, Controversy
72 Foedera
73 Higden; Rotuli Parliamentorum
74 Knighton
75 Goodman, John of Gaunt
76 Ibid.; Calendar of Patent Rolls; Westminster Chronicle; Walsingham; Rotuli Parliamentorum; Saul
77 Higden
78 Westminster Chronicle; Chancery Records, C. 53
79 Walsingham; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 29; Lewis, “Indentures of retinue”
80 Rotuli Parliamentorum
81 Ibid.
82 Ibid.; Westminster Chronicle
83 Foedera
84 Goodman, John of Gaunt
85 Stow, London
86 For Ely Place, see, for example, Ashley; Dalzell; Stow, London; Goodman, John of Gaunt; McHardy; Sharman. After Elizabeth I had forced the Bishop of Ely to surrender Ely Place to the Crown in the late sixteenth century, Sir Christopher Hatton acquired the freehold—hence the name Hatton Garden. The old palace was demolished in 1772, when the present Ely Place—a gated cul- de- sac of Georgian houses, incorporating the Church of St. Etheldreda—was built; it still remains a sanctuary.
87 Calendar of Close Rolls; McHardy. The London Silver Vaults now partially occupy the site of the bishops’ house.
88 Barron; Legge
89 Froissart
90 Armitage- Smith; Emden; Harriss; Goodman, John of Gaunt; Silva- Vigier; Le Neve
91 Dictionary of National Biography; Saul; Silva- Vigier
92 Leese
93 Boucicaut; Chronique du Religieux de Saint- Denys; Froissart; Kirby
94 Additional mss.
95 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
96 Froissart; Jones and Underwood
97 Froissart; Kirby; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28; Westminster Chronicle
98 Exchequer Records, E. 403
99 Waleys Cartulary, rolls A1, A2, A4, A9, B9; Goodman, Katherine Swynford; Rosenthal, in which are to be found the printed checkroll lists; Wylie
100 Jones, Major, Varley, and Johnson
101 Goodman, John of Gaunt; Edinburgh University Library ms.183, f.135v
102 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
103 Kyngeston
104 Waleys Cartulary
105 Calendar of Patent Rolls; Goodman, Katherine Swynford
106 One of two adjoining Northamptonshire hamlets now known as Chapel Brampton and Church Brampton.
107 Calendar of Patent Rolls; Complete Peerage; Chancery Records, C. 137; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28. The present Overstone Manor is a hotel dating from the 1930s and has nothing to do with the original manor house, which has long since disappeared; nor does anything remain of the medieval village, which was rebuilt in the eighteenth century.
108 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
109 Goodman, Honourable Lady; Wylie; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
110 Goodman, “Redoubtable Countess;” Tuck; Harriss
111 Waleys Cartulary
112 Foedera; Froissart (for example); Add
itional mss.
113 Knighton
114 Froissart
115 Bruce
116 Calendar of Patent Rolls; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
117 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28; Kyngeston
118 Victoria County History: Oxfordshire; Jacob
119 Higden
120 Walsingham
121 Jones, Major, Varley, and Johnson
122 Goodman, Honourable Lady; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
123 Calendar of Patent Rolls; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
124 Calendar of Inquisitions Post Mortem
125 Rotuli Parliamentorum; Armitage- Smith
126 Galbraith; Bruce
127 Westminster Chronicle; Walsingham; Palmer, England, France and Christendom
128 The date of her obit is given in John of Gaunt’s will as March 24. Higden, Knighton, and Walsingham all give the date incorrectly as March 25.
9. MY DEAREST LADY KATHERINE
1 St. Paul’s Cathedral mss., B, Box 95
2 Goodman, John of Gaunt
3 Foedera
4 Walsingham
5 Adam of Usk; Stow: Annals; Froissart
6 The date is sometimes incorrectly given as June 4, the day of Philippa’s birth, but in 1406, Mary’s obit was celebrated on July 4, which must have been the anniversary of her death.
7 Leland
8 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
9 Walsingham; Westminster Chronicle; Knighton (who gives the dates). After St. Mary’s College was suppressed in 1548, and the collegiate church demolished, Mary de Bohun’s remains were moved to the chapel of Trinity Hospital, Leicester. Tradition has long had it that a chest tomb bearing a poorly preserved alabaster effigy of a woman, which dates from the late fourteenth century, is hers, but that is unlikely because the figure is wearing widow’s weeds, and we know that Henry V commissioned a copper effigy of his mother. The effigy is possibly that of Dame Mary Hervey, an early benefactress of the hospital.
