Issue of Edward III of England

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Six of the children of King Edward III depicted as bronze statuettes on the south side of the base of his tomb in Westminster Abbey: Edward the Black Prince; Edmund of Langley; William of Hatfield; Lionel of Antwerp; Mary of Brittany; Joan of the Tower. Similar statuettes of six further children appeared on the north side, now lost[1]
1840 drawings of the six surviving bronze statuettes on the south side of the base of the tomb of King Edward III in Westminster Abbey, representing some of his progeny

King

Edmund Beaufort, 4th Duke of Somerset, and Henry Percy, 3rd Earl of Northumberland, and their families. A less powerful but determining role was played by Humphrey Stafford, 1st Duke of Buckingham, and Elizabeth Woodville
and their families.

Adam Rutherford, a twentieth-century geneticist, has claimed that it is "virtually impossible" that a person with a predominantly British ancestry is not descended from Edward III.[2] According to his calculations, "almost every Briton" is "descended between 21 and 24 generations from Edward III".[3]

Sons

The Wars of the Roses were civil wars over the throne of the

Richard III as king, supported and then betrayed by his cousin Buckingham, the descendant of Thomas of Woodstock. Finally, the Yorks were dislodged by the remaining Lancastrian candidate, Henry VII
of the House of Tudor, another descendant of John of Gaunt, who married the eldest daughter of Yorkist King Edward IV.

Edward, the Black Prince (1330–1376)

Edward, the Black Prince (15 June 1330 – 8 June 1376), Duke of Cornwall, Prince of Wales. Although he was eldest son of Edward III, he predeceased his father thus never became king. Edward's only surviving child was Richard II who ascended to the throne but produced no heirs. Richard II designated as his heir presumptive his cousin Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March, senior heir of Lionel of Antwerp through Philippa of Clarence, but this succession never took place as Richard II was eventually deposed and succeeded by another of Richard's cousins, Henry Bolingbroke (who ascended as Henry IV
), senior heir of John of Gaunt. Roger Mortimer had therefore a more senior right to the crown than Henry, but Edward III had reverted this ranking in 1376 by omitting Philippa from the order of succession.

William of Hatfield (1336–1337)

Monument to William of Hatfield in York Minster, with effigy

William of Hatfield (1336–1337), second son, was born at Hatfield Manor House in Hatfield near Doncaster in the West Riding of Yorkshire late in 1336, where Edward III kept Christmas with Queen Philippa. He was baptised by William Melton, Archbishop of York, but died soon afterwards. He was buried at York Minster on 10 February 1337,[5][6][7] where survives his monument with effigy in the north quire aisle, the position of his burial being unknown.

Lionel of Antwerp, Duke of Clarence (1338–1368)

Lionel of Antwerp, 1st Duke of Clarence (29 November 1338 – 7 October 1368), third son. He also predeceased his father. Lionel's only child, Philippa, was acquired as a wife by the powerful Mortimer family, which as noted above had exerted enormous influence during the reigns of Edward II and Edward III. Philippa's son Roger Mortimer, 4th Earl of March, was the designated heir of King Richard II but predeceased him, leaving his young son Edmund as heir presumptive. Anne Mortimer, Edmund Mortimer's eldest sister and Lionel of Antwerp's great-granddaughter, married Richard, Earl of Cambridge
, of the House of York, merging the Lionel of Antwerp/Mortimer line into the York line.

John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster (1340–1399)

John of Gaunt (6 March 1340 – 3 February 1399), 1st Duke of Lancaster
, fourth son.

Legitimate male heirs (Lancaster)

From the marriage of John of Gaunt and Blanche of Lancaster, daughter and heiress of the

Edward IV
.

The Lancaster kings also had Plantagenet ancestry on the female side from

Henry of Grosmont, 1st Duke of Lancaster (c. 1310–1361), descended from Edmund Crouchback, 1st Earl of Lancaster, the second son of King Henry III (1216–1272), the great-grandfather of King Edward III. A legend was developed, although without foundation, claiming that Edmund Crouchback was older than his brother King Edward I and had been passed over in the succession because of physical infirmity.[8]

Legitimized male heirs (Beaufort)

John of Gaunt's legitimized heirs were the

Battle of Bosworth
in 1485.

The present Somerset family,

royal arms of King Edward III within a bordure compony argent and azure,[9] and in 1682 were created Dukes of Beaufort
.

Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York (1341–1402)

Edward
to take over.

William of Windsor (1348–1348)

Monument and effigies of William of Windsor and of his sister Blanche, who both died as infants; Westminster Abbey

William of Windsor (24 June 1348 – 5 September 1348), 7th son. Died from the plague as an infant.

Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester (1355–1397)

Thomas of Woodstock, 1st Duke of Gloucester (7 January 1355 – 8/9 September 1397), eighth son. He was one of the Lords Appellant influential under Richard II, was murdered or executed for treason, likely by the order of Richard II; his eventual heir was his daughter Anne, who married into the Stafford family, whose heirs became the Dukes of Buckingham. Henry Stafford, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, descended on his father's side from Thomas of Woodstock, and on his mother's side from John Beaufort
.

Arms of the sons of Edward III

Edward's sons' arms appear over the Great Gate of Trinity College, Cambridge: York, Clarence, Wales, Hatfield, Lancaster, and Gloucester.

Daughters

References

  1. ^ "Edward III and Philippa of Hainault".
  2. ^ Greengrass, Martha (14 September 2017). "Family Fortunes: Adam Rutherford On How We Are All Related to Royalty". www.waterstones.com.
  3. ^ Rudgard, Olivia (27 June 2017). "It's not just Danny Dyer who is related to royalty - we all are, geneticist says". The Telegraph. The Daily Telegraph.
  4. ^ Burke's Presidential Families of the USA, 1981
  5. ^ "Gesta Edwardi de Carnarvon auctore cononici Bridlingtoniensi, cum continuatione ad A.D. 1377", Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I and II, ed. W. Stubbs, 2 vols., Rolls Series (London, 1882–3), Vol. 63, ii, pp. 128–29.
  6. ^ Register of William Melton, Archbishop of York 1317–1340, ed. R. M. Hill, Canterbury and York Society, vol. 70 (1977), p. 109, no.370.
  7. ^ W. Mark Ormrod, Edward III, Yale University Press, London, 2013, p. 174.
  8. ^ John of Gaunt also had legitimate descendants through his daughters Philippa of Lancaster, Queen of Portugal, the mother of Edward, King of Portugal; Elizabeth of England, Duchess of Exeter, the mother of John Holland, 2nd Duke of Exeter; and Catherine of Lancaster, Queen of Castile, a granddaughter of King Peter and the mother of King John II of Castile, but these Castilians engaged in their own wars over the Spanish succession and did not assert any claims to the English throne in the Wars of the Roses — and they all were of the female line, something the Lancaster claim avoided because they were originally secondary to certain senior female descents such as the Mortimers.
  9. ^ Debrett's Peerage, 1968, p.125
  10. ^ Marks of Cadency in the British Royal Family
  11. ^ Marks of Cadency in the British Royal Family