10 Leland. Constance’s tomb was destroyed when St. Mary’s Church was demolished during the Reformation.
11 Testamenta Eboracensia
12 Leland; Duffy
13 McKisack; Calendar of Close Rolls
14 Legge
15 Chancery Records, C. 61
16 Tuck; Harriss; Jones and Underwood
17 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers
18 Ibid.
19 Jones and Underwood; Harriss
20 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28
21 Froissart
22 Jones, Ducal Brittany
23 Goodman, John of Gaunt; Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28; Walsingham
24 Harriss
25 Walsingham
26 Chancery Records, C. 53; Armitage- Smith; Harriss
27 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers
28 Walsingham; Complete Peerage; Monk of Evesham; Froissart
29 Goodman, Katherine Swynford
30 According to Harriss, who gives no evidence to support this date
31 McHardy; Bishop Buckingham’s Register
32 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers
33 Joy
34 Engraved by Dugdale and Gervase Holles in the seventeenth century. See Sanderson.
35 Dugdale, “Book of Monuments;” Holles
36 Lewis, Cult of St. Katherine; Lucraft, Katherine Swynford. “The Beaufort Hours” is B.L. Royal ms. 2. AXVIII.
37 Froissart
38 For Pontefract, see Goodman, John of Gaunt; Armitage- Smith. The castle was disman-tled by the Parliamentarians in 1648 after a year- long siege, and only ruins remain today.
39 Calendar of Patent Rolls; Duchy of Lancaster Records, PL. 3; Goodman, John of Gaunt. All that remains today of Rothwell Castle is a pillar of rubble that once formed part of a rectangular building, and the buried foundations of a range of lodgings. The castle was largely dismantled before 1497, when a timber- framed house was built on the site. This was demolished in 1977.
40 Register of the Guild of the Holy Trinity
41 Trokelowe; Walsingham
42 An English Chronicle
43 Froissart
44 Ibid.
45 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers
46 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28. I am indebted to Professor Goodman for sending me this reference.
47 John of Gaunt’s Register
48 Perroy, Diplomatic Correspondence
49 Froissart
50 Goodman, John of Gaunt
51 Froissart
52 Ibid.
53 Goodman, John of Gaunt
54 Duchy of Lancaster Records, DL. 28. Again, I am grateful to Professor Goodman for this reference.
55 Walsingham
56 Goodman, John of Gaunt; Dictionary of National Biography
57 Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers
58 Walsingham; Capgrave
59 Some writers incorrectly identify her as Philippa de Coucy, granddaughter of Edward III and widow of Robert de Vere, Duke of Ireland, but Froissart says that of all the French ladies there, only Lady de Coucy accompanied Isabella, for there were many of the principal ladies of England present, including the Duchess of Ireland, i.e., Robert de Vere’s widow.
60 Scarisbrick
61 Froissart
62 Stow, London
63 Foedera
64 Chronicles of London
65 Goodman, Katherine Swynford; Monstrelet
66 Calendar of Close Rolls
67 Froissart
68 Jones and Underwood
69 Rotuli Parliamentorum; Armitage- Smith
70 Strictly speaking, the Beauforts were not “mantle children,” for they had not been born to single parents who subsequently married, but were the fruits of an adulterous relationship.
71 Rotuli Parliamentorum; Given-Wilson; Lindsay; Calendar of Patent Rolls; Jones and Underwood; Foedera; Walsingham
72 Rotuli Parliamentorum
73 Lindsay; Brooke- Little; Scott- Giles. A plate showing John Beaufort’s arms before and after his legitimation is in Given- Wilson. The Beaufort yale badge was not introduced until 1435.
74 Jones and Underwood; Dictionary of National Biography; Percy ms. 78, cited by Armitage-Smith
75 Calendar of Close Rolls; Calendar of Patent Rolls; Somerville; Harriss; Sussex Feet of Fines
76 Calendar of Patent Rolls; Goodman, John of Gaunt
77 Duchy of Lancaster Records, PL. 3
78 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography; Harriss
79 Emden
80 Calendar of Patent Rolls
81 Leeds Central Library ms. GC DL/3 f.14v; Armitage- Smith
82 Loftus and Chettle; Perry; Dugdale, Monasticon
83 Rickert
84 Chancery Records, C. 61
85 Froissart
86 Ibid.
87 Ibid.
88 Calendar of Patent Rolls
89 Froissart
90 For Richard II’s proceedings against the former appellants, see, for example, Eulogium; Monk of Evesham; Walsingham; McKisack; Lindsay; King; Froissart; Schama; Armitage-Smith; Williams; Palmer: England, France and Christendom; Tuck; Foedera; Chronicque de la Traïson et Mort de Richart Deux.
91 Goodman, John of Gaunt
92 Froissart
93 Ibid.
94 Rotuli Parliamentorum; Walsingham; Adam of Usk; Calendar of Patent Rolls; Calendar of Close Rolls
95 Complete Peerage
96 Eulogium; An English Chronicle
97 Goodman, John of Gaunt
98 Rotuli Parliamentorum
99 Walsingham
100 Rose; Walsingham; Calendar of Patent Rolls. On October 14, by way of reward, Richard granted John some of Arundel’s forfeited property. Calendar of Patent Rolls.
101 Ibid.
102 Norfolk Record Office, Norwich, ms. 15171
103 Rotuli Parliamentorum; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography; Chronicles of the Revolution
104 The date is usually given as 1399, but that cannot be correct, for by then John of Gaunt was dying. Circumstantial evidence strongly suggests that these documents date to 1398.
105 Calendar of Close Rolls; Tuck
106 Walsingham
107 Chronicles of London; Saul
108 Goodman, John of Gaunt
109 Ibid.
110 B. L. Harley ms. 3988, ff.39r- 40d
111 Calendar of Patent Rolls
112 Rotuli Parliamentorum; Calendar of Patent Rolls
113 Duchy of Lancaster Records, PL. 3
114 Walsingham; Armitage- Smith; Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers; Harriss; Emden; McHardy; B. L. Arundel ms. 68, f.19v; Lambeth Palace Library ms. 20, f.171v; Handbook of British Chronology; Perry and Overton
115 Foedera; Armitage-Smith; Calendar of Documents Relating to Scotland; Rotuli Scotiae
116 Chancery Records, C. 53
117 Rotuli Parliamentorum; Calendar of Patent Rolls; Chronicque de la Traïson et Mort de Richart Deux; Goodman, John of Gaunt
118 Froissart
119 Ibid.
120 Calendar of Patent Rolls
121 Rotuli Scotiae
122 Armitage-Smith
123 Chancery Records, C. 61; Calendar of Patent Rolls
124 Armitage- Smith; Chronicque de la Traïson et Mort de Richart Deux; Walsingham; Eulogium; Froissart; Rotuli Parliamentorum; Monk of Evesham; Chronique du Religieux de Saint- Denys
125 Froissart
126 Ibid.
127 Calendar of Patent Rolls; Harvey, “Catherine Swynford’s Chantry;” Froissart
128 “Inventories of Plate;” Wickenden; Lincoln Cathedral Dean and Chapter Muniments ms. Bj/2/10, f.12r
129 Calendar of Patent Rolls
130 Ibid.; Complete Peerage
131 Calendar of Patent Rolls
132 Froissart. Mowbray went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and died of plague at Venice, on his way home.
133 Ibid.
134 Wyntoun
135 Bevan
136 Calendar of Patent Rolls
137 There persists to this day a false tradition that John of Gaunt died at Ely Place in London. This derives from Leland, Collectanea (although in his Itinerary, Leland states that John died at Leicester), and of course Shakespeare. See Lane; Norwich.
138 Wyntoun
139 “The Kirkstall Chronicle;” Eulogium
140 Gascoigne; the original ms. of his treatise is in Lincoln College, Oxford; Goodman, John of Gaunt.
141 Calendar of Patent Rolls
142 Plantagenet Encyclopaedia
143 Goodman, Honourable Lady; John of Gaunt; Fowler, “On the St. Cuthbert Window;” Sharman
144 Sharman
